Last Full Measure and "Enterprise"

[Kemaiku]

But it's told by Tucker, we see in First Flight that he was assigned directly to the Warp 5/NX Programs under Archer.

The episode makes it clear there's one high warp engine in development. They need it to succeed, as they say that going back to design a second engine would take decades, there aren't any competing ones in progress.

The episode paves over Daedalus, and the Romulan War books continue the trend by having the Warp 5 program be the only one, the Daedalus class limited to warp 2 structurally, and mentioning the Warp 7 program is limited by them only having experimented with M/AM drives.

Best to just ignore some of the earlier novels based only off season 1 and the first half of season 2, as everything after that ignores them anyway.

 

[Jinn]

That's a bummer. So far I liked the S1 and 2 tie-in novels way more than the actual series. Thanks for answering, though.

 

[Christopher]

That's a bummer. So far I liked the S1 and 2 tie-in novels way more than the actual series. Thanks for answering, though.

Well, whether you like a story and whether it's in continuity are two separate issues. There are plenty of books and comics I still enjoy a lot even though they don't fit with current canon.

 

[WebLurker]

Personally, I wasn't overly impressed with the post-ENT novels. Read Last Full Measure once, and about all I remember was the bookends and the subplot with the MACO who realizes that she's pregnant and needs to do decide what to do about it (did like how that ended though). The fact that I think that the revising of Trip Tucker's story was really clumsy and should've been left alone didn't help.

Rise of the Federation is worth reading so far, though. Reads a lot more like an actual story instead of a chain of events, not choppy, and has some pretty interesting stuff.

 

[Jinn]

Well, whether you like a story and whether it's in continuity are two separate issues. There are plenty of books and comics I still enjoy a lot even though they don't fit with current canon.

Of course, but I'd prefer my favorite novels to be in continuity with the episodes. But you're right, the quality has nothing to do with continuity. I'm going to ignore "First Flight" in my head canon anyway...

 

[Idran]

I don't know that it's even that incompatible anyway. This is all how I fit it together in my head: There's no alternative by the time of First Flight because the CID was a failure, it was essentially abandoned by Earth as an engine design and they stuck with nothing but M/AM going forward because it was so disastrous. Trip worked on the CID with Brodresser's team in 2140, but by 2143 (the time period of the First Flight flashback) he was reassigned to the Warp Five complex. And the Daedalus from the duology is just completely unrelated to the Daedalus-class. Or possibly (though I've literally only just thought of this now) it was a testbed that was later retrofitted with an FTL engine it wasn't designed for a la the USS Excelsior, the incompatibility making it not much better than an ECS freighter in the first decades but making it capable enough to still be a feasible structure into the 2260s (as seen with the SCE refits).

Maybe that's even why it's got such a strange design compared to other mid-22nd-century ships? Maybe the ball-and-cylinder structure is natural for a CID, but it meshes poorly with more standard warp field configurations.

You have to squint a little, and the Daedalus-the-prototype-CID-ship/Daedalus-the-class thing is a little bumpy, but it works for me.

 

[Jinn]

I don't know that it's even that incompatible anyway. This is all how I fit it together in my head: There's no alternative by the time of First Flight because the CID was a failure, it was essentially abandoned by Earth as an engine design and they stuck with nothing but M/AM going forward because it was so disastrous. Trip worked on the CID with Brodresser's team in 2140, but by 2143 (the time period of the First Flight flashback) he was reassigned to the Warp Five complex. And the Daedalus from the duology is just completely unrelated to the Daedalus-class. Or possibly (though I've literally only just thought of this now) it was a testbed that was later retrofitted with an FTL engine it wasn't designed for a la the USS Excelsior, the incompatibility making it not much better than an ECS freighter in the first decades but making it capable enough to still be a feasible structure into the 2260s (as seen with the SCE refits).

Maybe that's even why it's got such a strange design compared to other mid-22nd-century ships? Maybe the ball-and-cylinder structure is natural for a CID, but it meshes poorly with more standard warp field configurations.

You have to squint a little, and the Daedalus-the-prototype-CID-ship/Daedalus-the-class thing is a little bumpy, but it works for me.

That's a great solution, I'll stick with that. "First Flight" got lucky there.

 

[Avro Arrow]

Or possibly (though I've literally only just thought of this now) it was a testbed that was later retrofitted with an FTL engine it wasn't designed for a la the USS Excelsior, the incompatibility making it not much better than an ECS freighter in the first decades but making it capable enough to still be a feasible structure into the 2260s (as seen with the SCE refits).

I'd be tempted to stick with the "unrelated to the Daedalus class" scenario instead, because wasn't the backstory that the CID Daedalus was lost shortly after launch? That'd make it tricky to retrofit it with anything...

 

[Kemaiku]

I just read his page on Memory Alpha.

Trip joined Starfleet in 2139, completed his 4 years at the Academy and was assigned directly to the NX/W5E program in 2143, so nope.

 

[Idran]

I just read his page on Memory Alpha.

Trip joined Starfleet in 2139, completed his 4 years at the Academy and was assigned directly to the NX/W5E program in 2143, so nope.

Right, but I'm checking the transcripts of the episodes they cite for his birth year and Academy entrance date, and I don't see any actual reference to either. The closest I can find for birth year is that in Fusion he mentioned it was "more than twenty years" since an elementary school dance, which only tells us that he was between 27 (21 years since 1st grade) and 40 (29 years since 6th grade) in Fusion. And I can't tell where they got the 2139 figure at all. It wasn't in dialog, and I checked for both absolute and relative references; maybe it was in an onscreen display somewhere? Or maybe I just missed it, I'll grant that.

Plus, he was a lieutenant in "First Flight", which would make no sense if he graduated in 2143.

Honestly Memory Alpha seems to pull a lot of references like that out of nowhere. I've been putting together a Trek franchise+novelverse chronology, and it seems like a quarter of the stardates they have listed for 24th century episodes are from literally nothing at all; not from the actual episodes, that's for sure.

 

[Jinn]

Honestly Memory Alpha seems to pull a lot of references like that out of nowhere. I've been putting together a Trek franchise+novelverse chronology, and it seems like a quarter of the stardates they have listed for 24th century episodes are from literally nothing at all; not from the actual episodes, that's for sure.

MA also knows for some reason which ENT episode happened in which month. So I asked them and still haven't received an answer...

 

[Idran]

MA also knows for some reason which ENT episode happened in which month. So I asked them and still haven't received an answer...

Haha, I never noticed that one. I like how whoever did it assumed that everything between "Carbon Creek" and "The Communicator" happened in April just because "Carbon Creek" happened in April. Sure, MA, six episodes, two with relatively-long off-screen gaps, are jammed in between the 12th and the 30th.

I think I'm going to edit that now, because that makes no sense.

 

[Jinn]

Maybe MA just has to compensate their not using of non-canon sources with guessing...

 

[Jinn]

Right, but I'm checking the transcripts of the episodes they cite for his birth year and Academy entrance date, and I don't see any actual reference to either. The closest I can find for birth year is that in Fusion he mentioned it was "more than twenty years" since an elementary school dance, which only tells us that he was between 27 (21 years since 1st grade) and 40 (29 years since 6th grade) in Fusion. And I can't tell where they got the 2139 figure at all. It wasn't in dialog, and I checked for both absolute and relative references; maybe it was in an onscreen display somewhere? Or maybe I just missed it, I'll grant that.

Plus, he was a lieutenant in "First Flight", which would make no sense if he graduated in 2143.

Honestly Memory Alpha seems to pull a lot of references like that out of nowhere. I've been putting together a Trek franchise+novelverse chronology, and it seems like a quarter of the stardates they have listed for 24th century episodes are from literally nothing at all; not from the actual episodes, that's for sure.

Okay, I found it:"TUCKER: I've been in Starfleet for twelve years." from Unexpected. Considering that he was a lieutenant in 2143, only four years later, makes it more likely to me that Tucker left the Academy twelve years before "Unexpected" in 2139. In 2140 Tucker got assigned to the Daedalus project and after its failure he moved on to the Warp 5 program.

 

[Idran]

Aha, okay, cool. Yeah, there's two ways you could interpret that; either meaning entering or graduating the Academy. Since graduating fits better with the duology, yeah I'll do that too.

Thanks, Jinn!

 

[Stevil2001]

Haha, I never noticed that one. I like how whoever did it assumed that everything between "Carbon Creek" and "The Communicator" happened in April just because "Carbon Creek" happened in April. Sure, MA, six episodes, two with relatively-long off-screen gaps, are jammed in between the 12th and the 30th.

I think I'm going to edit that now, because that makes no sense.

Maybe MA just has to compensate their not using of non-canon sources with guessing...

This fella was the one who added those months, some twelve years ago now.

 

[Idran]

This fella was the one who added those months, some twelve years ago now.

Haha, now I feel a little bad. Sorry about that.

 

[Stevil2001]

Haha, now I feel a little bad. Sorry about that.

Looking back over the evidence, I think I placed "Dead Stop" in April because Archer says the NX-01 has been in space for a year. (Admittedly, he's probably rounding. I was more of a literalist in my youth.) Other than that, I didn't see any big conjectures in the timeline that would warrant deleting all that information, instead of just modifying it a little bit.

 

[Idran]

Looking back over the evidence, I think I placed "Dead Stop" in April because Archer says the NX-01 has been in space for a year. (Admittedly, he's probably rounding. I was more of a literalist in my youth.) Other than that, I didn't see any big conjectures in the timeline that would warrant deleting all that information, instead of just modifying it a little bit.

Maybe I was a little overzealous, but it seemed like everything month-by-month there was just conjectural outside of the ones with specific date references. I was a little harsh earlier (again sorry for that), but like the period from Minefield to Communicator, there's no way it all happened in April. Maybe it would've been better to put it under a month span instead of wiping it out, though, true.

I'm honestly okay with reverting it and tweaking it instead, I probably did overcorrect too much. I'll see about doing that later on when I'm freed up enough to give it good attention.

 

[Stevil2001]

...but like the period from Minefield to Communicator, there's no way it all happened in April. Maybe it would've been better to put it under a month span instead of wiping it out, though, true.

You keep saying this, but I'm not sure why. The episode list used to mark "A Night in Sickbay" through "The Communicator" as "May - July."