Favorite Phasers!

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Kinda funny they'd still be using phasers in the 29th century... I guess someone stopped inventing.

At least the 29th-century phaser works like a phaser, or indeed any light-based weapon, is SUPPOSED to work: The beam instantly appears between the gun and the target. It does not take a visible amount of time for the beam to reach its destination. That's the biggest problem with all previous depictions of phaser tech: their beams move too slowly. A beam made of light should logically be instantaneous.

 

[F. King Daniel]

The STVI phasers were cool. I also liked the ones in "The Cage" (I'm assuming they're phasers and not lasers, owing to how they act and the fact that ENT and STXI retconned phasers much further back in Trek history)

No, actually those seen in The Cage are "Lasers". The ENT pistols were known as "Phase Pistols", not quite "Phasers" as we know.

ENT's phase pistols did everything a phaser could. "Phaser" was obviously meant to be a shorthand name, like "photonic torpedo" became "photon torpedo"

Although the weapons in "The Cage" were called lasers, real-life lasers don't function like that at all. It makes less sense that the use of phasers, which came into use in 2151, would be stopped at some point between 2233 (the Kelvin used phasers) and the 2250's ("The Cage"), only to become standard-issue again in time for TOS in the 2260's.

 

[Captain Robert April]

^ Which only highlights how JJTrek's version of the Pre-TOS universe doesn't quite fit...

 

[RapidNadion]

The type-2 phasers in TNG (post-dustbuster) and on actually had seven buttons: the usual trigger and controls, three function buttons on the back and two underneath.

Most of the sources I've checked don't show a sign of any more than three buttons as seen in the pic below:

Where are the other buttons supposed to be?

In the upgraded phasers (depicted above) those rectangular panels on the top and bottom of the phaser were retconned into "access panels" or something. The original TNG prop, however, had those panels painted with small labels and implied to be actual buttons you could use to toggle functions to be controlled by the regular buttons above the trigger. So IIRC: if you wanted to increase beam width, you'd press the top left button above the power indicator and then press the right button above the trigger. Beam intensity would be top right button. You could also adjust burst time using the buttons on the underside, and one of them even sets an "autofire" function where the phaser can be set to fire all by itself. And of course, one of them also sets the timer for phaser overload.

Would love to see a source for the assertion that the access panels were originally intended as buttons. This is the first I've heard of it.

 

[F. King Daniel]

^ Which only highlights how JJTrek's version of the Pre-TOS universe doesn't quite fit...

No more or less than Star Trek: Enterprise. "The Cage" is packed with other oddities like "time warp" that makes the ship translucent, Pike's bulky TV, Pike's blatant bigotry and a little paper printer on the bridge. The solution to that and all of Trek's continuity issues is simply to take it all with a pinch of salt, as recommended in the intro to the Star Trek Chronology. That was the future seen then, this is it seen now.

 

[Timo]

like a phaser, or indeed any light-based weapon

To be sure, nobody has said that phasers would be light-based. (That is, except unreal people from an alternate universe where Trek is a TV show.)

And clearly they are not, for the above reason. If it meows like a cat, walks like a cat, and refuses to swim, what possible point would there be in calling it a duck?

Although the weapons in "The Cage" were called lasers, real-life lasers don't function like that at all.

The ones I use do. A red beam that melts the things it hits is pretty laserlike behavior - and the early TOS VFX actually gives us faster beams than the more refined TNG stuff, so that part is okay as well (although it would also be okay to say that it takes a while before the beam ionizes enough of the air around it to create the bulk of that glow).

oddities like "time warp" that makes the ship translucent, Pike's bulky TV, Pike's blatant bigotry and a little paper printer on the bridge.

These may be "odd", but they are by no means aberrations from the Trek norm. Many characters have been "bigots" if you by that mean that they are misogynes; paper prints reappear in TNG; and bulky items from the past are treasured by virtually each and every one of our heroic starship captains. And there's no reason to think that the ship would become translucent for her crew; none of them react as if it did. It's just artistic license if we take it that way. (The crew does appear to suffer from excessive noise during "time warp factor seven", tho, as we get hand signals but little or no dialogue. But there's always increased noise on the bridge during high warp in TOS, too. For whatever odd reason.)

As for controlling a phaser with just three buttons, I can control entire kingdoms with two plus a handy but not necessary thumbwheel... More buttons would just mean more finger movements, translating to more opportunities for an epic fumble.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

like a phaser, or indeed any light-based weapon

To be sure, nobody has said that phasers would be light-based.

What else could they possibly be? Remember every phaser FX shot you've ever seen. What is that, other than light? It's not biscuits and gravy, believe you me.

 

[Timo]

What else could they possibly be?

About a thousand things. Say, a stream of rapid nadions. (Rather slow nadions if you ask me... But perhaps that's rapid for a nadion?)

Many of today's weapons look like that in action. A flamethrower or some other variety of weaponized Super Soaker, with a bit of extra pressure, would fit the bill very nicely. Or a machine gun with a very high rate of fire and very small projectiles (Larry Niven's "strakkaker" flechette gun is an extreme example of one).

But rays of light they obviously ain't. And nobody wants or needs them to be.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Vinkula]

Voyager / DS9 Type 2 phaser and the rifles. (Also FC, INS phasers, because they are same).

Hated NEM phasers.

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

-Probert's proposed TMP Phaser: It's pretty close to what we got, but slimmer and more elegant.
-STIII Phaser: Its a sexed-up TOS phaser.
-STV/VI Assault Phaser: .45s in space. What's not to like?
-First Contact "Boomerang" Phaser
-First Contact Phaser Rifle (Square Nose)
-TNG/DS9 Phaser Rifle (W/ carrying strap and an FC-style gizmo on top)
-ENT Phaser/Plasma/Pulse/whatever it is this week rifle (With the double barrel and scope): It may be a redress of the Jem'hadar rifle, but the style of the stock, and shape and placement of the foregrip make it seem a lot like a reimagined version of the TOS rifle.
-ENT MACO Rifle

 

[Redshirt214]

I would have to say my favorite Phasers would have to be:
1. The TOS Phasers I & II for it's classic design.
2. The Assault Phaser, for it's rugged construction and practical design.
3.The "Laser Gun" from the pilot, mainly for it's brass barrel and simple setting adjustment.
4. TNG Phaser Rifle : All the joys of a TOS Phaser rifle with out the bulkiness.
5. The Kelvin Phaser from the new movie!

 

[bryce]

I like the ST:TSFS phaser - and tricorder & communicator - because they were updates of the TOS props, which I am also partial to. (The TSFS wrist communicator was cool too.)

So I'd say the TOS & TSFS phasers. Also the Kelvin-era phasers (& communicator) in the new movie, which are also modeled on the TOS props.

And I'm kinda partial to the nuTrek phasers the nuEnterprise crew had...they have...grown on me. I know, I know...but they have a kinda retro Buck Rogers look, I think...

Btw...THIS THREAD NEEDS PICS!!! (But I don't have time to add them right now..)

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

Phasers or GTFO!

 

[Cwj]

Pics are definitely needed. I'll start: The popular Assault phaser from ST:5-6. (from phasers.net).

Edit-Oops couldn't use it.
I'll post some pics of my replica/toys

 

[C.E. Evans]

I've always been partial to the TMP/TWOK phasers. A sleek and simple design.

 

[Cwj]

I've always been partial to the TMP/TWOK phasers. A sleek and simple design.

Same here. I really like the ultra sleek design, and the front end actually being a removable hand phaser (not shown in the films). All the blinking lights are cool as well

I've warmed up to the 2009 phaser. Didn't like it at first but it grew on me. It would have been even better if it incorporated a type-1 somehow.
In fact one thing I dislike about the phasers from TNG onwards is the lack of a removable hand phaser.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I've always wanted a subsequent show or film to somehow build phasers directly into a Starfleet uniform. A weapon is more powerful simply by virtue of it being impossible to confiscate...and it would look really cool if the phrase "point and shoot" becomes literal.

 

[Captain Robert April]

Ironically, the little cricket phasers in TNG were essentially dropped after the first season because, thanks to their small size, it often looked like the phaser beams were coming directly from the characters' hands.

 

[C.E. Evans]

I've always wanted a subsequent show or film to somehow build phasers directly into a Starfleet uniform. A weapon is more powerful simply by virtue of it being impossible to confiscate...and it would look really cool if the phrase "point and shoot" becomes literal.

Back in the the late '80s, I designed a 25th-Century Starfleet uniform for a fanfic in which the phasers were incorporated into the sleeves. I realized, however, that the odds of the characters zapping themselves by accident or from impacts were probably unacceptable.

I've warmed up to the 2009 phaser. Didn't like it at first but it grew on me. It would have been even better if it incorporated a type-1 somehow.
In fact one thing I dislike about the phasers from TNG onwards is the lack of a removable hand phaser.

Ironically, the little cricket phasers in TNG were essentially dropped after the first season because, thanks to their small size, it often looked like the phaser beams were coming directly from the characters' hands.

Yeah, but I think given how small 24th-Century phasers have become, the primary need for a cricket phaser is gone. I always thought too that Type-1 phasers were ideal on missions (mostly diplomatic ones, IMO) in which concealment of a phaser was preferred over the outright display of one.

 

[Cwj]

I would have loved to see that uniform phaser C.E. Evans!

Now, does anyone have a favorite non-Starfleet phaser (or I guess disruptor would be a better word)?

I like the TOS Klingon disruptor, which apparently used some type of sound rather than a visible beam.
I absolutely love the Cardassian disruptors. So alien looking.

Anyone else?