Conspicuously absent.

RexTalionis: [4.bp.blogspot.com image 640x484]

Conspicuously absent.

Weapons, not doomsday devices.

Little Doctor is missing.

"We'll beam aboard and stop it."
"You can't."

So not only did Kirk's gay son (NTTAWWT) use proto-matter when he made Genesis, he didn't put a CANCEL button on it.

GAT_00: RexTalionis: [4.bp.blogspot.com image 640x484]

Conspicuously absent.

Weapons, not doomsday devices.

Little Doctor is missing.

From the episode in question:

SPOCK: She was attacked by what appears to be essentially a robot, an automated weapon of immense size and power. Its apparent function is to smash planets to rubble and then digest the debris for fuel. It is, therefore, self-sustaining as long as there are planetary bodies for it to feed on.
...

MCCOY: This whole thing's incredible. A robot? A machine like that, who would build it?
KIRK: We don't know. An alien race, apparently from another galaxy.
MCCOY: But why?
KIRK: Bones, did you ever hear of a doomsday machine?
MCCOY: No. I'm a doctor, not a mechanic.
KIRK: It's a weapon built primarily as a bluff. It's never meant to be used. So strong, it could destroy both sides in a war. Something like the old H-Bomb was supposed to be. That's what I think this is. A doomsday machine that somebody used in a war uncounted years ago. They don't exist anymore, but the machine is still destroying.

I'd like to add...

RexTalionis: KIRK: It's a weapon built primarily as a bluff. It's never meant to be used. So strong, it could destroy both sides in a war. Something like the old H-Bomb was supposed to be. That's what I think this is. A doomsday machine that somebody used in a war uncounted years ago. They don't exist anymore, but the machine is still destroying.

That thing killed the Borg (and Janeway) in Before Dishonor. IT WAS AWESOME.

Halo, oh, he means Ringworld.

2wolves: Halo, oh, he means Ringworld.

Except Ringworld wasn't a weapon. Or maybe it was, but I haven't read all the recent Ringworld books.

GAT_00: 2wolves: Halo, oh, he means Ringworld.

Except Ringworld wasn't a weapon. Or maybe it was, but I haven't read all the recent Ringworld books.

Shadow Squares used magnetic fields to make the star lase. So yes.

GAT_00: 2wolves: Halo, oh, he means Ringworld.

Except Ringworld wasn't a weapon. Or maybe it was, but I haven't read all the recent Ringworld books.

And Ringworld encircled a star. The Halos are just ring-shaped space stations orbiting various planets.

Puts nerd hat on. The least unfeasible weapon is the Shadow Planet Killer, because it doesn't require an unreasonable amout of power.

No James Bond references? I suppose that would take up most of the list.

Activate the Photonic Cannon!

ArkAngel: [images.wikia.com image 300x366]

Activate the Photonic Cannon!

Where the hell are the pips? That was the best part.

simplicimus: Puts nerd hat on. The least unfeasible weapon is the Shadow Planet Killer, because it doesn't require an unreasonable amout of power.

As far as planet killing goes, all of these fancy pants schemes still won't work as well as a couple thousand cubic meters of iron slamming into a planet at 0.75c. Cheap, crude, effective. The shotgun of planet killing.

Jubeebee: simplicimus: Puts nerd hat on. The least unfeasible weapon is the Shadow Planet Killer, because it doesn't require an unreasonable amout of power.

As far as planet killing goes, all of these fancy pants schemes still won't work as well as a couple thousand cubic meters of iron slamming into a planet at 0.75c. Cheap, crude, effective. The shotgun of planet killing.

The Centauri mass drivers seemed efficient, though not planet killers.

simplicimus: The Centauri mass drivers seemed efficient, though not planet killers.

Glad this was covered.

And although the planet would not be turned into rumble if they keep firing they'll kill everything on the planet.

What about turning a useful tool into a weapon of mass destruction? I'd vote guiding an asteroid into a Mass Relay and obliterating an entire solar system to be a good option.

Of course, the whole point of a Doomsday Machine is lost, if you keep it a secret!

Ohhh and it may have been campy (just like the first one), but the Q-Bomb in Starship Troopers 3 should definitely count. It's a planet cracker bomb and is used to destory a bug that had basically burrowed and grown into a quarter of the planet.

This, recruits, is a 20-kilo ferrous slug. Feel the weight. Every five seconds, the main gun of an Everest-class dreadnought accelerates 1 to 1.3 percent of light speed. It impacts with the force of a 38-kiloton bomb. That is three times the yield of the city-buster dropped on Hiroshima back on Earth. That means Sir Isaac Newton is the deadliest son-of-a-biatch in space. Now, Serviceman Burnside! What is Newton's First Law?

- Sir! An object in motion stays in motion, sir!

No credit for partial answers, maggot!

- Sir! Unless acted on by an outside force, sir!

Damn straight! I dare to assume you ignorant jackasses know that space is empty. Once you fire this hunk of metal, it keeps going till it hits something. That can be a ship, or the planet behind that ship. It might go off into deep space and hit somebody else in ten thousand years! If you pull the trigger on this, you are ruining someone's day, somewhere and sometime. That is why you check your damn targets! That is why you wait for the computer to give you a firing solution! That is why, Serviceman Chung, we do not "eyeball it!" This is a weapon of mass destruction. You are not a cowboy shooting from the hip!

/That round has nothing on the weapons in the article, but that lecture was really amusing

No Wunderland Treatymaker? (ok, so it just left a huge canyon cut into the planet, not total destruction.)

Knara: FuturePastNow: I always thought the solution would have been to keep hitting the Reliant with torpedoes until its warp core f*cking exploded, taking the Genesis Device with it.

But that's why I'm not a writer for Star Trek.

My rationalization was that they were close enough that a warp core breach would also have destroyed the Enterprise, seeing as they had no shields (since they were still in the nebula).

Well, they had no targeting in the nebula, and you have to aim where the target will be at arrival, not where it is now.

FuturePastNow: Knara: FuturePastNow: I always thought the solution would have been to keep hitting the Reliant with torpedoes until its warp core f*cking exploded, taking the Genesis Device with it.

But that's why I'm not a writer for Star Trek.

My rationalization was that they were close enough that a warp core breach would also have destroyed the Enterprise, seeing as they had no shields (since they were still in the nebula).

Perhaps. I'd think a couple of minutes at full impulse would get them far enough away, though. Then again, I'm not a starship captain.

They were inside the nebula, the targeting systems on both ships were farked to all hell, and neither were very good at making a shot. They also explained in the movie, with dialogue and everything that the maximum speed the Enterprise was capable at that time would not have gotten them away in time (and they were trying anyways)

Knara: FuturePastNow: Perhaps. I'd think a couple of minutes at full impulse would get them far enough away, though. Then again, I'm not a starship captain.

It's hard to say without having consistent stats in the ST universe on impulse power, but we can extrapolate that a warp core breach has a pretty large area effect, since it was enough to knock the fully-powered saucer section of the Enterprise-D out of orbit when it was attempting to get some distance under impulse power, and that's a ship design that was state of the art like 80 years after Star Trek 2.

I think it's feasible that the refitted original 1701 would have been toast, by comparison.

/also, folks, I think he's talking about *after* the Reliant was disabled and simply drifting, not during the actual battle itself

Also Enterprise was not capable of full impulse power, but a fraction of her best speed. A warp core breach would have destroyed her.

mark.jms: mark.jms: Iain M Banks; The Algebraist -


/I can't recommend the Culture series enough

Even though that's not a part of the Culture series :)

/ftfm

That book was bloody fantastic. So is the Culture series.

Snow Monkey: What was that thing & how did it kill the Borg/Janeway?

It's the Doomsday Machine/Planet Killer from the Original Series episode The Doomsday Machine. (new window)