posted
I've been doing some thinking as to the kinds of developments might lie in the near future of Starfleet after Nemesis and the Dominion war and three ideas have stuck out.
Verteron (Pulse) Torpedo In the TNG episode "Force of Nature" we see a "verteron mine" used to disable subspace systems aboard starships. Particularly, warp nacells are rendered inoperable until purged nad concievably other subspace systems such as impulse engines and computer cores could be affected. Such a warhead, if mounted in a standard photon torpedo casing coul dbecome a useful, non-leathal, weapon. The idea would be to direct these torpedos at a target's warp nacells to knock it out of, or prevent it from going to, warp for some number of hours.
This system would be ideal for law enforcement and convoy escort duties during peacetime to provdide a non-leathal way of disabling a target and aprehending criminals. It could also be used to allow smaller and out gunned starships (such as scouts or transports) to disable attackers and escape at warp speeds without pursuit.
The weapon could also be employed in a lethal fashion. A target saturated with vertons will likely loose computer control of key systems such as warp containment. Also if fired at a target travelling at warp directed only one nacell, the verteron pulse may cause an asymetric collapse of the warp field causing relativistic differential velocities across the target's spaceframe resulting in stresses which could destroy the ship.
Modern day analogy (sort of): EMP weapon.
Polaron(?) Torpedo Starfleet has developed the quantum torpedo as an improved standoff weapon with over 3 times the yield of a photon torpedo (suggested by the DS9 tech manual). However, increased yield has only limited gains in effectiveness and effeiciency while productions costs remain prohibitively high for mass production.
Throughout the Dimion War we saw examples of how polaron-based weapons could easily penetrate standard shields. If this technology, perhaps in the form of a polaron pulse generator, could be incorporated into a photon torpedo one could effectively create a shield-penetrating round. The yield of a standard photon torpedo should be sufficient to destroy a virtually unshielded target. A shield-pentrating photon torpedo is not only more efficient, but overcomes a basic weakness inherent in explosive weapons: that only a portion of the blast is actually directed at the target. A shield-penetrating round overcomes this weakness by using the target's own shield bubble to trap the explosive energy of the warhead, increasing its destructive power. These systems would utilize existing technology and be far easier/cheaper to produce than quantum torpedoes.
Modern day analogy: armor-penetrating anti-tank artilery. *Another improvement to the photon torpedo would be an equivilant to shaped-charge rounds.
Long Range Warp Capable Tactical Missile (WCTM-LR) At present, starship combat resembles gun ship battles prior to Earth's 21st century. Ships close to weapons range at sublight speeds and procede to "slug it out" with phasers and torpedoes at close range. What is needed is a true standoff weapon capable of destroying targets in one or two hits and facilitating tactical maneuver at warp speeds.
the WCTM-LR would be a shuttle- or runabout-sized vehicle with its own warp drive, sublight propulsion, computer, sensors, and coummications equipment. It will carry a photon or quantum warhead capable of destroying most targets possible with the aid of shield penetrating technology. The missile should be able to cruise at wf 8 to a range of ~.5 light year with terminal attack velocity in excess of wf 9.9. The missle will be capable of semi-autonomous operations and manuever at sublight speeds. They could also be dropped along the predicted path of target vessels and thus used as effective mines.
Such a weapons system would revolutionize starship tactics for the coming century. Linear phaser arrays would be optimized as point defense anti-missile systems, while pulse pasers would be optimized for slugging it out with targets at now extremely close range compared to the new expanded battle space. Also, such system would increase the importance of sensor capabilites for early detection of targets in incoming missle threats, an area in which Starfleet seems to have an edge over other powers.
Modern day analogy: Anti-ship cruise missile such as the French Exocet or US Harpoon. Mine function is similar to an encapsulated torpedo mine.
Comments, Suggestions, Questions?
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Registered: Jun 2005
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posted
I do like those possible weapons after Nemesis, although...
Wasn't the Long Range Warp Capable Tactical Missile (WCTM-LR) found in the ST: Voyager episode Dreadnought built by Cardassians. And didn't Harry onboard Voyager encounter another one of those when he was on Night Watch?
-------------------- "It speaks to some basic human needs: that there is a tomorrow, it's not all going to be over with a big splash and a bomb, that the human race is improving, that we have things to be proud of as humans." -Gene Roddenberry about Star Trek
Registered: May 1999
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posted
Dreadnought was much bigger than what I'm proposing and WCTM-LR would have nowhere near that level of AI. Also, it was a strategic weapon, not a tactical one. It's like comparing an anti-ship cruise missile with an ICBM.
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Registered: Jun 2005
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posted
So what you're proposing is somewhat in the size of a micro-torpedo and not a standard torpedo then.
-------------------- "It speaks to some basic human needs: that there is a tomorrow, it's not all going to be over with a big splash and a bomb, that the human race is improving, that we have things to be proud of as humans." -Gene Roddenberry about Star Trek
Registered: May 1999
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posted
No, it would be the size of a shuttle or runabout (10-20m), much bigger than a standard torpedo (~2m) and would need to be launched froma shuttle bay or specially constructed launching bay. Dreadnought, on the other hand, was the size of a small starship at ~100m. For an analogous size comparison to real world weapons: photon torpedo - artilery shell WCTM-LR - cruise missile Dreadought - ICBM
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WizArtist II
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posted
I think the whole weapons tech would have to go in another direction completely. How much more bang can you pack in a torp without it getting ridiculous? I always wondered why Genesis had never been studied as a true weapon. All that power in one man sized shell? Also, why aren't transporters used as weapons. you could make a solid rock materialize inside an enemies injectors and plug up there warp core or such. Or just dematerialize the hatch to the bridge and instantly decapitate the ship.
I think that Trek tech has reached its apex of current weapons and needs to go into some "far-out" systems for any real impact.
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Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
I don't think that works. I mean, OK, you're just talking about size, but a photon torpedo clearly isn't anything like an artillery shell, and is already a warp capable, guided weapon with potentially more destructive power than any real nuclear warhead yet built. (If I am remembering my nerd figures right. I looked it up, and some website was claiming upwards of 90 megatons for 1.5 kg of matter vs. an equal amount of antimatter, assuming a simple though wholly unrealistic total annhilation.)
These are neat ideas, but I guess I'm not so convinced of their, you know, necessity. "Obviously," were there real Star Trek battles, they wouldn't look much like their TV versions. I mean, space gunfights don't take place within ranges of a few hundred meters because anyone thinks they're realistic, but simply because they look cool.
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
(Also, transporters are clearly too finicky to be used as weapons in most circumstances. Or at least such has to be the case for a Star Trek TV show to remain recognizable. Teleportation without such limits turns it into some sort of weird Larry Niven setting. And anyway we've got lots and lots of examples of transporters being blocked by phenomena both natural and manmade, so there'd be no shortage of transporter-impervious materials or energies with which to line sensitive areas.)
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
May I toot the senior creator of a site to which I contributed? Paul Cargile and Baloo had some similar ideas about advanced weaponry in the wake of the Domninion War at Starfleet Military Reserves. Might give you ideas of what might be involved in these kinds of weapons.
-------------------- "Warfare is the greatest affair of state, the basis of life and death, the Tao to survivial or extinction. It must be thoroughly pondered and analyzed."
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Registered: May 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Sol System: (If I am remembering my nerd figures right. I looked it up, and some website was claiming upwards of 90 megatons for 1.5 kg of matter vs. an equal amount of antimatter, assuming a simple though wholly unrealistic total annhilation.)
Unrealistic? I'd think there would be plenty of matter lying around to annihilate with the antimatter. I'm sure the torpedo case itself is more then 1.5kg . You don't need to get special matter to annihilate the antimatter and try to get them to collide just right!
Also, 3 kilograms of matter/antimatter converted to energy would give about 2.7x10^17 Joules or 65 megatons. Using the actual TNT value rather then the conventional measurement gives almost 100 megatons (I don't think that's the most common choice of unit, though). To compare (in conventional units) hydrogen bombs are on the order of magnitude of one megaton, and the Hiroshima bomb was about 13 kilotons.
quote:Originally posted by WizArtist II: Also, why aren't transporters used as weapons. you could make a solid rock materialize inside an enemies injectors and plug up there warp core or such. Or just dematerialize the hatch to the bridge and instantly decapitate the ship.
Transporters aren't any more an effective weapon than phasers. Transporters are projected beams of matter that will be bocked by shields (frequency "windows" aside) like any other projected weapon like phasers or torpedo with the added disadvantage that they don't reduce the targets shields any. Once the shield are down you can do what youlike, but it would be much simpler to hit them with more "conventional" weaponry at that point.
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quote:Originally posted by Sol System: I don't think that works. I mean, OK, you're just talking about size, but a photon torpedo clearly isn't anything like an artillery shell, and is already a warp capable, guided weapon with potentially more destructive power than any real nuclear warhead yet built.
True, my comparison was only meant as an analogy. Actually, modern rocket-assisted artillery shells are now both guided and provide some of their own propulsion to extend their range considerably, much like a photon torpedo. Also, photon torpedoes are only capable of 75% increase of speed over the firing ship (TNG tech manual, if I remember correctly). They aren't really warp capable in any independent sense and only if fired from a ship at warp. They are also guided only in a limited sense since on-screen evidence (Star Trek VI aside) usually shows them following near-ballistic tragectories. They are not true stand off weapons (I'm suggesting a range of half a light year or more, ~4 hours at warp 8) capable of independent propulsion or guidance or have hit-to-kill lethality with only one or two rounds.
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posted
"Unrealistic? I'd think there would be plenty of matter lying around to annihilate with the antimatter. I'm sure the torpedo case itself is more then 1.5kg [Wink] . You don't need to get special matter to annihilate the antimatter and try to get them to collide just right!"
1.) The 3 kilogram payload (half deuterium, half antideuterium) is, I think, from the technical manual, though I got it, again, off some website.
2.) The unrealistic part is expecting every bit of antimatter to meet up with and annihilate every bit of matter. It's an unrealistic but useful mathematical abstraction, like the ideal gas law. Obviously, you could build a matter/antimatter weapon of arbitrary size. (Isn't that exactly what they do to blow up that giant space amoeba?) I'm just going with what my (brief and lazy) research returned as the "official" figures.
Also, I guess you could say that torpedoes are unguided because we usually don't see them fly around, but, again, that's a dramatic (and cost-saving!) thing. Torpedoes certainly zoomed around to find targets in "Way of the Warrior."
Registered: Mar 1999
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quote:Originally posted by WizArtist II: I always wondered why Genesis had never been studied as a true weapon. All that power in one man sized shell?
The ladies say that about me all the time...
quote: Also, why aren't transporters used as weapons. you could make a solid rock materialize inside an enemies injectors and plug up there warp core or such. Or just dematerialize the hatch to the bridge and instantly decapitate the ship.
I brought this up some time ago in another thread. While the federation and Klingons would not use transporters as weapons for reasons of morality and honor, pricks like the Romulans would likely concentrate their technology on quickly dismantling an opponent's shields, then just beaming the crew into space (or their ship's replicator's stores for protien).
I think weapons using subspace as a medium could be made (like the Dominion's "hoodini" mines) that could penetrate a ship's shields and hull before materializing and detonating.
Of course, there's always the possibility of converting a target to antimatter: probably not too difficult for races that have transporter and replicator technology down pat.
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Registered: Aug 2002
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But, the point about the transporters is that you can't use them 'til you get the other guy's shields down. And, once you've done that, what's the point? Just blow them up.
Registered: Mar 1999
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![[Wink]](wink.gif)
. You don't need to get special matter to annihilate the antimatter and try to get them to collide just right!
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