What the heck is a Highway Node?

[Shaper Mechanist]

Reading reviews and looking at screenshots, I keep seeing something called a Highway Node.

What the heck are they and what are they doing in a Star Trek game?

Are they the ST:I version of Stellaris wormholes? Gateways?


Waiting for version 1.1 (the bugfix) before I buy the game...

 

[Ausir]

I think they're Borg transwarp conduits, and the more you use them, the closer the Borg crisis becomes.

 

[TehJumpingJawa]

Weren't they a concept originally devised by the Trekkie fan base to explain away numerous plot holes created early in TNG (or maybe even TOS), where disparate locations were reached impossibly quickly? and later canonised into official lore.

 

[Calvax]

Weren't they a concept originally devised by the Trekkie fan base to explain away numerous plot holes created early in TNG (or maybe even TOS), where disparate locations were reached impossibly quickly? and later canonised into official lore.

I’m a huge Trekkie and to my knowledge no, nothing like this has been canonised. There was some early non-official sources that introduced the idea that certain routes were faster due to subspace factors (IIRC called the Cochrane variable) but never in the shows.

There are subspace/transwarp conduits that allow for transwarp travel along set routes but that’s different to regular warp.

 

[Workiwork]

they tell you what it is in game the first time you discover one. something about less friction and faster travel along those lines because of space mumbo jumbo (i like star trek space mumbo jumbo so its fine). to be honest it does fit into star trek as much as other stuff. it is only weird because it is new and not from canon.

 

[fabsh]

This seems to be a direct holdover from the original Stellaris FTA implementation. I do not understand why these things weren't renamed "trans-warp conduits", though.

In a related note, some in-game text on a warp-related discovery told me that "light isn't the fastest thing in the universe anymore". I did a Picard facepalm at this. Light is the fastest thing in the universe. This goes for the Star Trek universe, too. That's why the warp drive bends space time. It's a version of an Alcubierre drive.

 

[gammasfor]

So I did double take on this and had to look up if Warp Highways are a thing. So its largely a fan concept to explain the series "speed of plot" tendency but there are two major works that reference them which is "Star Trek: Star Charts" - which was an attempt to map out the Star Trek galaxy, and "Star Trek: Pendragon" - which was a fan novel.

 

[Pattywinks]

I seem to remember something mentioned about special highway-like routes (subspace something-or-other) mentioned in Enterprise that allow for faster speeds, giving access to more distant areas.

 

[Calvax]

I seem to remember something mentioned about special highway-like routes (subspace something-or-other) mentioned in Enterprise that allow for faster speeds, giving access to more distant areas.

Those were subspace vortexes, but IIRC they could only be generated from inside the expanse. Once the sphere builders were defeated space in the expanse returned to normal which got rid of the hazardous anomalies (yay!) but meant vortexes couldn't be mad (boo!).

There are various examples of subspace conduits in other episodes of the franchise, natural or otherwise. In the Voyager episode Dragon's Teeth the crew discovers a network of decaying conduits that local powers fight over.

 

[Pattywinks]

No, that's not what I'm thinking of. There was something mentioned by T'Pol in season one, referencing special paths produced by subspace technobabble that Vulcans had mapped and were referenced in the Vulcan starcharts. I swear I remember this, but I don't really want to watch Enterprise to find it. lol

 

[Calvax]

I recently rewatched Enterprise and don't remember anything like that. The closest subspace technobabble to the first season is when they periodically drop subspace amplifiers to be able to maintain communication with Earth.

 

[Pattywinks]

I recently rewatched Enterprise and don't remember anything like that. The closest subspace technobabble to the first season is when they periodically drop subspace amplifiers to be able to maintain communication with Earth.

I'm probably misremembering. Wouldn't be the first time!

 

[SAS]

They should just rename them subspace conduits.

 

[Calvax]

They should just rename them subspace conduits.

Agreed. Would be good if using them was a mid game tech too. Early game there’s no need to travel so far and having them open up later would help differentiate the stages of the game.

 

[Pattywinks]

Agreed. Would be good if using them was a mid game tech too. Early game there’s no need to travel so far and having them open up later would help differentiate the stages of the game.

I like the idea of making them subspace conduits, and it would have been better had they been introduced in a Borg DLC. Otherwise, they'd be fine if they were a bit shorter and if the map was larger and each faction was as large as they are in canon.