What's the most powerful weapon in Star Trek? (that we've seen on screen)

[Candleicious Ghost]

Oh the power of friendship....... I think Disco did that too

 

[DSG2k]

The list thus far (plus some other entries I am tossing in) could be sorted by destructiveness and area of effect. With the latter, you can separate items into groups of effective areas/sizes/radii of immediate or at least very short-term effect.

(I qualify that because of various examples that could do worse over time. The Doomsday Machine is a planet killer but, over long enough timescales, could theoretically eat everything in a galaxy that isn't radiating like a star.

I'm also a bit unsure of how to define the effective radius of temporal incursions from various sources. Theoretically that's universal, even if all you did was save Edith Keeler.)

Scales:

Person
Phaser on kill/'vaporize', Rock Penis

Building
Phaser on Setting 16 per Riker, (generously) the weak-sauce orbital bombardment by the Borg in First Contact, photon grenade

Ship/City
Atomic bomb, thermonuclear weapons, photon torpedo at high yield, 2150s Mars Terraforming Verteron Array

Continent / Planetary Surface
asteroid, General Order 24, Husnock bombardment, Nomad, V'Ger Orbital Devices, Genesis Device as designed, Cardassian ATR-4107 ("Dreadnought")

Planet
Circa 2370 Romulan/Cardassian fleet bombardment (hours to destroy crust and mantle), Doomsday Machine (with time to carve), Xindi weapon, 8472 combo-beam, red matter at Vulcan, Death Star

Star System
Genesis Device as observed (ate the whole nebula), Borg multikinetic neutronic mine (5,000,000 isotons), Soren's trilithium missile, Tox Uthat, Q munition bleedthrough supernova, red matter at Romulus

Star Cluster/Sector
Borg multikinetic neutronic mine (claimed five light-year nanoprobe dispersal, time unclear)

Quadrant and Galaxy
Lazarus entry vector (low destructiveness), Krenim Temporal Weapon-Ship (variable, non-classical destructiveness)

Galaxy Group
V'Ger? ... it recorded "planets, moons, stars, whole galaxies", but did that necessitate recording a la Epsilon IX?

Universe
Q frakking with Big Bang

What'd I miss?

EDIT: Changed City to Ship/City, added 2150s Mars Terraforming Verteron Array, Cardassian ATR-4107

 

[DonIago]

Should Admiral Nechayev be classified as a weapon?

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Kirk talking a computer into self-destructing.

 

[F. King Daniel]

IIRC, one thing I never quite understood about the timeship is the idea that it could bring people back from the dead. Conceptually it would seem as though if you wipe someone from ever having existed then you can't do something else to make them exist again, unless you pull a Janeway and wipe yourself from ever having existed. Unless the idea is that if A leads to B leads to C and you originally wiped out B to prevent C from happening, so A now leads to Not B leads to D, then you can subsequently wipe out Not B to restore C C, or at least C'...but that seems a bit like an act of luck (which might explain Annorax's perpetual paradox I guess).

Though, I also liked my pet theory that it wasn't that the timeship was wiping anything out, but rather that it was jumping itself into alternate timelines.

I think their logic had the time ship as A in every incusion made, so wiping it out undid all the incursions it had ever done.

Does it hold up to scrutiny? No more than any other time travel magic.

 

[Candleicious Ghost]

Kirk talking a computer into self-destructing.

I think that one gets so exaggerated though, like it only happened once or twice didn't it?

 

[Nerys Myk]

I think that one gets so exaggerated though, like it only happened once or twice didn't it?

Induced self-destruction

 

[Candleicious Ghost]

Induced self-destruction

Yeah Kirk did it four times but the way some fans talk about it, it was like something he did all the time when dealing with machines.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Yeah Kirk did it four times but the way some fans talk about it, it was like something he did all the time when dealing with machines.

Often enough.

 

[aridas sofia]

In Star Trek:The Motion Picture, Spock says that within V’ger he was “seeing images of planets, moons, stars, whole galaxies all stored in here, recorded.” If V’ger was able to reduce planets, moons, stars, and entire galaxies to digital patterns the way we saw it do to people, ships, and the Epsilon 9 station, then there is no comparison with anything ever seen in Star Trek — except perhaps, the potential of Lazarus’ ship to destroy two entire universes.

 

[Candleicious Ghost]

In Star Trek:The Motion Picture, Spock says that within V’ger he was “seeing images of planets, moons, stars, whole galaxies all stored in here, recorded.” If V’ger was able to reduce planets, moons, stars, and entire galaxies to digital patterns the way we saw it do to people, ships, and the Epsilon 9 station, then there is no comparison with anything ever seen in Star Trek — except perhaps, the potential of Lazarus’ ship to destroy two entire universes.

V'Ger was the ultimate artificial power, but in the end was just wanting to connect with its creators.. I wish future Trek would bring back whatever it became.

 

[DSG2k]

In Star Trek:The Motion Picture, Spock says that within V’ger he was “seeing images of planets, moons, stars, whole galaxies all stored in here, recorded.” If V’ger was able to reduce planets, moons, stars, and entire galaxies to digital patterns the way we saw it do to people, ships, and the Epsilon 9 station, then there is no comparison with anything ever seen in Star Trek — except perhaps, the potential of Lazarus’ ship to destroy two entire universes.

The only counterexamples to the V'ger idea we've both expressed are that (a) V'ger would have to be hella-fast -- within our galaxy it didn't seem to be going any faster than a ship, but perhaps it has to slow down in residential areas -- and (b), the apparent continued existence of other galaxies nearby.

While it would of course take millions or billions of years for information on their disappearance to arrive at lightspeed, there's never been a suggestion of a lack of nearby galaxies, e.g. Andromeda being gone or the WNOHGB Traveler flight of the Enterprise-D not having anything near. To be sure, this would require an active note on a writer's part, but still.

Also, yes, I think I left out that Lazarus claimed both universes would completely end, focusing instead on the wink-out only . . . but there was so much weirdness in the noggins of the Lazurii that I'd have to take out a loan before buying into it.

 

[Sgt_G]

What about Doctor Crusher using a solar flare to destroy enemy ships?

 

[Candleicious Ghost]

What about Doctor Crusher using a solar flare to destroy enemy ships?

That was very cool

 

[matthunter]

What about Doctor Crusher using a solar flare to destroy enemy ships?

Same was done in DS9 by Worf.

A few ships or a shipyard? A good war tactic, but we're talking war ENDERS or even species enders.

 

[Sgt_G]

Oh, in that case, see ST:TNG episode The Survivors.

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

Friendship and cookies.

 

[DonIago]

Friendship and cookies.

Bularian canapes?

 

[thribs]

Obviously the photonic cannon

 

[Candleicious Ghost]

Friendship and cookies.

And Deanna cake