Spoilers Star Trek: Discovery 1x02 - "Battle at the Binary Stars"

[BillJ]

I wonder what everyone thought, when during the supposed cease fire, the biggest Klingon ship disappeared? I mean, cloaking shouldn't have been totally unknown since a couple different species had it during the Enterprise-era.

 

[Amaris]

I wonder what everyone thought, when during the supposed cease fire, the biggest Klingon ship disappeared? I mean, cloaking shouldn't have been totally unknown since a couple different species had it during the Enterprise-era.

When you gotta go, you gotta go?

 

[Mad Jack Wolfe]

I wonder what everyone thought, when during the supposed cease fire, the biggest Klingon ship disappeared? I mean, cloaking shouldn't have been totally unknown since a couple different species had it during the Enterprise-era.

I thought it was already cloaked. But all things being equal, the Starfleet ships were certainly still reeling from the Klingon sucker punch Hello.

 

[Lakenheath 72]

The Klingon cleeve ship (name from StarTrek.com) was a hidden weapon of T'Kuvma. It was cloaked until it rammed the Europa. The "blob" on the right pin is the ship.

 

[Mad Jack Wolfe]

They hit Europa with a giant Klingon ice skate.

 

[Vger23]

The Klingon cleeve ship (name from StarTrek.com) was a hidden weapon of T'Kuvma. It was cloaked until it rammed the Europa. The "blob" on the right pin is the ship.

It's interesting, but that more "analog" method of attack in a space battle (ramming with a giant cleave ship) is completely consistent with Klingon culture. I was trying to remember how uncommon it was from TNG on for the Klingons to use beam weapons during ground combat as opposed to bladed weapons.

Seems like more than 75% of the time, it's swords, knives, bat'leths, etc.

Kind of cool to think they might have a space combat philosophy that is equal to that for some situations.

 

[Mad Jack Wolfe]

It's interesting, but that more "analog" method of attack in a space battle (ramming with a giant cleave ship) is completely consistent with Klingon culture. I was trying to remember how uncommon it was from TNG on for the Klingons to use beam weapons during ground combat as opposed to bladed weapons.

Seems like more than 75% of the time, it's swords, knives, bat'leths, etc.

Kind of cool to think they might have a space combat philosophy that is equal to that for some situations.

Only if the writers and effects folk learn how physics works before they try again.

 

[Vger23]

Only if the writers and effects folk learn how physics works before they try again.

I could give a shit.

 

[Lakenheath 72]

The Klingon ship's bow bears a passing resemblance to the bows of ancient Greek warships.

The most noticeable difference is the shortness of the "ram" in the Klingon ship. I would say the Klingon ship designers didn't think ramming was as important as cleaving an enemy ship apart.

 

[Nerys Myk]

I hated the idea that Sarek could communicate with her over vast distances. I despise when they introduce super powers to fill a plot need.

You mean like every unknown Vulcan power Spock suddenly remembered he had in TOS?

 

[Noname Given]

I wonder what everyone thought, when during the supposed cease fire, the biggest Klingon ship disappeared? I mean, cloaking shouldn't have been totally unknown since a couple different species had it during the Enterprise-era.

I believe the ramming ship was a different one then T'Kuvma's that had remained cloaked until the ramming maneuver.

(Ack - already ninja'd by a number of folks on this one. )

 

[cooleddie74]

Coming from Klingons with an ancient sense of martial discipline and combat tactics the ramming was an interesting concept. Raise your own shields and just plow into the enemy vessel. Minimal risk to your own ship so long as your shields remain stable and you don't develop any gaping holes at or near the point of impact. When the Scimitar rammed the Enterprise-E in Nemesis neither vessel had its shields up. Shinzon knew he was in the process of dying and no longer cared about the damage inflicted on his own ship and crew so long as Picard got his message and was among the casualties.

 

[cooleddie74]

n The Apple, that was an arrested culture - not a living, growing one, so the GO didn't apply.

Although Starfleet Command could reasonably argue had they chosen to do so that Kirk's evaluation of the state of cultural development on Gamma Trianguli VII was not sufficient justification to break the Prime Directive. Whether or not a sentient computer system pretending to be a deity was keeping the Feeders of Vaal in a state of arrested development and stunting their evolution may well have been viewed as a purely local affair and the duty of the natives themselves to gradually change or overthrow as more and more of them grew over time to resent the rule of Vaal. The culture on the planet was at best in an Iron or Bronze Age level of cultural and technological development and centuries if not millennia away from anything resembling an interstellar spacefaring capability.

Had Kirk not had the connections he did, the friends with flag officer rank that he enjoyed and such an accomplished track record as a starship captain he may well have been court martialled and drummed out of Starfleet for all the times he blatantly violated General Order 1 and came up with convenient excuses for why he did so. I'm not saying Kirk was morally incorrect because in almost every case depicted in the series you could defend his actions from a humanitarian and ethical point of view, but from Starfleet Command's perspective the man was as big a menace with the Prime Directive as he would one day be considered with the Temporal Prime Directive.

 

[JRTStarlight]

You mean like every unknown Vulcan power Spock suddenly remembered he had in TOS?

Ever since Spock felt the death cry of over 400 Vulcans on the Intrepid, light years away, I've more or less had to accept as canon there are some things about Vulcan mysticism that really work, and work at FTL speeds. Fortunately, it does seem to be extremely limited and so not a reliable power a Vulcan may call upon. Such powers tend to get in the way to many traditional story lines.

Although Starfleet Command could reasonably argue had they chosen to do so that Kirk's evaluation of the state of cultural development on Gamma Trianguli VII was not sufficient justification to break the Prime Directive. Whether or not a sentient computer system pretending to be a deity was keeping the Feeders of Vaal in a state of arrested development and stunting their evolution may well have been viewed as a purely local affair and the duty of the natives themselves to gradually change or overthrow as more and more of them grew over time to resent the rule of Vaal. The culture on the planet was at best in an Iron or Bronze Age level of cultural and technological development and centuries if not millennia away from anything resembling an interstellar spacefaring capability.

There was evidence those same feeders had been doing that job for 10,000 years. For the admiralty to second guess a captain who had boots on the ground while they had no first hand experience isn't the sort of thing StarFleet tends to do - they trust their captains. From everything they could discern, it was arrested, and they were going to lose the ship, too, unless they acted as Kirk did. Then maybe another, then another, each time StarFleet sent a ship to look for the last one that went missing. Starfleet agreed Kirk acted appropriately.

Had Kirk not had the connections he did, the friends with flag officer rank that he enjoyed and such an accomplished track record as a starship captain he may well have been court martialled and drummed out of Starfleet for all the times he blatantly violated General Order 1 and came up with convenient excuses for why he did so. I'm not saying Kirk was morally incorrect because in almost every case depicted in the series you could defend his actions from a humanitarian and ethical point of view, but from Starfleet Command's perspective the man was as big a menace with the Prime Directive as he would one day be considered with the Temporal Prime Directive.

"All the times?" I think it was pretty much established the majority of those 11 cited cases were nothing of the kind. The prime directive didn't apply in most of those instances, and for good and fairly obvious reasons, despite what some fans mistakenly thought, and only a few times might it even be close enough to warrant further discussion.

The temporal prime directive was even less of a problem for him since that really isn't in place in TOS so much as a good idea. I'm pretty sure it gets codified sometime after TOS, but to claim Kirk was breaking temporal rules before they were written would be a violation of cause . . . and . . .

Ah, I think I see your point.

Just kidding.

Seriously, DS9 hyped his 5 instances of time travel in TOS to 17, but in the ones we know, I don't see how anything was really Kirk's fault or only came about by ignoring rules or showing bad judgment.

 

[cooleddie74]

For what it's worth I'm glad they never revisited the whole "Spock can sense Vulcans from hundreds of light-years away" thing. V'Ger's psychic impressions were one thing since they were generated by a vast and incredibly sophisticated alien vessel, were not specifically directed at him and he just happened to pick up on them during his Kolinahr. Sybok receiving mental images and instructions from the Sha-Ka-Ree entity was a bit on the goofy and implausible side seeing as the noncorporeal being was tens of thousands of light-years away on the other side of a vast barrier of energy and gases but even in that scenario one can conjecture that the entity was so immensely powerful from a psychic standpoint that its thoughts could be projected halfway across the known galaxy.

Spock sensing the deaths of 400 Vulcans aboard the Intrepid was a well-played and gripping moment in a good episode, but such psychic powers and abilities open up a can of worms so juicy that Klingons would want to eat them right then and there.

 

[137th Gebirg]

Ever since Spock felt the death cry of over 400 Vulcans on the Intrepid, light years away, I've more or less had to accept as canon there are some things about Vulcan mysticism that really work, and work at FTL speeds.

That's right! I forgot about that. So yes, not quite as elaborate and surgical as directed communication, but certainly a canonical similarity. And very similar to Kenobi's force-overload at the same time that Alderaan got fried.

 

[Mr Awe]

Every one of those instances was reviewed by StarFleet Command and Kirk was judged to have acted appropriately. Therefore, there was no violation of the Prime Directive. It may have seemed so, or like he was skirting GO #1, but he never crossed the line in StarFleet's opinion.

And that just reinforces my point that the PD was not enforced or perceived the same back in Kirk's time. What you write proves that it wasn't just Kirk's attitude but, in fact, Star Fleet's.

 

[cooleddie74]

Whereas I may have judged Starfleet Command's attitudes from a 24th century perspective, which is easy to do considering we have more than 500 hours of episodes set in the TNG/DS9/VOY era not to mention four films and we had it browbeaten into us from Season 1 of Next Gen that the Prime Directive is practically the E Pleb Neesta of the Federation in that era. The Starfleet of 2367 was a helluva lot more likely to strip you of your command, rank and even career over a PD violation than the Starfleet of 2267, and Picard's almost religious reverence for protecting the integrity of the directive reflected the change in mindset between the 23rd and 24th centuries.

Kirk respected it, but if he wanted to bend the rules then to hell with the stuffed shirts in San Francisco. Bunch of paper-pushing sticks in the mud. Picard practically revered it and was ready to let entire societies die to defend a General Order that frequently seems to be more trouble than it's worth.

 

[gottacook]

Having just consulted the script for "The Immunity Syndrome" at Star Trek Transcripts - which I think is accurate, as I saw the episode on H&I a few days ago - it seems to me that Spock detecting the death of the Intrepid is not even the most unlikely thing that happens in the teaser:

STARBASE: [...] This is a rescue priority. We've lost all contact with solar system Gamma Seven-A, which the Intrepid was investigating. And we've just lost contact with the Intrepid. Report progress.
KIRK: Order acknowledged. Kirk out. Mister Kyle [why does Shatner call him "Cowell" throughout this episode???], you heard the order. Set course for Gamma Seven-A, warp five.
KYLE: Aye, sir.
CHEKOV: Captain I have just completed a full long-range scan of Gamma Seven-A system. It is dead.
KIRK: Dead? It's a fourth magnitude sun. There are billions of inhabitants there.
CHEKOV: It is dead.
​

They're far enough away to need warp drive, and nonetheless Chekov can do a long-range scan for life signs? And almost instantly, at that? Only 15-20 seconds have elapsed since the report of trouble in that solar system.

(All the life signs detection I recall from other episodes required actual proximity to, for example, a planet. If such amazing long-distance sensor tech - faster than subspace radio, apparently - was ever used again, I can't think of it.)

 

[cooleddie74]

Starfleet. Where the technology evolves or devolves based on the script in hand.