As far as I can tell it doesn't say. I imagine it turns stars into degenerate matter, making them white dwarfs and making the solar system in question uninhabitable for most creatures. (though I imagine undead immune to cold would be fine)
I think based on the story line (and there could be parts that I'm confusing) that this was more a "channel the energy of a star into a beam weapon" type deal that just obliterated whatever was in the way. So there would be nothing left, practically speaking. Maybe some debris.
It kills stars.
More specifically it alters their energy output and renders them inert without reducing their mass. Planets in targeted systems starve and freeze before being hurled out into space.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
So it just turns them into Iron then?
The energy well for fusion ends at iron, so you would just have big chunks of iron that slowly cool down and slows down (the sun spins a lot but it's hard to tell) and lose their magnetism.
As a point of order though, if it maintains the same mass the orbit of the planets shouldn't be affected. Gravity depends on mass. If the mass is unchanged the gravitational strength shouldn't change and the planets should orbit around a big hunk of iron where a star used to be.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
It degenerates stellars, duh.
;P
As a side note. Stars continue fusion past iron. All known elements are the product of fusion or are synthetic. Iron is the point where fusion consumes energy rather than releasing it however.
I think the science classes I've taken have said anything beyond Iron is generally the result of supernovas, but I'm no astrophysicist or anything so all I've got is gen-ed.
I opened the pdf and had a quick read.
The stellar degenerator fires an energy tether at a star, and forces it to rapidly turn into a black dwarf star, which no longer gives off light or heat. The tether is an energy weapon on its own, capable of destroying ships and moons on it's way to the sun.
IRL a black dwarf doesn't exist yet. They form when smaller stars like ours shed mass their outer masses and collapse into white dwarf stars and that then cools. The cooling is expected to take longer than the universe has been alive.
In starfinder it reads like this process happens in a few minutes.
As a side note. Stars continue fusion past iron. All known elements are the product of fusion or are synthetic. Iron is the point where fusion consumes energy rather than releasing it however.
which book says this and where?
which book says this and where?I opened the pdf and had a quick read.
The stellar degenerator fires an energy tether at a star, and forces it to rapidly turn into a black dwarf star, which no longer gives off light or heat. The tether is an energy weapon on its own, capable of destroying ships and moons on it's way to the sun.
IRL a black dwarf doesn't exist yet. They form when smaller stars like ours shed mass their outer masses and collapse into white dwarf stars and that then cools. The cooling is expected to take longer than the universe has been alive.
In starfinder it reads like this process happens in a few minutes.
As a side note. Stars continue fusion past iron. All known elements are the product of fusion or are synthetic. Iron is the point where fusion consumes energy rather than releasing it however.
It's basically repeated in the adventure background of the first five books, And then expanded on slightly in the early parts of book 5.
As a side note. Stars continue fusion past iron. All known elements are the product of fusion or are synthetic. Iron is the point where fusion consumes energy rather than releasing it however.
As far as I'm aware only when a star goes Supernova does the circumstances for fusion of iron nuclei occur. Otherwise the internal conditions are such that their is not enough localized energy to sustain iron fusion.
So yes, it happens but only in stars that go supernova. But you are correct that these occurrences, though rare, are the source of larger nuclei elements. But this is also why they occur in smaller quantities comparatively.