What's the difference between the two types of weapons?
Phase vs. Phaser and Photon vs. Photonic...?
- Thread starter VulcanMindBlown
- Start date
Mirror Archer found being able to disintegrate Admiral Black on the spot, satisfying. So you mustn't be able to do that with a phase pistol.
If you ask me, time. I figure people just shortened the names so they'd be easier to say. Like "cellular telephone" becoming "cell phone" or "pianoforte" becoming "piano."
One's slightly more advanced than the other.
Terminology is all. My impression was that "Phase pistol" and "phase cannon" was shortened to "phaser" and "photonic torpedo" to "photon torpedo". They used the exact same visual effects and sounds as TNG and Voyager.
It's worth noting that the term "photon torpedo" was introduced in ENT: "Sleeping Dogs" (as a Klingon armament) more than a year before "photonic warheads" were mentioned by the Vissians in "Cogenitor" and "photonic torpedoes" showed up in "The Expanse."
It could arguably be a matter of translation; in Sleeping Dogs, Hoshi appears to be translating directly from Klingon, whereas in Cogenitor I believe it was the universal translator.
It could be that the Klingons use a noun compound to describe photon torpedoes (this would be in line with Okrandian Klingon, but this is quite different from what is used most of the time in Enterprise), and the Vissians use an adjective+noun compound to describe photonic warheads.
...or, as others have said, they might simply be interchangeable and depends on the translator.
It could be that the Klingons use a noun compound to describe photon torpedoes (this would be in line with Okrandian Klingon, but this is quite different from what is used most of the time in Enterprise), and the Vissians use an adjective+noun compound to describe photonic warheads.
...or, as others have said, they might simply be interchangeable and depends on the translator.
Personally I think they should have kept the original EM weapons that the pilot had. Based on interviews with Berman and Braga I wouldn't be surprised if this was a studio matter as they wanted as many things to be recognizable as being Trek terms and technology.
Well, the MACOs used "plasma rifles," as I recall. But yes -- Berman and Braga wanted much less in the way of familiar Trek tech (no transporters, for instance), and even wanted the whole first season to be essentially like "First Flight," a Right Stuff-style story about the process leading up to the launch of Enterprise. But the highers-up found that too big a change and insisted on something that was more recognizable as Star Trek (even though they left off the name Star Trek for the first two seasons and a bit).
Phasers are to Star Trek what lightsabers are to Star Wars. It was an incredibly stupid idea to just change the names very slightly then use exactly the same thing. Just call them that.
And no invoking outdated and simply wrong things from TOS, ignore those remarks and use the correct ones.
And no invoking outdated and simply wrong things from TOS, ignore those remarks and use the correct ones.
It's set a century earlier. It's not stupid at all to reflect how terminology changes over time in real life. The pianoforte became the piano. The aeroplane became the airplane. The television set became the TV. The Radarange became the microwave oven became the microwave. The motorcar became the car. The names for things are not immutable in real life, so why should they be in fiction?
^ Yes. Terminology changes over time. The actual tech would also have changed, but from the similar names we can infer that the changes were developments from the same principle, not radically different.
Yup, those were cool.
One is more awkward to say.
technological differences aside.
The term photon torpedo and photonic torpedo are interchangeable. same thing.
phase cannon/pistol is not at all like phaser in science..
called phase cannon/pistol a phaser is like calling a ford pinto with supped up v8 engine a Porsche roadster.
The term photon torpedo and photonic torpedo are interchangeable. same thing.
phase cannon/pistol is not at all like phaser in science..
called phase cannon/pistol a phaser is like calling a ford pinto with supped up v8 engine a Porsche roadster.
What's a phaser in science? I thought it was a made up term.
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