I love how so many people argue about the effects in this scene when it is so obvious the destruction is hidden by the gaseous upper atmosphere that is seen reacting to the weapons fire. "The Omarion Nebula was an interstellar gas cloud located in the Gamma Quadrant, deep inside Dominion space. 10,000 years ago, the Founders retreated to a sunless planet inside the Omarion Nebula to escape persecution by solids." - Not a typical planet, so not the typical clearly visible destruction. I guess everyone who watched the show just thought its dark because its always night time. lol
Great point... I hadn't really considered the nature of the damage, just the argument that what is shown doesn't represent catastrophic results. Look how slow the clouds over earth spin during some of natures worst... I would not want to be around for a pressure wave capable of that kind of atmospheric disturbance on this video.
Imagine what the deflector dishes of a few Galaxy class ships would do to a planet. There is no shortage of serious firepower in the Star Trek universe.
Foebane72 True, but if I remember correctly, the crew of the Enterprise-D modified it to serve as a weapon in "The Best of Both Worlds." Also, Scotty used it to simulate a torpedo blast in "Star Trek: Generations." In the former case, though, the energy burned out the dish. As you mentioned, it wasn't designed for that purpose.
Steven Cohen. I think its like they use the shield emmiter to instead emit a phaser like beam. Very powerful but you only get one shot. Im suprised the federstion dont modify a few ships to be capable of doing that without such damage
Bleachsoul13 Coruscant would be pulverized to the mantle in mere seconds by the alpha quadrant forces that were present at the battle of Cardassia Prime.
WaveForceful And in just minutes Coruscant would be a cloud of dust. Trip tucker stated that it would take 1,000 NX class ships to destroy a planet, a single Galaxy class ship is worth hundreds of NX's.
WaveForceful That would depend on the strength of Coruscant's defenses. I'm not trying to support Wars, but we shouldn't underestimate the magnitude of the defensive capabilities of the planet. I'm sure they have multiple theater shields (which might form a planetary shield grid), ground-based defenses, and orbital weapons platforms, not to mention a defensive fleet. It's the capital world of the Empire/Republic. It would be foolish to assume that it didn't have significant defenses. But yes, if they just let a Federation fleet fire at it, they can kiss their planetary metropolis goodbye.
Yeah that the thing, SW fans claim SW vessels can cause catastrophic damage to planets while ST vessels actually HAVE decimated planets. I mean the USS Defiant could kill all life on a planet with just 2 torpedoes. Even the humble NX-01's full torpedo complement is equal to the worlds nuclear arsenal.
WaveForceful To be fair the Defiant was using a biological weapon loaded onto their torpedoes. Two Quantum Torps alone lack the explosive force to destroy all the life on a planet. They could cause incredible damage, but they really wouldn't do much more than a really powerful nuclear explosion, and even then the explosive force will mostly blow off into the atmosphere. On the other hand, Turbolasers and lasers were given every opportunity to demonstrate planet-slagging capacity. The former never even tries, and the latter just blows rocks apart, explosive style, not DEW style. So while you could make a good case for an ISD turning a planet into rubble, it's hard to argue for them turning a planet into molten slag. Phasers would actually do a much better job, even ignoring localized shields protecting cities. They can drill through a planet's crust, triggering faults, causing earthquakes, and generally wreaking geological havoc. After all, why spend all the time and effort to slag a planet when you can have the planet slag itself? That's something a lot of people ignore. Trek may not demonstrate power levels beyond some SW EU stuff, but they don't need to. The end result is still the same.
***** You didn't know about the slagging argument? I'm surprised, it's a commonly used argument from the Wars camp, which only has basis in SW Legends... which also provides counter-examples within itself. It's in relation to a Base Delta Zero. And the Death Star is certainly impressive, but is a one-off (two-off?) superweapon. The only time we've seen planet-popping a'la Death Star in Trek was the singular show of force by the Undine in Voyager
The barrage really shows the immense firepower Star Trek ships possess. All to often people is sci-fi debates assume they're weak but really they aren't at all as even a small lightly armed science ship possess weapons like those in the bombardment scene. Weapons fully capable of destroying - not glassing - large parts of a planetary surface in moments.
+Idazmi7 Indeed... which easily puts anything from Star Wars (at least in terms of weapons) to shame. Heck, even the Death Star (which is 160 km in diameter) isn't that impressive, considering that SF can make a 2 meter large torpedo that can destroy a whole freaking planet...
Indeed... numbers wise, does the explosive yield NEED to be huge to produce the effect, or is it possible that multi-gigaton yields can produce the same effect by combining various technologies together that can achieve it? Namely, I'm fine with the yields being in the multi-gigaton range (dozens to hundreds) as that seems much more in line with their capabilities, but it wouldn't surprise me if the weapons strength was increased by the time this episode aired. Oh and, the Dominion didn't seem that much more ahead of the Federation technology-wise. The Federation did display same cloning capabilities (actually, even faster in terms of maturation), and the weapons going through Federation shields had more to do with the Dominion intelligence network than superior technology. The only area the Dominion was ahead of the Federation was their long range transporters (which seems odd - then again the Dominion also had a 2000 years head start and also incorporated numerous races - though mainly via fear) and possibly construction (though automated construction is nothing new in Trek... actually TNG was specifically implied to have heavy automation in terms of maintenance and repairs - building starships would have to be done in the same manner, as I cannot see manual labour as being effective in this kind of setting when computers and machines, especially the ones the Federation has would be far superior for the task at hand - or in that regard, the Dominion might have just had a bit more advanced computer systems, and since they were more war oriented, a bit better prepared, though realistically, 2000 ships wouldn't be enough to overwhelm the Alpha and Beta Quadrants... that was just nonsense on the writers part since space is FREAKING HUGE, and come on, the Feds alone would have tens of thousands of ships - not taking into account the Romulans and the Klingons...)
+Idazmi7 "They grew an army in three days?" No. In TNG, Season 2, we've seen the ability of proverbial colonists with relatively lower technological level of the overall Federation to grow full sized replicas of both Riker and Pulaski in a short amount of time. My point was that clones on the Dominion side needed days to mature. The ones seen in TNG S2 'Up the long ladder' episode were fully formed, and it took under 24 hours to get them there. If you extrapolated that process on a much larger scale, Federation cloning capability outstrips the one on the Dominion side by over 3 times in terms of speed alone. "That wasn't implied." Actually, it was. The episode Jem'Hadaar from DS9 has this: TALAK'TALAN: It's too late for apologies. The Dominion will no longer stand by and allow ships from your side to violate our territory. I hear that Klingons are effective warriors. What's that weapon they're so fond of? The bat'leth? SISKO: I am not interested in discussing the Klingons. TALAK'TALAN: All right. Then what about the Cardassians? Are you satisfied with the treaty your Federation made with them? It seems a tactical error. SISKO: How do you know so much about our side of the galaxy? TALAK'TALAN: We gain more knowledge every day, and now we have you to help us learn more. It is very logical to think that the Founders have probably been gathering information on the Alpha Quadrant major powers in a stealth capacity (which was later confirmed) shortly since the wormhole was opened - or at least since the Federation was starting to explore the Gamma Quadrant. It is also not a stretch to imagine that sensitive tactical information would be obtained by the Dominion, giving them ample time until the end of season 2 of DS9 to adjust their weapons to penetrate AQ races shields. And if you noticed, the Defiant's shields in 'The Search' episode were effective against the Jem'Hadaar weapons, and later on DS9 itself was also well protected in terms of shields so their weapons wouldn't hurt them. The Defiant was an anti-Borg vessel for the most part, but it likely didn't sport a radically different shield design whose mods couldn't be applied to other ships in the fleet. The Dominion for the most part didn't shy away from using suicide tactics as they saw their troops as expendable/replaceable given how much they relied on cloning. Mind you, the Feds could do better in terms of cloning by comparison, they just refuse to using it on moral grounds... plus if you take into account that there's over 150 different member species in the Federation, and considering the stated numbers of 'potential casualties' quoted, there are billions of people who would likely be willing to serve on SF ships. And given the level of ease of use in terms of LCARS, etc... it wouldn't be difficult to offer crash courses, considering that LCARS seems to be used everywhere in the Federation. "A single Klingon scout took out the Enterprise-D with shield-penetrating disruptors. 2000 Dominion Warships would end them." The Feds nullified the shield-penetrating weapons of the Dominion well before the war started - starting with the Defiant. Getting their hands on one of their bug ships would have only given them more in terms of how Dominion technology worked, so they could improve upon what they already had in use. The only reason why that Klingon scout took out the Ent-D was mainly because it had direct access to seeing their shield frequencies, and bad writing. Realistically, Riker simply needed to fire a Sierra pattern style of torpedoes at the Scout - which would likely overload its shields, and a simple well placed phaser strike from both top and bottom forward arrays would have likely vaporized it. 2000 ships vs tens of thousands of ships, orbital defences that can also take out whole fleets, etc? I doubt it. The Dominion feared self-replicating mines which were placed at the wormhole entrance. 2000 ships is nowhere near enough. We know that DS9 dumbed down a lot of things to present a threat to the Federation (which was also described as Weyoun as 'vast and very difficult to control' - this might imply that the Federation was larger than the Dominion... and in that sense, it would also likely have a much larger number of ships - hence why the Dominion set their base of operations in Cardassian space and aligned with them, and later on with the Breen. 1 on 1, the Dominion couldn't go up against the Federation. Not if you take everything we know of Federation technical capabilities, etc. (which ARE rather extensive). DS9 simply dumbed a lot of it down for the purpose of drama (such as 0 use of personal shields - even though we've seen them in use in TNG and Voy), no use of wide-spread phaser beams (which would have come in handy with the Siege of that ridiculous planet and the Dominion listening post on the surface). This is why I said the Dominion was only marginally better at some things than the Federation. Otherwise, they were rather comparable. The Feds however, never really used their fullest potential of technological prowess - plus, we have been told that SF's ship production capacity during wartime was able to 'barely' keep up with the Dominion. So, technically, they were more or less on par. And in the battle to retake DS9, a fleet of some 600 Federation ships went on to battle 1200 ships from Cardassians and Dominion - and we've seen how easily one Federation ship was able to tear through a Cardassian ship. So , even though the odds were 2 to 1... some of those Federation ships would basically be as worth as 2 or 3 enemy ships. The Galaxy class was evidently worth 2 or 3 Galore classes, while the Defiant could hold on its own against 2 or 3 Dominion bug ships. And the battle was more or less a stand-off, until the Klingons showed up and helped the Feds tip the scales. I'd say that show the Feds are rather under-estimated a lot.
+Idazmi7 "Their knowledge seems much more political than tactical, and the Federation-Cardassian Treaty wasn't exactly "discreet". The Maquis made it even less discreet." Not necessarily. The Founders have infiltrated variety levels of governments in all major powers. There's no reason to think that Jem'Hadaar would have immediately told Sisko everything and lose the potential element of surprise. "Multiply that advantage times 2000 ships, with only a handful of newer ships like Defiant being able to counter it." And as I said before, the Federation countered Dominion shield penetrating weapon well before the war started which was likely adapted to all their ships from what they learned on the Defiant. The losses they suffered weren't because of the Dominion penetrating their shields... it was because of suicide tactics and initial larger numbers. "That means nothing: the U.S. feared Vietnamese mines. Self-replicating cloaked mines would scare any sensible person." Not when we are talking about planetary based defences and starbases that are likely capable of taking out fleets of ships much like the Cardassian ones did. "ALL Star Trek is guilty of that one. The personal shield was introduced in TAS, yet they almost never use it outside of TAS. That INCLUDES TNG and VOY." Agreed... but DS9 seems particularly negligent of dumbing Trek down (starting with the incredibly low warp speeds - which seems to have originated with Sisko in 'The Search'). vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/memoryalpha/images/2/22/Phaser_sweep_guest_quarters.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20071105132120&path-prefix=en I meant (as I also mentioned) 'no use of wide-spread phaser beams' in ground combat. "Those are minor forces. For the record, the Enterprise-D was state to be worth a dozen Galor-class ships. The Nebula class treats them a weightless, BUT you are forgetting the other ships. The flagships and battlecruisers of the Dominion, which are worth 3 refit Galaxy-Class ships. (mentioned in "Valiant")" The Dominion/Cardassian fleets seem to have been largely composed of those ships. My point was that a 600 ships large Federation fleet was able to go toe to toe with a 1200 ship fleet and produce a stalemate. As I mentioned, the inclusion of a small contingent of Klingon ships seem to have given the Federation an edge... mainly because the Dominion was focused on SF, while the Klingons managed to get very close and destroy multiple Dominion/Cardassian forces in an opening salvo using what might have been an element of surprise. "Nothing about Defiant is similar to the other ships in the fleet. It's phasers, hull profile,size, overall design..." And yet, the pulse phasers are nothing more than concentrated bursts of energy that managed to get twice the fire power output using simple modifications that Riker's twin was able to identify - suggesting this could be duplicated on other ships. Shields as we have seen behaved pretty much like on other ships... my point was that since the Defiant sported shields which operated a bit differently, that these modifications could have been applied to other ships on the go. Indeed, we've had ample examples of SF crews making deep changes to their technology in the field - and the Defiant had detailed sensor analysis of their initial encounter with the Jem'Hadaar bug ships. We're talking about same people who patched up a broken Defiant class starship in a space of about a day or two, so that they could take it into the GQ to find the Founders.
+Idazmi7 "BUT THAT IS EXACTLY WHAT HE DID.He told Sisko directly that they had been spying on the Alpha Quadrant." Indeed. But he would only give Sisko just enough to make him worried about the Dominion... hardly EVERYTHING, as I think a tactical surprise was an imperative, seeing how the Dominion was intent on showing the Federation to what lengths they would go. This gives us a strong possibility that the Dominion managed to acquire tactical data on the Federation (and other species) ships from the Alpha and Beta Quadrants which would allow them to make their weapons pass through their shields and make their ships more resistant to those weapons. Indeed, in the same episode, another Jem'Hadaar was sent to DS9 with a list of Starfleet vessels that he said they destroyed in the Gamma Quadrant (along with the Bajoran colony). And, since we've seen the Dominion being interested enough in new species, at least enough to learn as much as they can about them... its not a stretch to think it was just a matter of Intel and not 'superior technology' (at least not in the weapons arena). "The Defiant has dedicated pulse cannons. Any assumption of similarity is absurd." Correction, they were pulse PHASER cannons. So the base technology was essentially the same (phasers). They simply modified it to fire concentrated pulses of nadion particles as opposed to beams (something we saw handheld weapons were also capable of), and routed certain relays to get twice the power output (as Riker's transporter twin mentioned) - this particular modification might have been done on other ships too, as he was mentioning it in a relatively nonchalant manner (or at least a solution that seemed trivial to accomplish). I would also imagine that you could set each pulse to different frequency (or possibly even have the already fired pulse change their frequency after being fired) "That originated with PICARD in "The Price". "century at Warp 9" my ass." I stand corrected - the Barzan wormhole episode. But that was at Warp 9. The closer you get to the threshold, speeds are supposed to start jumping by rather large amounts. Particularly after Warp 9.9 where I think a non-canon explanation stated that every increment (0.01 increase) resulted in doubling of speed. So, Voyager's Warp 9.975 (which the ship was supposed to be able to withstand indefinitely, as it was explained to be it's maximum sustainable cruise velocity) should have been MUCH faster (along the lines of 470 Ly's per hour, or 11280 Ly's per day). If anything, this gives TNG, Ds9 and VOY credence to Paris's statement that Warp 9.9 is 21 374 times c... "Rotating the shield frequency does not suddenly change the nature of shield technology." No, and as we've seen, rotating the shield frequencies didn't really help the Odyssey, but the Defiant's shields nullified Dominion's weapons penetration capabilities, and that shield technology had very close ties to shields that came before them (actually they were likely based off them considering the Defiant was built before the Dominion became known - and likely, battle analysis of Dominion weapons in action for the first time gave Sisko ideas to modify the shield emitters). And we've seen very extensive modifications being done to the shield emitters in the field on a regular basis - usually because SF technology is made in a modular capacity and older designs can actually be extensively upgraded/modified with enough work to increase their capabilities and efficiency. So anything the Defiant sported and was effective would have likely been integrated on other ships immediately after 'The Search' episode. The main problem with SF losing ships and taking losses was Dominion suicide tactics. I doubt that Starfleet would have gone to war with the Dominion without being able to counter their weapons shield penetration trick. "What part was broken? If it was only a few systems, then I can see repairs taking only a day or two." If you recall, Sisko said they abandoned the whole project (the Defiant included) because of design flaws and issues of engines tearing the ship apart (among other things) during battle drills.
