Starfleet Jedi

This is for darkstar, it is not a debate or an argument. Its simply a interview on him, and his debates, finding out more about how he does his calculations and what his opinion on certain people are. I'd appreciate it if other people did not post on here (i made the mistake of inserting my opinion on the "I challenge darkstar to a debate." thread). I will start by asking Darkstar if he accepts.

I happen to agree with your comment from the other thread in which you say I am boring. Thus, I feel certain there's nothing interesting I could possibly say. But, I do appreciate the ego-stroke, and I pretty much make it a policy not to refuse to answer honest questions, so go ahead.

Lmao, fair enough. Alright, so i'll ask the questions and you just fill in the blanks.

First question:

How long have you been into the star wars vs star trek debate. Which side do you generally prefer and do you like both star trek and star wars.

2046 wrote:I happen to agree with your comment from the other thread in which you say I am boring. Thus, I feel certain there's nothing interesting I could possibly say. But, I do appreciate the ego-stroke, and I pretty much make it a policy not to refuse to answer honest questions, so go ahead.

That post was boring.

Touché.

leon_caboose wrote:Lmao, fair enough. Alright, so i'll ask the questions and you just fill in the blanks.

First question:

How long have you been into the star wars vs star trek debate.

On a "professional" level, I was in the field at ASVS in 2000, with my first post being April 26 of that year.

But I was considered an expert on Trek tech among other groups long before that and the question came up on a BBS circa 1995. At that time my only exposure to the EU was the Shane Johnson manual which basically posited battle-line-based starship combat (e.g. like Lord Nelson) with no 3-D aspect on the grounds that it made Star Wars folk universally queasy, or somesuch. And, I had no clue at the time that anyone would ever seriously posit that Star Wars turbolasers were a threat to Star Trek vessels. (On the other hand, some of my ideas at the time were ridiculous, too, but that's neither here nor there.)

So, Trek tech superiority seemed a foregone conclusion, at least before early 2000.

Or, quoting my Site History page:

The Confederate

Way back when, on a friend's BBS, a discussion had gotten started regarding Star Trek vs. Star Wars technology. Specifically, match-ups between the Enterprise-D and a Star Destroyer, the original Enterprise and a Star Destroyer, and so on. Naturally, we concluded that Star Trek tech was superior, though the original Enterprise was thought to require a hefty amount of luck to defeat an ISD.

Time passed.

In The Year 2000 . . .

It was a long, long time ago in a friend's apartment a couple of blocks away. She adored Trek and was talking to me about it. There was someone else present, though . . . he started talking about Star Wars. Soon, he and I were engaged in the classic sci-fi 'versus' argument. The calculations he was spouting sounded impressive, but I noticed that most of his Star Trek data was horribly flawed, and that most of his arguments were based on precarious interpretations of both universes. I held my own, for the most part . . . we argued to a draw.

So, I decided to start hunting online. Very soon, I discovered the old website of Wayne Poe. He'd done cutting-and-pasting and editing of arguments from alt.startrek.vs.starwars, and I recognized most of the claims . . . the apartment guy had parroted such claims word for word. Soon enough I had begun posting at ASVS.

Which side do you generally prefer

Well, I wouldn't call it a preference, but I would say that Star Trek technology is clearly superior. On a tactical, ship-to-ship level, even I had to admit that Star Trek would win hands-down in 2007, despite my custom (then as now) of avoiding anything resembling overbold statements.

and do you like both star trek and star wars.

I find Trek's stories more intellectually rewarding, though I do also enjoy the "research" of the TCW show. And I must say that the RotS novelization is quite excellent, even given the inherited characterization problems.

Thank you for your reply darkstar, if any of my questions are stupid or should be looked up on your site, don't hesitate to point this out. Now for the next questions.

What is the most frustrating thing you find, when debating warsies.

If you could change one thing about the star trek franchise what would it be?

If you could change one thing about the star wars franchise, what would it be?

Do you have anything critical to say about the way star trek fans debate against star wars fans?

leon_caboose wrote:Thank you for your reply darkstar, if any of my questions are stupid or should be looked up on your site, don't hesitate to point this out. Now for the next questions.

What is the most frustrating thing you find, when debating warsies.

Intellectual dishonesty.

If you could change one thing about the star trek franchise what would it be?

Hmm, interesting question. I don't know if there is any "just one thing" I would change. Star Trek's defects, however, can often be traced to particular sources.

I would basically want a Manny Coto-esque figure in place circa the beginning of Voyager, rather than Brannon Braga.

Braga is good as an idea man . . . almost unavoidable given how whacked out on smack he seems to be . . . but he needs a balancing influence for his nonsense to function. That influence was once Ron Moore, who was fairly conservative (figuratively speaking) at the time. But in Berman's greatest error he ended up letting Braga get to run things rather than a more Moore-like character like Ira Steven Behr or Moore.

So the best thing? Not sure. Given unlimited control of time and space, I'd keep Piller on things, Berman just crunching numbers like he was supposed to be doing, and have Piller fall madly in man-love with a Coto-esque figure just as Berman fell in love with Braga.

Braga could be a staff writer, but well-controlled by more rational minds until he left in frustration and went on to create stupid series that get cancelled within six episodes . . . y'know, just like he made in real life. And he could then still find success under the control of a more rational guy like Coto . . . again like real life, as Coto runs 24.

Then maybe Ira Steven Behr wouldn't have been stuck wasting time doing absurd things like arguing how much of Nog's leg was to be shot off, and we wouldn't be stuck with the worst parts of Voyager and Enterprise.

If you could change one thing about the star wars franchise, what would it be?

Anakin's fall to the Dark Side is the most crappily handled thing ever. In fact, Anakin in the films is generally crappily handled. I remember watching RotS not that long ago and I was just struck at how utterly different he is in that as opposed to TCW. In TCW he's actually a good guy . . . in RotS, he's just whiny.

Stepping into the production mindset as with the Trek answer, I'd say that going by the rumor mills, perhaps it would be best if Lucas were not such the control freak, and then perhaps things could've been done better in this instance. (Similarly, many give his not-so-hands-on approach to TESB credit for it being so good.)

However, his control-freak-ness has kept TCW from becoming some EU stupidity-fest as the writers keep 'complaining' about, so it has its benefits.

Do you have anything critical to say about the way star trek fans debate against star wars fans?

Well, I think I've said it fairly often recently in regards to poster StarWarsStarTrek, who I worried was getting an unfair shake in his early postings. It turns out not to have been the case, but put simply I would be concerned that even in a smaller group like this one, we must avoid the lure of groupthink and the anti-outsider intolerance shown by subcultures like SDN.