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| William T. Riker | |
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Gender: |
Male |
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Species: |
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Homeworld: |
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Birth: |
April 15, 2335 |
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Affiliation: |
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| Career | |
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Occupation: |
First officer (2363) |
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Posting: |
USS Potemkin (2363) |
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Rank: |
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Status: |
Active |
| Family | |
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Father: |
Kyle Riker |
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Mother: |
Betty Riker |
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Marital Status: |
Widower |
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Spouse(s): |
Deanna Troi (until 2403) |
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Children: |
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- For additional meanings of "William T. Riker", please see William T. Riker (disambiguation).
William T. Riker is a reputed Starfleet officer, who was widely known for his role as executive officer of the Excelsior-class USS Hood, the Galaxy-class Battleship USS Enterprise-D and the Sovereign-class Battleship USS Enterprise-E and likewise became famous for commanding the Luna-class USS Titan.
Childhood[]
Will Riker was born to Kyle and Betty Riker on August 19, 2335 at Valdez, Alaska, on Earth.
Starfleet Academy[]
Riker entered Starfleet Academy on 2353. After winning admission to the Academy, Riker began acquiring this lifelong reputation for unorthodox solutions when, during a simulation, he figured out a Tholian ship's sensor blind spot for use as a hiding place. Riker finished eighth in his graduating class on 2357.
The Pegasus Incident[]
As an ensign on his first assignment, Riker had served with now-Admiral Pressman on the test ship USS Pegasus and proved pivotal in defending his commanding officer against a rare Starfleet mutiny before they and only a handful of others escaped, shortly after the ship's destruction during a test project. Only in 2370 was Pressman's renegade cloaking experiment unmasked, and Riker was detained briefly for complicity but cleared.
Early Starfleet career[]
Later stationed on Betazed, his mission there ended in 2362 with a posting that would launch a rapid rise in his career. Sent to the USS Potemkin in 2362 as a Lieutenant, he proved unorthodox again in avoiding a confrontation by hanging over a planet's magnetic pole to confuse an opposing ship's sensors. Only six weeks after coming aboard, though, he barely escaped from Nervala IV, where his rescue of crewmates led to a promotion and a switch from operations to command division, where he eventually became executive officer of the USS Hood under Captain Robert DeSoto. During this stay he was offered his first command on the light cruiser USS Drake, but turned it down.
USS Enterprise-D[]
On 2364, he was promoted to the rank of Commander and picked "sight unseen" from among 50 candidates by Captain Jean-Luc Picard as his executive officer on the new Galaxy-class starship USS Enterprise-D; in fact, the two had not met until he signed aboard at Farpoint Station, after he was dropped off by the USS Hood.
In 2366, Riker and Lieutenant Matthew MacTavish beamed down to the unexplored planet Tuari VII for a scouting mission. Unfortunately, MacTavish and Riker were beamed down to the wrong location, a mountain peak. The peak was not strong enough to support both men and they both fell down the side of the mountain. Fortunately, a ledge broke their fall. Riker was seriously injured from the fall, but MacTavish saved his life by wrapping a tourniquet made from his uniform around Riker's wound. The two were beamed back up to the Enterprise and Riker made a full recovery.
Riker grew so satisfied with his assignment under Picard, who quickly dubbed him "Number One" according to old Terran naval parlance, that he twice turned down two more commands of his own: once to the frontier scout ship USS Aries in 2365, and again to the ill-fated USS Melbourne a year later, although he temporarily had a field promotion to captain during the Borg crisis of 2366-2367 during Picard's abduction. Ironically, he likely would have died on the Melbourne during the Borg massacre at Wolf 359 and would not have been present to play a major role during the Enterprise’s last-ditch attack.
Knowledgeable on legal issues, he was pressed into presenting Starfleet's case against Data's independence at Starbase 173 in 2365 and, two years later, defended Crewman Tarses and then even Picard before Admiral Nora Satie's inquiry in 2367. He was the first human to serve aboard a Federation-Klingon exchange program in 2365, where he showed a keen knowledge of their culture and became one of the few to obtain Picard's "surrender."
He had been given temporary command of the USS Excalibur in Picard's blockading fleet against Romulan involvement in the Klingon civil war of 2367-2368, but Vice admiral Alynna Nechayev passed over him by placing Captain Edward Jellico in command during Picard's abduction by the Cardassians in 2369. Their budding disagreements led to Riker being temporarily relieved of duty until he was called back by Jellico for Cardassian negotiations.
Riker's latter tour years on the Galaxy-class Enterprise-D were filled with more surprises. Aside from being drugged and made nearly insane by the Tilonians, captured and nearly killed by the xenophobic Malcorians on a first contact recon gone bad, abducted by solanagen-based aliens, and revealed for his role in the Pegasus incident, he discovered a duplicate of himself created in a transporter fluke from the Nervala IV mission. Ironically, the two clashed in temperament, with the "found" Riker finding his own restless career on the USS Gandhi before resigning to join the Maquis rebels and his subsequent capture by Cardassians in a botched theft of the USS Defiant from Deep Space 9.
USS Enterprise E[]
Riker, meanwhile, again gave no thought to his own command and joined the rest of the senior staff and crew aboard the new Sovereign-class USS Enterprise-E in 2372, under the presumption that Picard would be given command over the ship.
Riker strenuously objected when Starfleet gave command of the Enterprise-E to Captain Morgan Bateson, but did his duty as assigned.
Bateson soon stepped aside in favor of Picard after losing command of the ship to a group of Klingons, led by his old nemesis Kozara, and Picard was able to re-take the ship from them.
Though the incident has been classified, Riker also got the satisfaction of having joined chief engineer Geordi LaForge in the cockpit of Zefram Cochrane's warp test vehicle, the Phoenix, during efforts to repair temporal damage caused by Borg invaders in 2373.
Riker and Deanna Troi finally resumed their romantic relationship in 2375 after feeling the rejuvenating effects of the metaphasic radiation inherent to the adopted homeworld of the Ba'ku. While in temporary charge of the Enterprise-E, an armed conflict with the Son'a in the Briar Patch gave birth to the Riker Maneuver, a strategy he used in beating the enemy ship.
In late 2375, Riker was given temporary command of the Ambassador-class Starship USS Excalibur (which he had commanded briefly during the Klingon civil war of 2366-2367) when that ship's captain, Mackenzie Calhoun was on a temporary assignment for Starfleet Intelligence. Riker commanded the Excalibur and her unorthodox crew through an encounter with Sela and the Romulans.
In late 2378, Riker was forced to take command of the Enterprise-E after Picard's competence was called into question after an incident at the Rashanar Battle Site that resulted in the destruction of the USS Juno, with all hands, and the seeming destruction of an Ontailian vessel. Picard was soon cleared of all charges, and he re-assumed command of the Enterprise-E.
After the death of Riker's father on the planet Delta Sigma IV with so much between them still unresolved, he decided that his relationship with Troi was not something that he wanted to go unresolved any longer. Will proposed marriage to Troi, and she accepted.
Soon after, he was offered the command of the Luna-class USS Titan by Rear admiral (lower grade) Kathryn Janeway. Janeway reminded Riker that Starfleet had offered him his own command more than once, and warned him that this may be the last time. Riker accepted the offer soon after his ordeal at the hands of the madman from Tezwa, Kinchawn a few weeks later.
After seeing the Enterprise-E survive a grueling inspection tour, William Riker and Deanna Troi were married in a ceremony in Riker's native Alaska.
The Enterprise-E was on her way to Betazed for the wedding ceremony being planned by Deanna's mother Lwaxana, when the ship had its fateful encounter with the mad Reman Praetor, Shinzon.
USS Titan[]
In 2379, Riker was finally promoted to the rank of Captain, after having served as executive officer aboard the USS Enterprise-D and E under Captain Jean-Luc Picard. He was given command of the new Luna-class Starship USS Titan and had established a sterling record in the six years that he was in command of the ship.
Starfleet Command[]
In 2398 Riker, now a four-star admiral, was appointed to Starfleet Command. Three years later he was promoted to fleet admiral, and in 2404 President Aennik Okeg appointed him as Commander-in-Chief of the Federation Starfleet, replacing the retiring Fleet Admiral Sitak.
Starfleet Performance Evaluation[]
Riker is an accomplished tactician, inventing several strategies while serving aboard various starships. USS Enterprise-E second officer Data once estimated that Riker uses traditional tactics only 21% of the time.
Although Riker has displayed a well-rounded personality and temperament throughout his rising command career, his mother's death when he was only 2 helped foster an acrimonious 15-year separation from his father at age 15, when he left home. Riker's knack for improvisation runs throughout his hobbies and interests as well.
A master poker player and bluffer, he had learned the game during his brief stint on the USS Potemkin; his reputation won him the role as replacement Federation negotiator during the short-lived Barzan wormhole talks. He has also visited Quark's bar and casino on DS9, where in its first year of operation under Starfleet-Bajoran administration he was the only person to win a triple-down dabo.
He can play keyboards, but his favorite musical instrument is the trombone. He especially loves jazz and has played for numerous shipboard functions and concerts; he displays it in his quarters - having loaned his old boyhood instrument to his doppelganger, Tom Riker - and also displays a Risian horga'hn Picard once brought him, as well as a fishing reel.
Under Dr. Beverly Crusher's tutelage, his acting talents have increased greatly since "Something for Breakfast" in 2369 until his riveting "Frame of Mind" performance only weeks later. Cooking is another hobby, thanks to the necessity of a father who hated to do it, and his language skills include basic Ferengi as well as Klingon. Generally, he claims to be inept at organizing his time off and - predictably - prefers to let events happen unplanned.
Riker has a strong libido and - aside from encounters made in the line of duty, such as on Angel I and Tilonia IV - has fostered several romantic relationships, including the enhanced holo-woman Minuet, the doomed assassin Yuta and colonizer Carmen Davila, and Soren of the normally androgynous J'naii, for whom he risked court-martial over Prime Directive charges. His encounters nearly cost him a murder sentence on Tanuga IV and, after a Risian resort visit, the Ktarian takeover of Starfleet through a mind-control device. Additionally, he and then Ensign Ro Laren engaged in a love/hate working relationship, especially exposed during a memory blanking incident in 2368, and he offered to speak in her behalf when she was presumed dead later that year.
Despite his nominally robust outlook, Riker has been prone to short bouts of self-doubt regarding his perceived complacency toward ambition each time he debated and turned down his own ship command. His imposing physical presence has been an unintended impediment to effective communication with some in his command, especially junior officers, and he has taken steps to deal with it.
Riker generally enjoys good health. Athletically, he still enjoys Parrises Squares, despite medical warnings; he also trains for the Klingon bat'leth with sticks and studies in Worf's mok'bara classes. While he does not care for equine events he does indulge mountain climbing and fishing holo-programs, having grown up in the great outdoors of Earth's Alaska.
External Links[]
- William T. Riker article at Memory Alpha, the canon Star Trek wiki.
- William T. Riker article at Memory Beta, the non-canon Star Trek wiki.
- William T. Riker article at Star Trek Expanded Universe.