Something I noticed about "Code of Honor"

[Knight Templar]

In "Code of Honor", after Yar is kidnapped, Picard orders photon torpedoes armed and "display blasts" 1,000 meters short of the target.

Presumably, the target was the city and palace of the man who kidnapped Yar.

Now, I assume "display blasts" are very low yield explosions.

But wouldn't more than half a dozen antimatter explosions detonating in the lower atmosphere of a Class M planet create a series of massive blast waves that would've killed everyone in the vicinity (including Yar) no matter how much the yield was "dialed back"?

and given the explosions were visible in space after the Enterprise launched the torpedoes, they could not have been "dialed back" too much.

 

[sojourner]

Maybe they have enough control over the output of the explosions they can simply dial it to "light show".

 

[Start Wreck]

They are "photon" torpedoes, after all. They ought to be just a light show anyway!

 

[Timo]

Indeed, we have heard of "photon grenades" which are indicated to be futuristic flash-bangs ("Legacy") - and we have seen airburst mortar shells that create a massively blinding flash, yet no appreciable pressure wave mere 1,500 meters away ("Arena"). The precedent for an impressive light show certainly exists.

How to achieve that with antimatter? Distributing the annihilation would be the key - and distributing antimatter with annihilation ought to be a breeze (rather than a blast wave)!

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Leviathan]

Starfleet ships come with a "fireworks" mode?

 

[Knight Templar]

Starfleet ships come with a "fireworks" mode?

More like ST: TNG had a "we want to have the excitement of firing torpedoes but we don't want to actually hurt someone" mode.

 

[Timo]

Starfleet ships come with a "fireworks" mode?

Dunno about Starfleet - but the ships of the Cardassian Union certainly do.

http://ds9.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/3x22/explorers205.jpg

Timo Saloniemi