Have any of the novels ever just made you mad? (

[Thrawn]

I disagree about Destiny, as you may have noticed, but I actually sort of agree about the Neyel. The worst part was how they didn't recognize humans. Like, none of their data banks and books and everything had a picture or a physical description of ANY HUMAN?

 

[kkozoriz1]

It just struck me how similar the end of Destiny is to the end of the Shadow War in B5. Not in content but in execution. Big build up. The actual end is almost anticlimactic. I remember swearing and throwing the remote at the TV at the end of the Shadow War. Sheridan - Go away. We don't want to play any more.
Big Bad - Oh, OK. If you say so.
<blech>

 

[Sci]

The Destiny books annoyed me enough that I didn't bother following the line very far. Great example of Big Boom/Little Brain fiction. blech.

"Little brain?" Can't you just say you didn't enjoy the books without insulting the author?

It just struck me how similar the end of Destiny is to the end of the Shadow War in B5. Not in content but in execution. Big build up. The actual end is almost anticlimactic.

I, on the other hand, absolutely loved the resolution to Destiny. I think it's a wonderful, hopeful, beautifully written, humanistic scene. Every time I read it, it reminds me of the finale to Spring Awakening, "The Song of Purple Summer."

 

[Thrawn]

And for that matter I also loved the end of the Shadow War.

 

[SheliakBob]

My apologies to Mr. Mack--whose work I have greatly enjoyed in other novels.
For my taste, Destiny was overblown, the Federation strategies were laughably weak, and...super aliens. Again. Hate 'em.

A lot of the character work, on the other hand was quite nice. I just found the mix to be frustrating, irritating and just had better things to do with my time.

 

[JD]

And for that matter I also loved the end of the Shadow War.

Me too. I actually prefer a more cerebral ending to big booms. As for the end of Destiny, I thought it was amazing, and the perfect way to end the Borg. I know alot of people are complaining about the Caeliar coming in a saving the Federations asses, but I think everyone's ignoring the fact that the Borg were, more or less corrupted Caeliar and that all the Caeliar were doing was fixing their own mistake. They weren't just some random higher beings who were coming to save the day for the puny little Federations members, they were the ones responsible for the situation putting an end to it.

 

[ProwlAlpha]

I thought that at least we would see a Battle of the Line-esque sequence and during the middle of it, the Borg technology start to crumble and fade away not just disappear like a bad dream.

 

[Sci]

I thought that at least we would see a Battle of the Line-esque sequence and during the middle of it, the Borg technology start to crumble and fade away not just disappear like a bad dream.

I rather think that the image of every single Borg ship and station and planet in the universe turning into shining beacons of light and then disappearing is much more beautiful and poetic than that.

 

[Thestral]

I disagree about Destiny, as you may have noticed, but I actually sort of agree about the Neyel. The worst part was how they didn't recognize humans. Like, none of their data banks and books and everything had a picture or a physical description of ANY HUMAN?

You know, I've never actually read any of Titan, but I have read their back covers and all of "The Sundered." Are the Neyel the people Titan bump into when they get transported into the Small Magellanic?

I thought that at least we would see a Battle of the Line-esque sequence and during the middle of it, the Borg technology start to crumble and fade away not just disappear like a bad dream.

In fairness, we got several Battle of the Line-esque sequences, just smaller scale.

 

[ProtoAvatar]

One tenth of all Federation citizens were killed?

Yes - around one tenth of ALL federation citizens were kiled by the borg, Kestrel.

As per "Articles of the federation", the federation is comprised of 150 member worlds. On average, let's say ~4 billion inhabit each planet (despite the fact that we know many federation planets have far scarcer population - Deneva, for example), so we obtain 600 billion as the total population of the federation.

The borg killed ~64 billion. Most of them were federation citizens aka ONE TENTH of all federation citizens were killed by the borg.

And here I thought you were just misusing the word "decimated" like so many people do. I'm not gonna argue this point about the exact numbers, but I'm not sure I agree.

No way around the math, Kestrel.

I'm pretty sure there's no evidence that "most of starfleet" was as broken as Picard, so I say he was the exception. None of the "around-the quadrant" vignettes we saw during the battle were of Fleeters throwing their hands up in defeat.

Really? Most of starfleet (examples - around Deneva, Vulcan, etc), the federation government, were 'broken', their spirit was defeated, they did not beleive they had a chance of wining, they did not try to find ways to win.

Hernandez may not technically be Federation, but she's Starfleet, and she shared the same values as the Federation.

Hernandez was starfleet hundreds of years ago. During 'Destiny' she was more caeliar than human - thematically, she was a semi-divine being, 'Jesus'.

The federation had no involvement whatsoever in it being 'delivered' by the gods of night, by the caeliar - beyond being a taxi service for Hernendez.

That wasn't negligence, that was sheer overwhelming force carrying the day. Transphasics would barely have made a difference, and even if the thalaron weapon would have worked, there wasn't time for it.

Non-sense.
IT WAS EASILY PREDICTABLE THAT, IF THE BORG SEND MORE THAN 100 CUBES, THE AZURE NEBULA WILL BE A MASSACRE.
Whoever made the battle plan for Azure Nebula was incompetent not to see this very obvious possibility. And it was negligence - or plain stupidity -, Kestrel.

Transphasics were in use immediately after their specs were given - and they would have at least allowed the allied fleet to retreat.

No time for thalaron weapons? The fleet had days - plenty of time.
The argument - given by some federation minister - was that the thalaron weapon would cause trouble after the borg were gone, among alpha quadrant players. That minister really overestimated the external politics of ash clouds floating over dead worlds.

The morality argument is clearly spelled out in the book, but it's ultimately a moot point, because the thalaron weapon wouldn't have worked anyway. Congratulations, you've just opened Pandora's Box and the massive genocidal apocalyptic fleet is still not stopped. Plus (not that anybody knew this), it would've stopped the real solution of the Caeliar from working.

7 of 9 - an expert in borg tech - said the thalaron dischage would work. This means that there was a VERY GOOD CHANCE of the thalaron weapons working.

You're welcome to give passages from 'Destiny' that suppoprt the thalaron weapon not working - if there exist any beyond your unsupported speculations.

And the 'moral' argument given in the books by LaForge is, again, non-sense.
The borg were an enemy army on a genocidal mission. They already killed BILLIONS.
Using thalaron weapons against them in SELF DEFENSE is fully moral.
Plus:
"But your argument was that the thalaron weapon was immoral by 24th century standards, yes, Sci? This makes no sense:
The thalaron weapon was immoral because it would kill borg drones? Well, starfleet did their defeatist best to do just that throughout the books.
Or was it immoral because it could destroy all life on a planet? Standard foton torpedos can do the same thing equally well - indeed, an atmosphere assures nearly 100% antimatter annihilation (meaning foton torpedoes are quite effective when it comes to planetary destruction)."

There's easily-explainable reasons why all of these wouldn't work. For the deflector-blast: it utterly failed once already because of adaptation, and there's no indication that deflector-warp-blast-things can be modified to a different frequency like phasers can.

"Deflector blasts using energies on different modualtions, crippling borg ships with the first discharges":

Kestrel, the borg are ALWAYS vulnerable against a new modulation. If the borg adapted to a modulation, you can, in the next battle, use another modualtion - and the first shots of it will again go through the borg's shields.

The deflectors are there so that the first shots of this modualtion can carve a big hole in the borg ship, instead of scratching it.
And deflectors were repeatedly established as being able to create far more varied - and far more powerful - energy discharges than phasers.

For the "I, Borg" communication jam, that was done in a lab, with one drone, over an extended period of time - not at all the same as battlefield conditions. Perhaps they tried that, and the Borg counter-jamming was more effective.

"Cutting the subspace connection between borg cubes, impeding their ability to adapt to transphasics/other weapons":

A drone that was conected via subspace with the borg - much like a cube is connected with the collective.
LaForge cut the connection over an extended period of time aka it is quite posible to jam this conection.

During 'Destiny', our 'heroes' never even considered this potentially effective tactic - cutting the connection between one cube and the rest of the collective for a few seconds, during which transphasics should be used to destroy the cube.

But - you're welcome to show me the passages indicating the contrary - the 'heroes' trying to use this tactic, etc (that is, if they exist beyond your unsupported speculations).

Any other specific magic bullets?

Sure - watch TNG, VOY, DS9, etc - lots of them - all of which were unused.

It wouldn't be a story about people if there weren't some who were overwhelmed. But ultimately the Federation did triumph, and we see a lot more creativity and outside-the-box thinking than you're giving the series credit for. Dax, Calhoun, the SCE, Hernandez, among others.

"Some"? Most of starfleet, of the federation was 'overwhelmed'. Those you mentioned were the only exceptions of a civilization of BILLIONS who did NOT give up, accept death, and sought only a dignified death.

NOT humanistic at all. That's because "Destiny" is a deliverance story and deliverance stories are NOT humanistic.

And about those exceptions who thought 'outside the box" - you know what? They won!
Unlike the rest of starfleet who only used its useless standard tactics and armaments (knowing they're useless), waiting to die.

The whole thing was Kobayashi Meru writ large - and by and large, Starfleet acquitted themselves well. The tone of your last sentence is shocking in its callousness though.

Starfleet was composed of a bunch of suicidal jokes throughout 'Destiny' (with rare exceptions). They did not even TRY to win - no original thought, just going through the motions, waiting to be killed.

Starfleet's finest showed they're willing to die for the federation - good for them.
They also showed that their spirits were already broken by the borg, that their defeatist mindset was incapable of original thought (encountered everywhere throughout TOS, TNG, etc) - NOT so good for them.
No wonder they made no difference.

PS:
"Dax and the other ones who actuallly were not resigned to dying and thought outside the box WERE THE EXCEPTION. And they, as a rule, succeded in winning their battles - apparently, the borg are not so invincible if they did not already break your spirit and made you into a crying baby who spends his days in the holodeck, regressing to childhood."
That's callous, Kestrel?
It may be - but it's also an accurate presentation of the events - literally accurate, in Picard's case.
When the federation needed him most, when billions upon billions of lives, his civilization itself, faced annihilatioin, Picard (and many others) failed to do his duty to the best of his abilities.

 

[flandry84]

Boy,I can't believe how turned around I was on the whole point of Destiny.Here was I beliving that the story was about how the Federation would prevail against the horrible Borg(kinda like nuBSG)when actually it was all about getting the Caeliar to embrace their wayward offspring(kinda like a cosmic episode of 'Seventh heaven').

Spoilers for the Typhon pact series...
The Gorn give up their warlike ways after a Federation chaired 'Mutual respect in the workplace' seminar.
And the Romulans make peace with the Vulcans having first being exposed to the principles of Feng Shui.

 

[Wowbagger]

The fifth and sixth books of Double Helix absolutely staggered me with their incredible failure to resolve the series plot arc in a satisfying way. I was twelve. It was my first hint that writers do not always write good stories. The realization was world-shattering.

Mission: Gamma, particularly This Gray Spirit, did get me angry, and I stayed angry for a while. But then I loosened up and started to find the insanely wordy soap-opera of a book series really quite funny. Everytime the story cut back to that Andorian chick who slits her wrists, I was unable to stop giggling at all the self-interested melodrama.

I felt horrible and callous, but I couldn't stop. I still feel horrible and callous, in fact, because, criminy dutch, the girl slit her wrists and I was laughing! And the writing wasn't even that bad! But I still laughed. And felt bad.

 

[JarodRussell]

Picard (and many others) failed to do his duty to the best of his abilities.

And that the hero sometimes fails is unacceptable to you?

 

[ProtoAvatar]

Picard (and many others) failed to do his duty to the best of his abilities.

And that the hero sometimes fails is unacceptable to you?

That the hero has already given up/doesn't even try to succeed (among other reasons - the deliverance story formula, the insanely high number of deaths, etc) means that 'Destiny' is completely lacking star trek's humanism, is, essentially, grit a la nuBSG.

Destiny is about an already defeated civilization accepting - with dignity, of course - that all will die, not bothering to even try to find ways to survive because of defeatist 'it's pointless', 'it won't work, anyway'. And, in the end, this civilization is delivered by benevolent gods, in all of 5 minutes.

 

[JarodRussell]

At what point would you say they should have given up instead? Let's say they use the Thalaron weapon, and it fails, it's simply not enough. They use those deflector beams, they fail. They make suicide runs, it doesn't help.

The events of Destiny were simply supposed to be unstoppable. It makes no sense that a character says "Never give up, never surrender." when there is absolutely no way out.

 

[ProtoAvatar]

At what point would you say they should have given up instead? Let's say they use the Thalaron weapon, and it fails, it's simply not enough. They use those deflector beams, they fail. They make suicide runs, it doesn't help.

If they had tried, I would be less harsh on 'Destiny'.
But the point is, they did not try - the borg broke their very spirit; and all the borg had to do in order to accomplish this was show up.
They fatalistically lost confidence that they have a chance to win; all they wanted was to die with dignity - which is completely opposed to trek's humanism.

The events of Destiny were simply supposed to be unstoppable. It makes no sense that a character says "Never give up, never surrender." when there is absolutely no way out.

How many times throughout TOS, TNG, etc, did the situation seeme unstoppable?
Did our heroes give up? Did they stop trying? NO.

Well, our 'heroes' DID give up in 'Destiny'. And the small minority (as opposed to most of starfleet, of the federation) that did NOT give up (Dax, etc) succeded in actually winning, in overcoming an 'unstoppable' situation, like so many times in previous trek.

 

[Christopher]

Boy,I can't believe how turned around I was on the whole point of Destiny.Here was I beliving that the story was about how the Federation would prevail against the horrible Borg(kinda like nuBSG)when actually it was all about getting the Caeliar to embrace their wayward offspring(kinda like a cosmic episode of 'Seventh heaven').

See, the mistake you're making here is assuming that stories are about nations or species or fleets. Fundamentally, stories are about characters. At its most central, I'd say Destiny was the story of Erika Hernandez. And that story culminated with a great personal victory after centuries of struggle. She asserted her independence, took charge of her life, took action to discover the key to resolving a horrible crisis, and then persuaded the Caeliar to admit their mistakes and act to resolve them. It wasn't the Caeliar who saved the day, it was Erika Hernandez. An ordinary human captain who went through an unimaginable ordeal, managed to survive and adapt against all odds, almost lost her humanity in the process, but ultimately reclaimed it while becoming something greater, and thereby reached the most beneficial solution for all concerned. It doesn't get more humanistic than that.

 

[BillJ]

1) I'll never understand this opposition to using the Thalaron weapon. If the story needed it not to work, then it wouldn't work (same thing drives me crazy about I, Borg)... it's that simple. But for our heroes to not even make an attempt to save their civilization is weak. The story element just reeked of the author trying to create some tension towards the end of the story before the Caeliar come in and wave their magic wand and end the story.

2) It's silly to have a moral problem with one type of weapon of mass destruction (thalaron radiation) but have no problem using another (transphasic torpedoes) weapon from the future which they also have laws against (Temporal Prime Directive), which cracked Borg cubes like walnuts. It shows an inconsistent application of Federation "morals".'

3) The Enterprise crew had no problem violating the Treaty of Algeron by using a cloaking device in Before Dishonor, once again an inconsistent application of Federation "morals".

4) I think any worry of geo-political fallout from the use of the Thalaron weapon is "Grade-A" bullshit. It's silly to think that we'd rather be wiped out than deal with the ramification of our actions after saving our collected asses.

5) I don't know how many of you out there have kids? But when I look at them sleeping at night I know I would do anything to protect them and I wouldn't care what anyone thought of my actions. Very disappointed that Destiny didn't even touch on this when we had a member of the Enterprise senior staff with children. There was real drama to be mined there... missed opportunity.

6) I truly think Ru'afo from Insurrection was right. The Federation truly has the "smell of death". It's a problem when your "values" prevent you from protecting your citizens. Candlelight vigils on Earth while waiting for the end... please.

7) I'll leave with a comment from Commodore Matt Decker from The Doomsday Machine:

" Our primary duty is to maintain life and safety of Federation planets. Do you deny that? "

 

[Christopher]

1) I'll never understand this opposition to using the Thalaron weapon. If the story needed it not to work, then it wouldn't work (same thing drives me crazy about I, Borg)... it's that simple. But for our heroes to not even make an attempt to save their civilization is weak.

Again, the key is recognizing that stories are driven by character, not just plots and events. The thalaron controversy was a means to explore Picard's character, to show how far gone he was into darkness that he was willing to embrace the evil that had taken Data's life and use it in a futile, childish attempt to strike back at the bad people who'd hurt him. That plotline wasn't about the weapon or the technology or the military logistics. Those were just background, means to the real end. That plotline was about two human beings, Jean-Luc Picard and Geordi La Forge, and their emotions and relationships. It was about Picard almost giving in to the ugliness his Borg abusers had left in him and Geordi pulling him back from the brink.

2) It's silly to have a moral problem with one type of weapon of mass destruction (thalaron radiation) but have no problem using another (transphasic torpedoes) weapon from the future which they also have laws against (Temporal Prime Directive), which cracked Borg cubes like walnuts. It shows an inconsistent application of Federation "morals".'

Not at all, because a transphasic torpedo isn't a weapon of mass destruction per se. It's a very targeted kind of tactical weapon, not more destructive per se than an ordinary torpedo, just better at penetrating Borg defenses, harder for them to adapt to. It's a surgical weapon, one specifically invented to counteract the Borg's ability to adapt. There's just no comparison to something like a thalaron weapon, which is like a neutron bomb on a planetary scale, something that can wipe out all life on an entire world while leaving the structures and technology intact. Just imagine if that technology got out and into the hands of conquering powers. It's absurdly naive to argue that the Federation would be safer in a world where thalaron technology became widely known.

 

[BillJ]

2) It's silly to have a moral problem with one type of weapon of mass destruction (thalaron radiation) but have no problem using another (transphasic torpedoes) weapon from the future which they also have laws against (Temporal Prime Directive), which cracked Borg cubes like walnuts. It shows an inconsistent application of Federation "morals".'

Not at all, because a transphasic torpedo isn't a weapon of mass destruction per se. It's a very targeted kind of tactical weapon, not more destructive per se than an ordinary torpedo, just better at penetrating Borg defenses, harder for them to adapt to. It's a surgical weapon, one specifically invented to counteract the Borg's ability to adapt. There's just no comparison to something like a thalaron weapon, which is like a neutron bomb on a planetary scale, something that can wipe out all life on an entire world while leaving the structures and technology intact. Just imagine if that technology got out and into the hands of conquering powers. It's absurdly naive to argue that the Federation would be safer in a world where thalaron technology became widely known.

How can you be any less safe? So the question later in my posts is still unanswered: It's better to be annihilated than dealing with the ramifications of your actions?

Once again... it's okay to violate some morals but not others?

How many "victim" Borg did they kill with Transphasic torpedoes?