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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Umbran" data-source="post: 305212" data-attributes="member: 177">Actually, in The Doomsday Weapon, the only assistance Captain Decker lent was to suicide in such a manner that inspired Kirk.  "The Squire of Gothos" shows the classic tactic of the weaker hero - when in doubt, stall for time using your wits, eventually a solution will present itself.  Similarly with Adonais, with the addition that the ship was not equal in power.  The god was essentially a lich - more powerful than the PCs, but with one weakness, that could only be exploited through use of courage and wit.  Simple use of power would not have been sufficient.Who needs them to be "ringing successes"?  Against the Borg, mere survival is supposed to be a ringing success.  Yes, often there's a price to be paid - Wolf 359 and in First Contact, lives are lost.  Even Homeric heros sometimes lose compartiots and crew.Um, except for the fact that that "largest fleet in history" was insufficient to the task.  If you'll think back, you'll remember that said fleet was getting pasted - the Shadow War wasn't won by force of arms, but by having the wit to notice what the actual conflict was, and having the courage to tell both the Shadows and Vorlons to shove off.Actually, the battle against Earth forces is won specifcally without Minbari (or any alien) help.  Before the final confrontation, Sheriden sends the aliens to the rear.  If you think Bester and Psi Corps weren't a threat, you don't understand them very well.  Allies?  Yeah, right.  We always brainwash our allies friends and use them to capture allied leaders!  And, in season 5, being president doesn't seem to protect Sheriden's organization from threat of Byron's telepaths.Yep.  That's the staple tactic again - delay until youcan find the enemy's weakness.  Of course the weak hero doesn't take the full force of his enemy.  If that happens, the hero dies and you don't have much of a show.  Instead, the hero delays, uses wit and courage to hold on until the right solution is found, grits his teeth and does it.Actually, generally in Voyager the justification is there, but it isn't a good one, or it is poorly presented.  That's exactly my point.  The problem isn't the situations themselves, as virtually every other sci-fi show has similar situations. The problem is how they are presented.  Nobody minds that the Suire of Gothos was beaten by deus ex machina.  The episode is fun.  In B5, nobody minds that the actual conflict is inanely simplistic (and the Vorlons and Shadows both end up looking like spoiled children) - the writers spend entire seasons building up the story and final justifications.  We accept the implausible because it is well done implausibility. We can willfully suspend our disbelief if it is done with good art and craft.  This was not the case on Voyager.</blockquote>

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