Who should the next rival of the Federation.

[MAGolding]

Okay, I get what you're saying without going into the minutiae of comparable polities. If we're taking the US as an example, we have to remember that the US has a defense strategy of far exceeding anyone else in the world when it comes to military readiness, expenditures, capabilities. The UFP and Starfleet may be comparable, or believed itself comparable, and this led to the situation before facing threats from the Borg Collective and the Dominion (both multi-species, sort of, with capability on s level unmatched by any other). Because they're our heroes, they managed to defeat these threats.

But who are the "threats" the US faces today? Not Russia or China (publicly at least), but small groups. Al-Qaida. ISIS. Guerrilla fighters with no pretense of taking down the "rival government".

So the next threat to the Federation shouldn't be the Krenim Imperium or the Concordant of Galaxies. But someone much smaller that can fight our heroes existentially, if not completely.

But it would be a very inaccurate analogy to describe the UFP as having anywhere near the military superiority in the Milky Way Galaxy that the USA has on Earth. The USA has a far larger percentage of the land area, population, industry, wealth,etc. of the planet Earth than the UFP has in the gigantic Milky Way galaxy that it only rules a minute fraction of. There could be thousands or millions of other states with equal resources to the Federation out there, or possibly a single state with 359 times the military power of the F UFP or 1,284 times the military power of the UFP, or 45,915 times the military power of the Federation, or whatever.

The idea that the new rivals of the UFP would have to be raiders, or guerrillas, or terrorists, or some other small scale foes, is not correct. There is no reason to assume that the UFP must have run out of foes with equal or superior military might in this vast and vastly unexplored galaxy.

My favorite idea for a new rival would be the Dominion. I was very disappointed that the "The Search" identified the real Founders of the Dominion so quickly. So I like to think that the Changelings are not the real Foudners of the Dominion, merely a subordinate group that founded a province or state of the Dominion that was assigned the task of conquering the area by the Bajoran end of the wormhole and failed. So the real Founders of the Dominion may now assign the job to some other province or state.

You might also be interested in my answer h to this question: https://scifi.stackexchange.com/que...tch-to-another-planet-when-qonos-became-uninh

 

[Tenacity]

And so on and so on. The larger and more powerful the Federation is, the larger and more powerful a state would have to be to function as a plausible rival for the Federation.

Or a much smaller grouping that possesses superior technology.

The UFP - nothing like a civil war to shake things up

The south shall rise again.

I think it would be cool if one of the Federation's allies, such as the Vulcans, started attacking the Federation.

Seriously having a portion of the Federation, a few dozen members, declare that they decided to part company with the Federation and join another interstellar organization. And then a few sore ass remainders figure those are fighting words, and no-body gets to leave.

Someone that shares their multicultural/cosmopolitan/scientific values but rejects all those pesky Federation morals.

Or, that the Federation and it's moral don't go far enough.

 

[Tim Thomason]

Or a much smaller grouping that possesses superior technology.The south shall rise again.Seriously having a portion of the Federation, a few dozen members, declare that they decided to part company with the Federation and join another interstellar organization. And then a few sore ass remainders figure those are fighting words, and no-body gets to leave.Or, that the Federation and it's moral don't go far enough.

Good point. What if Picard, who doesn't believe that Starfleet is Starfleet anymore, convinces some of his friends in governments around the Federation to form a true, moral utopia again.

 

[F. King Daniel]

So.

Designers.

 

[Crazyewok]

Mintakens!

There holy galactic crusade to spread the the truth of The Picard!

 

[XCV330]

Kelvans.

 

[DS9forever]

The Tzenkethi.

 

[Nyotarules]

Terra First. A long-thought backwater segment of Human society clinging to the remnants of the earlier Terra Prime movement that suddenly gains significant political power after one of their members secretly becomes the new President of the Federation. Although not at first, a Terra FIrst-pushed proposal for Earth's exit from the Federation begins to gain momentum...

And the rest of the Federation rejoices and shouts 'Good riddance to those pesky humans'!

 

[Nerys Myk]

The Spanish Inquisition

You know why.

 

[Zeta]

Blimey, I didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition would be a rival to the Federation.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Maybe an authoritarian movement from within, playing off fear of the Borg, Dominion and synths. Though I guess a lot of other SF franchises did that.

 

[Unimatrix Q]

What about the Voth? When they give up or change their doctrine, they might want get their old homeworld back. And with their advanced technology they might be the biggest threat to the Federation beside the Borg or the Krenim...

 

[Kilana2]

A rogue group of Ferengi - calling themthelves the Warriors of Fortune.....

 

[Arpy]

8472 could come into our space from anywhere — they’re the only life in their universe. They’re also physically more interesting than most.

The Kelvins would be a baddie from “new” space we haven’t been to yet. These days, could also appear in their natural form.

The Tzenkethi could play on our fears of class consciousness and genetic engineering, but maybe their time hasn’t come yet.

The Conspiracy Parasites would be fun. But their punch is greater when there’s something to hold onto. I think we’re in a period of trying to redefine what we want.

The Dominion or rival Federation might have been an interesting stand-in for China and alternative ideology, but DS9 already did a full-on war with them.

Civil War just rubs me the wrong way. It’d be a step backward and a disgrace.

A couple of things I like about PIC is the exploration of civilian life and the lack of baddie. The Romulans are looking to prevent a synth takeover, not destroy the Federation. The Borg are frightening but not active.

There’s a huge established universe out there to play in. Maybe they do more with the current threats already established. Maybe the next series are a couple of police officers scouring the galaxy trying to solve a murder or a scientists trying to figure out a “The Chase”-like mystery, and it takes them from sexy Delta IV to post-war Cardassia to tense Tzenketh to a Dominion civil war to unknown space to the Q Continuum.

 

[Annorax849]

I've always thought three good rivals for a future series would be a the Breen, the Conspiracy aliens, and a new enemy we haven't seen before.

 

[MisterValis]

Given that we see the Hirogen hunting alpha quadrant race holograms in “flesh and blood” it would make logical sense for them to travel that far for the actual challenge.

 

[EmoBorg]

Maybe The Typhon Pact from the books could make a good new rival.

 

[Dispaminite]

A new race in the alpha quadrant beyond Cardassians or in the Beta Quadrant beyond the Romulans and Klingons would interesting.

 

[FederationHistorian]

I have a few.

Cult of Georgiou – a group of Federation officers (not necessarily Admirals) influenced by the morality of mirror Georgiou and actually act on her extreme and destructive ideas as a rather twisted form of exploration in a “what happens next” kind of sense.

Tholians – a Tholian web that expanded to cover an entire planet would be quite terrifying, as would a multitude of Tholian webs occurring at once in a single star system. Doesn’t matter if the Tholians fired on the surface or not.

Iconians – basically be Star Trek’s equivalent of Mass Effect’s Reapers or Thanos from the MCU. I know that’s technically the case in Star Trek Online, but I’m think more of in a tv sense.

 

[Boris Skrbic]

Star Trek fans.