To: 
From: "Steve Oostrom" 
Reply-To: trekcreative{at}yahoogroups.com

------=_NextPart_000_000D_01C2FE30.82334A80
Content-Type: text/plain;
        charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

>Nothing all that major, just a few things about
how you have your universe set up...

Okay, just the kind of things I've heard before.

>The quadrant situation for the Galaxy.  While on one
level I agree with your thinking about the Alpha/Beta line, for me the
quadrant borders have been established well enough to this point in
Produced Trek that I go pretty much with what they've got.

The reasoning here is that when the quadrant concept came up, there was no
mention on exactly where the quadrants were.  Throughout DS9, there was
reference to the "Alpha Quadrant alliance" and not
"Alpha-Beta Quadrant alliance."  I think the idea of putting the
quadrant boundary through Earth was because of one of those dreaded
throwaway lines "the only ship in the quadrant," and somehow it
became accepted in fandom, and then this spread into canon. However, I drew
my maps based on what Picard said in an early TNG episode about twenty-five
percent of the galaxy having been tentatively explored (at least in some
preliminary sense).  I assumed that was roughly centered around Earth, and
so that became my Alpha Quadrant.  Also, in a cartographic sense, I simply
can't seem them introducting a major division through an established
political unit.  It's like taking some country located on a big one-world
continent (like Pangaea on ancient Earth) and arbitrarily assigning
continent-like divisions through an established country when ther= e's
no physical reason to do so.  Finally, of course, accepting quadrant
divisions in this manner would mean splitting the Odonan Empire between
quadrants, which I did not want to do.

>I see your position about hybrid species individuals much
the same way.  From a purely scientific view I'd tend to agree with your
thinking, but again some individuals=20 have become so well established as
being mixed that I tend to accept it.  In fact, one of my characters,
Melissa Vargas, is half human-half vulcan, but raised by her human father
as a human.

Well, it is possible to interpret Trek without hybrids.  My real objection
= to hybrids
is when they come around through normal sex between species A and species B= .
That simply can't happen.  Hybrids in Steve-Trek have to be lab creations, = who then
become essentially a new species.  It's possible that Spock was created thi= s way,
but I interpret Troi as pure Betazoid and Torres as pure Klingon.  In Steve=
-Trek,
I do have some characters who were born as one species, but raised in the
e= nvironment
of another, or heavily influenced by another.

I also have an entire hybrid race in Steve-Trek, the Idobians, who are a
ha= lf-human,
half-Odonan hybrid race, but they were a lab creation and can only breed am= ong
themselves, and not with humans or Odonans.  By the "Athena"
timeframe, the= y're
almost extinct, with just one surviving member.

>I'm not sure I would have gone with something=20
like the Odonan Warp drive.  But I do really like it=20 in your stories.

I used it simply because I know how it works, and it prevents me from
resol= ving a plot
problem by doing something previously unknown with the engines; in other wo= rds,
the technobabble resolution.

>Like I said, nothing all that major, and certainly nothing
that detracts from the stories.

>Do you know how hard it would have been to squeeze
"U.S.S. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain" on the 3D model?  :)

Well, what about "U.S.S. Joshua Chamberlain"?  It's still a
problem because Joshua is not the number-one Chamberlain in history, which
forces you to explain who the ship was named after, and no doubt new
members of the crew have to be told too.  Besides, it's a 2 km big ship,
how hard could it be to squeeze those letters on?

>I tried out about four different shapes when designing
the model and finally settled on the version on the site. I did not
consider the idea of making it resemble a starbase.  Interesting idea.  But
how would the warp drive work for a shape like that?

I see your point, but just making it look like a regular ship design scaled
up seems to emphasize the gun-bunny aspect of it, and might make people
point out the absurdity of such a big ship.  On the other hand, a
fundamentally different design might have made the large size seem
practical and more probable.

>Interesting idea.  How would you envision that working?

It's a kind of gluon cascade weapon that causes nuclei to break down with
an explosive release of energy.  Because the strong nuclear force is
relatively short range, the effect of the weapon is to extend the effect
sufficiently far to trip off neighbouring nuclei.  The more protons and
neutrons in close proximity, the more energy is released, and the faster
the effect spreads.  This would make it effective against large, massive
vessels like the Borg cube.  These were just ideas I came up with to try to
develop a weapon that can stop the Borg, simply to get around the view that
what works against the Borg once only works once.  Since the Borg have all
but disappeared from Steve- Trek (because they are overused), development
and deployment of this weapon is not likely to be something that will
appear in any story in the foreseeable future, but it's in the back of my
mind in case I need it.

Steve
The Universe Unbounded.

Visit "Star Trek: Athena" at http://ussathena.iwarp.com






------=_NextPart_000_000D_01C2FE30.82334A80
Content-Type: text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit










>Nothing all that major, just a few things
abouthow you have your
universe set up...
 
Okay, just the kind of things I've heard
before.>The quadrant situation for
the Galaxy.  While on onelevel I agree with your
thinking about the Alpha/Betaline, for me the
quadrant borders have been establishedwell enough to this point
in Produced Trek that Igo pretty much with what they've
got.
The reasoning here is that when the quadrant
concept came up,
there was no mention on exactly where the
quadrants
were.  Throughout
DS9, there was reference to the
"Alpha Quadrant
alliance" and not
"Alpha-Beta Quadrant
alliance."  I think the
idea of putting the quadrant
boundary through Earth
was because of one of
those dreaded throwaway
lines "the only ship in the
quadrant," and somehow
it became accepted
in fandom, and then this spread into canon.
However, I drew my maps
based on what Picard said in an
early TNG episode
about twenty-five
percent of the galaxy having been
tentatively
explored (at least in some
preliminary sense).  I
assumed that was
roughly centered around Earth,
and so that became my Alpha
Quadrant.  Also,
in a cartographic sense,
I simply can't seem them
introducting a major
division through an
established political
unit.  It's like taking
some country located on a
big one-world continent (like
Pangaea on ancient
Earth) and arbitrarily
assigning continent-like divisions
through an
established country when there's
no physical reason to do
so.  Finally, of
course, accepting quadrant
divisions in this manner would
mean splitting the
Odonan Empire between
quadrants, which I did not want to
do.
>I see your position about hybrid species
individuals muchthe
same way.  From a purely scientific view I'd tend
toagree with your thinking, but again some individuals
have become so well established as being mixed that
Itend to accept it.  In fact, one of my
characters,Melissa Vargas, is half human-half vulcan, but
raisedby her human father as a human.
Well, it is possible to interpret
Trek without
hybrids.  My real objection to hybrids
is when they come around through normal sex
between
species A and species B.
That simply can't
happen.  Hybrids in
Steve-Trek have to be lab creations, who then
become essentially a new
species.  It's
possible that Spock was created this way,
but I interpret Troi as pure
Betazoid and Torres
as
pure Klingon.  In Steve-Trek,
I do have some characters who were
born as one
species, but raised in the environment
of another, or heavily influenced by
another.
 
I also have an entire hybrid race
in Steve-Trek,
the Idobians, who are a half-human,
half-Odonan hybrid race, but they were a lab
creation and can only breed among
themselves, and not with humans or
Odonans. 
By the "Athena" timeframe, they're
almost extinct, with just one surviving
member.
>I'm not sure I would have gone with something
like the Odonan
Warp drive.  But I do really like it in your
stories.
I used it simply because I know
how it works, and
it prevents me from resolving a plot
problem by doing something
previously unknown with
the engines; in other words,
the technobabble
resolution.
>Like I said, nothing all that major, and
certainly nothingthat
detracts from the stories.>Do you know how hard
it would have been to
squeeze"U.S.S. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain" on the 3D
model? 
:)Well, what about
"U.S.S. Joshua
Chamberlain"?  It's still a problem
because Joshua is not the
number-one Chamberlain
in
history, which
forces you to explain who the ship was named
after,
and no doubt
new members of the crew have to be
told too. 
Besides, it's a 2 km
big ship, how hard could it be to
squeeze those
letters on?
>I tried out about four different shapes when
designingthe
model
and finally settled on the version on the site.I did not consider
the idea of making it resemble astarbase.  Interesting
idea.  But how would
the warpdrive work for a shape like that?
I see your point, but just making
it look like a
regular ship design
scaled up seems to emphasize the
gun-bunny aspect
of it, and
might make people point out the
absurdity of such
a
big ship.  On
the other hand, a fundamentally
different design
might have made
the large size seem practical and more
probable.
>Interesting idea.  How would you
envision that working?
 
It's a kind of gluon
cascade weapon that
causes nuclei to break down
with an explosive release of
energy.  Because
the strong nuclear
force is relatively short range,
the effect of the
weapon is to extend
the effect sufficiently far to trip off
neighbouring nuclei.  The more
protons and neutrons in close
proximity, the more
energy is released,
and the faster the effect
spreads.  This
would
make it effective against
large, massive vessels like the
Borg cube. 
These were just ideas
I came up with to try to develop a
weapon that can
stop the Borg,
simply to get around the view that
what works
against the Borg once
only works once.  Since
the Borg have all but
disappeared from Steve-
Trek (because they are overused),
development and
deployment of
this weapon is not likely to be
something that
will
appear in any
story in the foreseeable future,
but it's in the
back of my mind in
case I need it.
 
Steve
The Universe
Unbounded.
 
Visit "Star Trek: Athena" at http://ussathena.iwarp.com;">http://ussathena.iwarp.comhttp://ussathena.iwarp.com">http://ussathena.iwarp.com;
 







Yahoo! Groups
Sponsor


http://us.ard.yahoo.com/M=249982.3083889.44
52939.1728375/D=egroupweb/S=1705019987:HM/A=1524963/R=0/*http://hits.411web.com
/cgi-bin/autoredir?camp=556&lineid=3083889&prop=egroupweb&pos=HM">http://us.a1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/a/sl/sleepangel/sleep_300x250.gif"
alt="" width="300" height="250"
border="0">

http://us.adserver.yahoo.com/l?M=2499
82.3083889.4452939.1728375/D=egroupmail/S=:HM/A=1524963/rand=318623790">







Star Trek; The E-mail Commands

Post message: trekcreative{at}yahoogroups.com Subscribe:
trekcreative-subscribe{at}yahoogroups.com Unsubscribe:
trekcreative-unsubscribe{at}yahoogroups.com List owner:
trekcreative-owner{at}yahoogroups.com Get Digest:
trekcreative-digest{at}yahoogroups.com Web only: 
trekcreative-nomail{at}yahoogroups.com Normal:
trekcreative-normal{at}egroups.com



Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo!">http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/">Yahoo! Terms of
Service.




------=_NextPart_000_000D_01C2FE30.82334A80--

--- BBBS/NT v4.00 MP