ST weapon accuracy and range
This article deals with demonstrated accuracy and range of various weapons used by major Star Trek civilizations like the Federation, Borg, Dominion, and Klingon Empire.
As the examples provided below demonstrate, all major military forces engage at ranges from several hundred meters up to several kilometers, which represents the upper limit of their demonstrated effective range.
Examples
DS9 "Call to Arms"
In this episode, a Dominion fleet attacks Deep Space 9. Even when engaging a completely immobile target, the Dominion ships close to within several kilometers before opening fire.
The screenshot on the right shows the Dominion/Cardassian fleet approaching Deep Space 9 to the point of it taking up a significant fraction of the field of view. Yet in the following scene, Damar reports that they will not be in weapons range for another minute[1].
After the battle is joined, the attacking fleet continues to fight at extremely close ranges; however, even ranges of several hundred meters appear to be too great for Deep Space 9 targeting sensors to achieve a reasonable accuracy. On the left we can see a Cardassian shuttle flying straight towards Deep Space 9 central assembly. The shuttle doesn't change course or attempt to evade the incoming fire, yet Deep Space 9 only scores two grazing shots on it, thus failing to stop the craft.
Further evidence of limited accuracy comes from the end of the episode. As the Defiant and a Bird of Prey flee DS9, the Dominion fleet opens fire, and we see 11 shots fired without a single one hitting the fleeing ships. The shots can be seen at right, and -- as is immediately apparent -- the ships are flying in a tight formation without making any attempts to evade enemy fire. As before, the range is on the order of several hundred meters or several kilometers at most.
TNG "Conundrum"
Worf reportedly states that the ship's phasers have a range of 300,000 km, yet later in the episode Riker says they are still several seconds from "optimum range" for targetting the Lysian command center, even though they are practically on top of a stationary target that is both very large and very poorly defended (by Federation standards).
TNG "Yesterday's Enterprise"
Three un-cloaked Klingon Birds of Prey close to within a few kilometers before firing on the Enterprise. Likewise, the Enterprise, knowing they will be attacked by the Klingons, doesn't fire until the enemy is at close range (there is no political reason to delay firing, since the Federation is in a state of war with the Klingons in this alternate-timeline episode).
TNG "The Wounded"
This episode is often cited as evidence for long-range combat by major ST civilizations:
- DATA: The warship is three hundred thousand kilometers from the Phoenix. It is opening fire. The Phoenix has taken a direct hit ... the Phoenix is beginning evasive maneuvers ... it has positioned itself outside the weapons range of the opposing ship ... the Phoenix has powered up with both phasers and photon torpedoes ... the Phoenix is firing photon torpedoes.
As Data is speaking, the viewscreen shows a two-dimensional display of the battle. If this display is oriented to provide the most useful view of the battle (placing all three of the vessels being tracked in the same plane), then it shows the relative weapon ranges of the ships and the distance between the them. The display casts doubt on Data's description of the battle, since the viewscreen shows that the Phoenix is still well within weapons range of the Cardassian ship, which actually has greater range than the Phoenix if the display is accurate.
It should also be noted that the ships involved in the battle are travelling at warp speeds, so a gap of 300,000 km could easily drop to zero in less than a second. It may also be worth noting that the battle was conducted entirely with torpedoes, and the Cardassian ship was pursuing the Phoenix: the Phoenix would therefore have been running away from torpedoes fired by the Cardassian ship, while the Cardassian ship was running toward the torpedoes fired by the Phoenix, possibly explaining the "out of range" statement.
The battle between the Enterprise and the Cardassian warship, Trager, earlier in the episode, further disproves any optimistic interpretation of Data's range description. As the screenshot to the left shows, the ships engage at a range of several hundred meters, nowhere near the supposed hundreds of thousands of kilometers.
TNG "Q Who"
When the Enterprise is attacked by a Borg Cube, Picard orders Worf to target the source of the tractor beam and fire. Shockingly, it takes Worf four tries to hit the beam emitter from point-blank range; the first three shots aren't even close!
VOY "Equinox"
Voyager reportedly attacks the Equinox with phasers from 30,000 km away. Upon closer inspection of the episode, however, we find that no evidence of such range exists. On the contrary, the episode implies far shorter maximum ranges of Federation ships.
The relevant dialog:
- [Bridge]
- PARIS: Thirty thousand kilometres and closing.
- JANEWAY: Target their power core.
- [Equinox Bridge]
- GILMORE: Direct hit. Minor damage.
- RANSOM: Return fire.[1]
Since Janeway only instructed the crew to start targeting Equinox's power core at 30,000km and since there is a scene cut between the order and the first seen hit there is no way to determine how far away Voyager actually was when it started firing upon Equinox.
Further events in the episode suggest much lower ranges:
- RANSOM: Lay in a course through the planet's atmosphere. Sixty degree vector.
- [Bridge]
- JANEWAY: What the hell is he doing. Follow him!
- PARIS: Crossing the upper thermosphere.
- JANEWAY: Phasers.
- TUVOK: Shields are weakening. Thirty one percent, twenty nine.
- KIM: Inertial dampers are offline.
- CHAKOTAY: Captain, if we loose our shields well be attacked by the aliens. Captain!
- JANEWAY: Break off pursuit.
If Voyager were capable of scoring hits from anywhere near 30,000km, there would be no need to follow the Equinox into the atmosphere and risk damage due to atmospheric friction.