Editing STA A More Perfect Union (section)

==Technology (Treknology)==
This section covers my baseline take on four "magic" technologies from Star Trek: replicators, transporters, warp drives, and the Borg. What's outlined below is my take, for this game, on how these technologies work in universe at a baseline level. This being Star Trek, I expect the player characters can and will modify/extend/find novel uses for these technologies as part of overcoming the challenges the story will present.

If other technologies need to be discussed in this fashion over the course of play, I will add sections here to cover them.

If I don't touch on it specifically below, I'll likely be relying on [https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Portal:Main Memory Alpha] to do research on technology, FYI.

(<i>NOTE: I am not a scientist of any stripe. The best Trek show runners I think at least consult with scientists. My spin on Treknology might veer into the "magical elves did it" territory more than the best Trek shows have done, fair warning.</i>)

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===<u>A Note on Quantum Technology</u>===
Replicators, Transporters, Warp Drive, and quite a lot of Borg tech involves quantum physics principles that the best scientists of 2450 have barely scratched the surface of understanding. The best engineers have been able to make these technologies <i>work</i> reliably well - and that's not the same as understanding them.

These technologies often violate what would seem to be fundamental laws of a Newtonian universe. 2450's brightest minds are still in pursuit of the evidence necessary to prove that the entire universe is a single quantum object that obeys quantum physics "rules" at all scales of interaction. That proof have been elusive.

In many ways, these technologies could be deemed para-causal technologies*, that is, they violate both common sense and rigorous Newtonian and even quantum mechanical definitions of causality.

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===<u>Replicators</u>===
Given enough of the right kinds of raw materials, replicators can produce just about any non-living material, or manufactured good. Replicators are not alchemy - they cannot turn one fundamental element of matter into another (no proverbial lead into gold). The largest industrial replicators can easily make most large construction projects (up to and including building a Starship or Starbase) go very quickly.

Replicator's require a set of quantum computing circuits and quantum meta-materials to work properly. These required components represent less than 10% of the overall mass of a replicator. This is important, because of the things a replicator can <b>NOT</b> replicate under any circumstances:

*Any quantum circuitry, quantum materials, or catomic (matter comprised of claytronic atoms) material.
*Living matter, without first scanning and copying an original's quantum biosignature, the process of doing so destroys the original (c.f. transporters)

The implication here is that a Replicator can print most, but not all, of the components required to build a Replicator, a Transporter, or a Warp Drive (and much technology used by the Borg). A bit of "by hand" manufacturing with the right exotic materials and specialized tools and methods is required, as is the final assembly.

One other note, the food and drinks produced by a replicator, contrary to popular portrayals, can only ever be "ok" - reaching the level of middling college cafeteria food at best. Replicator produced food and drink is edible and potable, and provides nourishment. Few would claim to "enjoy" replicator food (though tastes do vary). For any high quality dining and drinking, cooking the old fashioned way is still best.

Replicators come in classes, that roughly equate to the types of things they are capable of producing, again, given enough raw materials.
*Class 1 Replicators are for personal, civilian use (producing things a person might use/consume)
*Class 2 Replicators are for communal civilian use (producing things that, when assembled, could be of use to a small community)
*Class 3 Replicators are for large scale, civilian, terrestrial construction projects
*Class 4 Replicators are for personal, Alliance Starfleet use (all of what class 1 can do plus, components for a phaser, for instance)
*Class 5 Replicators are for Alliance Starfleet Starship scale uses (components and replacement parts for ships scale 5 and smaller)
*Class 6 Replicators are for Alliance Starfleet Capital Starship scale uses (components and replacement parts for ships scale 6 & 7)
*Class 7 Replicators are for Alliance Starfleet Starbase scale uses
*Class 8 Replicators are for Alliance Starfleet major construction projects (think replicating the components required to build a Starship construction shipyard)

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===<u>Transporters</u>===
Transporters are a dangerous technology. There are a ton of built in safeguards, at the software and hardware levels, to prevent their misuse. This technology is so dangerous, that any society that develops it almost immediately signs up to all the myriad "non weaponization of transporter technology" treaties that exist. 

Transporting a living being requires a comprehensive scan of a living being's quantum biosignature - that's the information that allows a Transporter to reassemble a living being after beaming it to the destination. The quantum biosignature is the most critical data stored in a transporters pattern buffer.

Storing a quantum biosignature over time spans longer than a few moments requires a lot of engineering know-how, and a substantial dedicated power source.

Creating a duplicate living being whole-cloth from a stored transporter pattern, despite the records of it happening a couple of times, is not possible <i>on purpose</i>. Some of the best scientific minds have tried. 99.99999999999999999% of the time, such attempts have ended up in grisly, body-horror inducing style disasters. It. Just. Is. NOT. Done.

The reason finicky transporter work is often done by more seasoned personnel is two fold - they have the experience, and they have the command authority to disable some of the built in safe guards to do things the transporter systems says are unsafe. Without these overrides, the transporter system's default is: "There's no interfering radiation, the target and destination aren't moving, we're at very close range, everyone involved has had their morning coffee, so sure, you can energize."

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===<u>Warp Drive</u>===
Analogies only go so far - keep that in mind.

By analogy, traveling at warp speeds is the equivalent of traveling underwater, relative to the "on the surface of the water" that traveling at impulse speeds represents.

"Regular" warp speeds represent a fairly "shallow" depth into subspace.

"Slipstream" or "Transwarp" speeds represent the next broad depth into subspace. Traveling at this depth renders a ships sensors incapable of "seeing" anything in normal space. The sensors <i>can</i> sense things happening in the "regular" warp speed depth.

"Underspace", "conduits", et.al. speeds represent the deepest currently understood depth into subspace. How these exist, whey they exist, are all unanswered questions. They produce routes through subspace. While traveling in one of these "structures", ships sensors can user sensors on what's happening in the corridor their in, and can use sensors on corresponding normal space.

There's been and handful of other anomalous FTL travel noted (e.g. The Guardian of Forever, Q Continuum) that aren't well understood, or easy to replicate.

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===<u>The Borg</u>===
All Borg technology, even nano technology, has the following "rules" baked in at a core level (think of it as firmware rules, really hard to change):
*Connect to the collective for survival
*Survive via diversity
*Diversify via assimilation

Up until the events of 2401, every bit of Borg technology would constantly, consistently, attempt to reach out and join any other nearby Borg technology / part of the collective. It took the Alliance a couple of years to notice, but by 2410, it was clear that the drive to connect has simply <b>stopped</b>, in all gathered Borg technology. No assessment of gathered Borg artifacts has proven why or how this happened.

Borg technology is built up from, and based on, deeply nested and interconnected quantum, self-editing, self-replicating, neural networks. The barely understood "programing language" underpinning this is a <i>quantum language</i>. It requires powerful, dedicated, purpose built computers to translate and work with. As it turns out, multitronic computers are up to this task.
  
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<u><b>Useful Links</u></b><br />
[https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/sta-development-a-more-perfect-union.911776/ Recruitment Thread] | [https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/sta-a-more-perfect-union.911904/ OOC Thread] | [https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/sta-a-more-perfect-union.911947/ IC Thread] | [https://wiki.rpg.net/index.php/STA_A_More_Perfect_Union/Game_State Current Game State] | [https://wiki.rpg.net/index.php/STA_A_More_Perfect_Union Game Wiki] | [https://wiki.rpg.net/index.php/STA_A_More_Perfect_Union#Game_Expectations Game Expectations] | [https://wiki.rpg.net/index.php/STA_A_More_Perfect_Union#Mission_Brief Mission Brief] | [https://wiki.rpg.net/index.php/STA_A_More_Perfect_Union#Player_Character Player Characters] | [https://wiki.rpg.net/index.php/STA_A_More_Perfect_Union#Players.27_Ships Players' Ships] | [https://wiki.rpg.net/index.php/STA_A_More_Perfect_Union#Trek_Cannon_.26_Game_Timeline Trek Cannon & Game Timeline] | [https://wiki.rpg.net/index.php/STA_A_More_Perfect_Union#The_Borg%3A_Unanswered_Questions The Borg: Unanswered Questions] | [https://wiki.rpg.net/index.php/STA_A_More_Perfect_Union#Technology_.28Treknology.29 Technology] | [https://sta.bcholmes.org/index.html STA 2d20 Online Character Generator] | [https://www.hillschmidt.de/gbr/sternenzeit.htm Stardate Calculator]

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