Forum:Star Trek Online and Memory Beta

Ten Forward → Star Trek Online and Memory Beta (Reply | Watch)

This forum is to discuss the status of STO as MBeta declared "canon". My thoughts are that it shouldn't be considered part of the same timeline as the novels, comics, etc. as it has already shown a disregard for critical events in novels, such as the Destiny trilogy, and as such, follows an alternate timeline from that of the "prime" timeline, so my thoughts are that STO portions of articles should be relegated to a sub-section and, for example, Tal'Aura's death in 2384, as stated by STO, will, with the announcement of the Typhon Pact novels, become STO-timeline only. --WTRiker 04:36, January 14, 2010 (UTC)

I suggest you have a read of the "Conflicts" section of our Inclusion Policy which explains how we treat cases like this (Star Trek Online is hardly an exceptional case we have to deal with contradicting information all the time).

Your example of Tal'Aura isn't the best, as the two conflicting continuities don’t actually conflict on her history; there's nothing in the novel continuity so far that precludes her death some years later. When there are overt contradictions then we separate the information, in most case that isn’t currently necessary. At most the Tal'Aura article (currently) needs a background note explaining the information originates from partially incompatible continuities and thus may or may not be how events play out in future prose-verse appearances. --8of5 06:02, January 14, 2010 (UTC)

The term "canon" doesn't much apply when comparing two non-canon topics ;)

I think putting the weight of this discussion on STO is also wrong, as it presupposes that the novels are the 'correct' version of history. To put it bluntly, I'd rather that the book versions not have gone the way that they have, as its a dismal way for the post TNG era to end up.

As to the game, it's going to have its own history and the TNG-era books may or may not catch up to there. As 8of5 says, these aren't exactly universe shattering contradictions -- a couple of years off describing some same events, some characters die but the descriptions differ slightly.

After all, the books say the Borg are done, but the game says the Borg technology is still around. I hate to point out the hole in this, but if the Borg technology was reasserted somewhere between the two, they'd all fit a little better. Perhaps even the STO history books were written from bad viewpoints -- if the 25th century writer who chronicled the history of the 2380s was wrong for example -- imagine parts of Destiny and the Typhon Pact being classified secrets that no 2409 history books would have access to. Changes the whole perception? -- Captain MKB 13:07, January 14, 2010 (UTC)

Trying to claim that there aren't major, major contradictions between the novel continuity and STO continuity is absurd. The Borg Invasion never happened in the STO continuity; billions of people were not killed, 40% of Starfleet wasn't destroyed, and numerous worlds were not devastated or exterminated. That's huge. And the idea that you can reconcile them is absurd -- that's like saying there's no real difference between a timeline where World War II happened and one where it didn't. (And the idea that the Borg Invasion -- an event that involved trillions of individuals -- could ever be classified or kept secret is equally absurd -- it's like saying they could keep World War II a secret.) Even if we disregard the idea that there are no more Borg, the invasion itself is such a huge, huge event that it makes it impossible to reconcile the STO and novel continuities as one continuity. They're clearly separate, and they present such radically different series of events that information from one or the other really ought to be clearly labelled in a different section of any given article. -- Sci 10:46 15 JAN 2010 UTC

No, not unless that article deals with a topic that is different in the two realities. While the Borg issue is a sticking point, there are many other topics where the two continuities agree and can be chronicled without any such clutter. -- Captain MKB 13:33, January 15, 2010 (UTC)

Yes and no. I know you've previously stated your wish for the following to be the case Sci, but: If we sideline the Star Trek Online continuity on whole just because it is in places irreconcilable, it has huge implications for the organisation of Every article on the site. If we set the precedent of every alternate continuity having to be in a distinct sub-section - as opposed to our current practice of only doing that as a last resort in the case of incompatibility specific to each article - most articles would not be a cohesive (readable!) account of the history of a subject, but a horrific jumble of different continuities, because a single fact in whatever novel/comic/game etc makes story after story incompatible with every other one.

Now there's a lot in Star Trek Online that simply isn't compatible with the major novel continuity yep, everything from Destiny and beyond is ignored by Online. So for plenty of subjects it is indeed entirely necessary to have the different continuities separated. But for certain articles the fact a Borg invasion didn't happened has no effect on the outcome for that subject. And don't pretend the novels or comics exist in some perfectly formed universe, they conflict themselves often enough that even the main novelverse cant be considered a cohesive whole at times!

To expand on Mike's argument: Let's take an example with a less contentious history than Tal'aura (who does appear in the post-Destiny novels already so there's a little more case for a split history on her). Take B-4, his story was tied up in the novelverse way back at Resistance and Articles of the Federation. The novels then rush off to a war with the Borg that doesn’t feature in the Star Trek Online history. However B-4's story does continue in Online, and Countdown. So should we split B-4's article in half just because events that have nothing to do with his individual history, events in books he doesn't even feature in, contradict, or should we present B-4's history as a cohesive whole as presented across the various stories he appears in?

I would suggest rather than thinking about these stories as massive cohesive continuities you should thing of each and every single title separately. If a subject appears in 6 different stories, and those stories provide a consistent history for that subject then the subject has a consistent history. If one of those six stories flatly contradicts the other five, then sure, the continuities need to split. --8of5 13:– 34, January 15, 2010 (UTC)

I've started to add some information from STO to the wiki, specifically articles on Miral Paris and the USS Kirk and 8of5 directed me to this discussion. I'm not really experienced with wikis and my additions will be slow going but no doubt others with contribute.

I'm going to post below about STO's content, but I think the wiki's own inclusion policy about conflicting sources covers the inconsistencies you are going to encounter. I don't read the novels but I know about the pretty radical events in the recent ones but apart from the Borg's inclusion in the game, I'm not sure of anything else that's wildly different. -- ST Games 11:52, February 7, 2010 (UTC)

Article sources

So, now that people are actively playing, we should clarify how people cite and proof their additions based on STO -- one user yesterday asked if we were adding some fact that was on an informational screen during the game -- basically, when we cite {{web}}... STO, how do we clarify what part of the game it was from -- i guess there are retrievable information modules, items achieved in play, and more simply in-game visual observations, etc. that we should probably keep track of so that things are clear to researchers expanding articles after the fact.

This is compounded by the fact that many users cannot independantly verify what is said. If User X says he/she saw a Melkotian in a certain location in the game, I personally don't have the ability to log in and go to that place and see it myself. This user must bear the weight of proving how they correctly determined it was a Melkotian. Was there a text piece saying that, or did the person assume based on appearance? Was it a similar alien this person mistook--maybe it was another space brain. Should we make screenshots our preference for cases like this, just to make sure we are being thorough? -- Captain MKB 13:57, January 15, 2010 (UTC)

Not been looking forward to this can of worms... well for starters, anything citing with {{web}} would be not from the game but from one of the game websites, which we can verify. I'd think the game would use the normal {{g}} citation.

If we're going to ask for screenshot verification, how would we arrange that? Basic screenshots aren't always great for illustrating articles (they need to be cropped for better framing and what-not), and a screen shot for everything that needs to be evidenced would also be more than most articles need, so would we need to set up a separate image upload system somewhere else just for keeping a record of verification images or something??

I'm more concerned about users getting confused about what is appropriate to add here. Typically on a game our information comes from the solid unchangeable story elements of the game, and does not include how the user plays the game. So in Star Trek Online as I under stand there are episodes/levels to play through, which I assume are effectively the same for everyone, that should be recorded, but what shouldn't is the myriad of custom starships and characters the player creates to play through that level. What I'm less clear about though is what happens in the more player directed parts of the game; there seems to be a system for exploring the galaxy which I think includes some degree of random planet and alien creation, how on earth do we decide what is then game or user generated? --8of5 14:09, January 15, 2010 (UTC)

To summarize -- just because you kill Character X in a game, doesn't mean that Character X will always necessarily die. Thus, each individual's 'exploits in gameplay' would not be appropriate here -- indeed, they could probably fill up another whole wiki. (thoughts for later - any other franchises with MMORPGs have wiki framework set up? perhaps we could copy)

Correct on the {{g}} corretion -- but perhaps we could expand or supplement with a new citation if more is needed.

I think that raw screenshots would be fine, but would probably need to be recropped as a revision -- possibly a version of the stub message could be required saying 'raw screenshot' and place it on a list of required maintenance, just like stubbed articles? -- Captain MKB 14:21, January 15, 2010 (UTC)

Re: alternate citation template, I think we'll be ok, as while the Online game is maybe bigger than most, it seems it relies on upon a set of missions that come with it as standard and any major additions to the game will come in the form of add-ons to the game later which I imagine we can cite as another title.

Your idea of a raw screenshot stub system seems like a very workable system. Even if we don’t end up needing it specifically for this it might be worth introducing for other screenshots and images in general. --8of5 22:05, January 15, 2010 (UTC)

As another user has recently pointed out Online is now in pre-order play and will be open to all users very soon. So we need to finalise what the system for Online is going to be if it is to differ from a normal game at all. Some input from players of the game would be extremely useful at the moment. I'm particularly concerned about the game's use of "episodes"; I'd like to know how full a story these are, are they comparable to a normal level in a computer game, or a bit more? Are they more akin to chapters in a novel, or short stories in an anthology? Because if it's the latter then we shall need to start generating pages for each "episode", and a suitable citation template to use with it.

Whether we're citing individual episodes or the whole game, can I also confirm support for my suggestion a little while ago that we consider Star Trek Online two entities, the single game, and a series, and with that in mind any citations to the game should identify the series as STO, rather than general ST.

The above discussion also raises something; we probably need to update our inclusion policy to make clear that information from any game should not include user generated content or actions, just the given elements from the game.

And finally, if we're going to have a screencap for evidence system we need to outline what we need users to provide in the screencaps and get a template in place. And again input from Online players would be useful; how practical would a screencap for evidence system be? --8of5 06:27, January 31, 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure why it's so hard to get a description from these users -- the most desciptive thing i've seen since we asked for qualification is someone saying 'yes, that's in the game' (talk:Naomi Wildman). In it 'how?

Star Trek Online Content

Missions in the game are as follows;

Story Missions - These are the main core of the game that everyone plays through and stay the same for everyone. There is a lot of attention to detail in these and a lot of links back to established Trek. Mission relating to Miral Paris, the Guardian of Forever, Klingon Augment virus, the events of Countdown and the latest movie which I think all should be added.

Exploration Missions - These are the randomly generated missions in randomly generated systems with content that are different for everyone. I wouldn't suggest having these added otherwise you will have lots of one line articles along the lines of 'A starfleet ship found some strange energy readings from an ancient civilisation in sytem J4-7849-C'.

Patrol/Defend Missions - These are the same for everyone but are really just "Go here, defeat these enemies" or "Go here, scan these anomalies" events. What you do get in some of them however is something that adds to the story in a small way. For instance one mission I completed had you discovering the wreckage of the USS Noble, which was said to be one of the medical ships that responded to the destruction of Romulus and was destroyed by Nero during Star Trek Coundown. Information worth recording I think.

Then you have the other content in the game;

Persistent locations and NPCs - Systems and key planets in the game could be recorded from the story missions and galactic map, and stations such as Starbase 39, Deepspace K7 & Earth Spacedock. Also the different NPC admirals and officers you get missions from could be added, and some are from or are related to known Trek characters. For instance, Naome Wildman is commander of K7, Captain Calhoun is stationed there as a wartime fleet commander also.

Ship Classes - The different ship classes for the races in game such as the Romulans, Nausicaan, Orion and Hirogen are faithful to canon and can be included just as the ship classes for other games have been. The only problem is the hull customisation players can make in game, but the base classes like they are listed on this page could be included without much difficulty.

Ship/Ground Equipment - There are so many different types of weapons, equipment and abilities you can equip and customise as well as upgrade and modify would make it very difficult to catalogue them all. I guess you could just make one article covering all subtypes such as "Phaser Auto-Assault Rifle" but it would be a lot of work!

Hopefully some of this helps.. ST Games 12:26, February 7, 2010 (UTC)