Why dont they just ram ships into enemy vessels at warp speed?

[Jounin]

I get a completely opposite idea from watching the episodes. It seems that they are always going to warp at the drop of a hat. For example, the Picard maneuver requires a precise, short distance jump to warp. There is no room for a lengthy Back-to-the-Future style speedup.

[jhug666]

remember if the situation is hopeless then suicide atacks become viable , look at the kamikaze attacks in ww2

[random1739]

The ship would have to know where and when the torpedoes were coming, and be at a good enough distance in order to evade them.

 

If warp drive could be used as a weapon. One would need to know the exact position of a ship, and that ship would need to be stationary. Being 0.1 degree of angle off when traveling at warp could mean missing the target by thousands of km.

 

Also I'm not completely sure, but maybe subspace prevents interaction with static matter, although gravitational fields still seem to affect subspace

[TFMF]

Also - in Nemesis - Picard rammed Shinzon's ship and was able to almost disable his ship - and yet - Picards crew was still alive - so although raming the ship at warp would cause more damage - you can't save your crew that way...

[rjfoster]

Also - in Nemesis - Picard rammed Shinzon's ship and was able to almost disable his ship - and yet - Picards crew was still alive - so although raming the ship at warp would cause more damage - you can't save your crew that way...

 

I don't think that the Scimitar was almost disabled by any stretch of the imagination. It easily was able to pull back out from the Enterprise, and power up the mega radiation weapon thing (can't remember what is was called).

Picard ramming the Scimitar was more of a diversionary tactic in order to beam aboard, and try and save as many of the enterprise crew as possible by blowing up the radiation matrix.

[remedyu]

Also - in Nemesis - Picard rammed Shinzon's ship and was able to almost disable his ship - and yet - Picards crew was still alive - so although raming the ship at warp would cause more damage - you can't save your crew that way...

 

I don't think that the Scimitar was almost disabled by any stretch of the imagination. It easily was able to pull back out from the Enterprise, and power up the mega radiation weapon thing (can't remember what is was called).

Picard ramming the Scimitar was more of a diversionary tactic in order to beam aboard, and try and save as many of the enterprise crew as possible by blowing up the radiation matrix.

 

It was called the thalaron radiation weapon.

[rjfoster]

Also - in Nemesis - Picard rammed Shinzon's ship and was able to almost disable his ship - and yet - Picards crew was still alive - so although raming the ship at warp would cause more damage - you can't save your crew that way...

 

I don't think that the Scimitar was almost disabled by any stretch of the imagination. It easily was able to pull back out from the Enterprise, and power up the mega radiation weapon thing (can't remember what is was called).

Picard ramming the Scimitar was more of a diversionary tactic in order to beam aboard, and try and save as many of the enterprise crew as possible by blowing up the radiation matrix.

 

It was called the thalaron radiation weapon.

 

Thanks, was midly upset -there was a bit of random star trek useless knowledge that I couldn't remember -what's happening to me -must be work pushing ST stuff out of my head. Right we'll soon solve that....

[Ressurrector]

This is a very interesting thread and I had an idea/concept once of having an enemy ship that could somehow do damage by warping and busting through ships. I would think this would be suicide for just your typical ship but if a ship was made for just such a purpose it might get interesting.

[rjfoster]

This is a very interesting thread and I had an idea/concept once of having an enemy ship that could somehow do damage by warping and busting through ships. I would think this would be suicide for just your typical ship but if a ship was made for just such a purpose it might get interesting.

 

How about a Torpedo, rather than a ship -it could warp inside the ship or whatever (depends on how much interaction subspace has with normal space, and then denonate a high yield warhead (eg: quantum torpedo) inside the ship, or at least inside the shields -might do a bit of damage.

Of course, this is all strictly theoretical and depends on the precisional ability available in jumping to warp over short distances..

Comments please

[TFMF]

Also - in Nemesis - Picard rammed Shinzon's ship and was able to almost disable his ship - and yet - Picards crew was still alive - so although raming the ship at warp would cause more damage - you can't save your crew that way...

 

I don't think that the Scimitar was almost disabled by any stretch of the imagination. It easily was able to pull back out from the Enterprise, and power up the mega radiation weapon thing (can't remember what is was called).

Picard ramming the Scimitar was more of a diversionary tactic in order to beam aboard, and try and save as many of the enterprise crew as possible by blowing up the radiation matrix.

 

well considering the Enterprise was much smaller than the Scimetar - Enterprise did a good job at almost disabling it - they did manage to disable the scimetars disruptors and i'm guessing their sheilds as well since Picard was able to beam through...

[rjfoster]

Also - in Nemesis - Picard rammed Shinzon's ship and was able to almost disable his ship - and yet - Picards crew was still alive - so although raming the ship at warp would cause more damage - you can't save your crew that way...

 

I don't think that the Scimitar was almost disabled by any stretch of the imagination. It easily was able to pull back out from the Enterprise, and power up the mega radiation weapon thing (can't remember what is was called).

Picard ramming the Scimitar was more of a diversionary tactic in order to beam aboard, and try and save as many of the enterprise crew as possible by blowing up the radiation matrix.

 

well considering the Enterprise was much smaller than the Scimetar - Enterprise did a good job at almost disabling it - they did manage to disable the scimetars disruptors and i'm guessing their sheilds as well since Picard was able to beam through...

 

I don 't deny that the Enterprise did a lot of damage, and probably did knock out a lot of the forward disruptor banks (I don't think the shields would have gone, unless they also did something to the power distribution network -remember from Best of Both Worlds, that an object moving slowly enough can pass through shields), but Shinzon was still planning on taking the Scimitar to attack Earth with his Thaleron radiation weapon thing, so I don't think it was as disabled as you might think.

[TFMF]

effectivly however - Shinzon was killed by Picards actions - up untll this point Shinzons main goal was to capture Picard to save himself - but now we learn: Picard - "it's not about me anymore" and so Shinzon didn't care about saving himself anymore.

 

Also - with the massive hull breach it may make going to warp difficult - or cloaking difficult....

 

of course this is just supposition.... :rolleyes:

[rjfoster]

effectivly however - Shinzon was killed by Picards actions - up untll this point Shinzons main goal was to capture Picard to save himself - but now we learn: Picard - "it's not about me anymore" and so Shinzon didn't care about saving himself anymore.

 

Also - with the massive hull breach it may make going to warp difficult - or cloaking difficult....

 

of course this is just supposition.... :rolleyes:

 

Hmm...I hadn't considered the hull breach when thinking about going to warp, or cloaking...Does anyone know of any canon where a vessel has a had a hull breach and gone to warp? I know that they ususally use force fields, but are these operable at warp?

As for the cloaking device...I think that it's a power issue, because the cloak works by wrapping subspace around the ship, and bending the light rays around it, so it wouldn't matter if there was a hull breach or not.

[Mav]

effectivly however - Shinzon was killed by Picards actions - up untll this point Shinzons main goal was to capture Picard to save himself - but now we learn: Picard - "it's not about me anymore" and so Shinzon didn't care about saving himself anymore.

 

Also - with the massive hull breach it may make going to warp difficult - or cloaking difficult....

 

of course this is just supposition.... :rolleyes:

 

Hmm...I hadn't considered the hull breach when thinking about going to warp, or cloaking...Does anyone know of any canon where a vessel has a had a hull breach and gone to warp? I know that they ususally use force fields, but are these operable at warp?

As for the cloaking device...I think that it's a power issue, because the cloak works by wrapping subspace around the ship, and bending the light rays around it, so it wouldn't matter if there was a hull breach or not.

 

Memory is a little sketchy but the first real example I remember was "Q Who" from TNG season 2. I'm pretty sure the Enterprise D is at warp speed at least once when the Borg Cube cuts into the ships hull somehow.

 

Plus there has to be some episode of Voyager where the ship is at warp speed and has a hull breach. I mean the ship takes massive damage at least once per season ;p ....

[TFMF]

hmm...there was Year of Hell where voyager took massive damage and couldn't go to warp without taken serious damage....but Voyager had taken a lot more damage - although the Scimetar had sustained one large hull breach - maintaining a cloak might be at least difficult - and they may have to slow down...

[rjfoster]

Very probable I think.