Star Trek Weapons Scientists vs.Star Wars Weapons Scientists

[SirNitram]

What's scientific about 'We've found this completely new idea... Whoops, it completely fails to work. Eh-heh. More funding please?', precisely, that is not scientific about 'By using known physics and engineering principles, we've miniaturized this hyperdrive to a size suitable for usage on the TIE fighter', exactly?

What I meant was that the Federation would like to research new technologies. Again, this is just a generalization I'm making, and I didn't say it was any better than the Star Wars method.

But yeah, it was poorly thought on my part.

Nevermind it, then.

They constantly try new, edgy, strange phenomenon, which never pan out. To me, this is evidence of shitty researchers: They constantly find something new with potential, but they're completely unable to deliver results, and blow huge amounts of funding on things that don't deliver. Compare this to the Empire, whose researchers consistantly delivered effective weaponry for it's military, and made actual, duplicatable advances(QC armour as stated above). Don't tell me QC armour, so superior to Dura-armour you can fly a fighter coated in it through a bridge tower without a scratch, isn't based on new technologies.

[Castor Troy]

Yeah, you're pretty much right. My generalization was not well thought out. Consider it conceded.

[Ra]

To me, this is evidence of shitty researchers: They constantly find something new with potential, but they're completely unable to deliver results, and blow huge amounts of funding on things that don't deliver.

Of course, Transwarp Drive comes to mind. It would have allowed Trek ships to go much faster, but Starfleet never got it working after Scotty sabotaged the Excelsior. A hundred years later, SF still can't get it to work. What gets me, they didn't test it on some smaller ship before building a big, fucking new starship with the drive? Starfleet wasted all those resources on a new ship, the largest SF ship at the time, and didn't build a fucking prototype drive first?
That's what seemed to happen. Trek researchers. Bah.

[SirNitram]

To me, this is evidence of shitty researchers: They constantly find something new with potential, but they're completely unable to deliver results, and blow huge amounts of funding on things that don't deliver.

Of course, Transwarp Drive comes to mind. It would have allowed Trek ships to go much faster, but Starfleet never got it working after Scotty sabotaged the Excelsior. A hundred years later, SF still can't get it to work. What gets me, they didn't test it on some smaller ship before building a big, fucking new starship with the drive? Starfleet wasted all those resources on a new ship, the largest SF ship at the time, and didn't build a fucking prototype drive first?
That's what seemed to happen. Trek researchers. Bah.

It may be that Transwarp requires such prodigous power that they needed that big ship. But yea, didn't work out. Even when they adapted their drive systems to use Transwarp, we discover their hulls can't take it.. Poor Voyager.

[Bounty]

I think he's referring to the Defiant's pulsed phasers. Trekkies think that they are uberpowerful compared to beam phasers. Don't ask me why.
- Ra

They're not "uber-powerful" by a longshot, but they are an example of of the Feds modifying existing tech for a new purpose.

What gets me, they didn't test it on some smaller ship before building a big, fucking new starship with the drive? Starfleet wasted all those resources on a new ship, the largest SF ship at the time, and didn't build a fucking prototype drive first?
That's what seemed to happen. Trek researchers. Bah.

The Excelsior wasn't an expensive one-off to test the drive, it was a perfectly useable starship that would become the backbone of the fleet for the next century. It wasn't a waste of resources.

[Darth Wong]

I think he's referring to the Defiant's pulsed phasers. Trekkies think that they are uberpowerful compared to beam phasers. Don't ask me why.
- Ra

They're not "uber-powerful" by a longshot, but they are an example of of the Feds modifying existing tech for a new purpose.

There's a huge difference between tweaking an existing technology and coming up with a new technology. The Federation has a pitiful record of coming up with genuinely new technologies; virtually everything they have is based on a handful of innovations dating back to its founding.

[Mobiboros]

I think he's referring to the Defiant's pulsed phasers. Trekkies think that they are uberpowerful compared to beam phasers. Don't ask me why.
- Ra

They're not "uber-powerful" by a longshot, but they are an example of of the Feds modifying existing tech for a new purpose.

Wait. You're telling me that this is "new" technology because the phasers shoot in pulsed shots?

You mean like the ships in ST:II did?

How is this an improvement? It looks like the scientists were just admitting they were wrong and that the beam phasers just didn't work out.

[Vympel]

Why didn't the Sovreign-class have pulse phasers then? To me the beam phasers look like a big waste of time- what with their "run along the track" firing sequence.

[Bounty]

Why didn't the Sovreign-class have pulse phasers then? To me the beam phasers look like a big waste of time- what with their "run along the track" firing sequence.

Pulse phasers have limited off-axis firing capability. Beam phasers have a far larger field of fire, making them more suitable for less-maneuvrable capships.

Wait. You're telling me that this is "new" technology because the phasers shoot in pulsed shots?

It's not new tech, it's exisiting tech used in new ways.

[Karza]

Why didn't the Sovreign-class have pulse phasers then? To me the beam phasers look like a big waste of time- what with their "run along the track" firing sequence.

Pulse phasers have limited off-axis firing capability. Beam phasers have a far larger field of fire, making them more suitable for less-maneuvrable capships.

And mounting said pulse phasers in turrets is out of the question?

Oh, silly me. Of course it is, since turrets sticking out of their hulls would break the "elegant smooth plastic ship" image.

[Stofsk]

And mounting said pulse phasers in turrets is out of the question?

Oh, silly me. Of course it is, since turrets sticking out of their hulls would break the "elegant smooth plastic ship" image.

And make the ship look like a dedicated warship, which would be a bigger no-no.

[General Zod]

And mounting said pulse phasers in turrets is out of the question?

Oh, silly me. Of course it is, since turrets sticking out of their hulls would break the "elegant smooth plastic ship" image.

if they don't provide any type of substantial power boost to traditional phaser strips, why would a capship need pulse phasers at all? especially given their lesser maneuverability to ships like the defiant.

[Karza]

And mounting said pulse phasers in turrets is out of the question?

Oh, silly me. Of course it is, since turrets sticking out of their hulls would break the "elegant smooth plastic ship" image.

if they don't provide any type of substantial power boost to traditional phaser strips, why would a capship need pulse phasers at all? especially given their lesser maneuverability to ships like the defiant.

I assumed that pulse phasers were more powerful. That's the impression I got from DS9 anyway.

[Bounty]

I assumed that pulse phasers were more powerful. That's the impression I got from DS9 anyway.

If they are more powerful-per-second, then it's only barely.

The only real use I see for PPC's is against the Borg; you can alter the frequency of each pulse, rather then wait for a whole array to fire.

[Spanky The Dolphin]

And mounting said pulse phasers in turrets is out of the question?

Oh, silly me. Of course it is, since turrets sticking out of their hulls would break the "elegant smooth plastic ship" image.

And make the ship look like a dedicated warship, which would be a bigger no-no.

The worst thing about that is that Starfleet ships used to actually HAVE phaser turrets...

[Ra]

The Excelsior wasn't an expensive one-off to test the drive, it was a perfectly useable starship that would become the backbone of the fleet for the next century. It wasn't a waste of resources.

I know that. But SF should have tested Transwarp in a smaller vessel before building an entirely new starship for testing it. They were just lucky that the Excelsior was able to become the SF backbone for a century. You don't build a huge new ship to test a dangerous, experimental system for the first time.
Excelsior was testing the Transwarp drive for the first time. No prior experiments to say, "Here. Transwarp works, it's been proven, now, let's equip a new starship with it." Instead, they took this idea straight from the lab and tested it on a new spaceframe, where it failed. Excelsior then had to be refit with traditional warp and given to Sulu.
Starfleet then took the class and began mass-producing Excelsiors because they were a good spaceframe. They got a success out of a miserable failure.
- Ra

[Mobiboros]

It's not new tech, it's exisiting tech used in new ways.

Ways that were used in Kirks time? We clearly see the Enterprise A, using pulsed phasers in Star Trek II. How are the PPC's on the Defiant a new use of technology when the technology and the use were around long before the ship was even conceived of and just fell out of use?

[Bounty]

Ways that were used in Kirks time? We clearly see the Enterprise A, using pulsed phasers in Star Trek II. How are the PPC's on the Defiant a new use of technology when the technology and the use were around long before the ship was even conceived of and just fell out of use?

Phaser beam with little lightpulses in the beam != pulse phaser

TMP era phasers were still beam weapons, not pulse weapons.

[Mobiboros]

Phaser beam with little lightpulses in the beam != pulse phaser

TMP era phasers were still beam weapons, not pulse weapons.

They didn't seem like "Little lightpulses". Perhaps someone could post screen captures of Star Trek 2 ship phasers firing, but it just appeared to be a very high rate of pulse fire.

How are "Pulse Phasers" on the Defiant different from the "Phasers firing in pulses" on the Enterprise A?

[Lancer]

Phasers in the TOS era were pulsed beams simply because they couldn't sustain continuous fire.

In TNG, they overcame that issue with phaser arrays, which allowed for continuous beams.

The Defiant's pulse phaser cannons, on the other hand, are able to compress the same output of a TNG phaser array into compressed bursts.

a rather crude comparison:
TOS and TMP-era:


TNG-era:


Defiant PPCs:

[Bounty]

Phaser beam with little lightpulses in the beam != pulse phaser

TMP era phasers were still beam weapons, not pulse weapons.

They didn't seem like "Little lightpulses". Perhaps someone could post screen captures of Star Trek 2 ship phasers firing, but it just appeared to be a very high rate of pulse fire.

How are "Pulse Phasers" on the Defiant different from the "Phasers firing in pulses" on the Enterprise A?

First of all, it's not the E-A in Star Trek II. In fact, we never even see the A fire it's phasers.

Defiant PPC
Constitution phaser beam

See the difference ?

[Batman]

I know that. But SF should have tested Transwarp in a smaller vessel before building an entirely new starship for testing it.

Who said they built the Excelsior for that? For all we know, the Excelsior was intended to be simply the successor and/or a larger contemporary to the Constitution, and when it was near completion, Starfleet Engineering Department said' Uh-guys-we have this really nifty Transwarp thing which is much, much faster than Warp. It's just that erm- we need a huge-ass ship to test it. Got any ideas?' and the decided to modify NCC-2000 and redesignate her.

They were just lucky that the Excelsior was able to become the SF backbone for a century.

Or maybe that was the intent of the program all along and they just managed to get Transwarp available (or so they thought) in time to equip Excelsior with it.

You don't build a huge new ship to test a dangerous, experimental system for the first time.

Not only do we not know they did this in the first place but how do you know you CAN test Transwarp on a smaller ship?

Excelsior was testing the Transwarp drive for the first time. No prior experiments to say, "Here. Transwarp works, it's been proven, now, let's equip a new starship with it."

Which might have been the smallest spaceframe they could test it on in the first place.

Instead, they took this idea straight from the lab and tested it on a new spaceframe,

which is the only way to test it in the first place. How do you know anything smaller would have worked?

where it failed.

Golly. The first ever live test of a new drive system failing.

Excelsior then had to be refit with traditional warp and given to Sulu.

No indication in ST III that NX-2000 didn't already have conventional Warp drive..

Starfleet then took the class and began mass-producing Excelsiors because they were a good spaceframe.

Or they began it because it was a good spaceframe to begin with, and only added Transwarp to Excelsior because she was
a) available, and/or
b) the only available ship that could take it in the first place.

They got a success out of a miserable failure.

Or they got a completely unusual failure out of a successful design.

[Darth Wong]

I assumed that pulse phasers were more powerful. That's the impression I got from DS9 anyway.

It's a reasonable inference given the fact that Defiant's weapons fire is horribly inaccurate (it typically takes them several shots to find the range on a fucking 100 metre long target) yet it is still combat-effective. Nevertheless, there is no clear proof of this.

[aerius]

Star Trek weapons R&D is basically R&D run by marketing fucknuts. It's new, it's cool, it has pretty colours and shit, and it's got 101 functions that we haven't found any uses for yet. Come to think of it, it resembles Microsoft as well, OMG, it's got fucking animated windows and a dancing fucking paperclip. Once in a while they accidentally come up with something good.

Star Wars weapons R&D is focused on finding better ways to kill people and blow shit up. Give them a need for improved weapons and they come up with some scary stuff that takes killing to a new level.

[Junghalli]

And mounting said pulse phasers in turrets is out of the question?

Phaser strips are still better than turrets in terms of being able to fire in all directions, because a turret needs to be physically turned and a phaser strip doesn't. Really, it makes sense for big slow cruisers to mount phaser strips.

Oh, silly me. Of course it is, since turrets sticking out of their hulls would break the "elegant smooth plastic ship" image.

Starfleet seems to design their ships the same way commercial car companies design cars: they value the sizzle over the steak. I'll take the Empire; I'd sooner not have to bite into that fat and gristle.