Balance of Terror…The Enterprise fired at warp 2 into open space (couldn’t get a lock on the Romulan). This is essentially the sci fi equivalent of dropping depth charges.
...With amazing precision: basically, our heroes were firing their depth charges across fifty nautical miles and managing to rattle the enemy sub nevertheless. That is, the
Enterprise had spent several minutes at the highest warp speed she could manage, putting maximum distance between herself and the Romulans - and no doubt the Romulans had been doing the same thing. The phasers then worked across that range and managed to damage the cloaked enemy ship, even when spatial near-misses shouldn't carry anything approaching the devastating effect of a depth charge near-miss.
Yes Timo, with amazing precision. The Enterprise fired at the
vicinity of the Romulan ship....they couldn't aim their phasers directly onto the BOP otherwise they would have locked her in and blasted the thing. Kind of like having your target walk into a bunch of bushes and you in turn fire your rifle or handgun just into the brush cause you cannot see the target and are just hoping for a hit.
Firing into a volume of space.
The Enterprise reversed course at full emergency speed (warp 8 maybe?) and put millions of kilometers between herself and the intruder during that two minute run from the torpedo. Yes this is true,
but there was some time involved
after being hit with the torpedo and resuming the pursuit...they even made some repairs. And no phasers were fired across those millions of kilometers…they went back to where they were before the torpedo run.
The Changeling......the Enterprise speed is never mentioned. The episode is a mishmash of conflicting information concerning Nomad's weapon speed and range.
Conflicting? The first bolt is "multiwarp speed", fired from a distance. Later this is established to be warp fifteen. The next hit comes from an unknown distance, because our heroes can't locate the tiny attacker, so no conflict there. The third comes from an enemy that's observed at 90,000 klicks, and the time the bolt spends traveling from that distance might indicate sublight rather than multiwarp speeds - but there's nothing particularly wrong with that. The
Enterprise is always at range as far as Nomad's weapons are concerned.
Conflicting yes indeed. The warp 15 Nomad weapons do not jive with the 90,000 km range that is given. The episode contradicts itself...not a very good example to use for determining Trek tech.
The Deadly Years….in this one, the Enterprise was at sublight before Kirk came back onto the bridge and ordered the ship to go to warp speed.
Yet the Romulans had clearly forced the ship out of warp by using their weapons. There'd be no other reason for our heroes to stop.
Timo Saloniemi
Yes, I watched this again and the episode would tend to support that. And the torpedoes were already confirmed as being warp capable in an earlier episode.
I'm not sure what part you disagree with me here. Enterprise at warp fires phasers at Romulan at impulse. Open space would mean shooting in the air but they were targeting and detonating phaser blasts close enough to warrant that they were in fact aiming at the Romulan ship. (Warp vs impulse and in the end, sublight vs impulse).
The cloak is a gross electronic warfare effect plus a visible light eliminator. The Enterprise was not targeting the Romulan directly but but firing about where they thought it might be....otherwise they would have locked on and fired directly onto the ship...no need for anything that is proximity.
In the first wargame, the Lexington and Excalibur started the battle with one in front and the other behind the Enterprise at 200,000km and closing. When the Enterprise increased speed to Warp 3 one of the ships "closed on" the Enterprise. That would not have been possible if the opposing ships were at sublight.
In the second wargame we know that the Lexington's impulse engines were hit but she was still maneuverable on warp drive. We can make the assumption that she had to resort to using her warp engines, no? In anycase, since M-5 didn't slow the Enterprise down and the other three ships had to get out of her phaser range, we can also assume that at some point they moved away at a faster warp to get some distance. Considering also warp combat was standard procedure in "The Elaan of Troyius" we have no reason to believe that the other 4 ships wanted to wallow around at sublight with a warp driven starship fighting against them
Yes, after reviewing the episode, I would agree that this was one of the rare warp to warp fights from TOS.
Aren't you now making the assumption that the Enterprise drops down to sublight after the warp 2 pivot? ;-)
From the dialogue, there was no indication that Kirk intended to drop down to sublight after the warp two pivot (and he didn't order it prior to telling Chekov fire). However once the Enterprise went to warp the Klingon was able to score another hit on the Enterprise before the warp pivot. Either the Klingons at sublight hit the Enterprise when she jumped to warp two or the Klingons accelerated to warp to hit the Enterprise that was at warp.
Yes sir, I was assuming that based on the idea that it took the Enterprise ten or twenty seconds to fire their torpedoes. The timeframe was 14 seconds or so. Oddly enough though, after reviewing the episode, I stand by my assumption.
1) Kirk orders Scott to engage the M/A power plant and provide full power to shields. Previous to this the Klink has been approaching at about 5,000 KM per second.
2) The Klink fires disruptors at an apparent stationary Enterprise (judging by the remastered special effects).
3) Kirk orders Warp 2 course 148 Mk3.
4) The Klink fires on what looks like a non-moving Enterprise judging by the remastered edition spec effects (are the remasters canon?).
5) The Enterprise then fires photons 14 seconds after the order for warp 2 is given.
It would appear that the raw, unrefined/unprocessed dilithium crystals caused a delay in the engagement of FTL movement….Scotty had already said on two occasions that the M/A reactor was having problems (both occurred within 30 seconds of the warp 2 order).
So, given all that, it would appear that:
1) The Enterprise was trying to engage warp speed when the Klink fired the last time and flew across her bow. The Enterprise’s engines finally got the ship moving and they pivoted behind the Klink and fired, but since the Klink was still at sublight, they would have had to back off to avoid overshooting the ship.
2) Or if you prefer, the Enterprise fired as it snapped around (meaning there was a definite delay in warp engagement) but before the ship could travel any real distance forward at Warp 2.
3) Or a third possibility is that the Enterprise went to warp with no delay or problems (despite Scotty’s dialogue) and the Klink also engaged FTL drive and the last weapons exchange (both Klink and Fed) occurred at warp speeds. If this is the case, one would wonder why refined and/or processed crystals are necessary if any old dilithium rock picked up on the back 40 would suffice for problem-free warp drive use.
So I still maintain this one was a Warp (attacker) to sublight (target) battle all the way...on both sides.
We know that during the battle, the Enterprise was at unknown speed, but the attacker's first pass was at Warp 8. Further passes we just know as faster than the Enterprise. This would qualify the Enterprise (at unknown speed) firing at the Orion ship making warp passes.
However on the final run we know the Enterprise has cut power and is "starting to drift" which lures the Orion ship to slow dramatically down and drop "close to sublight" (indicating it was at warp). By the time "75,000km" is read off, the ship was still out there to be attacked (rather than zipping by at low warp) so we can deduce that the Orion was at sublight when she was hit.
Like I said, this one is an unknown due to a lack of info on the Enterprise’s speed. Given that there was no dialogue about “warp drive failing” or something to that effect, my guess is that the E was at the same speed all along…sublight.
We know based on the dialogue there was the attempt to evade with the warp engines and once Kirk was informed that they were coming in at Warp 15, that no longer became an option. So it's Nomad's warp bolts vs Enterprise evading with warp engines. We know on the 3rd hit the Enterprise definitely goes to impulse and Nomad has moved to 90,000km and holds position there. At this point it becomes a sublight vs sublight battle.
The Enterprise uses “evasive maneuvers” for most of the encounter. No mention of speed or what type of maneuvering (warp or impulse). The contradictions in this episode are the warp 15 energy bolts and the 90,000 km range. After the range was confirmed at least one more of these super duper energy bolts came screaming in….and took way too long for the range specified. That would mean either the range figure was off or the warp figure was off. I like to think that Spock meant “point one-five warp” as opposed to the warp 15 which simply does not work. And add to that the dialogue where its indicated that the shields of the Enterprise can withstand 360 photon torpedoes
yet a few phasers in “Babel” is knocking shields down right and left??? Like I said, this episode is not good source for reliable information.
She was at Warp 5 when she set course for the RNZ and had made no indication of slowing down when she was hit with the first romulan blast. That qualifies for a Enterprise at warp attacked by Romulans who were pacing her at warp. By the time a rejuvenated Kirk made it to the bridge, it could be assumed that the Enterprise dropped to sublight, but it might not and she was still at Warp 5 with 10 romulans keeping pace around her.
After reviewing this one, I would say you are correct on this.
So as far as TOS goes, not virtually every battle was a warp on sublight affair. We get a good mix of warp on warp, sublight on warp, warp on sublight and sublight on sublight battles.
You’re right….virtually was definitely the wrong term to use in my original post. A better generalization, if you will, is that warp to warp battles were extremely rare and actually only occurred twice.
