How much damage can a planet take before being destroyed?

[Trinity Zeldis]

Simple enough question.

Base this on a Constitution class ship, because Kirk said he could destroy a world with the power of the Enterprise alone. Now true, he could be incorporating political destruction, or even economic destruction, but I think he meant it literally.

So, bearing that in mind, how much damage can a planet take before being destroyed, according to Spacedock rules?



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Sit.
Listen.
Challenge.
Learn.

[Dan Gurden]

And who would get the XP for killing all those creatures? The man giving the order or the man firing the phasers...

No wait thats old AD&D...



What needs to be remembered is that the Photon torpedo is the key here.

It is a Matter/Anti Matter exp[losion, and therefore by the physics as we understood it during the 60's the use of Anti-Matter would obliterate any matter it came into contact wirh...

They were also supposed to be the next step up and more powerful than atomics.

Now as life went on and Atomics upgraded to Nukes (bigger and more powerful), the Photons simply became the undisclosed furture of such weapons tech.

But I have a feeling that During TNG 'upgrade' did not mean 'bigger'. Just more controllable.

That aside, we have also seen Starship phasers used to drill into a planets mantle. Again during TNG not TOS.

So combine the two, and add time, you could feasably drill deep into a planets core, causing major ecological damage in the process. But when you drill deep enough, a volley of Torpedos will probably finish the job...

Sorry I couldn't totally equate it to TOS though. But I think the same key applies, its more of a tactical move than an easy one-shot effect...

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DanG.

"Hi, I'm Commander Troy McClure, you might remember me from other academy training holo-simulations as, Abandon Ship, the quickest way out, and I sense danger, 101 things you dont need a Betazoid to know..."

http://www.theventure.freeserve.co.uk

[Diamond]

I think Kirk was clearly saying he could destry civilization on a planet, or kill all the humanoids. NOT destroy the planet entirely. Else, why was the Genesis device so terrible and awesome in it's destructive (as well as creative) potential? McCoy wouldn't have been saying "Now we can do both at the same time!" He'd ahve been saying, "Ho hum, no big deal."

From orbit the TOS-era Enterprise could drop photon torpedoes (more powerful than a nuclear bomb) on every major city... then use the phasers to kill a city block at a time. It was sufficent.

[Dan Gurden]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Diamond:
McCoy wouldn't have been saying "Now we can do both at the same time!" He'd ahve been saying, "Ho hum, no big deal."
</font>

Why? McCoy was talking about the ability to both destroy all life, and immediatly create new life?

Dont get me wrong, I agree that their reactions suited, but even then, all the genesis did was erase the previous occupants, destroying civilisation on the planet, but not destroying the planet itself...

In this case it is proof of Bad Canon going all the way bad to Rodenberry.

Looks like Voyager and Enterprise are innocent of all charges...

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DanG.

"Hi, I'm Commander Troy McClure, you might remember me from other academy training holo-simulations as, Abandon Ship, the quickest way out, and I sense danger, 101 things you dont need a Betazoid to know..."

http://www.theventure.freeserve.co.uk

[Dexter Knight]

It's also possible Kirk was just bluffing.

[pesterfield]

In the novelization, and possible the episode(but I can't recall), Kirk actually destroyed a planet.

'Operation-Annihilate' Kirk fired two missiles 'planet wreckers'. The first caused the planet to break up and the second left only an expanding cloud of gas.

[Diamond]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">all the genesis did was erase the previous occupants, destroying civilisation on the planet, but not destroying the planet itself</font>

My point was that, even though Genesis does not destroy a planet (as you pointed out, it "merely" kills all life on it in favor of its new matrix), McCoy was still shocked and horrified at such a quantum leap in destructive power. He was not shocked and scared that they could create new things, he was worried that destructive weaponry could now wipe out a planetary populace in seconds instead of hours of intense planetary bombardment.

McCoy was shocked at how potentially destructive Genesis was. Even Genesis did not destroy planets entirely. Ergo, TOS -era starfleet could not easily and conveniently destroy an entire (terrestrially-sized) planet. There's some wiggle room there, but the general idea is clear.

[Dan Gurden]

You are spot on to my thoughts there Diamond... Which was why I wrote my initial description as a Tactical option rather than a 'one-strike' option...

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DanG.

"Hi, I'm Commander Troy McClure, you might remember me from other academy training holo-simulations as, Abandon Ship, the quickest way out, and I sense danger, 101 things you dont need a Betazoid to know..."

http://www.theventure.freeserve.co.uk

[tonyg]

In the TOS epsidoe OBSESSION it is mentioned that a small amount anitmatter drained from the warp engines is capable of destorying one-third of the planet's atmosphere.

In MIRROR:MIRROR when the time came for the destruction of the Halakans the impression is that the Enterprise will use the ship's phasers to level the Halakn cities one by one.

I suspect that a starship probably would not actually destroy a planet, per se, but make it unihabitable. For most purposes it would equate to about the same thing. Not that I would see Starfleet doing this.

While it is possible that a starship could actually destroy a planet, it probably isn't practical due to the time and rescoruces required.

[StyroFoam Man]

This message has been removed on request by the
poster

[Karg]

Or pilot the ship with Self Replicating Redshirts of Fodder, Patent Pending

Karg


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All these worlds are yours, except Europa, which is a wholy owned subsidary of weownthattoo, Inc. (TM)

[Phoenix]

Styro, Karg
I don't think a warp speed ramming attempt would work. First you'd need to hit the planet nearly dead on or you might end up just ricocheting off the atmosphere. Second if you do break through the upper atmosphere your warp field would collapse instantly, there-by returning you to a relativistic speeds (and your impulse normally isn't running when you at warp), the warp field break down explains why ships don't warp through nebulas or other high matter areas. Third the odds of your ship remaining intact long enough to actually hit the planet itself are right on up there. Lastly given all the things against you, the mass of the starship (save non-cannon super ships, Borg cubes, or the Voth’s city-ship) would probably just leave a rather large, radioactive crater, disastrous yes, but only locally.
As far as how many SU's a planet might have...more then enough. Figure the Galaxy class starship has several thousand and it only a little over half a kilometer, a class M planet is 10 to 15 thousand kilometers in diameter, about 78,500 times more massive.
Ok, out of SD a Galaxy class uses 3026 SU's times the afore mentioned 78,500 multiplier gives us 237,541,000 SU's for an average inhabitable planet, but my math is mostlikly off by a lot.

Phoenix...

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"Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake."
-Napoleon

[Karg]

However, A warp core breech would defenitly cause nuclear winter

Karg


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All these worlds are yours, except Europa, which is a wholy owned subsidary of weownthattoo, Inc. (TM)

[calguard66]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Diamond:
My point was that, even though Genesis does not destroy a planet (as you pointed out, it "merely" kills all life on it in favor of its new matrix), McCoy was still shocked and horrified at such a quantum leap in destructive power. He was not shocked and scared that they could create new things, he was worried that destructive weaponry could now wipe out a planetary populace in seconds instead of hours of intense planetary bombardment.

McCoy was shocked at how potentially destructive Genesis was. Even Genesis did not destroy planets entirely. Ergo, TOS -era starfleet could not easily and conveniently destroy an entire (terrestrially-sized) planet. There's some wiggle room there, but the general idea is clear.</font>

Actually, it did seem to me that he was more upset about being able to create life. Every part of his dialog was about the creation, and playing god... "Acording to myth, god created the universe in 7 days... we only need 7 minutes" or something like that.

I'm sure that being able to destroy all life on the surface of a world, or the world itself, is no big deal by TOS.

If nothing else they could sling tractored asteroids at a planet.

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"I'd rather die standing than live on my knees..."
Shania Twain