Can the Enterprise destroy a planet?

I think that comes from Mr. Scott's Guide to the Enterprise, if I remember correctly.

 

Spot on!

I always liked that concept from the book, along with several others that never made it into the films and shows themselves such as the controllable gaps in the shields around the transporter emitters, so that beaming could occur during combat.

 

I think we're playing semantics at this point. But, as far as I am concerned, based on the dialogue:

Can the USS Enterprise "destroy" a planet? Absolutely. Can the ship "blow up" a planet? No, it cannot. So, how to effectively destroy a planet? Phaser volley, set to wide beam, at full power, while strategically deploying photon torpedoes at known tectonic and volcanic sites. Such an action would make what the Cylons did to the Colonials pale in comparison.

What's funny is this attempt to perform mental gymnastics to justify why the USS Enterprise can't destroy a planet, ignoring the actual dialogue in the process. Remember folks: TOS made it a point why commanding a STARSHIP made its captain "special", probably analogous to a nuclear-powered submarine capable of launching nuclear weapons.

 

There was a little light planet-wide genocide in the first issue of the Gold Key comics.

 

WTH is the context for this?

 

Saw a website years ago that offered on-screen evidence that Star Wars turbo lasers are magnitudes more powerful than the Enterprise. Two comparisons were used, one was the asteroid scene in ESB and another was the asteroid scene in AtoC vs. various asteroid scenes in Trek like Paradise Syndrome.

End result was Star Wars weapons are more powerful. Slave 1 has as much firepower as the E-D

 

To coin a phrase,

STERILIZE!

 

Slag…but not bodily destroy.

There were explosive asteroids in trek…and very tough ones. A Firespray equal to a Galaxy? Not buying it.

 

If a Starship can destroy a planet why aren't there armadas of ships stationed defending Earth from Klingon Starships. Why the big deal in the movies about Nero, Vger, the whale probe, the doomsday machine, the ray beams in ENT and the last TNG movie?

 

Because the later shows are stupid.

 

Exactly. Because Star Trek II appeared to reduce phasers and photons to cannonball power (yes, I know, I know -- Khan was powering down to cripple the Enterprise; the Enterprise had low power to phasers after being hit; the Mutara "nebula" made photons less powerful; the photons were loaded at low strength so as to keep the Mutara "nebula" from exploding or something; yadah yadah) and every subsequent Trek made phasers and photons weapons to be fired at a range of meters against ships going Warp 10 knots.

The idea of Earth being defenseless except for the Enterprise is criminally stupid. Like, said writer should be shot. Or sent to Canada to work on The Starlost II: Cordwainer's Revenge. The only time the Earth was ever in danger in Trek was "Errand of Mercy" -- and the Organians were way outta our league.

 

Doubtful, considering that the purpose of the STAR TREK series isn't about warfare, and that Slave-1 can be picked off easily with a well-placed TOS Type-Two hand-held phaser weapon, which can vaporize its target instantly. If not instantly, a force of 15 tons of TNT can certainly do damage to ship, unless it is shielded.

And that's why I hate comparing SW tech to ST tech, since trying to compare them brings out the worse of fan boys.

 

I'll grant you this. It can easily get bogged in the weeds. What I appreciated from that website was their reasonings were all limited to what can be supported by on-screen evidence. In your above example, I can't recall when a shuttle or small ship has ever been vaporized by a hand phaser (perhaps you do).

The site wasn't one-sided and merely laid out "facts." The drawing conclusions was left to the reader. In this case the evidence pointed to Slave-1's offensive weapons to be more destructive than ship phasers.

Weapons range is another issue and there is no on screen evidence a Firespray can hit a planetary target from orbit.

Shields is a different category. On screen evidence points to shields in the Star Wars universe to be far inferior to Star Trek unless said ship has plot armor

 

Star Wars: "WE need to build a small moon to power our planet-destroyer!"
Star Trek: "Lets get one of Kirk's 'hookups' and his illegitimate love-child to build a single torpedo that can destroy an entire planet, which can be shot from ANY SHIP capable of torpedo fire" {Genesis Project}

Star Wars (the next): "Lets build an even bigger moon (planetoid?) to destroy planets!"
Star Trek (Enterprise): Uh, Captain Archer, we just accidentally ionized that planet's atmosphere and murdered everyone on it, instantly. Oopsies."

Darth Vader: "When we work really, really hard with hundreds of thousands of people (and robotic/slave labor), after many years we can build a single device that can destroy a planet!"
Kirk: "I do that all the time with an away team - last time I did it with my space herpes. I call that a Tuesday."

 

I think I know which site you're talking about but IIRC they are cherry picked examples. But yeah, the topic itself is just volatile

 

Both franchises create the illusion of a working technology with capabilities and limits, but only for a given situation. They would never impose strict rules that they have to obey in future stories. So imagining a comparison is wide open to us, a free for all.

But I'm still impressed with the thought @dswynne1, @Shawnster, and @MarkusTay put into it.

My personal crossover fantasy where I make the rules, is for the U.S.S. Voyager to drop in on Battlestar Galactica (the 1978 version). The only way I can make it go is if Q throws Voyager into the Galactica universe, because the laws of physics are so different, BSG has to be an alternate universe.

 

Well, Nomad and the Planet Killer were on their way towards Earth... But still far enough away to not require us to know a thing about Earth's defenses.

 

I thought the Planet Killer was just headed toward "the most densely populated portion of our galaxy".

Nomad was, indeed, headed home.

 

Well I'm sure Earth is in the most densely populated section. We're the center of everything!

 

I guess that depends on what a "portion" is in this case.