So, that, and the general geek goodness of having Dorn work on a third Trek series, should have made the team behind Discovery work a bit harder to keep him interested.
Now, I know Michael Dorn isn’t as big a name, in general, as Patrick Stewart has become since his time on Star Trek: The Next Generation, but it sounds like the producers of Discovery were barely willing to pay the man for his time and the basic Star Trek history love his presence on the show would have imparted.
But, ultimately, if the money simply wasn’t in the budget (whether that was because they didn’t want to spend it or his casting would have legitimately put other aspects of production at risk) then it’s hard to argue with that.
Obviously, having not been privy to the talks that took place, we can’t say how big a role Dorn would have had on the show, but since rumors were pointing toward him playing an ancestor of his famous character, it seems to make sense that he would have been at least a recurring player.