Mike Dicenso on Photon Torpedoes

[Ted C]

He decided to chime in on the Photon Torpedo page of the wiki, if anyone cares. I moved his edits to the discussion page, for now.

http://stardestroyer.net/mrwong/wiki/in ... .27s_edits

[Borgholio]

While he is correct that fully vaporizing the asteroid would require a lot more energy than just breaking it apart, nowhere is it specified that Riker means vaporized. Breaking it up even into a handful of large chunks can quite accurately be counted as destroying it.

[WATCH-MAN]

I have a few questions:

How do we know how many photon torpedoes the Enterprise carried in this episode?

This Mike Dicenso claimed that it was assumed in calculations that the Enterprise carries 275 photon torpedoes while - according to this Mike Dicenso - it is canonically stated in "Conundrum" the the Enterprise carried a loadout of 250 photon torpedoes.

As far as I know, in "Conundrum" Worf stated only the numbers of photon torpedoes the Enterprise had this moment.

This says nothing about how many photon torpedoes the Enterprise can carry at all nor does it say anything about how many photon torpedoes the Enterprise carried in "The Pegasus".

Even if we can assume that the Enterprise can carry 250 or 275 photon torpedoes, I do not see why we have to assume that the Enterprise had a full complement of photon torpedoes in "The Pegasus".

Is there any evidence that Enterprise's complement of photon torpedoes is restocked after each shot or each time it visits a starbase?

What speaks against the notion that the Enterprise was low on photon torpedoes in "The Pegasus"?

If the calculation of their yield - based on the assumption that 250 or 275 photon torpedoes could have been used - is contradicted by other observations in the canon - as this Mike Dicenso claims - it seems to be plausible that the Enterprise did not have 250 or 275 photon torpedoes in "The Pegasus" at its disposal.

[Batman]

Um-the asteroid in TMP wasn't vapourized and its size is completely undeterminable because we never see it in the same frame as the E-Nil. That sequence is quite simply useless for determining photorp firepower.

[Batman]

Um-the asteroid in TMP wasn't vapourized and its size is completely undeterminable because we never see it in the same frame as the E-Nil. That sequence is quite simply useless for determining photorp firepower.

Technically that is incorrect-we do see it in the same frame as the E-Nil...in shots that give us no way to determine the asteroid's distance from the ship and by extension, its size.

[Darth Tedious]

Did you actually just argue with yourself, Batman?

[Batman]

I forgot the 'GHETTO EDIT' . I was clarifying my comment.

[Simon_Jester]

Is there any evidence that Enterprise's complement of photon torpedoes is restocked after each shot or each time it visits a starbase?

I suspect we could at least prove that Enterprise has her torpedo magazines reloaded periodically. They fire torpedoes quite liberally on a number of occasions, and while I'm not remotely up to counting every torpedo launch in the series, it's got to be well into the hundreds.

Moreover, common sense argues that the ship's munitions are topped off once in a while. Who would build a ship with a weapon that can only be fired X times without any way to reload?

On the other hand, in Star Trek it's usually possible to resolve any given military situation with a relatively small number of torpedoes. Since the TNG-era Federation is relatively peaceful, and the Galaxy-class definitely have a partly-civilian design concept, it may well be that the ships routinely travel with only a small fraction of their maximum torpedo storage capacity- enough to win one fight, but not enough to, say, carpet-bomb a whole continent with nuclear fireballs.

Resupply of torpedoes may be hard to come by, with overall production being low, and some starbases not having enough in storage to refill a Galaxy-class ship's magazines.

[bilateralrope]

How much of a photon torpedo can be replicated ?

[Darth Nostril]

I wouldn't recommend trying to replicate anti-matter.
That's never going to end well.

[bilateralrope]

True. But anti-matter is something the ships will be stocking up on even if they don't see combat. Starbases should have a decent stock of it.

What about the rest of the torpedo ?

[Darth Tedious]

It can't be too hard to make your own photorps
How many did Voyager fire in 7 seasons? :V

[Eternal_Freedom]

Way more than the 32 she supposedly started with. Chakotay said they had that many in, I think, "The Cloud." Immediately afterwards Janeway points out they have no way to replace them.

[Batman]

'Voyager' also lost every shuttle she started out with several times over if I recall correctly. For all their many other faults the crew was apparently seriously good at replacing equipment

[Ted C]

True. But anti-matter is something the ships will be stocking up on even if they don't see combat. Starbases should have a decent stock of it.

What about the rest of the torpedo ?

Geordi cobbled at least one together from whatever the Pakleds had on-hand in "Samaritan Snare", so it's probably not a lot of un-replicatable stuff.

[Ted C]

Anyone know where Mike's 275 torpedo figure for the "Pegasus" calculation came from. I know that 250 was the figure given in "Conundrum".

[Batman]

I'd swear the 275 figure is from filmed material but for the life of me can't name the episode.

[Simon_Jester]

There may be costs and drawbacks to cobbling together your own torpedoes. They may not be as reliable or accurate. They might be less safe to store.

For Voyager, the alternative is to have few or no torpedoes left, either because the last ones can't be used for fear of running out, or because they do run out. So it's worth the risk of homebrewing torpedoes, although these may be a lower-yield version or something (supposedly Voyager carried multiple marks of torpedo, with the "Mark 9" and "Mark 10" being higher-yield; maybe the "Mark 6" was the best they could replicate out of home resources).

For LaForge, again, I gather the Pakleds already had some kind of antimatter bomb, and all LaForge had to do was upgrade the weapon.

So for Enterprise, it might honestly be considered preferable to let the torpedo magazines stay low, and wait for an opportunity to resupply out of factory-made torpedoes that had passed the Federation's quality control department, rather than trying to jury-rig.

[Captain Seafort]

I'd swear the 275 figure is from filmed material but for the life of me can't name the episode.

AFAIK the only place that exact figure is mentioned is in the TNGTM.

Way more than the 32 she supposedly started with. Chakotay said they had that many in, I think, "The Cloud." Immediately afterwards Janeway points out they have no way to replace them.

'Voyager' also lost every shuttle she started out with several times over if I recall correctly. For all their many other faults the crew was apparently seriously good at replacing equipment

Out of an initial stock of 40 irreplaceable torpedoes, she ended up firing 93. Total shuttle losses were 17 certainly or probably lost and 8 damaged.

[Batman]

The 275 figure is indeed mentioned in the TM as 'the number of torpedo casings typically carried' (working from the german version so the wording may be off) and while I still think it popped up in canon as I said, I can't tell where so it's entirely possible I know that number from the TM and it's been with me for so long I subconsciously transferred it to the canon.

[Ted C]

It's not like going from 275 to 250 makes the "hundreds of kilotons" statement in the wiki invalid. We are dealing with ball-park figures.

[Vance]

You could not vaporize the asteroid over a 250-275 torpedo barrage because it would begin to fragment and break up during the process. There will be melting and vaporization that will increase the energy needed, I don't see how you could gradually vaporize it totally without it already being destroyed.

[TheHammer]

True. But anti-matter is something the ships will be stocking up on even if they don't see combat. Starbases should have a decent stock of it.

What about the rest of the torpedo ?

Geordi cobbled at least one together from whatever the Pakleds had on-hand in "Samaritan Snare", so it's probably not a lot of un-replicatable stuff.

I never got the impression that he actually gave them a working photon torpedo, I believe it was just part of the ruse. It would be more in character for Geordi to make them kill him than it would be for him to provide them with advanced weaponry.

[Ted C]

True. But anti-matter is something the ships will be stocking up on even if they don't see combat. Starbases should have a decent stock of it.

What about the rest of the torpedo ?

Geordi cobbled at least one together from whatever the Pakleds had on-hand in "Samaritan Snare", so it's probably not a lot of un-replicatable stuff.

I never got the impression that he actually gave them a working photon torpedo, I believe it was just part of the ruse. It would be more in character for Geordi to make them kill him than it would be for him to provide them with advanced weaponry.

After being rescued, he said that they'd come within moments of the Pakleds nuking the Enterprise.

From the script...

RIKER
Did you disable their photons?

GEORDI
Just in time. That's why you're all standing here...

[TheHammer]

From the script...

RIKER
Did you disable their photons?

GEORDI
Just in time. That's why you're all standing here...

Wow I guess you're right. I found an even more conclusive quote from earlier in the episode...

DATA: Positive indication of armed photon torpedoes, Commander.
RIKER: Geordi did it.

Rather stupid and poorly written IMO. Granted, the rest of it indicates it was apparently "part of the plan" for him to give them photon torpedoes and then later disable them, but that's quite a gamble to take with the lives of the Enterprise crew.

Granted, I think Geordi's statements at the end about "That's why you're all standing here" are most likely hyperbole. After all, if he could rig up torpedoes, launchers, and targeting systems on the fly using alien technology and subsequently take down a Galaxy class ship it doesn't speak too highly of every alien of the week that had tried and failed to do the same.