Icon from a picrew by grgikau. Call me Tir or Julian. 37. He/They. Queer. Twitter: @tirlaeyn. ao3: tirlaeyn. 18+ Only. Star Trek. Sandman. IwtV. OMFD. Definitionless in this Strict Atmosphere.
Star Trek matte paintings, by Syd Dutton. Romulus; the First City of the Klingon Empire; Ocampa Underground City; Cardassia Prime; and Gagarin IV. All except the third one (Voyager) are from TNG/DS9. (Matte paintings were often re-used across the different series.)
You’re right Dukat just lays down in his old office on a yoga looking Mat because he was waiting for Sisko and got cold
You know this is fascinating bc I never really thought about the fact that Cardassians are most comfortable in low light warmth, which is an odd combination. It suggests the Cardassian homeworld is very warm, but low light for some reason. A thick insulating atmosphere a la Venice, or maybe their Sun is some odd type that emits a lot of radiation while being visibly dim. Or, another option, Cardassians are nocturnal. Mmm…
This is brilliant
Some kind of Uv light could possibly work
If I remembering the star charts book correctly, their sun is larger and cooler than ours. Now “cooler” in this sense means “cooler than other stars” - which translates primarily into light (electromagnetic) emissions primarily at longer wavelengths. Also according to star charts book, the Cardassian sun has a higher luminosity - i.e. emits more electromagnetic/light energy - than Earth’s sun.
This means that the Cardassian sun is sending out a lot more light, but at longer wavelengths.
Longer wavelengths in terms of the Cardassian sun would mean a lot of light in infrared, red and orange ranges, and less light in the blue-violet-UV range than Earth’s sun.
Infrared light or radiation is not visible to humans, but we do experience it - this is the energy from the sun (and from a fire, or a stove, etc) we experience as heat.
Therefore, I think it likely that the environment on Cardassia has red-shifted light, compared to Earth, possibly lower visible light intensity than Earth, and is likely much warmer, as more of their stars energy is being emitted as infrared radiation.
A Cardassian probably would enjoy a heat lamp exactly like Earth reptiles bc these lamps are emitting mostly infrared and red light - it would make a Cardassian feel like they were at a day at the beach.
Canonically, the Cardassian sauna has both reddish light and heated rocks, so I think the heat mats idea is great too.
UV light would probably not be preferable, as Cardassians would not be adapted to high UV.
One element I haven’t really seen utilised in post canon Cardassia stories is extreme climate change. Like, if we’re supposing a lot of dust got kicked up in the air and blocked out the sun (even if not totally), well that’s a recipe for cooling–mass plant and animal die offs, ice ages. If we’re supposing that with all the fires from the Dominion bombardment, a lot of carbon, methane, etc got released into the air, then things might heat up, and sudden and more powerful weather would become more common. Does Cardassia have an ozone to protect them from radiation? Disruption to that would fuck things up. The specifics are anyone’s game but ultimately, Cardassia’s weather is probably going to be pretty fucked for a while.
