Transphasic Torpedo Color...

[Jedi_Master]

I like it better when we try to force real world explanations onto all the acts, technology, and special effects of the "dramatic" presentation of the fictional world of Star Trek.

Okay, so why did Saavik get facial reconstruction surgery right after Spock's funeral? Why is the Romulan cloaking device made out of Nomad's head and Sargon's globe? Why is the Enterprise visibly turning when it orbits a planet, even though any orbital path would be tens of thousands of kilometers in circumference and thus appear as a perfectly straight line on the scale of a three-hundred-meter starship? And why do the stars often appear to move even when a ship is at impulse? Some of what we see has to be taken as figurative.

I said I "like" it better, not that it is any more accurate. I actually find it more entertaining and enjoyable to watch when people try to explain away plot holes, actor changes, etc.

I personally try to keep in mind that this is a mutable and fictional universe, and although it is fascinating when real world science is used to explain broad themes (your excellent discussion of "alternate" universes in the DTI books is a good example) when real world science is used as support when arguing about whether or not phasers would be blue, or whether or not torpedoes glow, or whether hand phasers would make "beyoo" sounds it gets just a bit goofy.

 

[USS Triumphant]

The bright glow on the torpedoes is actually to help DETER the target from just shooting it out of space before it reaches its destination. It's the visual part of a broad-spectrum ECM suite.

 

[Christopher]

^I'd think that making your projectile super-visible would have the exact opposite effect.

Here's a thought: cloaking devices on torpedoes. Why not? They're small, so it wouldn't take much energy to cloak them.

 

[USS Triumphant]

Cloak the torpedoes, then dump them out of the cargo bay of your cloaked ship, since we know from Star Trek IV that things can be moved in and out of the cargo bay without dropping cloak.

 

[tomswift2002]

Didn't TOS generally use one color for phasers on stun and another for phasers on kill/disintegrate? I forget which was which, though. And it wasn't entirely consistent.

With TOS I think it changed from episode to episode, since, as I recall in "The Alternative Factor" when the phasers are fired on the planet, they are blue, but then in "The Enterprise Incident" they were yellowish-green. I recall the phasers color were brought up when TOS was remastered and (on the DVD/Blu-ray special features) the production crew was talking about how the team decided on just going for the orange color in the remastered episodes to remain consistent, even though the original episodes switched from episode to episode.