Quick & Dirty Guide to Warp Speed

[selek]

There's a nice chart in the Encyclopedia, too.

The chart in the Encyclopedia (incidentally, the one they ripped off for the Narrator's Guide) is horrible- especially at the lower speeds.

Having spent most of the night working on these numbers, here are my revisions to the numbers.


Please feel free to correct my work if you find it in error.

[Penta]

The chart in the Encyclopedia (incidentally, the one they ripped off for the Narrator's Guide) is horrible- especially at the lower speeds.

Having spent most of the night working on these numbers, here are my revisions to the numbers.


Please feel free to correct my work if you find it in error.

Selek, my question is in terms of sublight speeds. IIRC, the TNG tech manual states that full impulse is generally 0.25c in Starfleet use because going past that has relativistic impacts.

Does your sublight chart account for that, or do you prefer to ignore relativity?

Also, your choices of scales are a bit odd - I always thought using warp inside a solar system was avoided for safety/environmental reasons?

[PGoodman13]

Also, your choices of scales are a bit odd - I always thought using warp inside a solar system was avoided for safety/environmental reasons?

You'd think that from some of the dialog, but there are numerous instances of ship's going to warp inside a solar system, and on at least one occasion from within a planet's atmosphere. I don't think I'd sweat about that too much, but that's possibly just me.

[C5]

A notorious example of a ship going to warp inside a system is the Phoenix flight in First Contact... And I think I remember a DS9 episode where the Defiant warps to catch a shuttle driven by a changeling.
I guess the rule of not going to warp inside a solar system is mainly for safety reasons, a bit like avoiding driving a race car at full speed inside a city: possible, but very dangerous for almost anything around.

[Calastir]

Oh I can just hear Valeris: "Captain, may I remind you that regulations specify thrusters only while in Spacedock?"

[The Tatterdemalion King]

A notorious example of a ship going to warp inside a system is the Phoenix flight in First Contact... And I think I remember a DS9 episode where the Defiant warps to catch a shuttle driven by a changeling.
I guess the rule of not going to warp inside a solar system is mainly for safety reasons, a bit like avoiding driving a race car at full speed inside a city: possible, but very dangerous for almost anything around.

The statement in "By Inferno's Light" seemed to imply that the danger wasn't proximity at the point of departure, but proximity en route and at the destination–they were warping right into the sun's gravity well, after all. The last time we saw someone do that, they ended up in the 80s. By inferno's light, indeed.

[trynda1701]

Agree with the above examples, but didn't a lot of TOS episodes have a line similar to...

"Take us out of orbit, Mr Sulu. Ahead, Warp Factor 1"

So that seems to me to say you can usually safely warp outwards from a star system no problem.

[selek]

Selek, my question is in terms of sublight speeds. IIRC, the TNG tech manual states that full impulse is generally 0.25c in Starfleet use because going past that has relativistic impacts.

Quite true....but then we have the RPG books telling us that the Intrepid class has a top impulse speed of .98c.......

Does your sublight chart account for that, or do you prefer to ignore relativity?

I did my numbers based upon those in the Narrator's Guide, and left relativity to the individual Narrator.

I do need to revise the chart slightly in that it should refer to actualy fractions of C (as given in the Narrator's Guide) rather than percentage of Impulse.

Also, your choices of scales are a bit odd - I always thought using warp inside a solar system was avoided for safety/environmental reasons?

If memory serves (and as others hear have pointed out) Enterprise (TOS) warps out of orbit in roughly 67 of 69 episodes.

I always took those lines as an easy way for a lazy writer to ratchet up the tension.

"In order to get a gallon of milk at the earliest possible moment, we're going to risk crossing the street while still inside the city limits! Dun dun dunnnnn!"

Of course, with experimental vessels or those just coming out of refit, I might take the easy way, too.........




Charts in the link above modified.