Warp Speed Combat

[Jnnyrly]

I was watching the episode of Voyager before in which Seven is rescued from Unimatrix 01 and during the persuit through transwarp it got me thinking.

How do ships actually manage to engage each other at warp? Or more accurately, how do ships fire photon/quantum torpedo's at each other at warp? I understand that the scene in Voyager is in a transwarp conduit which works completely differently, but basically my issue is this:

If a ship needs a warp field in order to enter warp, surely once a torpedo leaves that field it loses the ability to maintain warp speed and would be a) destroyed or b) overtaken by the ship that fired it and slam right back into it!

I'm not a Star Trek tech wiz but I am an avid fan, and I was linked to this site by a friend after I asked this! So, any insight would be awesome, do torpedos generate their own warp field? Is a warp field only needed to enter warp, not maintain it? (which based on that episode of Enterprise is not what I'm guessing) Or, does the warp field only come into play when the need for intertial dampners is present? (A.K.A. when there are "unfixed" objects present in the vessel)

 

[T'Girl]

While not exactly canon, from on screen depictions it would seem that torpedoes possess their own warp engines. So in addition to the warhead, there are a (small) warp core, warp coils, warp plasma conduits/manifolds, probably a deflector too.

The torpedo once fire must be able to overtake the target ship so it's faster than the ship that fired it, capable of acceleration, turning tracking.

 

[Dac]

If you would allow me to play devils advocate for a moment....

I can understand the firing of weapons backwards from a ship, as the Ent-D does in Q, Who. But also in Q, Who, the borg fire what is seen as an energy weapon forwards.


How does that work?! :P

 

[blssdwlf]

It should work fine, we've seen the TOS Enterprise fire phasers forward at warp all the time

If you want a semi-technical answer, energy weapons fired at warp could be "warp field saturated" as seen with the Enterprise-D in "Force of Nature" or "warp field jacketed" as suggested by fan speculation. Or phasers, disruptors, Borg energy weapons also have a subspace component allowing for FTL speeds.

As to torpedoes, they could have their own warp engine in order to accelerate and intercept their targets.

 

[Deks]

At first, I think that combats at FTL speeds were intended to be severely limited if not impossible for the heroes level of technological development.
However... seeing how combat DID in fact occur at FTL speeds, there are several ways to explain this.

The Warp field that's generated by a star-ship could extend a great deal away from the hull.
Of course, the on-screen interpretation would have us think the warp-field extends only a few meters away from the hull.
Then again, that same on-screen interpretation claims that it takes 5 to 10 seconds to cross 200 000 km at Warp 4 (so I think we should discard the visual evidence that doesn't correspond with the dialogue - since the visual aspect was made more or less to be eye-candy).

To get back to the topic at hand though ...
Under warp speed, the warp-field could be extending for hundreds, if not thousands of km away from the hull.
The space inside the warp-bubble is not susceptible to distortions of any kind.
You could easily take a walk in a space-suit on the hull of the ship while it's at warp without fearing you'd be torn to pieces due to the speeds involved.

Now, if the torpedoes and phasers stay within the warp field (which would in this instance in fact be 'huge') then there would be no problem if you fire weapons forward (so long as they remain within the bubble).
But this rule would sooner apply to phasers rather than torpedoes (which are already Warp capable).

Phasers on the other hand were never mentioned directly to be FTL.
In fact, their maximum effective range is 300 000 km as stated on-screen, which might indicate that they can achieve only 1 c (because the speed of light is essentially 300 000 km/s), but not above that (going beyond 300 000 km, they don't have any effect).

Now ... the warp combats we saw were usually fought with ships being within visual distance from each other.

Even at slipstream or transwarp speeds, the ship would need to project a field bubble of necessary size to generate the tunnels in question (warp speed is also yet another tunnel).
We've seen from visual inspection the size of the slipstream/tw tunnels 'walls' are at least several hundred meters away from the hull (at least on left/right/up down relative locations ... while the distance of the 'tunnel' from front/back edges of the hull is MUCH larger (by a factor of 10 at least ... if not more).

It's not unreasonable to think that when we see the 'tunnel' itself ... it's the visual representation of the ship's warp field.

Except of course in Enterprise (the NX-01) case, we saw the warp field is in fact very close to the hull.

Perhaps when phasers are fired at warp ... a low level warp field extends around the beam, allowing it travel outside the 'skin tight' bubble and safely impact the vessel.

But as I said before, the visual representation cannot be taken always in the literal sense (at times yes, but a lot of others, no).
Cherry-picking in this instance is necessary if we want it to correlate with their technological capabilities.

I for one would love if the FX was done to reflect combating at huge distances.
Fire a torpedo ... you only see a flash from the tube itself, but not the torpedo.
At sub-light speeds, you wouldn't even SEE the thing if it's meant to to achieve FTL speeds.

Minimum distances involved here would be 300 000 km to accommodate phasers.
And larger distances for torpedoes (ranging in millions of km).

 

[Mytran]

Lightspeed beam weapons is one thing that I think Babylon 5 did really well. The beams just snap on instantly and keep on going ad infinitum. The beams also sweep across a target, causing maximum impact. A different visual style I know, but I like it!

 

[Forbin]

Photon torpedoes have a "warp sustainer" component. It's seen in the cutaways in the tech manuals.

 

[YARN]

Photon torpedoes have a "warp sustainer" component. It's seen in the cutaways in the tech manuals.

Right, right. They store those in the ship next to the Heisenberg Compensators.

 

[Deks]

Photon torpedoes have a "warp sustainer" component. It's seen in the cutaways in the tech manuals.

Right, right. They store those in the ship next to the Heisenberg Compensators.

Just in case that reply was meant as a sarcastic one, we have seen torpedoes being fired at warp, or probes that are warp capable.
In fact, in TNG a starbase launched a torpedo casing sized object with a Klingon ambassador inside.
The pod remained at high warp for long periods of time before it was retrieved by Enterprise-D.

I would imagine that if fired from a stationary object, a torpedo would have the ability to achieve lower level warp speed and sustain it.

As for torpedoes that were used in TW or Slipstream ... bear in mind that both utilize subspace in one way or another.
The sustainer inside the torpedo would likely have to be modified to accommodate for the velocity in question, or as I already stated, the 'tunnel' itself is the visual manifestation of the subspace field.
So long as the torpedo is inside this visual range, it can be fired at those velocities.

 

[T'Girl]

Phasers on the other hand were never mentioned directly to be FTL.

Phasers are frequently show being fired by ships moving FTL, just not the Enterprise Dee. Journey to Babel clearly depicts phaser fire while the Enterprise is at warp speed,

[phasers] In fact, their maximum effective range is 300 000 km as stated on-screen

In which episode please.

in TNG a starbase launched a torpedo casing sized object with a Klingon ambassador inside.
The pod remained at high warp for long periods of time before it was retrieved by Enterprise-D.

Pretty much a agreement for a warp engine as opposed to a warp sustainer.

 

[Forbin]

Engine or sustainer, either one is fine by me. Torps have been repeatedly shown at warp, and written about as warp-capable weapons.

Here's a thought about phasers - if they're energy weapons, then there's some kind of sense in declaring they can be used at FTL speeds. But what if they're particle beams?

 

[blssdwlf]

If they can have tachyon particles in Trek, then an un-named FTL phaser particle component could work just as well.

 

[T'Girl]

Nadion particles?
http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/Particle

 

[blssdwlf]

Sure, why not? I still lean on a FTL component that can be added to phasers when necessary (or power is available)

 

[Deks]

Phasers on the other hand were never mentioned directly to be FTL.

Phasers are frequently show being fired by ships moving FTL, just not the Enterprise Dee. Journey to Babel clearly depicts phaser fire while the Enterprise is at warp speed

VFX were shown to not correlate with the technological capabilities or dialogue on more than one occasion.
For example, in Enterprise, the ship was travelling at Warp 4 and took approximately 10 to 20 seconds to cross 200 000km (when in fact Warp 4 is supposed to be numerous times faster than the speed of light itself which equates to 300 000lm/s).
On other occasions, ships were stated to be hundreds, if not thousands of km away from each other, yet visual representation showed them to barely be hundreds of meters away.
During DS9, fleet battles neglected to show shield bubbles and ships went down like flies (on both ends).
Need I go on?

To this end, the visual representation of phasers being fired at Warp could have simply meant that they were fired within a ship's warp field.
As I explained in the original post, the field in question could be a visual manifestation of the 'warp tunnel/streaking stars' and not exactly 'skin tight'.
Or the warp field could in fact be extending thousands of km away from the ship.
That interpretation allows for phasers to be non-FTL yet capable of being fired in Warp because they are within the Warp field.

[phasers] In fact, their maximum effective range is 300 000 km as stated on-screen

In which episode please.
[/quote]

TNG episode 'The Wounded'

Pretty much a agreement for a warp engine as opposed to a warp sustainer.

Agreed.
While some people will state that torpedoes simply have warp sustainer's, I do think they are in fact true FTL weapons capable of achieving Warp speeds (for short periods) when needed.

 

[T'Girl]

On other occasions, ships were stated to be hundreds, if not thousands of km away from each other, yet visual representation showed them to barely be hundreds of meters away.

Which doesn't seem to have been a problem during TOS. TOS was very consistent in this area. The only time I recall ships being in close physical proximity was in The Enterprise Incident when the Enterprise was surrounded by three Romulan ship, which actually were supposedly only a very few mile apart from each other.

[phasers] In fact, their maximum effective range is 300 000 km as stated on-screen

In which episode please.

TNG episode 'The Wounded'

DATA: "The [Cardassian] warship is three hundred thousand kilometers from the Phoenix. It is opening fire."

Is this what you were referring too? It's not clear from the dialog if the Cardassian warship is using beam weapons or torpedoes. However, after being fired upon from three hundred thousand kilometers, the Phoenix maneuvers outside the Cardassian's warship's weapons range, but obviously within it's own and destroys the Cardassian warship.

 

[blssdwlf]

In "The Wounded" it wasn't spelled out what weapon the Cardassian warship fired at the Phoenix with. When the Phoenix fires its torpedoes at the Cardassian warship it is from approx 275,000 km (and inside the Cardassian's weapons range). Interestingly, the Cardassian ship appeared to slightly outrange the Phoenix!

We're never shown exactly what each range circle means though. The Phoenix has 3 equally spaced circles while the Cardassian's seemed to be clumped at the outer edge of 300,000km.

I remember phaser ranges from TOS: 90,000km in "The Tholian Web" and that 0.04ly was too far in "Obsession". TNG, etc I'm not as familiar with (other than "The Wounded").

 

[T'Girl]

DATA:
[The Phoenix] ... has positioned itself outside the weapons range of the opposing ship.
The Phoenix has powered up both phasers and photon torpedoes.
The Phoenix is firing photon torpedoes.
MACET:
He has destroyed our warship.

While the Cardassian warship initially fired from three hundred thousand, that doesn't necessarily represent it's maximum "weapons range," Data's unqualified statement that the Phoenix was "outside the weapons range" would seem to indicate that she was out of range of all the Cardassian warship's weapons systems. While at the same distance, the Cardassian warship remained inside of the Phoenix's torpedo range.

The Phoenix was definitely farther than three hundred thousand when she fired her torpedoes.

.

 

[blssdwlf]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkqELVEhUyU

You can see the entire sequence in the beginning of the video. You can see that the Cardassian opens fire as the Phoenix enters the Cardassian's outer weapons ring (which is slightly further than the Phoenix.)

Then we are described that the Phoenix has moved outside of the Cardassian's range - this is not shown. You are correct in that we do not know each ship's "maximum weapons range".

Then we see the Phoenix fire her torpedoes and destroy the Cardassian within each other's weapons range circles suggesting that they both were within each other's weapons range.

 

[SPCTRE]

How does that work?! :P

Off topic: Your new avatar is awesome.

Off topic 2: Am I the only one who can hear the thread title proclaimed in a Mortal Kombat style announcer voice, complete with the Mortal Kombat main theme playing in the background?

Warp Speed Combaaaaaaaaaat!