Vexx wrote:
Lol.
Anyway, no offense to anyone, but this has just become a bunch of die-hard Warsies sweeping down into the trek-only forum to keep the Empire safe in vs debates by trying to bash down any evidence that they're wrong.
I'm a Trekkie and a "Warsie." And a B5 fan, too, though I'd object to the term "Fiver," which I traditionally associate with people who, in their own words, "support" B5 technical issues in a manner w/ which I'm not comfortable doing myself.
The Galactic Empire is so far beyond 99.9999_% of Trek that I actually feel a bit sorry for the UFP...if only a
little. I'm only too quick to argue with someone who feels that the Star Trek V torpedo is indicative of their greatest firepower. I
want Starfleet to get a fair shake when it comes to assessing their weapons (as do the vast majority of the other "rabid Warsies" here, you'll find).
However, it all comes down to what I perceive as the truth. I see big turbolasers as hundreds of gigatons/shot weapons and more. I see photon torpedoes as, at best, 1-2 megatons--and even that I have trouble with because it's not readily supported by the preponderance of evidence.
If acknowledging that renders me an exclusive Warsie, so be it
I said several times there were low-kiloton and even less than 1 kiloton torpedo explosions, not that every torpedo is more massive than anything ever concieved.
You might have, indeed (I don't have the time right now to verify this, which I usually do no matter who I'm talking to. I'll take your word for it).
However, you were also asserting something along these lines:
Tsar Bomba is a 50 megaton device, built by Cold War-era Soviets.
The Federation is far more advanced than the CW Soviets.
Therefore, the Federation routinely fields ship-to-ship warheads that could exceed that yield.
That's a non sequitur. It simply doesn't follow that Starfleet ships must have multi-megaton torpedoes because they're more advanced.
I agree, next to the USSR, Starfleet's technology is a Humvee next to a bike, maybe a bike with training wheels.
But we're talking about a GIANT nuclear weapon built for a
single test--a weapon that's certainly not capable of being launched from a spaceship, let alone able to track a target travelling at hundreds of gees or do the other things that photorps do.
Photorps can't simply be scaled up for the occassion; the launchers can't allow a 2m-wide torpedo to go through a .7m-wide tube.
And the warhead can only be so big given limits in magnetic containment technology, not to forget the very important fact that the torpedo IS more than just a warhead: it contains guidance systems, gear to sustain a warp field when fired therefrom, mass-lightening equipment, some kind of tiny shield generator ("Half a Life"), and a propulsion unit.
As such, you can't just indiscriminately cram a bunch of antimatter in there for a bigger bang.
These limitations make it impossible for even the more advanced photon torpedoes to equal the yield of a huge but "crude" nuclear weapon. More advanced doesn't mean "more powerful," even if that advancement is staggering.
Apparently, we're both wrong:
"The largest nuclear weapon ever produced was the Soviet thermonuclear Tsar Bomba ("King of Bombs"), which had an estimated yield of 100 megatons (100Mt--equal to one hundred million tons of TNT). The explosive force of this bomb would have been approximately 6,500 times the 15-16 kiloton bomb detonated at Hiroshima. A scaled-down 50Mt version of Tsar Bomba was tested in September 1961, in the largest man-made explosion to date." -
www.bullatomsci.org
Tsar Bomba was
planned as a 100 megaton device. The actual test itself was "only" 50 MT.
The 100 megaton bomb was designed and built, but never fired. Instead, the Soviet union decided to develop 50 megaton versions. It's not surprising. The 100 megaton bomb would have been useless militarily.
See above.
Also, you might look for a stronger analogy in Treknology. A bomb of that size is about the ultimate WOMAD by today's standards. Photon torpedoes are capable of planetary bombardment, but their primary role is anti-ship.
A better analogy would be the Cardassian Interceptor "Dreadnought," an automated missile with a low gigaton-range warhead. Among 24th century technologies, IT is considered a WOMAD.
One time frame was, IIRC, 45 minutes. TDiC had a timeframe (despite all the attempts to claim that the figure in TDiC were "lies", and not only that, pretty meaningless lies, I will continue to believe that a fleet that size is capable of that level of destruction in said time limits.)
I and numerous others have already addressed the reasons why "The Die Is Cast" is worthless insofar as determining photorp yields.
As far as the timeframes go, I covered this as well: "Computer analysis indicates that the planet's crust will be destroyed within one hour; and the mantle, within five."
Anyway, since people decided to bring up the whole vs thing I'd just like to say one thing. Warsies worship the calculations of the Hoth asteroids to determin HTL power despite the evidence that points to the contrary throughout the films.
Huh?
Those turbolasers
weren't the heavy guns--and that's the understatement of the century. Their lower-limit output was somewhere around 3,000 to 4k terajoules (a megaton is 4,180 TJ).
But what evidence to the contrary were you thinking of?
Yet, planetary-wide destruction is mentioned many times as quite capable by ST ships from TOS to Voyager and they're all written off as "lies", "bluffs", etc, SOME excuse as to why it's not possible.
Yes and no.
Sometimes these things might be somewhat exaggerated. It depends on the individual circumstances.
Now, I agree that a starship could inflict planet-wide destruction given a little time..."The Die Is Cast" DOES demonstrate that.
Regarding bombardments, however, what you seem to be missing is:
A--Their weapons needn't be insanely powerful to "bomb a civilization back to the stone age" (kiloton-ranged torpedoes WOULD suffice);
B--This is accomplished by torpedo AND phaser weapons. Phasers are NOT direct-energy transfer weapons.
Therefore, to conclude that planet-wide destruction is solely attributable to "raw firepower" is incorrect. In light of the meticulous analyses of phaser effects available today, anyone who says phasers are direct energy transfer weapons is delusional, blind or both.
Even "The visual effects of those explosions do not support those yield figures", even though I never saw a HTL make a 300 gigaton explosion.
In space?
You wouldn't. You're context-dropping again. Effects in an atmosphere are totally different than what you'll see in space.
This isn't to forget the fact that you've never actually
seen a heavy turbolaser fire. (Some have IDed HTL fire in "ROTJ" but I won't complicate matters by discussing that.)
As such, what information do you have that contradicts the 200 gigaton-plus HTL yield? You
must see the thing's effects to conclude they're indicative of any yield, "low" or "high".
Anyway, I digress.
Let's get back to
"The visual effects of those explosions do not support those yield figures":
That's right.
When we see an atmospheric disturbance in "TDIC" or "Skin of Evil," but we do NOT see a giant fireball, the effects
do not support a megaton-plus explosion.
It can't get any simpler than that. A megaton-class explosion will glow VERY brightly for over a minute. For whatever reason, those explosions do not. End of story.
In the case of "TDIC," I posit some kind of subspace weapons were used. "SoE" involves a DET weapon, but the effects aren't at all consistent with even a single megaton explosion.