Self Destruct.

[Timo]

Towards the end of TMP

...That is, certain editions of it. "My" Kirk never ordered self-destruct.

Indeed, in the next movie he'd still insist that he had never really faced death, never tried to resolve a no-win scenario through personal sacrifice like Spock would proceed to do.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Rarewolf]

Picard tried to blow up E-E to make a dent in the Scimitar, but self-destruct went on holiday.

It's one of several problems with that battle. Were all the Shuttlecraft trashed? They had phaser banks, transporters, warp cores. Some probably had torpedos too.

 

[Timo]

It would not be consistent with previous Trek to use shuttlecraft as weapons. DS9 confirms that small craft cannot really make dents in starships even when specifically built for the role and called "attack fighters". And the Scimitar was a pretty fearsome starship opponent, way beyond the capabilities of armed shuttlecraft even with a hole in the bow and shields at 70%.

It would, OTOH, be consistent to use shuttlecraft for transportation.

1) If the ship's own centralized transporter system was down, the independent transporter units of the shuttles could be used for the short hop from the E-E to Shintzon's bridge. That is, unless the only transporters even theoretically capable of defeating the double obstacles of the Bassen Rift and the enemy shields were the main ones - which would be very consistent with preceding Trek. So scrap that plan. (Unless we assume Picard's button transporter was an "independent unit" as well, rather than a mere homing aid for the main transporters. If so, the much larger and more powerful independent units of the shuttles ought to have counted. But that button, and the way it was used, never made much sense anyway.)

2) However, shuttles could be used simply for flying across, for duplicating Data's leap in a more controlled manner and with more firepower aboard. Why this wasn't attempted is unclear; if Shintzon were capable of shooting down the shuttles, Data should have been worried about getting shot down himself. And when he wasn't blasted to bits, LaForge ought to have launched a hundred redshirts aboard a dozen shuttles as a second wave of assault.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Itisnotlogical]

^^

Data was a very small target, possibly small enough to be missed by a damaged Scimitar focused on the fact that the bridge of the Enterprise E just landed in their living room. Phasers and torpedoes have been depicted, on rare occasions, to miss smaller targets simply because of error on behalf of the officer in charge of shooting at that time. The thing Shinzon probably least expected was a homicidal maniac robot jumping several hundred meters with absolutely no protection on to his ship.

 

[Timo]

Fair enough. And we can always argue that Picard wanted to defeat Shinzon with minimal casualties to his own crew. Victory at all costs wasn't necessary, because Shinzon had already more or less lost the game: his ship was half shot to pieces and Starfleet was waiting for him, while his support back on Romulus had already evaporated. The only remaining threat really was to the E-E crew.

This is also a good argument for explaining why Picard didn't self-destruct. He had absolutely no intention of dying himself just for the sake of that pitiful clown of a clone. If he couldn't blow up the E-E safely (that is, with a computer-controlled countdown that would allow everybody to evacuate safely first), he certainly wouldn't do it by walking down to Engineering and firing his phaser at the warp core. Yet the failure of the safe self-destruct meant he'd probably have to sacrifice himself one way or another; he chose one of the more productive, workable and proactive options and personally attacked Shinzon's superweapon from inside.

Why he didn't also launch a shuttlecraft boarding assault is left for the audience to explain. Shinzon's remaining fighting ability is certainly a reasonably good argument. And Picard may not have been planning on going alone, but the failure of the transporter prevented the sending of reinforcements; Picard may have optimistically underestimated the risk of such a failure.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[LeadHead]

Lets say that all you had left on the ship were junior officers for whatever reason. Would an ensign be in command if he or she was the highest officer and could he or she and his next in line set the auto destruct? Saying you need two people at that point.

Referring back the original question here, The possibility of junior officers being able to set it off seems possible because of one incident; Worf being a part of setting the Auto Destruct in First Contact. He was not an assigned officer to the ship, he was rescued after the Defiant was disabled. Officers have their own access codes, I tend to believe that if Riker had been aboard there would have only been a need for 2 codes. Just Picard and Riker, like in the olden days aboard the Enterprise-D.

Crusher probably did not have the highest command access to enable the sequence, so another command level officers code was needed to engage the sequence. Since Data had been captured, Riker, Geordi and Troi were off the ship, Worf was likely the highest ranking officer available. Given this, other officers, reaching more junior ranks, ould potentially be able to set the sequence, perhaps needing greater numbers or to enter some confirmation to the computer that all higher ranking officers were deceased.

 

[Rarewolf]

If he couldn't blow up the E-E safely (that is, with a computer-controlled countdown that would allow everybody to evacuate safely first)

Was that the plan? I always assumed the Omega instruction was reference to the Omega particle plot of Voyager - destroy ship immediately doing as much damage to the surrounding area as possible - the look on Troi's face didn't look like she was ready to abandon ship.

Ramming ships wasn't that consistant either (Doomsday Machine and Caretaker)

Timescape showed ships could be flown by remote. Easy to overload their warp cores.

What about using the shuttles for Enterprise's escape? We saw a Runabout tow a much larger Galor class vessel in DS9. Could a dozen shuttles tow the Enterprise?

 

[Timo]

Was that the plan?

We don't know, and the writers probably had only a very fuzzy idea, too. But if Picard really wanted everybody to die in the explosion, there would have been endless opportunities for blowing up the E-E without the help of a dedicated self-destruct system. Our best bet at explaining why none of these opportunities was taken lies in arguing that Picard didn't want to die, not for something as insignificant as an already won battle.

Timescape showed ships could be flown by remote. Easy to overload their warp cores.

We have seen plenty of shuttles blowing up, and none seem to have gone out with enough of a bang to be useful as weapons. Shuttles may have too little antimatter aboard to make a difference - or then they lack warp cores altogether, which would be one way to interpret "The Sound of Her Voice" where warp cores are said to be incompatible with the timeshifting planet, yet a shuttlecraft is launched there nevertheless.

What about using the shuttles for Enterprise's escape? We saw a Runabout tow a much larger Galor class vessel in DS9. Could a dozen shuttles tow the Enterprise?

This sounds possible. But it would probably take longer to rig than they had, and there was no indication the Scimitar couldn't follow them: the enemy was still mobile, and Shinzon was actually convinced he could still fly all the way to Earth to finish his mission. Although he was probably too optimistic about that; at least his cloak seemed too damaged to protect him from the waiting Starfleet forces.

Launching the shuttles on a simple assault mission would be quicker and might achieve better results. Certainly it should have been doable in the, what, seven minutes they had. But the counterargument about Shinzon being able to see them and shoot them down is probably valid.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Vanyel]

Question about the shuttles: Are they tied down, or somehow secured? If not they would be scattered around the shuttle bays.

Using True Q and Ethics as examples, Starfleet doesn't even tie down containers they just stack round barrels two high and go to the next level, I don't think they do.

 

[A beaker full of death]

Every incident aboard ship is recorded in the log. At all times. It's been that way throughout naval history, and would certainly be so in an era of automation. Thus the ship always "knows" who the ranking officers are.

 

[Vanyel]

Would it know rank and position during battle? I mean if the first and second officer are killed on the bridge and the 3rd officer is the Chief Security Officer and he's trying to repel a boarding party on deck 24, who would be the second one with command codes? The next ranking bridge officer? Or the ships 3rd officer who's down in the midst of a fire fight on deck 24?.

 

[Timo]

That shouldn't really matter: the destruct codes would be available to a select number of officers, and any three of those should be able to use them, not just the exact top three at timepoint T.

It's not as if a person who is suddenly promoted from 3rd Officer to 2nd Officer due to casualties would somehow also suddenly gain the destruct codes (say, in a sealed envelope). He or she would have had those codes memorized to being with.

The computer would decide whether the codes are valid, and might insist on having at least one of the trio be of sufficient rank and position. But the computer shouldn't be excessively selective or exclusive in a situation like that.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Vanyel]

That shouldn't really matter: the destruct codes would be available to a select number of officers, and any three of those should be able to use them, not just the exact top three at timepoint T.

It's not as if a person who is suddenly promoted from 3rd Officer to 2nd Officer due to casualties would somehow also suddenly gain the destruct codes (say, in a sealed envelope). He or she would have had those codes memorized to being with.

The computer would decide whether the codes are valid, and might insist on having at least one of the trio be of sufficient rank and position. But the computer shouldn't be excessively selective or exclusive in a situation like that.

Timo Saloniemi

Let me see if I understand you:
Let's say that on the 1701D there are 20 people with the proper command codes. Any set of three of those officer could initiate the self destruct, with the officer with the highest rank or position being the one to give the final go ahead?
And let's say that another 3 try to terminate the destruct sequence, would the computer check to see which group has the highest ranking officer/position and ultimately follow that command?

I'm looking at it like a poker hand. Both hands are a straight. Hand one is 8,9,10,J,Q the other 9,10,J,Q,K. The latter hand wins because of it's higher card (position and/or rank.)

If I did it right out of 20 people and only any combination of three needed to initiate self destruct there 1140 possible combinations without any repetition. If only 10 people have command codes then there are only 120 combinations without repetition.

 

[brian577]

Was that the plan?

We don't know, and the writers probably had only a very fuzzy idea, too. But if Picard really wanted everybody to die in the explosion, there would have been endless opportunities for blowing up the E-E without the help of a dedicated self-destruct system. Our best bet at explaining why none of these opportunities was taken lies in arguing that Picard didn't want to die, not for something as insignificant as an already won battle.

Actual line
Computer. Auto-destruct sequence
Omega. Zero time delay. Recognize
voice pattern Jean Luc Picard.
Authorization Alpha Alpha Three
Zero Five --

 

[Arpy]

There's something democratic and terrifying the notion that a) the internal sensors decide who can kill us all, and b) everyone on the ship can kill us all. There's the classic HAL-9000 "what if the ship's busted" threat. I'd hope the system that decides who's in charge is more secure than the regular internal sensors that go down every other week. That theyre more that emergency WWIII internet rather than Comcast.

And it'd be nice if I'm #1013 on the USS Galaxy, and my comrade and I are about to have our brains sucked out by the wretched space vampires of Omicron Persei 8 as they did to nearly all 1012 of my superiors, that even I, Bartender Number 2, could blow the ship up first.

 

[Rom's Sehlat]

Someone way earlier in this thread said "Ramming ships isn't consistent [throughout the franchise]."

Well, during the time of E-E and the Scimitar, ships had improved so much they didn't blow up upon contact. The same thing with Voyager. I just saw an episode of VOY where a gigantic space amoeba was swimming around and was pushing Voyager around. There was no damage, deformation, or explosions at all. These almost third-gen ships can handle physical stress a lot better without exploding. Plus they were at fairly low speeds. No crashes, just nudges basically.

 

[JB2005]

^Plus the EE had skin tight shields, it's probable those took a lot of the brunt of the impact

 

[Rarewolf]

Someone way earlier in this thread said "Ramming ships isn't consistent [throughout the franchise]."

That would be me

Ramming ships wasn't that consistant either (Doomsday Machine and Caretaker)

In those cases I meant using the ship as a weapon, as a missile, and expecting to survive - in those two cases they were beamed out.

Picard knew he had 'got him' because crashing the Enterprise into him was the last thing his clone would expect of him. They had to defeat him no matter the cost.

Besides I was answering the point that using shuttles as weapons wasn't consistant. Desperate times call for inconsistant tactics - like ramming.

^Plus the EE had skin tight shields, it's probable those took a lot of the brunt of the impact

With a hole in the Bridge I think its safe to say the shields were fried at the time.

 

[JB2005]

^ Not really, the shields aren't only one emitter. there's a graphic where it shows the shields fore were still strong, but the top shields were failing, hence the hole in the bridge!

 

[Rom's Sehlat]

And I hate to bring up real physics, but as I understand it if a chamber (room) in a spaceship did have a break, the entire room would depressurize so fast NO ONE would survive (or be found again). Just one person wouldn't be pushed out, everything that wasn't bolted down wouldn't.