Have they? I'm not saying that's not true, but Klingons having had FTL travel for much longer than humans isn't Trek lore I'm personally familiar with.
Star Trek Picard SPOILERS thread
- Thread starter MarkB
- Start date
In Enterprise, when Archer first runs into them, they are a centuries-old warrior culture known as raiders.
In Discovery, Vulcan had contact with Klingons and skirmished enough to develop the "Vulcan hello" (i.e. shoot on sight) as a tradition.
Klingons have had an empire since about 900 AD when Kahless united the various factions.
As an aside, the Vulcan hello seems like it would be a stupid response to develop to deal with a combat-revering warrior race. Wouldn't they take that as a challenge and a worthy enemy?
Hmm. Well if that’s the case then yeah, they should be over a thousand years ahead of the Federation.
Vulcan starflight is even older. The schism and exodus from Vulcan that led to the founding of Romulan civilization happened somewhere around 300 - 500 AD. And some species didn't develop warp drive on their own, despite being old civilizations otherwise on par with the other starfaring species, ie the Ferengi had to buy warp technology.
Mustrum_Ridcully
Legend
Well, we know they asked the Federation for help, so I conclude that they did not have the ships.They had ships, but not enough.
I am not entirely sure the figure of 900 Million people is how many they had in total on the planet, or is how many they couldn't evacuate on their own.
A thing to keep in mind about the Romulan Star Empire is that they rely heavily on cloaked ships. Their individual ships don't seem weaker than the ships Starfleet has, so if they were equal-sized in fleet, there is absolutely no reason why they shouldn't be able to steamroll them, because with cloak, they can decide to only engage at weak spots and their target must spread its resources to be ready for attacks at any spot in their space.
But they never even try, they always use rely on subterfuge.
And in Yesterday's Enterprise alternate timeline, we see that they were overrun by the Klingons - decades after the Praxis incident, which put the Klingon Empire in a weakened state, so weak that they needed peace, and even an alliance, with the Federation to manage.
So my take is - the Romulan Empire doesn't have a huge fleet at its disposal, at least not compared to the Federation or the Klingon Empire. They use cloak to only strike when they see a huge opportunity open up. They cannot afford a prolonged war, however, because they can't defend their Empire once an enemy goes really on the offensive and is willing to sacrifice some worlds.
Their strategy works for them most of the time.. But when it comes to evacuating a planet, it's not about tactics or strategy, it's about raw numbers.
But it's not just the humans that's catching up to everyone. It's the Federation. I think the humans are maybe the magic glue that makes the Federation work, and the result is multiple races working together. It allowed them the Federation to overcome challenges that had stumped individual races for centuries or millenia, but once you mix the different viewpoints and approaches of the different species, you can overcome more problems than ever. When your Vulcan gets stuck on his logic, a Tellarite's temperament might make him take a seemingly illogical step and find an unexpected solution, but the Tellarite might just get too frustrated with a very complex and involved math problem that he has to really think through from all the angles and requires an incredible amount of other math problems to be discovered, where a Vulcan logic and patience might allow him to go systematically through it all.
At least that's my take.
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MarkB
Legend
That, and you've got dozens of different species that have all developed advanced technologies independently, probably taking quite different routes to get there, and they all get to share their scientific insights with each other relatively freely. That's bound to result in some unusual synergies, and probably significantly faster advances than more singular cultures.
Ryujin
Legend
Have you seen "Prelude to Axanar"? In it Richard Hatch, playing the Klingon Commander Karn, has a rather nice line about fighting The Federation during the Four Years War. "One never knew who you were fighting and knowing one's enemy is the first rule of war."
Hussar
Legend
Again, sure, I can see it, kind of. Except that you've got things like the Klingons, who have the resources of hundreds of worlds - including numerous vassal races - for a thousand years before the humans first moon shot.
Yet, Klingon ships are significantly less advanced than human ships. Note, sure, the Enterprise is a Federation ship, but, it was built by humans. None of the other federation races had empires even remotely the size of what the Klingons controlled.
So on and so forth. It's so ingrained into the basis of the show that it's almost never questioned - of course humans are just as advanced as everyone else. We're obviously smarter, more creative, and better than everyone else, so, of course we're on the top of the heap.
It's an attitude that you find in genre fiction all the time. It's such a part of genre fiction that it doesn't get questioned, it's just assumed to be true.
Yet, Klingon ships are significantly less advanced than human ships. Note, sure, the Enterprise is a Federation ship, but, it was built by humans. None of the other federation races had empires even remotely the size of what the Klingons controlled.
So on and so forth. It's so ingrained into the basis of the show that it's almost never questioned - of course humans are just as advanced as everyone else. We're obviously smarter, more creative, and better than everyone else, so, of course we're on the top of the heap.
It's an attitude that you find in genre fiction all the time. It's such a part of genre fiction that it doesn't get questioned, it's just assumed to be true.
Khelon Testudo
Cleric of Stronmaus
I think a founding assumption of Star Trek is that treating others as equals rather than vassals is going to invite synergies you wouldn't otherwise get.
