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So, Spacedock is the last line of defence for Earth, which made no sense whatsoever until it was disabled and we saw A DEFLECTOR SHIELD AROUND THE ENTIRE EARTH fall.
Is this giant projected shield supposed to be a recent thing, or a retcon going back to the OG movies (where Spacedock fell before the Whale Probe affected Earth)?
Has there ever been mention of a planet-wide deflector shield protecting Earth before? IIRC, Discovery's 32nd century had them first but that was 900 years more advanced and stuff like that would be expected.
So, Spacedock is the last line of defence for Earth, which made no sense whatsoever until it was disabled and we saw A DEFLECTOR SHIELD AROUND THE ENTIRE EARTH fall.
Is this giant projected shield supposed to be a recent thing, or a retcon going back to the OG movies (where Spacedock fell before the Whale Probe affected Earth)?
Has there ever been mention of a planet-wide deflector shield protecting Earth before? IIRC, Discovery's 32nd century had them first but that was 900 years more advanced and stuff like that would be expected.
They've probably always had one and the space dock acts as ATC. That said, maybe it is only as effective as it is now because of The Borg and Breen attacks.
The earliest chronological appearance of planetary shields I can remember is the one around Vashti in "Absolute Candor" (PIC S1). So I would infer they're a relatively new technology developed sometime between VOY S7 (2377-78) and PIC S1 (2399).
This is what I thought of:
BERKELEY: Ready to beam down. Energise. Energise.
KIRK: Having trouble, gentlemen?
BERKELEY: I just don't understand the problem, sir.
KIRK: You're beaming cargo down to a penal colony, Mister Berkeley.
BERKELEY: Their security force field, sir.
KIRK: U.S.S. Enterprise to Tantalus colony.
WOMAN [OC]: Rehab colony. Come in.
KIRK: Request opening in your force field for beaming down of cargo.
With "Dagger" and "Whom Gods Destroy" we don't know if the penal colony shields envelop the entire planet, or just the facilities. I always leaned towards the latter.
What I'm thinking is that the planetary defense grid went down pretty early. Since space dock was the last line of defense they extended their shield around the entire planet. I doubt this was normal practice but more so a desperate move.
Every major UFP Planet that has a significant Population Count should have it.
If your Planetary Population has met 7-digits worth of residing people and above, you should consider installing a Planetary Shield so no Space Priates / Marauders / Bandits can just arbitrarily mess with you so easily.
We saw what a 2nd hand Romulan Planetary Shield Grid did for dealing with Marauders.
This also buys time for reinforcements to come in and save your butts when bad things happen.
The Castle-Walls of the 24th century is a Planetary Shield with Orbital Defense Platforms pointing outwards, ready to kick butt and take out several Fleets.
The Guard Towers should be Giant Space Bases parked at the various Lagrange Points.
We saw how tough Earth-Space Dock held out against a single Fleet within StarFleet.
It took quite the beating from several hundred ships in the fleet and lasted pretty damn long, all things considered.
Within each Star System there is a veritable wealth of resources on each planet.
Nothing wrong with having an excess of Space Bases ready to help!
Every Lagrange Point is a good place to park your Space Bases for defense and sending backup incase anything happens like a alien attack fleet shows up at your door step and you need to buy time before your main fleet shows up to kick butt and take names.
Each Larger Star/Planetary Body combo has at least 5x Lagrange Points.
Each Planetoid/Moon combo has another 5x Lagrange Points.
That means each Major Star System has ALOT of room for parking ALOT of StarBases for defense and reinforcements.
Within each Star System, you can create a Spheroid shaped Defense Platform and/or Sensor Platform grid along the Termination shock boundary layer & HelioSheath Boundary Layer on the inside and outside of those major parts of each Star System.
That's more than adequate to give you early warning / slow down any invading fleet that might come for your Star System.
Maybe even the Kzinti as well depending on how one tries to reconcile TAS's now-implausible implication of 2269 - 400 = 2069 with Vulcan Contact happening in 2063 and United Earth not being a thing until the next century.
From Dialogue, there were other defense systems in orbit, but the fleet took them out, the station was the last part. Seemed to me, that there were planetary shield satellites, but Probert Station was supplying the power, and it was appart of the shield, so when its sheilds went down, the whole grid went down.
Probably need like 10 warp cores burning away to power the damn thing...
From Dialogue, there were other defense systems in orbit, but the fleet took them out, the station was the last part. Seemed to me, that there were planetary shield satellites, but Probert Station was supplying the power, and it was appart of the shield, so when its sheilds went down, the whole grid went down.
Probably need like 10 warp cores burning away to power the damn thing...
The Planet itself should be providing any excess power to the Satellite Shield Grid from ground based station for quick re-supply of energy mid battle and to quick re-charge the shields on each unit.
You have so many options on land or on sea to create platforms to supply a giant swath of sky with excess energy.
Remember how the Cardassian / Dominion Orbital Defense Platforms had their power supplies supplied by a external power source and how tough it was for the allies, every Planetoid could easily maintain a large network of Reactors to supply their orbital Defense Platforms with excess energy to keep the Planetary Shield Grid up and to power the Planet when not in times of war.
There is literally no reason why your StarBase should be the one supplying excess power or even main power.
You have a giant planet beneath your feet to supply power, use it.
With "Dagger" and "Whom Gods Destroy" we don't know if the penal colony shields envelop the entire planet, or just the facilities. I always leaned towards the latter.
