My Musings

Star Trek vs Star Wars

I love the Star Trek series, especially the Next Generation. I also love the original trilogy of Star Wars. There has been a rather vigorous debate over which universe would win a conflict. Here are a few of my ideas about which way I think the battle would go and the advantages held by each side.

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The battle in space:

1) Shields up!

While the ships in Star Wars do have shields, they're only deflectors. They reduce the damage done by grazing hits, but a direct strike will still destroy the fighter or do damage to the hull of a larger vessel or station. Even the massive shield power output by the Super Star Destroyer was still overcome by only two fighters concentrating their attacks in Return of the Jedi.

When the shields on the Enterprise-D are hit in Star Trek, an encompassing bubble of energy is revealed. As long as the shields are up, nothing gets through.

2) Target Lock

In Star Wars small ships can evade the turbo lasers of large capital ships and stations. Fighters have to manually aim at their intended targets. Even with the assistance of a targeting computer, it's still possible to miss as was evident during the trench run on the first Death Star.

The lack of targeting systems in the Star Wars universe is strange because in Episode II, Obi-wan has to dodge a seeking missile fired from Jango Fett's ship, Slave 1. I think this is a slight hole in the story as this is supposed to be a prequel, but in the first Death Star battle of Episode IV, when the fighters are dodging the turbolasers, Vader decides the only way to destroy them is ship to ship, ordering the deployment of TIE fighters. Why would a bounty hunter ship, back in the time when Anakin Skywalker was still a kid, have access to weapon technology not available on the Empire's greatest armored space station in the present day? Another thing that makes the missile out of place is that if the tech exists for a missile to track a space fighter through an asteroid field, dodging all the debris in its way and never losing target lock, then why do the guns on ships require manual aim? As I said, I think it's a bit of a plot hole.

Targeting systems in Star Trek can be locked on for guaranteed hits every time a weapon is fired. Additionally, individual sections such as the bridge or engines can be targeted to maximize the damage and cripple opposing ships. Photon torpedoes have their own guidance systems, allowing them to track targets over considerable distances once target lock has been achieved.

3) Space Arsenal

The ships of the Star Wars universe have lasers of different sizes and forms, as well as missiles and proton torpedoes.

Star Trek is very similar with phasers and photon torpedoes. That being said, Star Trek ships can fire continuous beams of particle energy at their targets while Star Wars' ships fire individual pulses. This allows Star Trek ships to concentrate greater amounts of fire against their opponents in less time.

4) Super Weapons

Star Wars' most infamous weapon has to be the Death Star. The armored station can take out fleets of ships with its laser or obliterate whole planets. It has countless squadrons of TIE fighters and a ridiculous amount of turbo laser turrets across its surface.

However, the Death Star does suffer from the fact it's slow. It movement speed is ponderous, and it takes time between shots of its main laser, giving enemies time to do damage.  Also, it has to be facing its intended target, allowing faster ships to simply move around to the other side and avoid the main laser altogether.

Starkiller base has the same weakness in that it can't fire on anything behind it. Star Trek ships can change their phasers for drilling purposes and dig into a planet's crust, destabilizing its mantle and causing the entire planet to collapse from the inside. So, the Star Wars super weapon could be defeated by almost any ship from Star Trek.