What if Voyager ...

posted on March 25th, 2010, 2:58 am

And forgive me because this is a stupid question:

  Why did Voyager not head towards the Gamma Quadrant and enter the wormhole to DS9?


Clearly the answer is:  Because the show would not be the way they wanted it to be.  The Wormhole could likely have been reached in something closer to 35 years as opposed to 75, but the idea of a cross-galaxy journey is a better device to power the script.

 


  However, if things were not motivated by scripts and marketing, don't you think it would have been smarter to simply make for the Gamma Quadrant Wormhole?  Sure the Dominion space is nearby to that, but I'm sure that even a slight detour around it would still be faster.

posted on March 25th, 2010, 3:01 am

The Wormhole would still be on the other side of the Galaxy. A straightline with the occational shortcut would probably be faster and the Wormhole is likely to be in Dominion space, rather than just close to it.

posted on March 25th, 2010, 3:08 am

But we know that the Wormhole is not in Dominion space.  I don't have the references but it's not.


  The Gamma Quadrant  cannot be as far away as Earth given that the entire Milky Way is only 100,000 light years across.  If Voyager was transported 75,000 and Earth is not technically at the edge of the Galaxy, then math-wise there is almost no way for the Bajoran wormhole to be farther.  Only if space was not a constant when it came to how fast a vessel can move.  There's a very interesting link I provided in another thread that talks about how "space highways" might be a good explanation for how vessels can move across larger distances more quickly (i.e how the Beta Quadrant is an accessible thing for Starfleet).

[Anonymous]

posted on March 25th, 2010, 3:17 am

Last edited by Anonymous on March 25th, 2010, 3:22 am, edited 1 time in total.

Voyager wouldn't have known about the Dominion anyway, would they?  Didn't Voyager leave before all that?  At the very least, they wouldn't realize just how colossal a threat they were.

What would be really funny is if they traveled there, only to find that it had been blown up by Sisko because he's a prick and it would get a good laugh on the promenade.

"Guess you'd better 'set another course for home', Janeway! "

Edit:  Also, why couldn't they set charges after they figured out the array and blown it up after it sent them home?  Fire Tricobalts at anything that moves until the science team figures it all out, then set up explosives hidden by holo emitters that are triggered 5 minutes after they leave.  It's pretty clear they weren't dealing with einsteins where technology was concerned.  They could have eliminated 7 years of bad television in one shot!

posted on March 25th, 2010, 3:23 am

Voyager was launched in 2371 and the Odyssey incident happened in 2370, so Voyager was quite aware of the threat they posed. Voyager had Dominion warships in their Database.

posted on March 25th, 2010, 3:41 am

Forgive me if I'm wrong but wasn't the gamma quadrant wormhole the 1st 'stable' wormhole ever found?  due to the unpredictable nature of wormholes, could they have expected the wormhole to still be there after 30 or more years, in which case they would only be adding more years to their journey by going there, in theory.  Then you have the Dominion... with the amount of knowledge they had it would likely be safer to just go straight line back to Earth I think.

[Tyler]

posted on March 25th, 2010, 3:49 am

Last edited by Tyler on March 25th, 2010, 3:53 am, edited 1 time in total.

Unstable wormholes are unreliable, the Bajoran one was proven to be stable. It will likely stay as long as someone doesn't kill it.

[cabal]

posted on March 25th, 2010, 4:35 am

Last edited by cabal on March 25th, 2010, 4:41 am, edited 1 time in total.

(i.e how the Beta Quadrant is an accessible thing for Starfleet).

Earth is supposed to be near the border of the Alpha and Beta quadrants.

The Bajoran wormhole had a stable end (near Bajor) and branched into several less stable ends (I think). It seems like going through the wormhole didn't take them where they expected it to once.

posted on March 25th, 2010, 5:22 am

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3291/231 ... 3ab0_o.jpg

This map makes it seem like a very similar distance...  Traveling towards Earth would have been a sure thing... heading towards the wormhole would not.

posted on March 25th, 2010, 7:12 am

by the way how does the borg transwarp network work? it goes into a sun like structure??? :s hm...

posted on March 25th, 2010, 7:25 am

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3291/231 ... 3ab0_o.jpg

This map makes it seem like a very similar distance...  Traveling towards Earth would have been a sure thing... heading towards the wormhole would not.

I've never agreed with that map.  It actually assumes that the TMP movies were plausible.  I don't think it hold any credence whatsoever.

[Selor Kiith]

posted on March 25th, 2010, 10:05 am

Last edited by Selor Kiith on March 25th, 2010, 10:07 am, edited 1 time in total.

I've never agreed with that map.  It actually assumes that the TMP movies were plausible.  I don't think it hold any credence whatsoever.

I'm not sure... why?

And I think Earth is actually closer to Voyager then the Wormhole...

posted on March 25th, 2010, 10:14 am

4 Points..

1. does anyone know where the Bajoran Wormhole exactly ends in the gammea quadrant ?!
So i think we will never find out which way is the shortest.

2. It's some kind of psychological effekt to show the earth in some episodes, this point far far away.
Would just be stupid to show a wormhole an say, this is the point we wanna travel to. Cause it's not "home".

3. They need their own story with the borg and not with the dominion again.

4. sometimes the bajoran wormhole disappears..so what, you reach it after years with 1000 dominon ships behind you..and there is nothing . Cause the Pah wraiths do some kind of dinner party ^^

posted on March 25th, 2010, 11:19 am

speaking from the official Star Trek Star Charts book, the direct path to Terra is actually shorter. Sol is not in the center of the Alpha Quadrant, but quite close to the border to the Beta Quadrant, while the Worhome itself is in the "south" part of the Gamma Quadrant. As Voyager would not be able to fly directly through the center of the Galaxy, the path would be longer. Plus they do not know the precise dimensions of Dominion space, but they could say for sure to cross it. They knew close to nothing about Borg space, so the direct path would be much more efficient. Remember that there is even a large portion of Federation space "behind" the Romulan Empire in the deep Beta Quadrant

[Boggz]

posted on March 25th, 2010, 4:26 pm

Last edited by Boggz on March 26th, 2010, 1:40 am, edited 1 time in total.

speaking from the official Star Trek Star Charts book, the direct path to Terra is actually shorter. Sol is not in the center of the Alpha Quadrant, but quite close to the border to the Beta Quadrant, while the Worhome itself is in the "south" part of the Gamma Quadrant.

  Is that this map?  This one is from the official starchart book.  It doesn't show TOO much of the other quadrants except up in the top right corner.  It shows the spacing as being much smaller in terms of overall territory owned by the various factions.


   I've seen some other maps that had questionable sizes for territories.  I mean they were so vast that I didn't think they could even be possible. 

THIS map is part of a database that actually is full of some very good explanations for sizing.  The mathcraft for sizing is tackled HERE (Optec I figure you'd like this explanation specifically as it's very math intensive.  Someone clearly gave it a LOT of though .