Starfleet Jedi

Ok so i just had yet another Leo1 experiance on SB.com with the typical level of moderation bias so i figured i would do this here rather than waiting the 3 days for my ban to be over.

So we have canon dialog to support it warp strafing saying:

1. That the BIG E will be sluggish without warp manouvering.

2. That the hostile ship was attacking at warp speeds.

Now the argument against seems to ignore these two things and claims that the countdown proves that the ship was traveling STL as the ranges and seconds clearly point to sublight.


Now as far as i can see this argument is absurd for several reasons:

1. It ignores the canon dialog regarding speed and warp manouvering.

2. Even if they try to argue a variation of the "picard manouver" with the ship warping in slowing to sublight, firing and then warping out the facts do not fit because the way sulu counts down the approaching ship was moving at around 1500km/s or even slower at ranges starting at 100,000km down to 30,000km or less and if they were doing so what the hell was soooo difficult for the BIG E to hit them or catch them for that matter as the BIG E still had impulse drive and power as well as torps ect (the BIG E has a range of at least 90,000km for its torps as per "the changling")..


I find it much more likely that the KLINGON ship was orbiting at warp outside the range of the weapons and reducing its orbit into weapons range while still at warp, this would account for:-

The seconds in between sulu's calls of range.

The contradiction regarding the difficulty of hitting a ship that according to the warsies was inside 30,000km moving at around 1500km/s when we know that the BIG E had impulse and as such can easily match that speed as well as having weapons ranges greater than 30.000km.

Anyway aparantly pointing this out and using a few terms (that leo1 used first in the thread) is enough to get the 3 day ban i pretty much expected the moment i saw him in the thread....

Kor_Dahar_Master wrote:2. Even if they try to argue a variation of the "picard manouver" with the ship warping in slowing to sublight, firing and then warping out the facts do not fit because the way sulu counts down the approaching ship was moving at around 1500km/s or even slower at ranges starting at 100,000km down to 30,000km or less and if they were doing so what the hell was soooo difficult for the BIG E to hit them or catch them for that matter as the BIG E still had impulse drive and power as well as torps ect (the BIG E has a range of at least 90,000km for its torps as per "the changling")..

One major fact that you are missing here is that the Enterprise had been sabotaged prior to the engagement so that she did not have weapons as well as warp drive. Kirk was getting ready to fight the Klingons by readying phasers, even when he thought he still had phasers. Later when the entire dilithium assembly is found fused, it is learned that the ship does not even have the power for weapons:


KIRK: Give us every ounce of power you can from the impulse drive, and find a solution to the bomb. Kirk out. Mister Sulu, stand by to make your manoeuvres smartly. She'll be sluggish on response.

SULU: Aye, sir. One hundred thousand kilometres. Ninety. Eighty.

KIRK: Phaser crews, stand by to fire on command.

SULU: Sixty.

KIRK: Ready.

SULU: Fifty.

KIRK: Hold your fire.

SULU: She's passed us without firing a shot.

So everything says that they could potentially fire back at a warp-driven starship, just that the sabotage was so through that it precluded the use of weapons as well. Whether or not they could hit is another matter.

Also the ranges are 10,000 km/sec, not 1,500. In a later scene when the Klingon attacks we have this:

SULU: Captain, the Klingon ship is closing on an intercept course. Five hundred thousand kilometres. Deflector shields up.

KIRK:Scotty, can you give me partial power on the phaser banks?

SCOTT [OC]: No, sir, not a chance.

SULU: Three hundred thousand kilometres.

KIRK: I told you to stay in Sickbay.

ELAAN: I want to die with you.

KIRK: We're not going to die. Now get off the bridge.

SULU: One hundred thousand kilometres.

(Weapons fire hits the Enterprise)

SPOCK: He's passed us. All shields held.

Here we have relative speeds from the Klingon ship of 20,000 kps or better.
-Mike

Mike DiCenso wrote:Also the ranges are 10,000 km/sec, not 1,500. In a later scene when the Klingon attacks we have this:

SULU: Captain, the Klingon ship is closing on an intercept course. Five hundred thousand kilometres. Deflector shields up.

KIRK:Scotty, can you give me partial power on the phaser banks?

SCOTT [OC]: No, sir, not a chance.

SULU: Three hundred thousand kilometres.

KIRK: I told you to stay in Sickbay.

ELAAN: I want to die with you.

KIRK: We're not going to die. Now get off the bridge.

SULU: One hundred thousand kilometres.

(Weapons fire hits the Enterprise)

SPOCK: He's passed us. All shields held.

Here we have relative speeds from the Klingon ship of 20,000 kps or better.
-Mike

How do you get 10,000km/s or even 20,000km/s from that?.

I watched the episode and when they are calling out ranges it goes down in differing increments but the most regular is 10,000km, sulu calls out 100k, 90k, 80k ect down to 30,000km at some points and the gaps between him calling those 10,000km decreases in range are from 4 to 6 seconds giving us 1500km/s to 2500km/s IF the klingon ship is flying directly at them.

And it is not a measure pf relative speed it is only a measure of distance being closed, i could orbit you a at billion times c without closing the distance between us or i could orbit you at that speed and close the orbital distance by 1cm a hour if i had accurate enough stearing. Would that mean our relative speeds are 1cm a hour or still a billion times c because if sulu was just calling out the range we would get 1cm per hour relative speed doing it your way and assuming speed rather than range.

Now if it is flyng directly at them as the warsie retards claim AND we know the connies weapons ranges are up to or above 90,000km from other episodes AND it has impulse power then the frigging klingon is in the Enterprise weapons range for 36 to 24 seconds traveling at a fraction of impulse speed the connie has available...

So their retarded theory gives the Enterprise a absurd amount of time to kill the bloody ship as it slowly flies towards them inside weapons range, it also ignores that KIRK had to warp pivot at warp 2 to hit them....WTF????..


The fact is that the only way to make sense of it is to say that the Klingon ship was on a orbital course and spiralled in at warp decreasing its orbital range slowly, this allows for the high warp as stated, it explains how it was at warp and how the ranges could change so little over so many seconds, it explains why the enterprise could not hit it and it explains why kirk had to warp pivot to get a bead on it as it orbited.

I don't know. Wouldn't the simplier answer, and the one prefered by Occam's razor, be simply that the passes that Sulu calls out are sublight ones? Notice he doesn't call out numbers for every attack:

SPOCK: He's passed us. All shields held.
KIRK: Mister Sulu, bring her to one four three mark two. Keep our forward shields to him.
SULU: Here he comes again, sir.
KIRK: Stay with the controls. Keep our forward shields to him.
SPOCK: Better than warp seven.
KIRK: Hard over, Sulu. Bring her around. He's going for our flank. (another disruptor hit) Sulu!
SULU: Sorry, Captain. She won't respond fast enough on impulse.
SPOCK: He's past us again. Damage to number four shield.

As you can see no numbers are called out for this one identified as a warp attack which to me suggests the Klingons changed tactics. Likely after their sublight strafe failed to coax Kirk into making the jump they decided to do so themselves and either force the Enterprise to warp or eviscerate it while staying a safe distance from its rigged to explode reactor. :)

Kor_Dahar_Master wrote:So their retarded theory gives the Enterprise a absurd amount of time to kill the bloody ship as it slowly flies towards them inside weapons range, it also ignores that KIRK had to warp pivot at warp 2 to hit them....WTF????..

I don't think you fully apreciate Kirk's position. The Big E is running on fumes in essence with the shields failing. Now my own personal interpitation of the events is that Kirk didn't have the spare energy to fire weapons and keep those shields up and once you lose your shields your goose is pretty much cooked. Keep in mind that with a full spread of torpedoes he only "crippled" the battlecruiser which likely would have fired when he did and found either drasticly weakened shields or none at all turning the Big E into a debris field.

SPOCK: He's past us again. Damage to number four shield.
KIRK: How bad?
SPOCK: It will not withstand another full charge, Captain. I'm getting some very peculiar energy readings

Just to show that with full "impulse power" and not diverting anything to weapons their shields were already starting to fall

KIRK: Mister Sulu, prepare on my order to turn quickly to port. Try and protect the number four shield.
SULU: Aye, sir.
KIRK: Now, Sulu. hard a-port!
(Another disrupter hit)
SULU: Shields holding, but weakened, sir.

Again reinforcing the shields are failing issue with Kirk trying to shepard and protect certain sections reaching critical.

sonofccn wrote:I don't know. Wouldn't the simplier answer, and the one prefered by Occam's razor, be simply that the passes that Sulu calls out are sublight ones? Notice he doesn't call out numbers for every attack:

SPOCK: He's passed us. All shields held.
KIRK: Mister Sulu, bring her to one four three mark two. Keep our forward shields to him.
SULU: Here he comes again, sir.
KIRK: Stay with the controls. Keep our forward shields to him.
SPOCK: Better than warp seven.
KIRK: Hard over, Sulu. Bring her around. He's going for our flank. (another disruptor hit) Sulu!
SULU: Sorry, Captain. She won't respond fast enough on impulse.
SPOCK: He's past us again. Damage to number four shield.

As you can see no numbers are called out for this one identified as a warp attack which to me suggests the Klingons changed tactics. Likely after their sublight strafe failed to coax Kirk into making the jump they decided to do so themselves and either force the Enterprise to warp or eviscerate it while staying a safe distance from its rigged to explode reactor. :)

So you are saying for that one they were warp strafing just like i said they were?.

I don't think you fully apreciate Kirk's position. The Big E is running on fumes in essence with the shields failing. Now my own personal interpitation of the events is that Kirk didn't have the spare energy to fire weapons and keep those shields up and once you lose your shields your goose is pretty much cooked. Keep in mind that with a full spread of torpedoes he only "crippled" the battlecruiser which likely would have fired when he did and found either drasticly weakened shields or none at all turning the Big E into a debris field.

We know they have no weapons power initially because they mention it and it is not the issue.

That does not change the fact that in the final pass he had enough power for warp 2 to pivot and the weapons, nor does it change the fact that if the Klingon ship was flying directly towards them for that final pass it was well inside weapons range (90k km) flying at a fraction of impulse (1500km/s to 2500km/s) for 24-36 seconds but for some reason they did not fire on it while it was on such a slow and predictable approach.

If the klingon ship was not at warp why would he need to go to warp to keep up with it target it and ht it, scotty mentions earlier that they had 90% plus of impulse so they were able to move way faster than the klingon ship was doing IF the slow approach theory is correct.

Forgive me if I misunderstood you but you seemed to advocating that the Klingon warship was circling, to use that word, the Big E at high warp speed and closing in on them by thousands of kilometers.

Kor_Dahar_Master wrote:That does not change the fact that in the final pass he had enough power for warp 2 to pivot and the weapons, nor does it change the fact that if the Klingon ship was flying directly towards them for that final pass it was well inside weapons range (90k km) flying at a fraction of impulse (1500km/s to 2500km/s) for 24-36 seconds but for some reason they did not fire on it while it was on such a slow and predictable approach.

Well let's take a look on the final pass.

UHURA: Captain. Message coming in.
KLINGON [on viewscreen]: Enterprise, our readings confirm your power extremely low, your shields buckling. This is your last chance to surrender.
SULU: Captain, number four shield just collapsed. Impulse power down to thirty one percent.
KIRK: Lieutenant Uhura, open a hailing frequency.
UHURA: Channel open, sir.
KIRK: This is Captain James Kirk of the United Spaceship Enterprise. May I request your terms for surrender?
KLINGON [on viewscreen]: No terms. Surrender must be unconditional and immediate.
KIRK: Scotty, your estimate.

[Engineering]

SCOTT: We're fitting it now, sir, but we'll have to run a few tests to make sure.

[Bridge]

KIRK: Test it in combat.

[Engineering]

SPOCK: Captain, these are crude crystals. There is no way to judge what the unusual shapes will do to the energy flow.

[Bridge]

SCOTT [OC]: Aye, that could blow us up just as effectively as
KIRK: Let me know when it's in place. Open a hailing frequency.
UHURA: Hailing frequency open, sir.
KIRK: This is the Enterprise. Will you guarantee the safety of our passenger, the Dohlman from Elas?
KLINGON [on viewscreen]: No conditions. Surrender immediately.
SULU: Captain, he's starting his run.
SCOTT [OC]: Scott to Captain.

[Engineering]

SCOTT: It's in place, sir, but I can't answer for what happens.

[Bridge]

KIRK: You and Spock get up here. Sulu, prepare for warp manoeuvres.
SULU: Aye, sir.
KIRK: Chekov, arm photon torpedoes.
CHEKOV: Photon torpedoes ready.
SULU: Warp power to the shields, Captain?
KIRK: Negative. His sensors will pick up our power increase. The more helpless he thinks we are, the closer he'll come. As he passes, I want to cut in warp drive. We'll pivot at warp two and bring all tubes to bear.
SULU: Aye, sir.
KIRK: Mister Chekov, give him a full spread of photon torpedoes.
CHEKOV: Aye, Captain.
(Scott and Spock enter)
SULU: One hundred thousand kilometres.
KIRK: Scotty, stand by to cut in warp drive.
SCOTT: Fluctuation. It's the shape of the crystals. I was afraid of that.
SULU: Seventy five. Seventy. Sixty. Fifty.
KIRK: Fire at minimum range.
SULU: Forty.
SCOTT: She won't steady down.
SULU: Thirty.
KIRK: Warp in, Scotty. Full power to shields.

Sorry for the long quote but I thought it'd save time and refrence.

First off Kirk deliberatly wants the Klingon cruiser to come as close as possible, likely for the same reasons Riker says closing to forty thousand ie to cut down reaction time and hit the arragont Klingons hard on the snout. Second this pass appears to be sublight, closing in at five to ten thousand KMs a second I would guess not having access to the actual episode at the moment, so Kirk's pivot likely has more to do in moving the Enterprise to a unforseen location/firing position than attempting to "catch up" with the Klingon cruiser. Third as for why the Klingons present Kirk with such a ripe target remember they think the Big E is dead in the water, a sitting duck waiting to be 1) boarded 2) shot to ribbons or 3) blow herself up. Fourth it is not impossible that even with Warp power restored Kirk doesn't believe the Big E will be able to withstand a prolonged fight, or will at least fair worse than she did with the point blank affair, against the battlecruiser after being wailed on for so long and firing from longer ranges would give the cruiser more time to evade/present its best shields towards the attack.

sonofccn wrote:Sorry for the long quote but I thought it'd save time and refrence.

First off Kirk deliberatly wants the Klingon cruiser to come as close as possible, likely for the same reasons Riker says closing to forty thousand ie to cut down reaction time and hit the arragont Klingons hard on the snout.

Second this pass appears to be sublight, closing in at five to ten thousand KMs a second I would guess not having access to the actual episode at the moment, so Kirk's pivot likely has more to do in moving the Enterprise to a unforseen location/firing position than attempting to "catch up" with the Klingon cruiser.

Third as for why the Klingons present Kirk with such a ripe target remember they think the Big E is dead in the water, a sitting duck waiting to be 1) boarded 2) shot to ribbons or 3) blow herself up.

Fourth it is not impossible that even with Warp power restored Kirk doesn't believe the Big E will be able to withstand a prolonged fight, or will at least fair worse than she did with the point blank affair, against the battlecruiser after being wailed on for so long and firing from longer ranges would give the cruiser more time to evade/present its best shields towards the attack.

To point 1.

Ok i can maybe accept that to a point but attacking it on approach at say 30,000km as you know its heading ect is a better option than turning after it has passed and is moving away if that was the case.

To point 2 and 3.

Sulu counts down 10k km ever 4-6 seconds so its 1500km/s-2500km/s and the Enterprise had 93% of impulse available through the entire fight that works out to about 40% of c or 120 million km/s compared to your theory that says the Klingon was moving at 1500km/s to 2500km/s...

So essentially the klingon approached at a 1000th of the speed the Enterprise had available for 24-36 seconds if you are correct, do you see the issue i have :) with that theory?...

Point 4.

I can understand that but it brings us back to my reply in point one that has Kirk perform a unnecessary maneuver that even at warp 2 would be slower than just firing as the ship was on his lap, he had to turn bring his weapons to bear and fire and that means the Klingons had ALL that time to click into high warp.

IF they were approaching at slow sublight as you claim then best chance to nail them was on approach when speeding up would have just got them a photon torpedo in the face that much faster.

My theory:-

I think that they were orbiting at high warp and spiralling in ever decreasing ornits without reducing speed as this would allow for sulu's timing regarding the range calling. They kept up that speed in ever decreasing orbits and on the pass that kirk had warp power back he pivoted the ship at warp 2 to get a bead or even a lead on their fast orbit and opened up with his weapons, he did this because he did not have a warp factor high enough to just turn and follow them.

Image trying to shoot a race car going 200mph by running along side it firing or chasing it you would have no chance like kirk did not, now imagine it was on a circular loop of a track driving around and around and instead of chasing it you stood in the very centre of the circle a distance from the car with a rifle and just pivoted while taking aim at the car circling around the track, you could easily keep it in your sights.

That is what i think kirk did with the Enterprise.

Kor_Dahar_Master wrote:Ok i can maybe accept that to a point but attacking it on approach at say 30,000km as you know its heading ect is a better option than turning after it has passed and is moving away if that was the case.

I thought that is essentially what Kirk did, waited until 30,000 and then warp pivoted to avoid return fire/position its own fire.

Sulu counts down 10k km ever 4-6 seconds so its 1500km/s-2500km/s

Well as I said I don't have the episode in front of me at the moment and I was just guessing base on dialoge.

Kor_Dahar_Master wrote:Enterprise had 93% of impulse available through the entire fight that works out to about 40% of c or 120 million km/s compared to your theory that says the Klingon was moving at 1500km/s to 2500km/s...

This isn't completely accurate:

SULU: Captain, number four shield just collapsed. Impulse power down to thirty one percent.

This was just before the final strafe, shields are failing and power has been diminished greatly strongly supporting my contention that Kirk is pumping everything to keep them up. The power figure also has likely been dropping throughout the one sided battle not just at the end.

Also where is percentage of impulse=X speed coming from? I know a single impulse engine is rated in the double digit megatons if it goes critical and a Connie has Y number of impulse engines but as far as I know we don't know their standard output or conversion to velocity rate.

Kor_Dahar_Master wrote:I can understand that but it brings us back to my reply in point one that has Kirk perform a unnecessary maneuver that even at warp 2 would be slower than just firing as the ship was on his lap, he had to turn bring his weapons to bear and fire and that means the Klingons had ALL that time to click into high warp.

Bear in mind it takes a few seconds normally to jump to warp and the Klingons likely were surprised as all get out when the Enterprise failed to explode when she did so. Again Kirk may have been manuvering to avoid having his shields battered, I don't remember another "shudder" when he does his trick, or to line up a shot on a weaker section on the Battlecruiser. Perhaps diverting power from say shield four to increase shield one kind of like what Archer had to deal with the Klingon BOP at the end of season two.

Kor_Dahar_Master wrote:I think that they were orbiting at high warp and spiralling in ever decreasing ornits without reducing speed as this would allow for sulu's timing regarding the range calling. They kept up that speed in ever decreasing orbits and on the pass that kirk had warp power back he pivoted the ship at warp 2 to get a bead or even a lead on their fast orbit and opened up with his weapons, he did this because he did not have a warp factor high enough to just turn and follow them.

Possible but in my opinon needlessly complicated without sufficent evidence to justify it. We get manuvers refered to as strafes, conjuring up fighter strafes or zoom and boom IIRC, no mention of the circling Klingon ship or such unusual attack pattern.

In the end I'm not going to say your wrong, we all are speculating here, but color me a disbeliever of it. Which is not to say I disaprove of unorthodox explanations or "new eyes" look at old situation, simply the act of such discussion regardless of outcome are a boon to the larger group.

In my opinion however your will need a larger cache of supporting evidence if you hope to make headway over at spacebattles.

sonofccn wrote:In my opinion however your will need a larger cache of supporting evidence if you hope to make headway over at spacebattles.

A larger cache of supporting evidence means jack shit on sb.com if your position is opposite to leo1, white_rabbit and a few others on that forum. They hold others to absurd levels of proof, are permitted to dismiss that proof with speculation and are supported by the mods in doing so who claim "it makes sense" even if it contradicts canon.

They are also not held to the same standards and can throw around abuse at will with no comeback, in a recent discussion one of those individuals use foul and abusive language in direct insults over 15 times in a single thread (18 times i think) on the tech discussion forum where doing so is breaking rule number 1 for that forum.

Complains were made and the mod gave the language a light mention while also warning the person complaining about it for doing so as much as he did.....another time from another of those individuals a similar complaint was made for multiple foul insults, the complainer got a 3 day ban for not providing the aforementioned absurd levels of proof and the insulter got a minor comment regarding language that included a winking smiley face from the mod...


So while i respect your opinion i would rather get banned for calling a c*nt a c*nt than essentially grabbing ankle for them and going to all the effort of locating and providing proof just to have it dismissed by a hand wave and ultimately get banned anyway.

Leo1 and crew are not looking to debate they are hunting ban scalps and the moderators support it. Most people on SB.com including myself for most people (not leo1 ect) post corrections or point out if somebody is wrong or whatever, all him and his asshole buddies do is normally post abuse along with demands and then spam the report button.

Sorry if I pressed the wrong button and I can relate. I couldn't and don't post on spacebattles, I don't think I could take the needless agravation, and have nothing but respect for those who do and try to actually discuss and debate topics with some shred of rationality. That said I presumed you came here to discuss the topic in question in order to strenghten your case, running into a random thread all suicidal without everything worked out and organized strikes me more to play into Leo's hand than anything else. But that's just my thoughts of course.

sonofccn wrote:Sorry if I pressed the wrong button and I can relate. I couldn't and don't post on spacebattles, I don't think I could take the needless agravation, and have nothing but respect for those who do and try to actually discuss and debate topics with some shred of rationality. That said I presumed you came here to discuss the topic in question in order to strenghten your case, running into a random thread all suicidal without everything worked out and organized strikes me more to play into Leo's hand than anything else. But that's just my thoughts of course.

If i do continue on that site i think i will stick to threads where the "truth" and "facts" have not already decided by the select few for their favorite franchise and any challenge towards it results in warnings and a evenual ban.

1. Careful with the insults. We try to avoid fiery posts here. Now, I'm not a saint, but just saying. ;)
2. You got banned?
3. It's been recently suggested that it could be possible to achieve faster STL speeds while flying at warp. Could it be a mix of both? Could it be indeed such a thing, with the Klingon ship closing in fast by using a warp field at STL?
I haven't read the transcript nor seen the episode, but if there were only mentions of warp, it could be rationalized that way.

Kor_Dahar_Master wrote:If i do continue on that site i think i will stick to threads where the "truth" and "facts" have not already decided by the select few for their favorite franchise and any challenge towards it results in warnings and a evenual ban.

That means pretty much sticking with obscure or very new franchises. And when I mean new, it's like a very few years old.

moving to sb.com thread.

Warp and impulse-speed passes by the Klingons are the notion which I espoused years ago and still stand by.

See:

http://www.st-v-sw.net/STSWwarpturn.html
http://www.st-v-sw.net/STSWwarpturn-obj.html
And also my response to the claim made by somebody that the original episode (this was pre-TOR) showed stars in the shots of the Klingon ship that contradicted the notion of high speed:
http://www.st-v-sw.net/STSWelaantime.html