• Light/Dark
  • Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.

Being transporter tech has to be one of the most chill jobs on a Star Trek ship

Slayven

Slayven

Never read a comic in his life
Moderator
Oct 25, 2017
93,051
The enterprise d has 4 personal transporters(also 2 backups in engineering, 4 low rez cargo transporters and 4 emergency evac ones) that have to be staffed at all times. You probably not doing anything 95% of the time, but that 5 percent is probably stressful as fuck.

They could at least let them have chairs
 
Meauxse

Meauxse

Member
Oct 25, 2017
4,238
New Orleans, LA
Cue the comic

CYIN2sw.jpg


Chief O'Brien At Work - Imgur
 
Cross-Section

Cross-Section

Member
Oct 27, 2017
6,873
I imagine you just spend a lot of time double-checking the heisenburg compensators and other components

and their backups

and their backups' backups

gotta love that starfleet redundancy
 
BlackGoku03

BlackGoku03

Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,272
Until you got to modify some shit in half the time it's normally take. And you have lives in your hands... it'd be nerve wrecking for me.
 
butalala

butalala

Member
Nov 24, 2017
5,267
You'd get PTSD from that time you accidentally turned someone inside out like that scene from The Motion Picture or Galaxy Quest.

Edit: Real ones know that those Chief O'Brien comics are a horrible portrayal of the best Star Trek character. The real Chief would be too busy playing cello, racquetball or whitewater rafting to mope around like that.
 
Mr_Antimatter

Mr_Antimatter

Member
Oct 28, 2017
2,571
Always figured they were doing some maintenance or site to site transportation of stuff around the ship when not beaming people to another ship or planet or such.
 
Kmonk

Kmonk

#TeamThierry
Member
Oct 30, 2017
3,689
US
Slayven said:
The enterprise d has 4 personal transporters(also 2 backups in engineering, 4 low rez cargo transporters and 4 emergency evac ones) that have to be staffed at all times. You probably not doing anything 95% of the time, but that 5 percent is probably stressful as fuck.

They could at least let them have chairs
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...


It sounds terrible. Like 90% of the chaos on Star Trek is caused by issues with the transporters. And captains are always expecting you to perform miracles, like recovering crew members during electrical storms, or beaming them through miles of ore-rich rock- real high-stress stuff.

When you're not at the transporter, I assume you get all the shit jobs in engineering. When we're not seeing O'Brien at his post, he's probably scrubbing out miles of Jeffries tubes.
 
Salmonax

Salmonax

Member
Oct 27, 2017
2,088
One has to be impressed that Colm Meaney parlayed such a modest role into such a powerhouse on DS9. And then he does Hard Time and it's like, damn.
 
OP
OP
Slayven

Slayven

Never read a comic in his life
Moderator
Oct 25, 2017
93,051
Salmonax said:
One has to be impressed that Colm Meaney parlayed such a modest role into such a powerhouse on DS9. And then he does Hard Time and it's like, damn.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Could say the same about Micheal Dorn, he spent years getting punked on TNG, then ends up running the klingon empire at the end of DS9
 
Mandos

Mandos

Member
Nov 27, 2017
30,891
butalala said:
You'd get PTSD from that time you accidentally turned someone inside out like that scene from The Motion Picture or Galaxy Quest.

Edit: Real ones know that those Chief O'Brien comics are a horrible portrayal of the best Star Trek character. The real Chief would be too busy playing cello, racquetball or whitewater rafting to mope around like that.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Pop-O-Matic said:
Yeah, after all the shit he went through on DS9, the endless boredom of being Transporter Chief is the kind of stuff he should be looking back on as "the good ol' days".
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Pretty sure DS9 makes it obvious he was doing all that stuff on the enterprise too, just that in a properly functioning ship regular maintenance is boring as heck and doesn't get as much focus
 
hordak

hordak

Member
Oct 31, 2017
2,533
Anaheim, CA
couldn't they just ask the computer to do it?

also why do they beam to the transporter room and then walk to the bridge? to save power?
 
CommodoreKong

CommodoreKong

Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,697
I would guess in many situations there's only 1 or 2 transporters staffed at a time, especially like when the ship is at warp and there's nothing around them for lightyears. They're probably just shut down in those situations assuming they can be quickly turned back on in an emergency.
 
Fathead

Fathead

Member
Oct 31, 2017
777
butalala said:
You'd get PTSD from that time you accidentally turned someone inside out like that scene from The Motion Picture or Galaxy Quest.

Edit: Real ones know that those Chief O'Brien comics are a horrible portrayal of the best Star Trek character. The real Chief would be too busy playing cello, racquetball or whitewater rafting to mope around like that.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Except O'Brien literally says he stood in the transporter room for hours hoping something would break when talking about his life on the Enterprise in an episode of DS9.
 
deimosmasque

deimosmasque

Ugly, Queer, Gender-Fluid, Drive-In Mutant, yes?
Moderator
Apr 22, 2018
14,183
Tampa, Fl
hordak said:
couldn't they just ask the computer to do it?

also why do they beam to the transporter room and then walk to the bridge? to save power?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
It used to be that site-to-site transport was dangerous and could end up with you reappearing in the floor, or the wall. The Transporter room is designed safer transport.
 
butalala

butalala

Member
Nov 24, 2017
5,267
Fathead said:
Except O'Brien literally says he stood in the transporter room for hours hoping something would break when talking about his life on the Enterprise in an episode of DS9.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

And yet we also see him playing cello in a concert at 10 Forward, visiting sickbay because he dislocated his shoulder in the holodeck kayaking (not rafting, my bad), we see him joining the poker games, he gets married and he has a child. The fact is that Miles O'Brien had a rich, full life on the Enterprise and on DS9. I imagine he only said what you quote him as saying to ease the mind of someone who feared that he regretted leaving the Enterprise.
 
Billfisto

Billfisto

Member
Oct 30, 2017
14,929
Canada
hordak said:
couldn't they just ask the computer to do it?

also why do they beam to the transporter room and then walk to the bridge? to save power?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

I think they once said it takes more energy, yeah. Point to point isn't really point to point, but instead point to teleporter to point. Scooping them right off the platform instead saves a bit of shuttling their pattern around, I guess.

Plus it's a more controlled environment with hardware specific to teleporting right there.

I want to see a Star Trek future where they have teleporting so perfected that they're doing stuff like just teleporting their clothes on and off, or just telporting the waste directly out of their intestines.
 
Billfisto

Billfisto

Member
Oct 30, 2017
14,929
Canada
butalala said:
And yet we also see him playing cello in a concert at 10 Forward, visiting sickbay because he dislocated his shoulder in the holodeck kayaking (not rafting, my bad), we see him joining the poker games, he gets married and he has a child. The fact is that Miles O'Brien had a rich, full life on the Enterprise and on DS9. I imagine he only said what you quote him as saying to ease the mind of someone who feared that he regretted leaving the Enterprise.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

It's possible to have a satisfying personal and social life while still being absolutely bored to tears at work.
 
Pop-O-Matic

Pop-O-Matic

Avenger
Oct 25, 2017
12,864
butalala said:
And yet we also see him playing cello in a concert at 10 Forward, visiting sickbay because he dislocated his shoulder in the holodeck kayaking (not rafting, my bad), we see him joining the poker games, he gets married and he has a child. The fact is that Miles O'Brien had a rich, full life on the Enterprise and on DS9. I imagine he only said what you quote him as saying to ease the mind of someone who feared that he regretted leaving the Enterprise.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Just because he had a fun and fulfilling life during his off-hours doesn't mean that his 9-5 couldn't be soul-crushingly boring.
 
Wag

Wag

Member
Nov 3, 2017
11,638
realmoffear3.jpg


Every so often something like this happens...

When things go wrong with the transporters, they really go wrong.
 
T002 Tyrant

T002 Tyrant

Member
Nov 8, 2018
8,951
Imagine the pressure on performing an emergency beam out while moving at high speed in an area with lots of interference.
 
Pluto

Pluto

Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,433
Slayven said:
Could say the same about Micheal Dorn, he spent years getting punked on TNG, then ends up running the klingon empire at the end of DS9
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
That didn't happen, he became the federation's ambassador to the Klingon empire but by Nemesis he was back in starfleet doing the same old job on the Enterprise.
 
hordak

hordak

Member
Oct 31, 2017
2,533
Anaheim, CA
Billfisto said:
I want to see a Star Trek future where they have teleporting so perfected that they're doing stuff like just teleporting their clothes on and off, or just telporting the waste directly out of their intestines.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
or just teleport their enemies 20 feet below the surface. This wouldn't work in space battles because of shields but if officers are in a shootout somewhere, just beam them out. or beam the bad guys into the space. Yet this never fucking happensssss.
 
vivftp

vivftp

Member
Oct 29, 2017
19,754
Transporter operators are probably busy running diagnostics, watching Youtube and playing Returnal.
 
Lonewolf

Lonewolf

Attempted to circumvent ban with alt account
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
3,900
Oregon
Kmonk said:
It sounds terrible. Like 90% of the chaos on Star Trek is caused by issues with the transporters. And captains are always expecting you to perform miracles, like recovering crew members during electrical storms, or beaming them through miles of ore-rich rock- real high-stress stuff.

When you're not at the transporter, I assume you get all the shit jobs in engineering. When we're not seeing O'Brien at his post, he's probably scrubbing out miles of Jeffries tubes.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

This was my thought as well. Those stations don't need to be manned 100% of the time and probably have O'brien and a handful of staff that are scheduled as needed. O'Brien and some staff under him probably respond to the personal and emergency transporter rooms during yellow/red alerts, but otherwise we probably have Data future E-mailing LaForge from Ops that the Enterprise is to take on cargo during it's scheduled stop at Risa so have O'brien schedule a couple of junior techs to man the transporters and help the Quartermaster during this specific block of time.
 
The Real Abed

The Real Abed

Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,722
Pennsylvania
I always wondered what it's like "programming" a Holodeck program. You always hear about some character who created a game or a simulation or something but you never see them making it. The most you get is when characters go into an empty Holodeck and tell the computer to give them some furniture or tool from the database and the computer just knows what to give even though there's gotta be hundreds of variations in existence. I wonder if there's two ways of making Holo programs. One that is WYSIWYG where you verbally tell the computer what you want and where you want it -- Kind of like a Unity or Unreal engine for Holodecks -- and another that's more in-depth with code. Because surely there's gotta be a way to write all the scripting for these programs. Like look at Data's Sherlock program. Someone had to program how Moriarty acts. How all the other NPCs act. Someone had to go into every building and furnish it. That shit has to be super fun to do. But it's gotta be so time consuming. It's a wonder any of the crew could have enough free time to design Holo novels like that. Is there a Holo-Asset Store for downloading custom user made pieces to put in your programs? There must be.

Remember that the Voyager crew created Fairhaven out of nowhere. There must have been an olde_tavern.map in the database with a bunch of furniture and stuff and some pre-made NPCs complete with accents.

Quark must have people he hired specifically to program and maintain all of his sex suite programs. I wonder how much gold-pressed latinum you get paid for that.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.