Specialized Weapons
While Starfleet equips its vessels with a wide variety of standard weaponry, other technologies are available for implementation on Starfleet vessels if deemed necessary.
The primary beams weapons of the Klingons and Romulans, if not the most commonly used weapon in the galaxy, is the disruptor; the Cardassians use a variant, the spiral-wave disruptor, which moves energy through the system differently; The Gorn use narrow-wave disruptors in a similar fashion. Disruptors create highly-charged, powerful beams of plasma using microscopic amounts of antimatter, unlike older plasma based weaponry such as plasma EMP emitters, and other technologies observed by the Ferengi and Cimothians which use plasma based weaponry in a forced-phased plasma injector to create a bolt of highly charged plasma equal to Disruptors but not as versatile usually. This makes the comparative model more powerful than a Starfleet Phaser array, but much less versatile.
Romulan and Breen disruptors leave an anti-proton residue, which can be detected and traced to their specific disruptor weapon signatures. Klingons use a tritium intermix matrix in their disruptor weaponry, and can be configured to emit tetryon particles to increase its power output similar to the way tetryon-based phasers are increased, but, not to an equivalent level as Starfleet phasers, giving them an equally distinct signature. The same can be said for nearly any other race that uses these weapons; Cardassian, Gorn, Cimothian, Ferengi, despite the distinct differences in style and method of generating phased plasma weaponry.
Neutral Particle Weaponry
While similar to Phasers, most neutral particle weaponry have very little in common with standard particle accelerator weapons. Based on neutral meson particles known as kaons, "Meson Cannons" as they are known in many circles, are favored by pirates and those of similar ilk for their intense ability to penetrate deflector shields. Despite being powerful, they often suffer from limited range and are prone to overload if utilized too often. Standard pirate tactics involve near-suicide runs at a target, softening up the shields with Disruptors or other standard weaponry, and devastating the shield grid with a close range Meson attack.
(They're bought as Disruptors, with a +30 damage bonus, and a 3 shots per round handicap on -all- variants. If used for three rounds consistently, they must take one round to cool down or suffer from catastrophic failure.)
The polaron beam is the standard weapon of the Dominion. Powerful, and possessing several useful tactical applications, they’re the perfect weapon for such a belligerent, militaristic species as the Jem’Hadar. From 2370 to 2373, Starfleet vessels were utterly vulnerable to polaron beams; their deflector shields offered no protection against them whatsoever, regardless of shield nutation or harmonics. In 2373, Starfleet developed a way to overcome this limitation upon capture and extensive examination of a Jem’Hadar attack ship in 2372; since that time Starfleet shields have affected polaron beams normally. A polaron beam can also be used to disrupt a tractor beam, and polaron bursts through the shield grid can have a similar effect if the beams or emitters are synchronized to the harmonics of the shield matrix. Starfleet doesn’t exclusively use this weapon on any current vessel type or class, but has made refits to several Starfleet vessels based on polaron beam technologies acquired from the Dominion.
The Borg uses a powerful energy beam, which does 250 points of damage per shot. It can be fired up to twice per round, in all firing modes, with accuracy unattainable by other types of beam weaponry encountered and used thus far (with the exception of tetryon-channeled phaser emitters, which were designed partially using Borg technologies). This, and other Borg weaponry was a by-product of the capture of a Borg sphere in 2378, which allowed Starfleet and Federation scientists a chance to view and dissect Borg technologies in their undamaged dormant state. Though not normally equipped to Starfleet vessels, Starfleet can equip a vessel with Borg energy beam weaponry if it is tactical sound and required for them to do so, but, with the advent of other phaser technologies evolving from this intelligence find it is not a common current practice.
The Borg use a weapon called a cutting beam to take samples of other ships technology. Able to bypass shields without any loss of effect, the cutting beam slices through the ships hull and systems in a circular pattern, then uses a linked tractor beam to pull the ‘cylinder’ of the ship’s hull and systems out like removing a cork from a wine bottle.
A Borg cutting beam does 20 points of damage a round/post. They’ve only been employed in vessels, such as the Rogue-class Fast Courier and ‘breaching’ pods for surgical strike operations against other vessels when their shields or down, or, by bypassing the shields somehow. They’re not standard equipment aboard Starfleet vessels.
Borg defensive technology includes a beam weapon-like device, which allows a Borg ship to send a ‘feedback pulse’ back down a beam, which hits it, causing the attacker to take the weapons damage as well. Thus far, Starfleet has been mostly unable to adapt this weapon-defensive system to its vessels, but study of the weapon has led to the advances of point-defense systems (PDSs) used by some newer Starfleet vessels.
Federation/Starfleet vessels equipped with multi-phase tractor pulse emitters can only use this weapon. When the weapon catches a ship with one of their tractor beams, they can activate the shield-draining weapon the next round/post. Each round/post it drains 25% of the shields normal maximum protection until the shields collapse. Once they collapse, the shields cannot recharge or regenerate until the weapon is deactivated or disabled by the opposing vessel.
The weapon can also be modified with a tachyon-based ACB jacket pulse to cause the same effect at impulse or warp, and fires 1 shot per round/post.
Lasers, ranging from the basic models to high-energy X-ray lasers, are primitive weapons used by societies, which have not yet developed phaser or other advanced weaponry. Starfleet does not employ lasers as part of their standard weapons armament, but some Federation member world vessels, such as the Saurian, Orion, and Bolian space fleets still equip their vessels with lasers either for extra weapons armament, point defense, or in their most basic use, clearing of large stellar objects without the cost of equipping the vessel with a phaser array.
Nuclear Weapons
Humans, and most other star-faring species with aggressive tendencies, used fission and later fusion based rockets and other nuclear ordinance for a time as soon as they found it technologically feasible to do so. For humans, this time came early, in 2070, less than ten years after Zephram Cochrane’s first historic warp flight and have long fell out of disuse since. Initially the intention was to use nuclear rockets primarily to clear debris, smash open asteroids, destroy obstacles, and defend ships. Starfleet no longer uses the latter in particular (though, other Federation member worlds, including the Humans, still use nuclear fusion devices for the aforementioned intentions), but other more primitive spacefarring races still use these devices as weapons of war—such as when Earth was embroiled in the Romulan War of the late 2150’s.
(The accompanying table describes the different types of nuclear ordinance. They can be either used as mines, or rockets using the rules described in the Torpedo/Projectile section of this site.)
|
Type |
Damage |
Range |
|
Mark I |
120 |
5/150/750/3,000 |
|
Mark II |
135 |
5/200/1,000/5,000 |
|
Mark III |
150 |
6/300/2,500/8,000 |
In open combat, the Tholians use a gravimetric-based energy beam along the same lines, in which it’s theorized, they create the Tholian Web. Upon observation and encounters with the Tholians, including the brief but violent Tholian border wars in the early 2360’s, Starfleet has been able to recreate the Gravitic beam weaponry with variable success.
(In game terms they count as type 7 and 8 disruptors, with the same firing mode restrictions and ranges for disruptor, but as with Gravimetric Torpedoes, shields only provide half the protection they would against normal disruptors SIF, Ablative armors, and a ships hull resistance apply however to the damage inflicted. Models have been created by both the Tholians and Starfleet however that allow them to be equal to a Gravitic Beam weapon equal and surpassing a type 13 disruptor, reaching the ability for a ship to mount a type 15 planetary disruptor onto their ships with a damage of 320, and 5 shots per round.)
The so-called ‘Doomsday Weapon’ encountered by the Enterprise, which virtually destroyed the USS Constellation and obliterated several planets in 2267 used an enormous energy weapon which fired pure anti-proton beams. Although the weapon normally used this system as a tool to slice planets apart and ‘consume’ them for fuel, the beam also served as a potent weapon. Later, in 2366, the Enterprise-D encountered a Husnock Warship that used jackets streams of positrons and anti-protons, as it’s primary weapon. Later in the 2370’s, encounters with Starfleet and extra-dimensional forces of the United Empire of Planets who had forged an alliance with the Husnock living in their reality, allowed Starfleet to create its own anti-proton based weapon systems, but thus far, have not been equipped to Starships for use as it is generally untested.
(An anti-proton beam weapon has a range of 25/50,000/250,000/750,000 and an accuracy of 3/4/6/9. It does 300 points of damage per shot, can be fired 3 times in a round/post, and can firing only in standard and pulse modes. A ship cannot multi-fire it. It costs 80 SU’s, has a firing arc of 360 degrees, and can only be equipped one per vessel of size 7 and above. Husnock vessels mount three such emitters on their ship, each combining in a single collimated jacketed pulse that does 900 points of damage, each emitter array x3.)