Would a Federation warship like the Defiant out gun a Star Wars Star Destroyer? Who has a bigger armada? Who has the tactical advantage? Don’t forget that The Federation includes the Klingons, who love warfare and have fast, agile, heavily armed ships, with cloaking devices, and the Vulcans with superior logic and tactical planning.
You don’t shoot it at the star destroyer. You shoot it at the star next to the star destroyer. When you take away nuclear fusion you get a large explosion more commonly known as a supernova. Everything within a few dozen light years is now obliterated. Gotta think like the Emperor if you want to beat him.
You don’t want to bring real-world physics into this. If you turned off fusion in a star, it would still shine for thousands of years.
A star massive enough to supernova, during the final stage, is held up by fusion. Fusion in the core continues to make heavier and heavier elements in stages. The final stage is measured in days. When that stage completes, the supernova initiation is measured in fractions of a second. The resulting shockwave travels faster than 10% of light speed.
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That was mostly to counter the “it will keep shining for thousands of years” in the previous comment. Yes, a starship might outrun the shockwave of material, but it might not detect the gamma waves until it’s too late, as the sudden influx of energetic light could overwhelm shields, and those do travel at light speed, and could reach the ship before it can jump.
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Well now we’ve just arrived at MAD, in space. Both sides deploy their Star Killers and both galaxies are rendered uninhabitable.
The vast majority of stars are not big enough to nova, no matter what you do to them.
a supernova is caused by nuclear fusion
Depends what type of supernova you’re talking about. Type Ia supernova are caused by runaway fusion but most supernova are caused by core collapse which is when the fusion in the core dies out and gravity wins causing the star to explode. Depending on the size of the star you might even get a black hole at the end of this explosion.
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