Star Trek Ships vs. Stargate Ships

[Tetsujin]

You have to provide evidence that the planets in question are anything other than earth-sized. Gravity even twice earth norm would make us feel twice as heavy (naturally) and you wouldn't easily disguise that. It's also not unreasonable to assume that they composed of similar materials to earth, since all rocky planets share similar compositions (just look at our own solar system).

HAHAHAHA. Why would I have to provide evidence on something that you are using for the basis of your argument. You are basing your assumption on the planet being earth sized yet have no proof of such. So your argument is speculative at best because you have no comparative evidence. Im pretty sure you can disguise 2G while wearing a bulky space suit and walking. I myself have carried almost 1.5x, which is over 2G, my own body weight walking and looked fairly normal. I wouldn’t have been able to run normally because of where the weight was located and it restricting the freedom of movement but walking isn’t that difficult when the weight isn’t messing with your center of gravity. Also I am fairly fit and we are talking about trained military personnel and Teal'c so they should be able to make it look easier than I would. Rocky planets share similar composition but not the same amounts nor do they all have the same mass. Mars has 15% of the volume of Earth yet only has 10% of the mass. Which means that while composed of similar elements Earth is more dense which means has a higher relative gravity. This logical can be applied to all "rocky planets" and would give you varying mass, volume, density, and thus gravitational force. Again you have no evidence to support the size of the planet nor its mass so how can you even come to the conclusion that it is Earth sized when it could potentially be larger than earth but have lower gravity or smaller than earth and have higher.

I have also shown several sources for my arguments, including two different types of evidence, visuals and dialogue- you are the one who is relying on unsupported dialogue to form your argument, which no scientist would do.

You are using visuals and dialogue from the same episode. Which counts as single instance. No scientist would use a single instance to come to a conclusion. What a scientist would do it use a wealth of information to draw a conclusion which 4 is not. The scientific method would not allow the use of only 4 instances when you have hundreds to draw from. I am drawing from the hundreds and you from 4 and somehow I am not being scientific? The dialogue is only unsupported in your eyes, and is still canon information regardless.

Has it not occured to you that Hataks could have been upgraded over time? Even the shape changed somewhat between Season 1 and Season 10, and we know from Season 1 that they had improved their hyperdrives, so why not weapons as well?

It has occurred to me of course, but is never stated thus is speculative. Regardless of if they upgraded their hyperdrives or not has no bearing on weapons upgrades and if they did or did not happen. Also hyperdrives on most species work of precise and efficient manipulation of hyperspace to travel. Only the Asgard and Lantean city ships have shown a more brute force method that requires radical amounts of energy rather than efficiency. To support this I bring forth cases of the Goa'uld ships firing and having shields raised immediately after exiting hyperspace, and Thor stating that Asgard ships can not raise shields or use weapons for a small period after exiting hyperspace because the hyperdrive uses too much power. In the case of the city ships it was stated that they only still travel faster than Asgard hyperdrives because they are designed to use the vast amounts of power the ZPM can give, referring to a even more brute force method increasing speed compared to current Asgard hyperdrives.

First up, you are asking me to prove a negative. I cannot prove that no fancy mechanism was in place in 'Survivors', but in the absence of evidence, why assume there was one? The onus is on you to provide proof that such a mechanism was in place. The same goes for the Breen attack. Prove they did not use standard weapons in that attack.

I am stating that there is no proof that there wasn’t one or was one, but evidence from hundreds of other episodes suggests that a Galaxy class vessels shields can take more punishment than that. Also the Breen attack is also moot because you have no evidence at all to support what happened or didn’t and are only assuming to strengthen your case. I could easily also assume that despite a Breen attack while using 64Mt weapons SF's defense of San Francisco was so effective only minor damage was done. See how that works. Neither of us have evidence in this case so it should bee dropped.

Secondly, 'plot device' is not an argument I am willing to entertain. It is a dodge, in a bid to not even tackle the examples properly, so please stop with it. It won't get you anywhere.

Plot device is a dodge, but it is necessary when all previous and following evidence doesn’t not support that instance. If it was real life it would be different, yet it still would be a debatable anomaly and not standard, but its a sci-fi show where each episode has a different director and writer so visual effects and quoted numbers will be different. Regardless of whether or not you are willing to entertain it, when it is obvious and doesn’t fit with data from hundreds of other sources(episodes) what can you logically say to it but that? In a universe that has many inconstant effects and numbers each individual number can not be taken as law and only the average should be used in practice of debate. So your 4 instances weighed against 150+ episodes per series is not even remotely close to average hence why I deem them plot devices and why no matter how much you analyze those 4 instances they will never have the weight to counter even a single ST series worth of evidence, let alone 4.

[Tetsujin]

It's funny how this same problem crops up in just about every sci-fi series.

Dialog and misc other supporting material says X yield, usually megatonish or higher, then on screen visuals habitually show fireworks being exchanged at spitting distances.

I think the only show that ever successfully stomped this out was Andromeda, which despite its awfulness in literally every other category, did have the forethought to create a tech website and just tell fans to ignore every SFX shot in favor of what was written there instead.

Personally I tend to weigh the actual episode dialog the highest in these situations, because I figure that's closer to the actual plot at hand than a farmed-out FX shot or tech manual.

You can use anything though as long as you're fair to both sides. IE you don't say "my tech manual says I have megatons where as your VFX shots show fireworks so I win" cause chances are your VFX shots show fireworks too, and his tech manual probably says megatons...

A lot of these match ups change pretty drastically depending on what weight you assign to the dialog, vfx and tech manuals.

I agree. That is basically what all sci-fi shows need to do because some people like to take visuals literally and ignore dialogue even though dialogue normally reflects what the show means better than visuals. Although both have weight using one lone instance to verify power there is irrational an can only be used to suit the person who brought it up. I would say an average of visuals, dialogue, and tech manuals gives you a pretty decent understanding of a shows capacity because they all tend to get at least some of it right some of the time.

[darth_timon]

Again what you believe to be visually accurate doesnt change the fact that the weapons release said amount of energy. I repeat, if you have not seen an M/AM explosion and do not know what form of energy the photon torpedoes are geared to release who are you to say what it is supposed to look like. Also all you seem to give is visual evidence which is not supported by dialogue. If it was 1 or two instances of dialogue I would agree with you. However, there is so much dialogue supporting my figure that it cant possibly be writer error or actors saying incorrect figures so whether the explosion pleases you aesthetically changes nothing.

I have already provided two dialogue examples of low firepower- Survivors and Pegasus. You've even commented on these examples, yet you then accuse me of having not provided any. I will provide the quote from Survivors again:

(The Husnock warship returns and approaches to within 5 km again)

PICARD: Lieutenant Worf, open a hailing frequency. Warn the vessel to stay clear of the planet.

WORF: Aye, sir. But they are already within firing range.

(The Husnock ship fires)

WORF: Shields down! Captain, they hit us with four hundred gigawatts of particle energy!

PICARD: Damage?

WORF: Superficial -- but I am having trouble reassembling the shields!

(The Husnock ship fires again)

WORF: Shields down! There is thermal damage to the hull!

There, dialogue for you.

Then, we have visuals: http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/The_Cha..._%28episode%29

Since you are the one suggesting other mechanisms in place in both episodes, it's up to you to prove it. Basically, put up or shut up, to put it bluntly.

Umm I have given you evidence of how ludicrously small an amount of antimatter you would need to use to get even a 1kt explosion. So it is illogical for you to assume that a vessel carrying hundreds of tons of it would only use such a small amount in a military weapon. Also I use that example because of stated yields of weapons and weapons fire hitting the ground and doing no damage when the entire area should have been vaporized. No one is copping out of anything, you are justifying all cases with visuals only and throwing logical thinking out of the window. When you see a ship fire a shot that is damaging to shields, and then fire a shot at the surface of a planet and make the same explosion as a claymore, something has been changed to suit the plot. This is logical thinking, because if it was only that powerful they wouldn't need shields at all and would just rely on the alloys of the hull which are strong enough to withstand such explosions. Also again I would like to point out that you are relying on visual evidence almost solely on a sci-fi show. The shows visuals are based almost entirely on artistic liscence, which includes weapons effects. Also I again will ask you to give me reference to an antimatter explosion so you can help me understand where you are referencing how they should look or are you just basing it off of nuclear explosions which arent the same?

You are again relying on 'plot device' as an argument. I should point out that dialogue is also subject to artistic licence and is clearly not consistent with itself, even within a single episode (see my earlier example regarding TDIC). If we are to follow the scientific method, then we must look at visuals with suspension of disbelief and treat the events as real. We don't have the luxury of saying 'plot device' when studying real phenomena, and to reach an impartial result when comparing two sci-fi shows, we must compare them on the same, neutral basis.

That means, when we see an explosion on the show, we cannot write it off just because it doesn't give us the answer we want. In the absence of other data, we cannot assume additional mechanisms are involved, and the principle of Occam's Razor tells us that the method with the fewest mechanisms to achieve a particular outcome is the preferred one. As for what a M/AM explosion would look like- think about it logically. M/AM reactions release energy. The greater the reactants, the bigger the reaction, and therefore the more energy released. Scientists already know that the reaction is quite a violent one. You need only research anti-matter on Google to reveal this.

With large quantities of energy will come vaporisation, heat and shockwaves. I would imagine this is not an unreasonable case.

"Changing Face of Evil" is conclusive in no way. Again, I am stating what could have happened because I am assuming nothing since this battle was not seen on screen nor was it discussed in detail. So assuming anything and claiming it is conclusive proves an illogical though process. I will not argue a plot device because there is nothing to argue besides this reference being useless without supporting facts, which you do not have. Again when you can tell the facts of the battle such as how many breen ships there were, how long did the battle last, what did SF do to respond, was shielding employed over San Francisco, or anything at all you can not use this as a reference. I am shocked that you even attempted to use this and call it conclusive when you have 0 facts about this battle other than the Breen did it and there is some minor damage to the city.

If there was not a shield, then Breen weapons would have struck the surface unencumbered and thus would have released the full fury of their firepower, and if there was a shield, for there to be explosive damage to the surface (as we saw) then said shield must have failed. You point out that damage can sometimes 'bleed through' shields, which is true, but we never see explosive damage until shields have failed. Even if one Breen ship was able to land a single direct hit on San Franciso, with the yields you insist are accurate, San Franciso should have been toast.

Again, you are the only one assuming anything. I rationally have concluded that I can not logically conclude anything on a situation that I know nothing about. For all you know that minor damage could have been cause by the Breen ships wrekage impacting when they were shot down. You dont know, I dont know, so this reference has no merrit.

A very small possibility.

More accurately these yields have not been demonstrated to your satisfaction. They have been demonstrated, they have been referenced my dialogue, they have been referenced by real world physics, and they have been reference by non-canon material. That is evidence to refute you personal opinion on the weapons capabilites. Yes, I say personal opinion because you have little evidence to support your argument other than ambiguous visuals, therefore your argument is based and driven mostly by opinion.

Your yields have not been seen on screen. All you have is dialogue, whereas I have both visuals and dialogue. I can in later posts you claim 'hundreds' of episodes support your claims, which to be honest, is an outright lie, as is your claim to have visual evidence. 'Pegasus' and 'Survivors' provide dialogue-driven evidence, giving clear numbers, whilst 'CFOE' and 'First Contact' provide clear visual evidence. What part of this is not understood?


[/quote]Once again you point out your undying use of only suspect visuals. I dont need to put forth any more visual evidence than I have. I dont need to put forth any more dialogue evidence than I have, which is not third party since its from a charater in the show who is not affected by special effect constraints. I all honesty, in most cases dialogue carries more weight than visuals especially multiple instances of the same dialogue. In the real world, yes direct observation is prefferable, but this is a sci-fi show where direct observation easily leads you astray. Direct observation is only viable when you can trust your eyes and or instrument taking the visual data, and any scientist would tell you that. You have no visual evidence supported by dialogue, only visual. You have evidence of a Breen "attack" the word can mean many things and is never clarified visually or otherwise as to what exactly caused the damage and you cannot prove it. I have multiple instances of ships taking photon torpedo fire, which is visual. I have large amounts of dialogue corroberating amounts of antimatter and yield. I have visual evidence of photon torpedoes effecs, which you refute because they dont LOOK like a nuclear explosion I guess they dont release enought thermal energy for your tastes. I have physics to support yields, which from your perspective physics is wrong because you refute the evidence. If you do not refute it, then explain to me why you would use .0001kg(.0002lb)of matter and intimatter which is still .5Kt when you carry hundreds of tons of antimatter. Even only using 1.5kg is perplexing but .0001kg is downright illogical and for you to not see that shows at least some bias. Thats like carrying a trunk full of gas and only putting a syringe full of it in your tank at a time. [/quote]

You have put forward no visual evidence and your claim that my visual evidence is not supported by dialogue is simply dishonest of you. I refer you to my above paragraph. Finally, you seem to be assuming that a M/AM reaction of 64MT would not be noticable as a destructive force in any way, despite scientists today acknowledging that it would be a violent release of energy! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antimat...ter_detonation

http://www.universetoday.com/39957/antimatter-bomb/

I trust I don't have to embarass you with further examples.

[/quote]This weapon has been time and time again been reffered to as more powerful than a phaser and phasers have been shown to drill great distances into planets on super low power settings burn through hull of ships that are made from a material stated to be 24 times harder than I diamond and have been shown to withstand super high temperatures like being near a star. They also have been visually shown to be capable of utterly destroying a large mountain 200 years before the phasers im talking about. So by your reasoning phasers are stronger than photon torpedoes which every source says its not true. A hand phaser on maximum settings has been shown on screen causing more damage than the shots you quoted that came from a ship in orbit.[/quote]

My reasoning is that you have nothing other than statements to support your point of view, whereas mine is supported by visuals AND dialogue.

So your faith in your position is mostly based on your belief that your are correct and not based on facts because you only bring up evidence than is the exeption rather than the rule.

I bring up two different types of evidence and have more than one example for both. You bring up nothing but dialogue. I know which is better.

[Tetsujin]

I have already provided two dialogue examples of low firepower- Survivors and Pegasus. You've even commented on these examples, yet you then accuse me of having not provided any. I will provide the quote from Survivors again:

(The Husnock warship returns and approaches to within 5 km again)

PICARD: Lieutenant Worf, open a hailing frequency. Warn the vessel to stay clear of the planet.

WORF: Aye, sir. But they are already within firing range.

(The Husnock ship fires)

WORF: Shields down! Captain, they hit us with four hundred gigawatts of particle energy!

PICARD: Damage?

WORF: Superficial -- but I am having trouble reassembling the shields!

(The Husnock ship fires again)

WORF: Shields down! There is thermal damage to the hull!

There, dialogue for you.

Very nice you quoted an anomaly. No show me how those numbers fit with the rest of the hundreds of episodes where kiloton yields are not even worth mentioning. You are trying to set a precedent from a single episode on a series with hundreds of instances that contradict that episode. You would have to bring up at least 100 instances that support that yield to even make a viable claim. I didnt even have to read all the lines to see there is an instance that makes it seem as though the weapon has shield disrupting capabilities. If it did not why was he having trouble reassembling the shields? Why would he even state this in a way that seems as though they should be able to bring them back up immediately. Also 400Gigawatts is ludicrously small compared to the power output of the ship and by extension the power they can put into the shield system.

Then, we have visuals: http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/The_Cha..._%28episode%29

Since you are the one suggesting other mechanisms in place in both episodes, it's up to you to prove it. Basically, put up or shut up, to put it bluntly.

I am not suggesting anything, you are. I merely stated it was possible given its the capital world of the entire federation.. Given that a planet like betazed has been stated on screen to have a planetary defense system I am just saying it would not be illogical for the backbone of the Federation to have on. In fact, it is your job to prove what happened since you are supposedly using it as evidence. So tell me what happened. Give me more details than “See look at that damage, must have been caused by the weak weapons I never saw used, fired from the ship(s) I never saw.” If you can give me ANYTHING more we can go forth, but since you keep reiterating “I dont know” in different ways I have come to the conclusion that you have no more facts regarding this incident and I kindly as you to drop the episode “Changing Face of Evil”. Or should we always summarily charge everyone near a dead body with murder even though no one saw anything and there is no evidence to prove anyone did anything.

You are again relying on 'plot device' as an argument. I should point out that dialogue is also subject to artistic licence and is clearly not consistent with itself, even within a single episode (see my earlier example regarding TDIC). If we are to follow the scientific method, then we must look at visuals with suspension of disbelief and treat the events as real. We don't have the luxury of saying 'plot device' when studying real phenomena, and to reach an impartial result when comparing two sci-fi shows, we must compare them on the same, neutral basis.

Yes, because the instances you have brought up are anomalies and “plot device” worthy. If you cease bringing up exceptions and start bringing up “rules” then the plot device comments will quickly vanish. Yes, dialogue is subject to artistic license, however having an actor say something is not under the same restraints as the special effects they have to pay for, and how they can do the special effects in a way to stay in line with the plot, and how they can do them in a way that people will relate to pertaining to the rest of the ST universes shown visuals. In a lot of cases dialogue is just more reliable when dealing with a sci-fi show since the person who writes the episode writes the script and has direct control of what they say while visuals can be up for grabs as long as they look nice and dont cost too much.

That means, when we see an explosion on the show, we cannot write it off just because it doesn't give us the answer we want. In the absence of other data, we cannot assume additional mechanisms are involved, and the principle of Occam's Razor tells us that the method with the fewest mechanisms to achieve a particular outcome is the preferred one. As for what a M/AM explosion would look like- think about it logically. M/AM reactions release energy. The greater the reactants, the bigger the reaction, and therefore the more energy released. Scientists already know that the reaction is quite a violent one. You need only research anti-matter on Google to reveal this.

With large quantities of energy will come vaporization, heat and shockwaves. I would imagine this is not an unreasonable case.

I am not writing it off because it did not give me what I wanted. I wrote it off because it does not meet the average energy levels given by the entire series. It has nothing to do with what I want or need. Also this principle is sound, unless you already have set occurrences that prove the simplest method(brute force) to be improbable therefore a more complicated method is most likely and logical. Yes it releases ENERGY. What form of energy is changeable. Violent on its own but ST races have already shown to be able to control the violent energy release of a M/AM reactor by virtue of having an efficient reactor built around the process.

Also since via the quote I used long ago that stated they dont want to make every action violent looking so they toned down visuals. Do you think somehow this would exclude the potentially most violent appearing weapon? Again you will probably dismiss this quote again, I mean its not like a producer can change how a show does special effects or anything right? They are in no way in a position of authority in most aspects of the show from fact checking to actual shooting and special effects. A producer stating clearly that they downplay the visual effects of ST weaponry in no way holds any merit because they can in no way enforce this statement and in fact would need to lie about such a thing. This actually being true is simply unfathomable and offensive and is merely an attempt for my own personal quest to prove how superior ST is to all things scifi. -_- Torpedoes are a minimum of 50+Mt deal with it, jeez.
At the very very very least can you admit that having a mainstay weapon with .0001kg of antimatter in it when you are carrying hundreds of tons of it wouldnt make sense?

[darth_timon]

I have made changes to my most recent reply, FYI

[Gatefan1976]

@ Darth_timon

If you want a visual reference to the destructve power of photon torpedos, I suggest you watch the end of "Unnatural Selection" (TNG) in which the Enterprise vaporizes a Miranda class ship (which is Approx 230 metres long) with one photon torpedo. Yes the ships shields are down, but to totally anihillate a ship of that size would require a significant amount of power wouldn't you agree?

[darth_timon]

@ Darth_timon

If you want a visual reference to the destructve power of photon torpedos, I suggest you watch the end of "Unnatural Selection" (TNG) in which the Enterprise vaporizes a Miranda class ship (which is Approx 230 metres long) with one photon torpedo. Yes the ships shields are down, but to totally anihillate a ship of that size would require a significant amount of power wouldn't you agree?

It's an interesting point but it doesn't proof significant firepower. Starships are not dense objects like asteroids and the warp core and/or impulse drive may have contributed to the explosion.

[Tetsujin]

It's an interesting point but it doesn't proof significant firepower. Starships are not dense objects like asteroids and the warp core and/or impulse drive may have contributed to the explosion.

You mean the warp core that contains the same antimatter used in a photon torpedo? Even if it did help in the explosion the annihilation of matter and antimatter would have been very inefficient since it is not meant to be all annihilated at once and could not mix with matter quickly before it all was forced away by the explosion. Also how dense the object is is relative. It may be solid but the starship is definitely made out of more resilient materials and has the structural integrity field to further reinforce those materials.

Also I am still waiting for you to respond to if you can agree that using less than .0001kg of antimatter in a ship to ship explosive device when you carry hundreds of tons of it would not make sense militarily.

[Tetsujin]

You are again relying on 'plot device' as an argument. I should point out that dialogue is also subject to artistic licence and is clearly not consistent with itself, even within a single episode (see my earlier example regarding TDIC). If we are to follow the scientific method, then we must look at visuals with suspension of disbelief and treat the events as real. We don't have the luxury of saying 'plot device' when studying real phenomena, and to reach an impartial result when comparing two sci-fi shows, we must compare them on the same, neutral basis.

Ok. To compare them on a neutral basis we have to use the average of special effects and dialogue. We can not look to special effects as real because seldom do special effects capture what is being reffered to in dialogue(Which came first). Also when you bring forth evidence that special effects are not as they should be portrayed such as with ST and Andromeda, you have to rely somewhat more on dialogue because special effects are known to be tweaked. Imagine that a scientist told you to do a simple experiment where the outcome has been the same in all previous tests. Then the scientists informs you that within the area you are performing the test will definitely change the outcome. You can not treat the changed outcome as the new standard because you have been told it would be different than what it would be under normal circumstances.

That means, when we see an explosion on the show, we cannot write it off just because it doesn't give us the answer we want. In the absence of other data, we cannot assume additional mechanisms are involved, and the principle of Occam's Razor tells us that the method with the fewest mechanisms to achieve a particular outcome is the preferred one. As for what a M/AM explosion would look like- think about it logically. M/AM reactions release energy. The greater the reactants, the bigger the reaction, and therefore the more energy released. Scientists already know that the reaction is quite a violent one. You need only research anti-matter on Google to reveal this.

In reality that means when we see an explosion and we are told that is not a realistic expression of the explosion, we know that is not what the explosion would actually look like and that we can not treat it as such. If there is an absense of data we can not come to a conlusion at all PERIOD. We can not assume something we have no knowledge of yet we can also not readily believe something that goes agains the grain so blatently either.

If there was not a shield, then Breen weapons would have struck the surface unencumbered and thus would have released the full fury of their firepower, and if there was a shield, for there to be explosive damage to the surface (as we saw) then said shield must have failed. You point out that damage can sometimes 'bleed through' shields, which is true, but we never see explosive damage until shields have failed. Even if one Breen ship was able to land a single direct hit on San Franciso, with the yields you insist are accurate, San Franciso should have been toast.

Exactly my point, had they landed a direct hit the entire city would have been toast. So ratinally they either did not land one. Which means something stopped them. Again we know that Earth would have at least a small fleet guarding it at all time. Some form of supplementary planetary defense is also likely such as shields or surface to air torpedo launchers and/or phasers which have been referenced in other places as being in existence. Also since there is no evivdence to prove what happened you can not say that the damage was due to a direct weapon hit or falling debris or anything. You have no proof of what happened therefore you are tweaking it to suit your argumnt. All I am saying is that neither one of us can say what happened because it was never shown or stated. All you know is aftermath, which is not enough to come to a definite conclusion of anything. Also, are you really saying that a starship being shot down and causing damage to the land below is only remotely possible? Planes cause damage when they crash so how is there only a small possibility of something larger and heavier causing damage?

Your yields have not been seen on screen. All you have is dialogue, whereas I have both visuals and dialogue. I can in later posts you claim 'hundreds' of episodes support your claims, which to be honest, is an outright lie, as is your claim to have visual evidence. 'Pegasus' and 'Survivors' provide dialogue-driven evidence, giving clear numbers, whilst 'CFOE' and 'First Contact' provide clear visual evidence. What part of this is not understood?

I dont understand the part where you dont understand that visual evidence that showcases the full potential of the weapons is not there because they havent made it. Is admission from a producer that they tone down visuals something that does not compute? Again you evidence supports low end inconsistancy and only that. Regardless of how much you quote anomolies as reference they are still only anomalies. Again thinking rationally, if the weapons were so incredibly weak why would they be used. Also if it is as easy as adding more antimatter to make them more powerful why wasnt it done. You evidence has little standing in the show and logical reasosning. "Hmm we have 400 Tons of antimatter on this ship, lets use less than .0002lb for our strongest standard armament and call it a day." It would make 0 sense. Even limiting yourself to 1.5kg make little sense. The fact that suggest they would use such a miniscule amount boggles the mind when you already should find the 1.5kg suspect.

You have put forward no visual evidence and your claim that my visual evidence is not supported by dialogue is simply dishonest of you. I refer you to my above paragraph. Finally, you seem to be assuming that a M/AM reaction of 64MT would not be noticable as a destructive force in any way, despite scientists today acknowledging that it would be a violent release of energy! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antimat...ter_detonation

http://www.universetoday.com/39957/antimatter-bomb/

I trust I don't have to embarass you with further examples.

When did I say it would produce no noticable destructive force in any way? Its embarrasing for me that you believe such a thing has been said by me and I dont appreciate you telling me I am assuming something when it is in nor way supported by what I ACUALLY said. You seem to have simplified being able to release different forms of energy with "not be noticable as a destructive force in any way". Had I said that, I am sure you would have quoted it, but surpriingly you did not. Interesting. Hence why using an amount that would be in line with you evidence would be so incredibly small it would be impractical do even design a weapon based on it since the cost of the mechanism would be astronomically more than the viable results. Which again points to your argument not making sense.

I will state again that we are dealing with people who use antimatter as a fuel source. So obviously they have been able, at least to a manageable degree. to tame and shape this violent reaction to their needs. Imagine you are a producer and are shown a ship to ship battle with dosens of these "violent reactions" going on screen at once. It would not be visually pleasing to watch and would take away from the ships themselves.

This weapon has been time and time again been reffered to as more powerful than a phaser and phasers have been shown to drill great distances into planets on super low power settings burn through hull of ships that are made from a material stated to be 24 times harder than I diamond and have been shown to withstand super high temperatures like being near a star. They also have been visually shown to be capable of utterly destroying a large mountain 200 years before the phasers im talking about. So by your reasoning phasers are stronger than photon torpedoes which every source says its not true. A hand phaser on maximum settings has been shown on screen causing more damage than the shots you quoted that came from a ship in orbit.

My reasoning is that you have nothing other than statements to support your point of view, whereas mine is supported by visuals AND dialogue.

So all things that they have blown up on screen is no evidence at all? Seing a phaser drill through kilometers of a planet in seconds, a volley of pulse phaser fire crack apart a asteroid, phaser fire level a mountain and after all this show of force countless evidence both visually and verbally confirm that photon torpedoes are more powerful means nothing?

I bring up two different types of evidence and have more than one example for both. You bring up nothing but dialogue. I know which is better.

You obviously do not in this case. You bring up dialogue and visuals yes, dialogue and visuals from a source that is irregular. Your evidence is like me using the instances of a ship being near unbeatable as standard. It was one time and not the norm so it has no weight in practice. I have given you real life words from someone who has at least partial control over what the show looks like and you still dont understand why I refuse to give visuals the upper hand over dialgue in this show. Your instances of evidence are nothing more that irregular instances driven by plot needs. If the borg ship would have hit anywhere near the settlement on the planet the ST universe as we know it wouldnt exist so they dumbed down the explosion to make it dramatic and so that the people on the surface had a chance especially since we have seen phasers cause similar destruction when on maximum settings. Not rational enough, how about this. The ship that attacked the Enterprise was CREATED by a near Q level entity. It was not a real ship from any species. He had the power to destroy an entire race with a thought, so does overpowering a starship through irregular means not within his power? Also all you have to go on in Worf's surprise. I can be construed that it was an incredibly powerful blast, but it also can be construed as frustration on how in the world a blast of such caliber could have taken down our shields

I looked on the internet an found this.

http://www.st-v-sw.net/STSWsurvfal.html

I had not even read this until now but it supports my argument on the episode "The Survivors" showing that even someone completely unconnected to this particular debate can see that episode can not be taken at face value.

[darth_timon]

HAHAHAHA. Why would I have to provide evidence on something that you are using for the basis of your argument. You are basing your assumption on the planet being earth sized yet have no proof of such. So your argument is speculative at best because you have no comparative evidence. Im pretty sure you can disguise 2G while wearing a bulky space suit and walking. I myself have carried almost 1.5x, which is over 2G, my own body weight walking and looked fairly normal. I wouldn’t have been able to run normally because of where the weight was located and it restricting the freedom of movement but walking isn’t that difficult when the weight isn’t messing with your center of gravity. Also I am fairly fit and we are talking about trained military personnel and Teal'c so they should be able to make it look easier than I would. Rocky planets share similar composition but not the same amounts nor do they all have the same mass. Mars has 15% of the volume of Earth yet only has 10% of the mass. Which means that while composed of similar elements Earth is more dense which means has a higher relative gravity. This logical can be applied to all "rocky planets" and would give you varying mass, volume, density, and thus gravitational force. Again you have no evidence to support the size of the planet nor its mass so how can you even come to the conclusion that it is Earth sized when it could potentially be larger than earth but have lower gravity or smaller than earth and have higher.

<Snipped by Moderator.Take the off site links /conversation to pm/e-mail with Tetsujin.>

You are using visuals and dialogue from the same episode. Which counts as single instance. No scientist would use a single instance to come to a conclusion. What a scientist would do it use a wealth of information to draw a conclusion which 4 is not. The scientific method would not allow the use of only 4 instances when you have hundreds to draw from. I am drawing from the hundreds and you from 4 and somehow I am not being scientific? The dialogue is only unsupported in your eyes, and is still canon information regardless.

I am drawing from Skin of Evil, Changing Face of Evil, and First Contact for visual information, and can even include Nemesis in that too (which is in fact four seperate visual examples. Ooh, in fact, include in that The Die is Cast (five visual examples). These visuals are backed up by two dialogue examples, Survivors and Pegasus. A grand total of seven different sources supporting my stance, whereas you allude to 'hundreds', but this is, as I said before, dishonest of you. You don't have hundreds of sources. You have unsubstantiated dialogue, whereas I have dialogue and visuals on my side.

It has occurred to me of course, but is never stated thus is speculative. Regardless of if they upgraded their hyperdrives or not has no bearing on weapons upgrades and if they did or did not happen. Also hyperdrives on most species work of precise and efficient manipulation of hyperspace to travel. Only the Asgard and Lantean city ships have shown a more brute force method that requires radical amounts of energy rather than efficiency. To support this I bring forth cases of the Goa'uld ships firing and having shields raised immediately after exiting hyperspace, and Thor stating that Asgard ships can not raise shields or use weapons for a small period after exiting hyperspace because the hyperdrive uses too much power. In the case of the city ships it was stated that they only still travel faster than Asgard hyperdrives because they are designed to use the vast amounts of power the ZPM can give, referring to a even more brute force method increasing speed compared to current Asgard hyperdrives.

Speculation yes, but not outside the realm of possibility. They upgraded shields against both the Asgard and the Tollans, so increased firepower cannot be ruled out (especially if Beach Head bears this out in the end).

I am stating that there is no proof that there wasn’t one or was one, but evidence from hundreds of other episodes suggests that a Galaxy class vessels shields can take more punishment than that. Also the Breen attack is also moot because you have no evidence at all to support what happened or didn’t and are only assuming to strengthen your case. I could easily also assume that despite a Breen attack while using 64Mt weapons SF's defense of San Francisco was so effective only minor damage was done. See how that works. Neither of us have evidence in this case so it should bee dropped.

Once again, you do not have hundreds of examples supporting your case. You are asking me to somehow prove a negative (i.e prove something did not occur, which in the absence of evidence for it is impossible), whereas the simplest answer is usually the correct one. Energy struck the shields of the Enterprise and those shields failed. Simple, supported by dialogue, and no unnecessary mechanisms are introduced. I note that in another post you cite st-v-sw as a source, but that site does not make use of the scientific method and his Survivors page relies on assumptions and speculation heavily. I suggest instead you look at http://www.stardestroyer.net- far more comprehensive and it follows the scientific method.

Plot device is a dodge, but it is necessary when all previous and following evidence doesn’t not support that instance. If it was real life it would be different, yet it still would be a debatable anomaly and not standard, but its a sci-fi show where each episode has a different director and writer so visual effects and quoted numbers will be different. Regardless of whether or not you are willing to entertain it, when it is obvious and doesn’t fit with data from hundreds of other sources(episodes) what can you logically say to it but that? In a universe that has many inconstant effects and numbers each individual number can not be taken as law and only the average should be used in practice of debate. So your 4 instances weighed against 150+ episodes per series is not even remotely close to average hence why I deem them plot devices and why no matter how much you analyze those 4 instances they will never have the weight to counter even a single ST series worth of evidence, let alone 4.

Since you do not have hundreds of examples, beyond vague allusions to how they exist and how they support your argument, it becomes a moot point about how much evidence we both have. Both visuals and dialogue support my position, and you only have unsupported dialogue to support yours. You rely on plot device because you have no alternative and you know it. To use that as an argument is to effectively concede defeat if we are applying suspension of disbelief.

[darth_timon]

Very nice you quoted an anomaly. No show me how those numbers fit with the rest of the hundreds of episodes where kiloton yields are not even worth mentioning. You are trying to set a precedent from a single episode on a series with hundreds of instances that contradict that episode. You would have to bring up at least 100 instances that support that yield to even make a viable claim. I didnt even have to read all the lines to see there is an instance that makes it seem as though the weapon has shield disrupting capabilities. If it did not why was he having trouble reassembling the shields? Why would he even state this in a way that seems as though they should be able to bring them back up immediately. Also 400Gigawatts is ludicrously small compared to the power output of the ship and by extension the power they can put into the shield system.

You appear to have arrived at the arbitrary figure of 100 episodes of evidence for a situation to be valid. Under that sort of process, we might as well argue that since we don't see Garak eat food in anything close to 100 episodes of DS9, he doesn't need to eat very often.

At what point will you realise that visuals supported by dialogue will trump unsupported dialogue every time? We have both visual evidence and verbal evidence of low firepower and Survivors fits neatly into this.'Resembling the shields' doesn't prove a fancy mechanism; its another way of saying 'restoring shields'. In short, I am still waiting to see proof there was a fancy mechanism in place.

I am not suggesting anything, you are. I merely stated it was possible given its the capital world of the entire federation.. Given that a planet like betazed has been stated on screen to have a planetary defense system I am just saying it would not be illogical for the backbone of the Federation to have on. In fact, it is your job to prove what happened since you are supposedly using it as evidence. So tell me what happened. Give me more details than “See look at that damage, must have been caused by the weak weapons I never saw used, fired from the ship(s) I never saw.” If you can give me ANYTHING more we can go forth, but since you keep reiterating “I dont know” in different ways I have come to the conclusion that you have no more facts regarding this incident and I kindly as you to drop the episode “Changing Face of Evil”. Or should we always summarily charge everyone near a dead body with murder even though no one saw anything and there is no evidence to prove anyone did anything.

In the absence of additional data it is unwise to draw definitive conclusions, but in this case my firepower argument works with or without hypothetical defences. We SEE damage to the city of San Francisco. We KNOW there was an attack by the Breen. We KNOW the possess firepower similar to Federation vessels. If even a single shot hits San Francisco with the power you claim, the city is fried. We KNOW the city DID take damage, as we can see it. We do NOT see anything resembling ship debris, making this sheer conjecture on your part (prove it if you can), so the logical source of that damage is weapons fire. PROVE it was some kind of other weapon, or debris.

Yes, because the instances you have brought up are anomalies and “plot device” worthy. If you cease bringing up exceptions and start bringing up “rules” then the plot device comments will quickly vanish. Yes, dialogue is subject to artistic license, however having an actor say something is not under the same restraints as the special effects they have to pay for, and how they can do the special effects in a way to stay in line with the plot, and how they can do them in a way that people will relate to pertaining to the rest of the ST universes shown visuals. In a lot of cases dialogue is just more reliable when dealing with a sci-fi show since the person who writes the episode writes the script and has direct control of what they say while visuals can be up for grabs as long as they look nice and dont cost too much.

You have no larger pool of evidence to support your stance than I do mine, but MY evidence is in the form of clear visuals and dialogue. You cite my evidence as the exception to the rule, but so far you have provided NO substantial evidence of your own. Dialogue is just as subject to artistic licence as visuals, and visuals are easier to examine.

I am not writing it off because it did not give me what I wanted. I wrote it off because it does not meet the average energy levels given by the entire series. It has nothing to do with what I want or need. Also this principle is sound, unless you already have set occurrences that prove the simplest method(brute force) to be improbable therefore a more complicated method is most likely and logical. Yes it releases ENERGY. What form of energy is changeable. Violent on its own but ST races have already shown to be able to control the violent energy release of a M/AM reactor by virtue of having an efficient reactor built around the process.

Also since via the quote I used long ago that stated they dont want to make every action violent looking so they toned down visuals. Do you think somehow this would exclude the potentially most violent appearing weapon? Again you will probably dismiss this quote again, I mean its not like a producer can change how a show does special effects or anything right? They are in no way in a position of authority in most aspects of the show from fact checking to actual shooting and special effects. A producer stating clearly that they downplay the visual effects of ST weaponry in no way holds any merit because they can in no way enforce this statement and in fact would need to lie about such a thing. This actually being true is simply unfathomable and offensive and is merely an attempt for my own personal quest to prove how superior ST is to all things scifi. -_- Torpedoes are a minimum of 50+Mt deal with it, jeez.

The energy levels you insist we go by are contradicted by every example of a military situation we see. The best answer you have to this is Ron Moore's quote. Fine if you're looking for out of context answers, but not acceptable if you're looking for a level way to analyse both sides equally.

[QuoteAt the very very very least can you admit that having a mainstay weapon with .0001kg of antimatter in it when you are carrying hundreds of tons of it wouldnt make sense?[/QUOTE]

It doesn't make sense, but it doesn't change what we see.

[Tetsujin]

<Snipped by Moderator.Take this to the other place or discuss it in pm or e-mail .Thanks ! >

I am drawing from Skin of Evil, Changing Face of Evil, and First Contact for visual information, and can even include Nemesis in that too (which is in fact four seperate visual examples. Ooh, in fact, include in that The Die is Cast (five visual examples). These visuals are backed up by two dialogue examples, Survivors and Pegasus. A grand total of seven different sources supporting my stance, whereas you allude to 'hundreds', but this is, as I said before, dishonest of you. You don't have hundreds of sources. You have unsubstantiated dialogue, whereas I have dialogue and visuals on my side.

What exactly are you referencing from "Skin of Evil" all I seem to recall is a phaser energy absorbing creature? "Changing Face of Evil" is meaningless to your argument because it is never shown or stated what happened so it can only end in speculation on both our parts. "First Contact" was an obvious plot element. How can the Borg be more advanced than the federation not be able to even be able to destroy a small settlement with multiple disruptor bolts which a ship from 200 years ago has been shown capable leveling a mountain with a single shot? This supposed simplest solution? This argument makes no sense at all and you are completely ignoring that it makes no sense other than to fulfill plot requirements. Relying fully on visuals and anomalies can not done if you are trying to obtain logical results. I am trying to keep SG yields to what they rationally should be and not unreasonably trying to weaken them to insulting proportions. It illogical to be suggesting that ST weapons arent even in the kt range. I completely moved away from the instances of Goa'uld or any other race for that matter visually attacking surface targets because I know that those explosions were going to be mostly plot driven when the main characters are involved but you can not do the same. I even allowed the use of 800GT as standard for the gatebuster when there is nothing concrete in universe to support that besides explosions on planets where we can not establish relative perspective and vague quotes such as “multi-gigaton”(which means anything from 2Gt on up if used in the most generic way possible) and “vaporize anything within 100 miles”. I am giving leeway since that yield is the most accurate real world estimation given the dialogue stated at a 100 mile vaporization radius and you cant even let 64Mt go by even when I have proof to back it up. Interesting.


How do you plan on using "Nemesis" and "Survivors"? Nemesis showed nothing irregular from my recollection and in "The Survivors" they were attacked by a ship created by an almost all powerful being so that can not be taken as a regular situation. So this leave you with having to explain yourself on two accounts with the rest being able to be disregarded for blatant reasons that you only ignore because it suits you. So explain to me what happened in "Skin of Evil" and "ST: Nemesis" that supports your argument.

I say hundreds because listing all The episodes that support my figures would be in the hundreds considering most episodes of all the series support the numbers. Here are a few references however.



"knock the com array off a shuttlepod without scratching the hull, or put a three-kilometer crater into an asteroid." - Malcolm Reed referring to a 200 year old weapon the photonic torpedo.

The warhead had a detonation chamber filled with antimatter. Upon detonation the torpedo created a matter-antimatter explosion. (Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Star Trek III: The Search for Spock; DS9: "Tribunal"; VOY: "Good Shepherd"; TNG: "The Loss")

A photon torpedo with a 25 isoton yield can destroy an entire city within seconds. (VOY: "Living Witness")

USS Voyager was equipped with type-6 photon torpedoes. They were not in use before Voyager was launched in 2371. Some of these torpedoes had a yield of 25 isotons. A class-6 warhead in this type of torpedo had the explosive yield of 200 isotons. These torpedoes had an effective range of approximately 8 million kilometers. The class-6 torpedoes are not capable of creating tears into subspace. (VOY: "Dreadnought", "Scorpion, Part II", "Living Witness", "Human Error", "The Voyager Conspiracy")

A class-10 torpedo could be armed with an even more powerful high yield warhead. (VOY: "Scorpion, Part II", "In the Flesh")

At 23% the shields of the Enterprise D resists solar flares(hundreds of millions of gigajoules) for hours while over time the flares intensity is growing. (TNG: "Relics")

High-yield torpedo explosion (http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/File:Borg_8472_warhead.jpg)

Photon being used as a warp flare denoting capability of intensity change and change of energy released.http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/File:Warp_flare.jpg)

Why would you use this complex of a delivery system and then load it out with a C4 yield. (http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/__...-_the_ship.jpg)

"The weapons are way too powerful to present them in any realistic kind of way. Given the real power of a hand phaser, we shouldn't be able to show ANY firefights on camera where the opponents are even in sight of each other, much less around the corner! It's annoying, but just one of those things that we tend to slide by in order to concentrate on telling a dramatic and interesting story." (AOL chat, 1997) - Ronald D. Moore on how powerful hand phasers are.

The 100 year old original enterprise when traveling back in time was completely unconcerned with the weapons of a 20th century interceptor and stating only nuclear weapons would have the capacity to "do some damage"("Tomorrow is Yesterday"[TOS1])

This is not a hundred pieces of evidence but I think its enough for you to comprehend my point.

Speculation yes, but not outside the realm of possibility. They upgraded shields against both the Asgard and the Tollans, so increased firepower cannot be ruled out (especially if Beach Head bears this out in the end)

.

I believe both instances of this were of using ancient technology to upgrade the shields and not the Goa'uld themselves as a whole advancing. Since these upgrades would have been limited to Anubis's ships (as he would not share upgrades with his enemies) they were not Goa'uld standard shields and it certainly possible despite only being speculation that the rest of the Goa'uld collective got a hold of or even comprehended any of the Lantean modifications Anubis made to his ships. This has also shown no offensive upgrades.

]Once again, you do not have hundreds of examples supporting your case. You are asking me to somehow prove a negative (i.e prove something did not occur, which in the absence of evidence for it is impossible), whereas the simplest answer is usually the correct one. Energy struck the shields of the Enterprise and those shields failed. Simple, supported by dialogue, and no unnecessary mechanisms are introduced. I note that in another post you cite st-v-sw as a source, but that site does not make use of the scientific method and his Survivors page relies on assumptions and speculation heavily. I suggest instead you look at http://www.stardestroyer.net- far more comprehensive and it follows the scientific method.

I am asking you to show me conclusive evidence that this amount of power has been shown to be able to completely defeat shielding on a vessel that size. I am stating that from other episodes where that amount of power (0.095 kiloton or 400GJ) equated to about nothing leads me to believe that shield disruption is one of the simplest answers. "Unnecessary" is a matter of opinion based on viewpoint. I find it necessary because there various instances that proves 0.095 kilotons is something to laugh at in the ST universe, not something that would somehow completely lower the shields but simultaneously cause only superficial damage to the hull after being struck again with shields still down. In all other cases of shields being taken down by brute force, they need to recharge and are not immediately and casually tried to be brought back up. In any other situation if something can overpower the shields in a single shot, it would have completely destroyed the ship with the next shot owing to the hull having nowhere near the resistance to ST weapons fire as the shields. I would like too add that say that near-omnipotent being should be at the top of the list on simplest answers dont you think?

[darth_timon]

SKin of Evil shows a torpedo impact the surface of the planet, and leave behind no visible damage to the surface. Nemesis, as I explained, shows a low-speed collision punch through shields which are at 70%. Changing Face of Evil is most likely the result of an attack from weapons fire and I have shown why it is not likely to be the result of anything else. The fact that you resort to plot device yet again to explain away First Contact is proof that you have no rational, in-universe explanation for why such low yields were present.

With Survivors Worf's instruments record the energy of the weapons fire against the shields. We get specific numbers in common standards of measurement. Your shield disruption argument is weakened by the fact that earlier in the episode the Enterprise takes two weaker shots from the Husnock vessel without losing shields- whereas a more powerful shot knocks out the shields, suggesting power is the key here. Anything else is pure speculation on your part.

With Pegasus, the Enterprise required a majority of her torpedoes to destroy a 3KM hollow asteroid, as stated by Riker.

With the examples you state to supposedly support high firepower, all we have is unsupported dialogue, and not one single demonstration. The Borg 'high-yield explosion' you refer to in one of your pictures produces no physical damage to any of the ships, and was a nanite dispersal device, hardly indicative of yield.

If you're bringing up Relics, then I suggest you look at the distance a damaged Hatak sat from a blue giant star in Enemies. It sat closer to a much more energetic star for longer. Besides, Relics is clearly contradicted by visual evidence.

[Tetsujin]

SKin of Evil shows a torpedo impact the surface of the planet, and leave behind no visible damage to the surface. Nemesis, as I explained, shows a low-speed collision punch through shields which are at 70%. Changing Face of Evil is most likely the result of an attack from weapons fire and I have shown why it is not likely to be the result of anything else. The fact that you resort to plot device yet again to explain away First Contact is proof that you have no rational, in-universe explanation for why such low yields were present.

In “Skin of Evil” the torpedo was meant to destroy the shuttlecraft not to decimate the entire area. It is called variable yield. Also low speed is a matter of perspective. Given the speeds ships have been shown to accelerate even in that movie alone, low speed was unlikely when you are trying to cause as much damage as possible with an impact. I will repeat again that 70% was total strength and not of particular sections. Since the forward shields took the brunt of the Enterprises attack in which a fair amount of damage was done. I would say they would be the weakest section of the shielding at the time if not near failure. “Changing Face of Evil” is still only speculation so I dont need to touch upon that. Its a scifi television show, some things cant be explained in universe at all because they werent made to be explained logically. Like carters famous plot shields, you just have to accept it and use something else for logical refference. With all the evidence of weapons being at the least more powerful than a kiloton you suggesting that a weapon fired from a 24th century space faring vessel has about as much punch as a C4 explosive and calling it logical or rational is preposterous.

With Survivors Worf's instruments record the energy of the weapons fire against the shields. We get specific numbers in common standards of measurement. Your shield disruption argument is weakened by the fact that earlier in the episode the Enterprise takes two weaker shots from the Husnock vessel without losing shields- whereas a more powerful shot knocks out the shields, suggesting power is the key here. Anything else is pure speculation on your part.

Yes they record energy in standard measurements, however that makes knowing that the yield of the second encounter was unreasonably low indisputable. Show me another instance of 400GW doing any damage to the shields if this is such a normal event. It is in no way weakened because this only proved that the near omnipotent being that created the ship wanted to actually try harder to scare them away. As I said before if power was all there was to it, the Enterprise would have been destroyed if hit by a second shot while shields were still down plain and simple so there must have been more to it. And to be perfectly clear that was not a Husnock vessel, neither their ships nor even a member of their species have ever been shown. That ship was the construct of an incredibly powerful alien being and even assuming that ship has anything to do with real technology and isnt just an extension of that being power is speculation on your part. With all your talk of simplest explanations you seem to eagerly dismiss the being that can do almost anything “he” wanted and acting like this is pure technology at work.

With Pegasus, the Enterprise required a majority of her torpedoes to destroy a 3KM hollow asteroid, as stated by Riker.

First off, there is no way that the asteroid was only 3km in diameter. The Enterprise D is over 600 meters long and 3 or 4 of them lined up would fit on the screen while only showing a very small portion of the size of the asteroid. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJLyc...eature=related go to around 8:50 in this video. Later on they state that they have passed through 3 kilometers of the asteroid, this does not mean the asteroid was only 3km. Since they did not pass through the entire asteroid, they had to travel a distance to get to the rock face, and they would have wanted to phase the shortest distance possible through the asteroid, the asteroid was at very least over 3 kilometers in diameter, with visual and logical evidence indicating it was over 6 kilometers in diameter on low end. This even further illustrates the acceleration capability of the ship with it being able to cross kilometers in seconds using only maneuvering thrusters which further goes to show you that the so called low speed impact of Nemesis was only for visual effect purposes. Also no one stated the asteroid was “hollow” merely that it had a chasm. So while not completely solid it was still rather massive and easily many many times the volume and mass of the enterprise.

With the examples you state to supposedly support high firepower, all we have is unsupported dialogue, and not one single demonstration. The Borg 'high-yield explosion' you refer to in one of your pictures produces no physical damage to any of the ships, and was a nanite dispersal device, hardly indicative of yield.

I have just shown you demonstrations and given you a sizable list of references in my last post. The torpedo was fired to hit a location in the center of the enemy formation, the torpedo was not meant to actually hit any of the ships to begin with. So you are saying that a visual boom has no bearing on yield yet visual booms are what you are using base the assumption that ST weapons are weak. Also if yield was not a factor they would not have used a type of torpedo that utilized the highest yield possible. They used a high yield explosion to disperse the nanites over a large area and also produced a shockwave that not only knocked the species 8472 vessels off course but also affected voyager which fired the shot and was a good distance away. Even so, you have been wanting to see a large boom and there you go. If you still want more evidence yp add to the list given previously refer to the episodes, "This Side of Paradise", "Return to Grace", “Cost of Living”, and “ST:TMP” .

If you're bringing up Relics, then I suggest you look at the distance a damaged Hatak sat from a blue giant star in Enemies. It sat closer to a much more energetic star for longer. Besides, Relics is clearly contradicted by visual evidence.

The Ha'tak was not very damaged considering how quickly 2 people were able to repair its systems. Closer is a matter of opinion given the relative sizes and the extension of a corona being millions of kilometers into space they could have in reality been very very far away. Also solar flares can emit up to a sixth of a stars per second output and the star was stated to be unstable and emitting solar flares of increasing frequency and intensity. Yes a Ha'tak with full shields can last 10 hours in that case. And a Galaxy class with 23% shields can last 3 hours while contending with intense solar flare activity in mine.

[darth_timon]

In “Skin of Evil” the torpedo was meant to destroy the shuttlecraft not to decimate the entire area. It is called variable yield. Also low speed is a matter of perspective. Given the speeds ships have been shown to accelerate even in that movie alone, low speed was unlikely when you are trying to cause as much damage as possible with an impact. I will repeat again that 70% was total strength and not of particular sections. Since the forward shields took the brunt of the Enterprises attack in which a fair amount of damage was done. I would say they would be the weakest section of the shielding at the time if not near failure.

Skin of Evil had them seeking to ensure that the creature on the planet could never leave. Whilst it is on its own a rather weak example of low firepower, when combined with other examples it shows the limitations of Federation weaponry quite nicely. It does after all, tie in with Nemesis- you claim that the Scimitar's forward shields were the worst hit, but you have not backed this up at all- in fact, in the scene where the cloak fails, most of the hits are on the aft quarter! Prior to that, Commander Denotra's warbird is firing primarily at the Scimitar's aft quarter! So your claim that the forward shields were somehow much weaker is complete speculation. Besides, even if the forward shields were only at 20%, with the sort of firepower you claim is the norm, a collision should not have breached the shields.

“Changing Face of Evil” is still only speculation so I dont need to touch upon that. Its a scifi television show, some things cant be explained in universe at all because they werent made to be explained logically. Like carters famous plot shields, you just have to accept it and use something else for logical refference. With all the evidence of weapons being at the least more powerful than a kiloton you suggesting that a weapon fired from a 24th century space faring vessel has about as much punch as a C4 explosive and calling it logical or rational is preposterous.

You're misrepresenting the facts. 'All of the evidence' does not support high firepower, in fact the visual evidence suggests the complete opposite. The fact remains, the simplest explanation is usually the right one- the chances of starship debris being the cause of the damage we see in Skin of Evil is highly unlikely, for the reasons I have already explained, plus the odds of such debris hitting a city instead of open space are highly unlikely. I have also explained why surface damage would not be apparently unless any hypothetical shield had already failed, so the most likely explanation in like of these simple bits of logic is weapons fire. It is pure assumption on your part that the weapons used would be something other than the norm, especially seeing as the Breen could have paralyzed the Federation's military and political bodies with a single shot under the firepower you claim.

Yes they record energy in standard measurements, however that makes knowing that the yield of the second encounter was unreasonably low indisputable. Show me another instance of 400GW doing any damage to the shields if this is such a normal event. It is in no way weakened because this only proved that the near omnipotent being that created the ship wanted to actually try harder to scare them away. As I said before if power was all there was to it, the Enterprise would have been destroyed if hit by a second shot while shields were still down plain and simple so there must have been more to it. And to be perfectly clear that was not a Husnock vessel, neither their ships nor even a member of their species have ever been shown. That ship was the construct of an incredibly powerful alien being and even assuming that ship has anything to do with real technology and isnt just an extension of that being power is speculation on your part. With all your talk of simplest explanations you seem to eagerly dismiss the being that can do almost anything “he” wanted and acting like this is pure technology at work.

More speculation on your part. You seek to dismiss the evidence with mystery mechanism and appeals to god-like entities having an influence on proceedings. The bottom line is, a fancy mechanism would have taken out the shields in the first instance, if this is how the shields were brought down, yet they didn't- application of greater power later on did.

With Pegasus, the Enterprise required a majority of her torpedoes to destroy a 3KM hollow asteroid, as stated by Riker.

First off, there is no way that the asteroid was only 3km in diameter. The Enterprise D is over 600 meters long and 3 or 4 of them lined up would fit on the screen while only showing a very small portion of the size of the asteroid. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJLyc...eature=related go to around 8:50 in this video. Later on they state that they have passed through 3 kilometers of the asteroid, this does not mean the asteroid was only 3km. Since they did not pass through the entire asteroid, they had to travel a distance to get to the rock face, and they would have wanted to phase the shortest distance possible through the asteroid, the asteroid was at very least over 3 kilometers in diameter, with visual and logical evidence indicating it was over 6 kilometers in diameter on low end. This even further illustrates the acceleration capability of the ship with it being able to cross kilometers in seconds using only maneuvering thrusters which further goes to show you that the so called low speed impact of Nemesis was only for visual effect purposes. Also no one stated the asteroid was “hollow” merely that it had a chasm. So while not completely solid it was still rather massive and easily many many times the volume and mass of the enterprise.

Even if we are extremely generous and assume the asteroid was instead 20KM, the energy required to fragment such an asteroid is 8GT. The Enterprise D carried 275 photon torpedoes, so if we divide that by 8GT, we get 0.02GT per torpedo! Another way to do it is to divide 8,000MT by 275- you get 29MT per torpedo- and remember, 20KM is an extremely generous assumption, since the asteroid was in all actuality no bigger than 10KM at an absolutely maximum (in which case we are looking at 3.6MT per torpedo).

I have just shown you demonstrations and given you a sizable list of references in my last post. The torpedo was fired to hit a location in the center of the enemy formation, the torpedo was not meant to actually hit any of the ships to begin with. So you are saying that a visual boom has no bearing on yield yet visual booms are what you are using base the assumption that ST weapons are weak. Also if yield was not a factor they would not have used a type of torpedo that utilized the highest yield possible. They used a high yield explosion to disperse the nanites over a large area and also produced a shockwave that not only knocked the species 8472 vessels off course but also affected voyager which fired the shot and was a good distance away. Even so, you have been wanting to see a large boom and there you go. If you still want more evidence yp add to the list given previously refer to the episodes, "This Side of Paradise", "Return to Grace", “Cost of Living”, and “ST:TMP” .

Voyager was not a 'good distance' away and neither were the 8472 ships- for that matter, the bright flash we see is not that big in relation to the 8472 ships we see! It's clearly not a huge explosion, no matter how you try to spin it.

The Ha'tak was not very damaged considering how quickly 2 people were able to repair its systems. Closer is a matter of opinion given the relative sizes and the extension of a corona being millions of kilometers into space they could have in reality been very very far away. Also solar flares can emit up to a sixth of a stars per second output and the star was stated to be unstable and emitting solar flares of increasing frequency and intensity. Yes a Ha'tak with full shields can last 10 hours in that case. And a Galaxy class with 23% shields can last 3 hours while contending with intense solar flare activity in mine.

A Hatak can take close proximity to a much more energetic star at far closer ranges. The star in Relics was a relative sedate type of star compared to the monster the Hatak sat near- the Hatak absorbed far more energy.