PROJECT IDEAS

Hey everyone! Thanks for coming by. I know people were already running-over with ideas for doing a group project for the Foundry so here is where we start going at them. So, let's hear it.

For starters, you guys are all over this board. We're here for one big timeline project, lets keep discussion all in one thread. Dont need to be all over the place with different versions of the same thread.

If we are all to come together, we need to agree on the starting point. We have 7 guys here so far. So only our votes count till others join.

Whatever our timeline is, it must be a fertile playground for authors imaginations if we want more to join us. So, do we stay in Cryptics timeline, or start out fresh with a clean slate?

My vote is this: Lets back it up all the way and write our own Path to 2409. Id rather not spend my brainstorming writing time filling in for Kestrals holes and covering for her mistakes. It would be a tug of war with what we want and what she writes, and players would accuse us of not following the STO plot when we write ahead of her, which will be easy cause they are slow as hell updating their story. I say we pick a point from The Countdown comic and go from there. Spock went back and disappeared with Nero, Romulus is destroyed. And ACTION!

Everyone please comment in this thread with two answers only. STO timeline or our own? What starting point?

I, too, feel that an alternate timeline would be a good way to go. Especially that the STO story was so "good", I can't even remember 10% of it.

How about it all starts of with a 2 parter where the player confronts the Iconians and gets ported back to the TOS or even STE era. There, in an attempt to break free from the Iconians, the player infects the scout drones with a tricky computer virus. In the confusion, the ship escapes. Here we can add a tie in to the era. Maybe have the Enterprise show up to help or a cameo of some of the characters...
That virus, however, proves to be more lethal than expected. It severs all Iconian outposts. Destroys most technology they still have and makes the gates work in an erratic and uncontrollable way (as seen in Contagion). Later it turns out to be the very same virus that you saw in the episode Contagion.

At the end of the mission, the ship returns to the future, finding a more or less peaceful quadrant. Without the Iconian interference the Undine didn't start to infiltrate the ranks of the major powers. The Klingons didn't get all paranoid and crazy about them. So the whole war just never happened. With that in mind, Starfleet operates normally. No field promotion for Ensigns and no Vice Admiral in a year. Under these circumstances, the player is classified back to Lt Commander rank. However SFC granted an acting Captain status and allowed to retain his command. This way, we can do a more proper military career through the series where you don't get promoted once every hour.
The mission ends with the crew trying to adjust to the changes.

The adjustment is not easy, thou. At the 2rd mission, a really desperate crew member tries to create a device secretly, that can send the ship back to the STO timeline. The problem is, it was to be a one way trip. The mission ends with a modified device fitted onto the ship, allowing it to pass between this peaceful timeline and the STO timeline at will. The crew decides that while this new timeline fits them better, they will still help the other timeline's StarFleet as much as they can.

With this pilot, the Kestrel story is ended with a logical explanation. Clean slate. However the player can still participate in the STO things without going out of sync with this series. We can assume that he just used the device and poof he in the normal STO timeline to help out that StarFleet. Everything is wrapped up and explained, major plot holes covered.

Alternatively, most events still match the STO timeline. Like the Borg behave the very same way. The Undine are still hostile, but not offensive against the Federation. Renegade Klingon factions still prey on UFP shipping, justifying simple piracy by acting that they are at war with the UFP. Cardassian part, everything is exactly the same. The Iconians are still lurking around, but their power and influence is greatly diminished.

So things are strikingly similar in many aspects. There are fights, but they are only border skirmishes and police missions against renegades. The setting is more like the happy TNG era than the "desperate war on 35 fronts" STO era.

Yeah, um, where is everyone? I see some big foundry names in the memberslist, yet two or three are doing all the posting? This is NOT how we are going to make any progress on this goal. We havnt even had opening discussions yet. Dont be a lurker guys. Speak up. Im sure we are all skeptical that we'll all get along. But you dont know that till you speak up and have your say. If this group project isnt for you, then you can back out at any time. But the guys that ARE speaking up and hashing out ideas are going to be the guys laying the foundation here, and if you dont speak up now, dont try coming in later and having an opinion about drastically changing things. If you arent going to be checking this forum at least once a day, then unmember yourself from this place so we arent expecting you to help.

To address you Pendra, I need to reread all the Path to 2409 again before really commenting on your approach. I was waiting for others to pipe up before I went on about other things, Guys arent even helping to find a starting point. Offhand, I feel we shouldnt even need to explain away Iconian non involvement. We shouldnt get caught up explaining away Kestrals decisions. Thats why if we start back early enough, we can disregard everything shes set up. One thing is clear, we dont need a war on a 1000 fronts, I assume we'd all agree on that.

While I dont think we need to explain Kestrals timeline, we do need to find a way to utilize all the good assets in the Foundry. We obviously need to find a way to use New Romulus.

I didn't expect anything less than this.

On the other topic, even JJ had the courtesy to link up his movie, Die Hard in Space with the prime universe.

Well, if this effort doesnt start getting some real discussion going by the end of January, Im off the project.

With all the ideas Ive had in the meantime waiting for guys to chime in, Ive decided I'll just do my own reboot timeline and go it alone. If my missions become successful, I'll consider letting other authors contribute to my timeline to crank out more missions faster.

Well you can pretty much decommission this place.