That's assuming they are the same type of torpedo. Note how the TMP onward torpedo launchers are a totally different. This could probably indicate a change in torpedo design as well, caseless to encased.
Beaming a Photon Torpedo
- Thread starter Raul
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That's assuming they are the same type of torpedo. Note how the TMP onward torpedo launchers are a totally different. This could probably indicate a change in torpedo design as well, caseless to encased.
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C57D
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I guess that I have no problem with a TOS "Photon torpedo" being some sort of energy burst which was held in stais by some sort of magnetic/EM field until it either hit something or the enveloping field ran out of steam. One that could be launched with differing field strengths for differing ranges (or "proximity" bursts).
Nor do I have a problem with the term Phaser being used for this weapon in BoT in the very early S1, when terminology was still extremely variable. Especially when said Phaser doesn't really behave like a Phaser.
But since TOS thankfully avoided any techno babble, and so we dont exactly what it was, I also have no problem with any other reasonable option either ( just so long as fungi is not in anyway involved !!!) Lol.
Nor do I have a problem with the term Phaser being used for this weapon in BoT in the very early S1, when terminology was still extremely variable. Especially when said Phaser doesn't really behave like a Phaser.
But since TOS thankfully avoided any techno babble, and so we dont exactly what it was, I also have no problem with any other reasonable option either ( just so long as fungi is not in anyway involved !!!) Lol.
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C57D
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And one that must have had the monoply in Starfleet for a century or more lol !!
:thumbsup:
And then we have ENT where the torpedo is the exact same, and the launcher is again totally different (but quite possibly very close to what the TOS one would have looked like with its hinged gunport open...
Well, any Russian or Soviet aircraft is a MiG, any eastern assault rifle is a Kalashnikov, and every western tank used to be Patton...
Timo Saloniemi
And then we have ENT where the torpedo is the exact same, and the launcher is again totally different (but quite possibly very close to what the TOS one would have looked like with its hinged gunport open...
Well, any Russian or Soviet aircraft is a MiG, any eastern assault rifle is a Kalashnikov, and every western tank used to be Patton...
Timo Saloniemi
Lieutenant, fire another *smiles to camera* Photon(TM) *pauses for dramatic effect* Torpedo.
Yes... Well...
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C57D
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Apologies for being anal but I can't resist it.
Some Russian planes are Sukhoi and Kamov and Antonov etc etc. Lol
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But the pilots who fly them know a MiG23 from a Sukhoi 37.
And I'm sure Starfleet know exactly what a "Photon Torpedo"is.
And I'm sure Starfleet know exactly what a "Photon Torpedo"is.
I believe they were always a cased item. TOS just didn't go into sufficient detail. How could they -- a whole new universe was being created and they didn't know it. Phasers being a kind of higher powered form of laser makes sense. The photon torpedo as a "chunk" of phaser beam makes little sense. You can't guide a blob of energy after released. From what we observe when they are launched, there is an energy shield around the torpedo that glows and makes it look like a blob of energy.
TOS didn't go into sufficient detail because they likely didn't really care about that stuff. It wasn't until Next Gen that the technobabble really came into use. TOS was always about the story more than internal consistency, or explaining the tech in any great detail.
However, I don't agree that the TOS photon torpedoes were just balls of phaser energy. That would seem to be redundant. Besides, I always got the impression that photon torpedo blasts were more powerful than a phaser blast
Then how do you explain the failure to use photon torpedoes on occasions when the phasers proved not powerful enough?
"The Paradise Syndrome", "Whom Gods Destroy", possibly "The Doomsday Machine"
My point is that they were encased weapons, and the movie is set in terms of the timeline only a few decades after TOS.
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C57D
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I can see both sides of this topic and since it was never discussed on screen we will never know. But I don't ever recall seeing a TOS PT tracking or maneuvering or in anyway being guided to a target. Maybe they were just an energy pulse (not necessarily Phaser energy) held together by an EM field and hyperaccelerated to megawarp speeds. Damage then comes from both their energy and the kinetic force from such high speeds. And at such high speed no need for post launch guidance but just "drawing a bead" before launch? And as in BoT a "proximity blast" gives a pretty good hit anyway so again reducing the NEED for any guidance package post launch.
I also wonder also if they were shown (in TOS) as being used at all speeds or just at warp? Probably not, but it would also ease the need for independent guidance systems, since warp speed would need to be more or less the same and with more or less the same vector otherwise the scapping ships would just warp apart at warp speed difference x warp speed C multiplier x 186,000 miles per second! Surely too far for any weapons or targeting systems.
Or maybe not!
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I can't explain that. You'd have to ask the writers and the producers about that bit of inconsistency. There's absolutely no reason why they didn't use torpedoes in those episodes other than it wasn't in the script. Why? I have no idea.
It would depend where it's being beamed. If it's into a hostile target they've already lost their shields so a torpedo and/or phaser hit on their main reactor/gravity generator/computer core would cripple/destroy the target.
If it was at a starbase and the ship was being restocked then transporters could be an option, but there could also be an umbilical connection between the two near the torpedo bay that would allow for restocking of ordnance without the risk transportation might cause (transporters in this time were not without their faults and issues).
If it was at a starbase and the ship was being restocked then transporters could be an option, but there could also be an umbilical connection between the two near the torpedo bay that would allow for restocking of ordnance without the risk transportation might cause (transporters in this time were not without their faults and issues).
But if the torpedo weren't tracking and maneuvering, it would never hit anything, except perhaps stationary, gigantic targets at point blank range.
We don't know the method of tracking - is there always a sensor at the tip of the torpedo, or never a sensor there but only at the starship? But guiding is clearly required, and that can't happen without tracking.
Or without maneuvering. We don't know the method of maneuvering, either - but we do see the glow, which quite possibly is simply the exhaust from the rocketlike holes at the stern. Might be a rocket flame giving Newtonian thrust (like in today's missiles). Might be mere venting of wastes so that the internal engine can produce its non-Newtonian thrust using invisible fields (much like in steam-propelled torpedoes of yore vented the steam nonpropulsively while the propeller pushed the torp forward). Might be the propulsive field itself (although it's basically never visible in any other spacecraft of Trek).
As for observed performance, the visuals only show the launch. We can't tell if the torp typically executes a 782 degree turn after launch just for shits and giggles, but we can tell in "The Changeling" that Kirk fires over his shoulder (the bearing to the target is given as being behind the ship (and not directly behind) while the torpedo initially flies forward).
Yuppety-yup, they covered those bases in the original show already. The ship was in orbit in "Arena", prevaricating over whether to beam up Kirk and pals, when torps were first mentioned used in Trek. Warp firings in turn were evident e.g. in "Elaan of Troyius".
What they didn't show was using torps for ground bombardment. That came later, in TNG and the TOS movies.
Of course, the visuals always showed the torps leaving the ship at a snail's pace, certainly nowhere near lightspeed. So either we saw the combat scenes in slow motion; the torps accelerate after launch on their own; or we saw the combat scenes in fast-forward motion, omitting the minutes (or sometimes weeks!) it took for the torps to find their targets.
Timo Saloniemi
I agree with you. Even nowadays modern missiles, rockets have sensors and driving systems. I think that it's a bit anachronistic thinking that in the TOS era that wasn't possible.
Maybe it's only a visual effect due to a high speed and high turning radius that make people think that the photon torpedos can only go straight.
