Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Did a related website in the community go down? Come back up? Relocate to a new address? Install pop-up advertisements?

This forum is for discussion of these sorts of issues.
Lucky
Jedi Master
Posts: 2239
Joined: Mon Aug 31, 2015 8:28 pm

Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Post by Lucky » Wed Oct 20, 2010 9:18 am

http://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewtopic. ... 8&t=145164

Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful/incompatible with TNG?

The Dude
Jedi Knight
Posts: 546
Joined: Mon Aug 31, 2015 8:28 pm

Re: Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Post by The Dude » Wed Oct 20, 2010 10:09 am

For me its because Starfleet, the Federation and the attitudes of just about everyone is totally different.

TOS: SF is the Napoleonic era Royal Navy in space. Humanity is flawed but trying to improve itself. Klingon's are basically the Soviets. Romulan's, maybe the ChiComs.

TNG Era: SF is now some quasi-military science fleet, humanity is damn near perfect. Klingon's become screaming barbarians and the Romulan's are now similar to the original Klingon's.

I know TNG is closer to what Roddenberry wanted but compared to TOS...ugh.

Picard
Starship Captain
Posts: 1433
Joined: Mon Aug 31, 2015 8:28 pm

Re: Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Post by Picard » Wed Oct 20, 2010 11:04 am

That's exactly why Picard said that TNG era Federation needed "good kick in ass" to be put out of its lazyness.

The Dude
Jedi Knight
Posts: 546
Joined: Mon Aug 31, 2015 8:28 pm

Re: Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Post by The Dude » Wed Oct 20, 2010 12:21 pm

Picard wrote:That's exactly why Picard said that TNG era Federation needed "good kick in ass" to be put out of its lazyness.
I think it goes far deeper then that. Yeah, TNG era (especially the early era) was pathetically complacent but that they arrived at that point in a mere 80 years is hilarious. We can't even get gays or trans-gendered folk to be universally accepted after a good 60 years of changes. Yet the Federation apparently went from having a military organization and outlook to TNG's odd mentality?

It's even more odd because Picard was CO of the Stargazer for 22 years, meaning he was probably around for a good portion of the change but mentions absolutely nothing.

Now I realize that Gene probably didn't intend TNG to be totally compatible with TOS and I doubt anyone would have foresaw the obsession with continuity and canon that nerds would have with the arrival of the Internet.

So I tend to treat them as separate.

Kor_Dahar_Master
Starship Captain
Posts: 1246
Joined: Mon Aug 31, 2015 8:28 pm

Re: Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Post by Kor_Dahar_Master » Wed Oct 20, 2010 1:58 pm

80 years in the same quadrant is a long time for social change, look at how blacks were treated in the 1930's compared to today to get the idea.

WW1 is close and WW2 is within the time frame and look at the political and social mentality of the planet now compared to those days and even the 50's especially in western countries.

TNG was lax but it was the inevitable conclusion of such a long period of relative status quo between the alpha quadrant races in regards to tech ect. Look how much the federation developed due to the borg and the dominion, we saw a connie hull wreck at wolf 359 that should have been on display not in a major conflict.
Last edited by Kor_Dahar_Master on Wed Oct 20, 2010 6:49 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Picard
Starship Captain
Posts: 1433
Joined: Mon Aug 31, 2015 8:28 pm

Re: Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Post by Picard » Wed Oct 20, 2010 6:01 pm

That's right. Only Federation ships capable of serious combat I remember seeing in TNG were Galaxy and Nebula class ships, both behemonts. After contact with Borg, we got Akira class (althought I think it was developed earlier - it has same saucer like New Orleans class - I think wreck of one New Orleans class ship was seen at Wolf 359), Defiant class, Sovereign class, Prometheus class, all heavily combat-oriented ships.

Before contact with Borg, Federation was using better versions of 23rd century tech, only major breakthrought was introduction of phaser strips in place of banks (and major advantage, seeing how none of other powers developed phaser strips); after that, we have explosion of new technologies - pulse phase cannons, quantum torpedoes, ablative armor, regenerative shielding. So I think it is question of which period of TNG era we take - if we take TNG itself, we have Starfleet sure in itself to point of arrogance and with some officers even suggesting that battle drills are unnecessary - which is absurd. With Borg and Dominion War, situation prbably changed.

Mike DiCenso
Security Officer
Posts: 5836
Joined: Fri Aug 18, 2006 8:49 pm

Re: Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Post by Mike DiCenso » Wed Oct 20, 2010 9:33 pm

Sigh, here we go again with this horrid old myth. Nothing about TOS' tech was more advanced or more powerful as far as any can see, except that they tended to use the ship's combat ranges more often, and at times seemed faster. Anyway, a link to the old "TOS & TNG" thread from two years ago that hashes out most of the issues technologically, except for the ST 2009 movie, which showed that a large mining ship from the 24th century can kick all kinds of mid-23rd century ass.

As for liking the stories and characters... well, that's your own subjective choice.
-Mike

Lucky
Jedi Master
Posts: 2239
Joined: Mon Aug 31, 2015 8:28 pm

Re: Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Post by Lucky » Thu Oct 21, 2010 7:33 am

Mike DiCenso wrote:Sigh, here we go again with this horrid old myth. Nothing about TOS' tech was more advanced or more powerful as far as any can see, except that they tended to use the ship's combat ranges more often, and at times seemed faster. Anyway, a link to the old "TOS & TNG" thread from two years ago that hashes out most of the issues technologically, except for the ST 2009 movie, which showed that a large mining ship from the 24th century can kick all kinds of mid-23rd century ass.

As for liking the stories and characters... well, that's your own subjective choice.
-Mike
Thank you for pointing out the thread.

Lately I've seen claims of everything from TOS is not canon to ships were more powerful. It gets on my nerves.

User avatar
Mr. Oragahn
Admiral
Posts: 6865
Joined: Sun Dec 03, 2006 11:58 am
Location: Paradise Mountain

Re: Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Post by Mr. Oragahn » Thu Oct 21, 2010 1:28 pm

It's because people remember the silly upper outliers of TOS more often than, eventually, those of Voyager. The kind that may have begun to rival the absurdity of Doctor Who's average nonsense.

Mike DiCenso
Security Officer
Posts: 5836
Joined: Fri Aug 18, 2006 8:49 pm

Re: Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Post by Mike DiCenso » Thu Oct 21, 2010 9:28 pm

Lucky wrote:Lately I've seen claims of everything from TOS is not canon to ships were more powerful. It gets on my nerves.
The TOS is not canon myth is easily laid to rest by looking at the many TOS references there are in TNG, DS9, VOY, and ENT. Hell, TOS being canon is a critical for the movie ST:Generations!
-Mike

Jedi Master Spock
Site Admin
Posts: 2164
Joined: Mon Aug 14, 2006 8:26 pm
Contact:

Re: Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Post by Jedi Master Spock » Wed Oct 27, 2010 4:39 pm

Mr. Oragahn wrote:It's because people remember the silly upper outliers of TOS more often than, eventually, those of Voyager. The kind that may have begun to rival the absurdity of Doctor Who's average nonsense.
Actually, I think you have it precisely reversed.

The common Saxtonite claim is that TOS is more powerful because the pro-Star Wars VS debate crowd sticks to low outliers for analyzing Star Trek. If you're from SDN and debating on SB.com or ST.com, you typically take "Pegasus," mis-scale the asteroid, assume fragmentation with little to no melting or vaporization, and get a low yield as an "upper limit." You take the slowest speeds in the TNG+ canon (generally from Voyager) and call them "upper limits."

It's true that TOS has a couple high outliers, such as the antimatter of "Obsession." However, TOS only ran three seasons, and there are essentially no low outliers in TOS when it comes to speed, range, or firepower; so even if TNG+ high outliers are higher, believing the "Warsie" party line requires concluding TOS is more powerful, because its low outliers are higher.

TOS isn't more or less powerful; it's simply more technologically consistent in many ways, mostly because there isn't nearly as large of a body of canon, but also partially because of the fact that later Trek involves a wider range of creative inputs - more writers, producers, and directors have put their imprint on it now.

It's actually much like how the EU isn't so much more or less powerful than the movies in SW, as much as less consistent.

User avatar
Mith
Starship Captain
Posts: 765
Joined: Wed Jun 04, 2008 1:17 am

Re: Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Post by Mith » Wed Oct 27, 2010 6:04 pm

^
This.

And never of course forget that they only consider 200 gigatons to be 'powerful' as far as interstellar societies are considered.

User avatar
Mr. Oragahn
Admiral
Posts: 6865
Joined: Sun Dec 03, 2006 11:58 am
Location: Paradise Mountain

Re: Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Post by Mr. Oragahn » Wed Oct 27, 2010 9:22 pm

Jedi Master Spock wrote:
Mr. Oragahn wrote:It's because people remember the silly upper outliers of TOS more often than, eventually, those of Voyager. The kind that may have begun to rival the absurdity of Doctor Who's average nonsense.
Actually, I think you have it precisely reversed.

The common Saxtonite claim is that TOS is more powerful because the pro-Star Wars VS debate crowd sticks to low outliers for analyzing Star Trek. If you're from SDN and debating on SB.com or ST.com, you typically take "Pegasus," mis-scale the asteroid, assume fragmentation with little to no melting or vaporization, and get a low yield as an "upper limit." You take the slowest speeds in the TNG+ canon (generally from Voyager) and call them "upper limits."

It's true that TOS has a couple high outliers, such as the antimatter of "Obsession." However, TOS only ran three seasons, and there are essentially no low outliers in TOS when it comes to speed, range, or firepower; so even if TNG+ high outliers are higher, believing the "Warsie" party line requires concluding TOS is more powerful, because its low outliers are higher.

TOS isn't more or less powerful; it's simply more technologically consistent in many ways, mostly because there isn't nearly as large of a body of canon, but also partially because of the fact that later Trek involves a wider range of creative inputs - more writers, producers, and directors have put their imprint on it now.
If you focus on Saxtonites, yes, but more globally, I don't see non-Trek debaters knowing much about the internal consistency of TOS you speak of. They just remember the biggest feats.
They seem not to insist on expanding their knowledge of TOS as they see it as just too detached of the rest of the Star Trek canon material.
Hence the skewed vision and belief that TOS is up there.
Now, the flow of Saxtonites obviously taints this as well to some degree.
It's actually much like how the EU isn't so much more or less powerful than the movies in SW, as much as less consistent.
Outside of the ICS, I find a lot of the EU to be very consistent with the terajoule/low petawatt range for cap ships.
The movies seem consistent, as a whole, in depicting a weaker power tier, but that's only if we are superficial. Because the moment we scale up the firepower of the heavy blaster carried by one goon on Jabba's barge, or the firepower of Slave-I or the shield durability of the Aethersprite to the volume of a Corvette, and then to an ISD, we do get in the terawatt/low petawatt range.
TCWS seems to be consistent in its cartoonish silliness.

Picard
Starship Captain
Posts: 1433
Joined: Mon Aug 31, 2015 8:28 pm

Re: Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Post by Picard » Wed Nov 03, 2010 9:31 am

Photon torpedoes of TOS era, as based on threat Kirk made to Eminiar VII, are 50 gigatons. In "Skin of Evil" we have torpedo that could be anywhere from 500 megatons to 144 gigatons. In Voyager episode "Rise" we have torpedo that is in high megatons at absolute minimum; more reasonable value would be 10-20 gigatons.

Jedi Master Spock
Site Admin
Posts: 2164
Joined: Mon Aug 14, 2006 8:26 pm
Contact:

Re: Why is it people assume TOS is more powerful the TNG?

Post by Jedi Master Spock » Tue Nov 09, 2010 1:33 am

Picard wrote:Photon torpedoes of TOS era, as based on threat Kirk made to Eminiar VII, are 50 gigatons. In "Skin of Evil" we have torpedo that could be anywhere from 500 megatons to 144 gigatons. In Voyager episode "Rise" we have torpedo that is in high megatons at absolute minimum; more reasonable value would be 10-20 gigatons.
Not necessarily.

There's no reason that Kirk's threat needs to be entirely based on the photon torpedo complement of the NCC-1701 (which I suggest likely numbers 96 as with the 1701-A refit). Instead, it is mainly indicative of the phaser power of the Enterprise.

Phasers are the primary weapons of UFP starships IMO.
Mr. Oragahn wrote:If you focus on Saxtonites, yes, but more globally, I don't see non-Trek debaters knowing much about the internal consistency of TOS you speak of. They just remember the biggest feats.
They seem not to insist on expanding their knowledge of TOS as they see it as just too detached of the rest of the Star Trek canon material.
Hence the skewed vision and belief that TOS is up there.
Now, the flow of Saxtonites obviously taints this as well to some degree.
They don't know TOS, so they just trust what they hear from others. Saxtonites have been quite vocal, and are the source of a great deal of misconception about Trek IMO.
Outside of the ICS, I find a lot of the EU to be very consistent with the terajoule/low petawatt range for cap ships.
Darksaber gives gigajoules for a SSD on full power. Karen Traviss makes smaller ships sound in the range of nuclear weapons. And "kilojoules."

We have megatons in the EU, and tons in the EU. It's not particularly consistent - the range within the EU is at least 7 orders of magnitude just in the novels (and easily 12 including the ICS). Within the movies themselves, we really have much less inconsistency - 4, maybe 5 orders of magnitude for cruisers at worst between different reasonable intepretations. Realistically, if we use consistent models and stick by them for all incidents, <3 orders of magnitude of variation happens in on-screen evens.

Post Reply