Gravity Guns and Solid Slugs.. Will it work?

[tonyg]

Null Zero,

Your correct about the "do-do torpedo", but things don't seem work that way in TREK. A photon torpedo is just such an object, and the explosive forece from the anitmatter is supposed to be greater than just the kinetic energy.

The real world formula for pojectiles is: E=1/2mv^2

E= Energy of the projectile (in Joules)
m= mass of the projectile (in kilograms)
v= velcity of the projectile (in meteres/sec).

[Klingermann]

Actually, from some website I saw it said that if one gram of matter traveling at a speed of .25c hit a starship traveling at a speed of 0, it would inflict roughly three terajoules of kinetic energy damage (or almost 1/5 the damage of a type 10 phaser after polarization occurs). Now, if both objects are in motion that damage is multiplied to like 3,000 terajoules or more.

If accorrding to canon information, 2.5 terajoules is enough to effectively vaporize 1 cubic meter of tritanium (more than enough to cause a hull breach) than 3,000 terajoules would safely annhilate ANY ship, station, or small planet it hit. Forget 50lbs., and definitely screw 30 metric tons!

Oh and did I mention that it wouldn't be a velocity of .25c but prolly about .30-50c and roughly .90c or better on a 30 metric ton slug? Y'know, the damage would just plain not be comprehendable!

------------------
-"We are the Borg..
You're hickory smoked!"

[This message has been edited by Klingermann (edited 09-28-2001).]

[tonyg]

Yeah, but if it worked that way in TREK ships would never survive going at warp. That's what the defectors are for. A sepc of dust would take out any ship travelling at warp.

Anti-matter explosions are supposed to be more powerful than nukes, but only do so much damage in the rpg.

If the kentic energy from a photorp was greater than the explotive force of the warhead, they wouldn't bother to put warheads in them.

I mean a photorp has a mass of 186kg and moves at around .99c. That's 8.37x10^12 Joules!

[RykkDaBrik]

Originally posted by tonyg

I mean a photorp has a mass of 186kg and moves at around .99c. That's 8.37x10^12 Joules!

[/B]

Actually, photon torps are capable of Warp speeds, but most of their damage comes from the Anti-Matter explosion.

[Cybrludite]

One of the free-form chat-based Trek games I play in invoves a Federation Marine Corps special ops team. I play the sniper. He uses an anti-materiel grav rifle that's similar to a gauss rifle, but uses a focused low power pressor beam instead of magnetics. Other non-standard bits of kit we've used include Klingon anti-vehicle missile launchers, grav-powered gatling needlers (Obscene rates of fire, and as much oomph as a .30-06), and low yield nuke-pumped x-ray lasers. Those last items were used to slice up a Kelvin star-base that was still under construction.

[Cybrludite]

Originally posted by RykkDaBrik


Actually, photon torps are capable of Warp speeds, but most of their damage comes from the Anti-Matter explosion.

Yup. Near as I can tell, the main reason to use anti-matter in weapons is to be able to make smaller projectiles with relativly small yields. (Say a heavy machinegun bullet that explodes with the force of a ton of TNT, instead of a torp that can level a city and much of the surrounding countryside.) Seems to me that high-yield nukes would be safer to handle than M/AM warheads. There might be size limitations that make anti-matter more useful, but we should be able to stuff several scores of megatons in the warhead compartment of a pho-torp by then. Heck, in the real world, a Hiroshima yield bomb started as something that would fill the downstairs of my apartment, and 56 years later has been reduced to something that I could (probably) carry in my rucksack. (From 10,000lbs to several hundred pounds) However, a year or so before I was born, Rodenberry said, "Hmmn, Photon Torpedo sounds nifty. And the phrase "Old style nuclear warheads" whould give people cause to ponder.", so we're stuck with the trekno-babble.

[Morticutor_UK]

Uh, my favourite take on the railgun was the one in the ALIENS tech manual. A 220 gram lump is fired and will basically go through one side of the ship and out the other, leaving a hyperkinetic wake to cause superheating in pressurised areas. Add a round designed to turn into directed plasma in atmosphere, and you get internal burnout as the atmosphere flames. Nice.

I dunno what effect shields would have, given that torpedoes [nice and solid] always seem to go right through shields and hit the hull, but from what I remember, kinetic weapons have a very high kinetic energy charge - would ithat be more than a 5.1 megawatt phaser? I have no idea, and it's too early to do the math.

With grav guns, what about a lattice of graviton emmitters that pull and push the ship apart? And what about gravitational tides if you use a field-based weapon?

OK, I'll shut up now.

[Owen E Oulton]

Sorry, this forum is for discussion of a role-playing game set hundreds of years in the future, in the Star Trek fictional universe. It is NOT under any circumstances to be used to buy or sell weapons of any type. The only buying and selling is of gaming books and accessories like dice and miniatures and is to be done via eMail or PMs (private messages). This is a moderatorial warning. The next offense along these lines may result in your being banned from this forum.