Sovereign Torpedo capacity

[Alyeska]

Ok, I want a semi consensus here. How many PTs and how many QTs does the Sovereign class carry? We know the Enterprise-D as a non War GCS carried a standard compliment of 275 PTs. We also know that the Defiant carries more then 100 QTs. Now, general consensus accepts the Akira at 2,000+ torpedoes for its launchers given its warship status.

Well the Sovereign is definately designed for war, but its not ALL war designed. So, how many torpedoes does it really carry? I am going to go out on a limb here. I would say it carries easily more then 250 QTs and at least 1,000 PTs. Is that a reasonable assumption given known figures for other ships?

[Ender]

The Neutral Zone Ship Database used to have a listing of 250 PTs and 250 QTs. They did take those numbers and their dataentry down in favor of a scan from a book though (oddly the Sovie was the only one to get this treatment, other ships have both)

Anyways, that is the number I usually use.

[Alyeska]

Given the combat capability of the Sovereign being significantly MORE then the Galaxy and the Enterprise-D having carried 275 torpedoes while the much smaller Defiant carried more then 100 Quantums... I think that is an absurdly low torpedo count.

[Alyeska]

Ok, I scoured Nemesis for all the torpedoes that we see fired. I counted 24 Photon Torpedoes and 9 Quantum Torpedoes. Now, you can get a different idea as to a torpedo count through observing the rocking of the Scimitar. Each tripple shot salvo from the QT turret caused the Scimitar to rock. The Scimitar was observed to rock as if under QT impact twice more while the QT turret was in LOS. That bumps the number of QTs fired up to 15. When the Enterprise passed the Scimitar it continued to fire from its rear launchers. The Scimitar is observed to have three more rocking events. Given the Enterprise's love of firing in three shot torpedo bursts, this would increase the PT count up to 33.

I am going to do something slightly different now. I am going to go through the battle footage and determine the points in which the Enterprise was in combat with the Scimitar minus the known torpedo incidents as well as periods in which we know that no torpedoes were fired. I will then take the time frame of the known torpedo incidents, figure out how many torpedoes were fired per second, and apply that to the other footage we can assume the Enterprise was combating the Scimitar.

Something interesting I have learned from Nemesis. Both the Quantum Torpedo and Photon Torpedo launchers behaved similarly. We know in the past the Quantum Torpedo turret can fire up to four torpedoes. In Nemesis we see it firing in three shot bursts but with a fast refire. I am going to assume that the Photon torpedo tubes are similar. It would seem that the Enterprise can maintain a higher overall refire rate if it fires fewer torpedoes. That said, here is the refire rate. The Enterprise can fire a tripple shot burst in a single second, three seconds after the last torpedo has launched the Enterprise can again launch a three second burst. The reload time on the launchers is three seconds for the three torpedoes. The Enterprise can maintain this fire rate if it so wishes. In Nemesis it did not do so all the time because it had to conserve its torpedoes for use against the Scimitar.

[Alyeska]

Visual combat in which weapons fire occurred listed in seconds
11
8
9
5
7
7
7
32
Total of 86 seconds
In these 86 seconds 33 Photon Torpedoes and 15 Quantum Torpedoes were fired. The Quantum Torpedoes were fired in a span of 18 seconds. The Photon Torpedoes were fired in a span of 86 seconds. In known combat time the Enterprise averaged .38 torpedoes per second. Note, this counts all visual combat time as well as observed events on the Scimitar. It is assumed that the sampling of combat time of the Enterprise in these events is a fair sampling of the entire battle.

Total time the Enterprise was in direct combat with the Scimitar. These times exclude the exchange between Picard and Schinzon and Picard-Denatra. These times also exclude the time in which Deana finds the Scimitar.

Time segments in which the Enterprise is in combat all together listed in seconds
120
189
195
Total of 504 seconds.
The Enterprise was in battle with the Scimitar for approximately 504 seconds. In this time the Enterprise both fired at and received fire from the Scimitar. The battle ends when the Scimitar blows out the bridge of the Enterprise because shortly before that it ran out of torpedoes. Multiplying by the ratio previously shown the Enterprise fired a minimum of 191 photon torpedoes and 15 quantum torpedoes. Taking into account that there are periods in the battle in which very little information can be gathered I conclude that this figure is a very low-end figure.

A medium range figure would be assuming the Enterprise has an equal number of photon torpedoes as the Galaxy class. This would mean at points in the battle in which we could not see the Enterprise fired torpedoes either trying to find the Scimitar or when it had locks that we didn’t know about. Given the already established refire rates of the torpedo launchers it is not unreasonable to assume that the Enterprise was firing at higher rates at times that we did not always see. Couple this with blind firing by the Enterprise to find the Scimitar and you can see where all the torpedoes went.

Now, how many Quantum Torpedoes does the Enterprise have? I believe it has at least as many as the Defiant if not a few more. That puts it up to 150 Quantum Torpedoes. Where did all these go? Its possible the Enterprise was blind firing these at times we didn’t see as well as using them to assault the Scimitar when we weren’t looking (IE, the boarding party).

There is one ultimate conclusion though. The Scimitar is capable of taking far more pounding then previously accepted. There is a span of 195 seconds in which the Scimitar is fully visible for the Enterprise to fire on before it ran out of Torpedoes. The Enterprise likely fired just about everything it had in this span and its possible this single point is where the vast majority of the Enterprise torpedo usage came from.

[Howedar]

I'm going to pull something out of my ass, so watch out, it might smell a bit.

I like 250QT, 500PT

[Alyeska]

I'm going to pull something out of my ass, so watch out, it might smell a bit.

I like 250QT, 500PT

Using what we have observed 500 PT and 250 QT is possible, but that means the Scimitar was taking a REAL pounding when we weren't looking. Then again its possible the Enterprise-E wasn't at fully torpedo stocks. In that case its possible they had 150 torpedoes or less.

[Chris OFarrell]

I would like to say there is a good chance the ship was not at full torpedo stocks. I was watching the DS9 episode when that changeling tried to start a war between the UFP and one of its neighbours by taking the Defiant. In it, Sisko explicitly orders O'Brien to load up a full complement of photon torpedoes. I think its possible that when not at war, UFP ships don't generaly carry full weapons loadouts unless they are expecting to go into combat. The E-E of course was only goign to Betazed on a diplomatic mission and didn't have time to resupply.

[Vympel]

Does it cost them anything to not have a full torpedo loadout capacity?

Perhaps the Defiant had been on exercises before- perhaps the same is true of the Enterprise-E.

If they conduct exercises ...

[Atavarius]

How accurate is the DITL analysis of the Sovereign class redesign for Nemesis? I say this because i think the best way to analyze torpedo count would be by examining distribution among the tubes. I can count 7 tubes (Plus the QT turret) JUST from the pictures. Using the 500 PT count, thats 71 per tube, which does not seem unreasonable. Although, i would make some allowances for the forward firing tubes, perhaps upping their count to 100 to 150. Also upping the rear tubes a bit, because 71 just does not seem to be a good numer to me. So by the pictures alone (again i do not know how accurate they are, so please correct me if applicable) if the Sovy has only those tubes my numbers are this:

Forward Facing Ventral Tubes: 150 per tube
Aft Ventral Tubes: 100 per tube
Aft Dorsal Tube (Above Shuttle Bay): 100
Aft Dorsal Tubes (on the end of the saucer platform): 100 per tube

With these figures that would be 800 PT. Anyway, this is just some observations general assumptions that i think fit. Discuss, critique, bash, flame all ya want.

[Alyeska]

The observed launchers on the Sovereign MK-2 is 7 Photon Torpedo launchers and 1 Quantum Torpedo launcher.

Here they are.

Forward launchers
http://www.ditl.org/gpns/GSovereignPhotons1.jpg

Aft bottom launchers
http://www.ditl.org/gpns/GSovereignPhotons2.jpg

Aft shuttlebay launchers
http://www.ditl.org/gpns/GSovereignPhotons7.jpg

Now, there is an additional schematic image that indicates 3-6 more launchers.

http://www.ditl.org/gpns/GSovereignPhotons8.jpg

One problem. I can confirm the forward most indicated launcher is not on the model and I can not confirm the existence of the other two. Daystrom lists 10 launchers thanks to this schematic. However, since I can confidently say that one of them is not on the model, none of them are. That gives us 7 torpedo launchers.

As to torpedo counts per tube. Doesn't really work that way. Indications from Trek show that there is a conveyour system of some sort that can take the torpedoes from one launcher to another. Depending on the battle the tactical officer could probably indicate which torpedo launchers should have the largest stocks.

[Atavarius]

As to torpedo counts per tube. Doesn't really work that way. Indications from Trek show that there is a conveyour system of some sort that can take the torpedoes from one launcher to another. Depending on the battle the tactical officer could probably indicate which torpedo launchers should have the largest stocks.

I had always figured they would adopt the Defiant's quick change magazine principle.

[Rhadamanthus]

Multiplying by the ratio previously shown the Enterprise fired a minimum of 191 photon torpedoes and 15 quantum torpedoes. Taking into account that there are periods in the battle in which very little information can be gathered I conclude that this figure is a very low-end figure.

I'd say its a reasonable figure, since theres no reason to assume that the Enterprise would have been firing more intensely in the scenes when we don't see the combat, we certainly don't hear about or see any evidence of any sudden failure in Shinzon's cloak or something that would give the Big E a better target.

Which begs the question of why the largest and most advanced ship in the fleet has a torpedo complement much lower than that of its predecessor ships.

[Alyeska]

Multiplying by the ratio previously shown the Enterprise fired a minimum of 191 photon torpedoes and 15 quantum torpedoes. Taking into account that there are periods in the battle in which very little information can be gathered I conclude that this figure is a very low-end figure.

I'd say its a reasonable figure, since theres no reason to assume that the Enterprise would have been firing more intensely in the scenes when we don't see the combat, we certainly don't hear about or see any evidence of any sudden failure in Shinzon's cloak or something that would give the Big E a better target.

Which begs the question of why the largest and most advanced ship in the fleet has a torpedo complement much lower than that of its predecessor ships.

Actualy we DO hear of the Scimitars cloak failure. The first nine Quantum Torpedoes fired by the Enterprise knocked out the Scimitars cloak. After this point there was 160 seconds time in which the Scimitar had no cloak and the Enterprise still had torpedoes to fire. So we have every indication that there were higher rates of fire at points we don't see.

[Rhadamanthus]

Actualy we DO hear of the Scimitars cloak failure. The first nine Quantum Torpedoes fired by the Enterprise knocked out the Scimitars cloak. After this point there was 160 seconds time in which the Scimitar had no cloak and the Enterprise still had torpedoes to fire. So we have every indication that there were higher rates of fire at points we don't see.

How much of that time was offscreen, and what was the ratio during what we did see?

[seanrobertson]

Ok, I want a semi consensus here. How many PTs and how many QTs does the Sovereign class carry? We know the Enterprise-D as a non War GCS carried a standard compliment of 275 PTs. We also know that the Defiant carries more then 100 QTs. Now, general consensus accepts the Akira at 2,000+ torpedoes for its launchers given its warship status.

The 2,000 torpedoes thing seems extraneous to me. An Akira is far smaller than a GCS, yet it carries almost 8 times the number of torpedoes?

Mind you, I'm skeptical of the whole Akira/15 launchers thing. I know many if not all of them have been IDed on the CGI model, but for some reason or another, they don't seem to be capable of dishing out quite that much punishment.

I know, I know "First Contact" might not've been the best time for the Thunderchild to showcase such heavy torpedo firepower, as she could've depleted her torpedo inventory or have taken damage to some of her launchers.

But what about "Message in a Bottle"? The Akira there didn't spew torpedoes all over the place. With even 5 fwd. launchers, it should've been unleashing holy hell on those Warbirds. Against that kind of foe, the Tal'Shiar should've gone all out to KO it, which they really didn't, splitting their fire between her, the Ds, and the Prometheus.

Also, a nitpick: I'm pretty sure that "Conundrum" established 250 photorps, not the 275 as in the script. Maybe a writer had actually read the _TNG TM_ and decided to lower that number, figuring that some of the casings should've been pre-loaded with dinky probes and the like.

Well the Sovereign is definately designed for war, but its not ALL war designed. So, how many torpedoes does it really carry? I am going to go out on a limb here. I would say it carries easily more then 250 QTs and at least 1,000 PTs. Is that a reasonable assumption given known figures for other ships?

I respect going out on a limb

You've got a point in that tiny Defiant managed to probably carry 100 quantums or more. We don't know exactly how many she had, or if they're necessarily the same type as those on the Sovereign as noted previously in the thread.

However, it'd seem likely that the E-E could carry more by virtue of sheer size. Defiant WAS a dedicated warship and probably DID devote a tremendous amount of internal volume to weapons, but in the end, the ship was still VERY small at ~120m in length.

Does that mean the E-E necessarily carries more? Not really, but they were used exclusively in "First Contact," even against Cochrane's shit-kicking ship. Seems rather wasteful to me if you weren't carrying a very large inventory of quantums.

Also, if "Nemesis" is any indication, the E-E carries more photons than it does quantums. So you're probably looking at well over 200 torpedoes total.

How to go from there, I dunno. Are there any Okudagrams that might depict the thing's torpedo bay?

One thing to keep in mind is that the SCS, while somewhat more militarized than the GCS, is also a lot smaller. It might not be easy for her to carry several times the GCS's full loadout. I could see 1.5x more torps, or something like that.

Maybe ~400 total? I dunno. I'm not comfortable with much beyond that, but that's purely subjective.

[Sea Skimmer]

Using what we have observed 500 PT and 250 QT is possible, but that means the Scimitar was taking a REAL pounding when we weren't looking. Then again its possible the Enterprise-E wasn't at fully torpedo stocks. In that case its possible they had 150 torpedoes or less.

Or just most torpedoes where missing. The only ones we saw his was the quantum salvo via mind reading as I recall. As the Enterprise was weakened they may have resorted to firing them blindly as well.

I suspect the major limiter on torpedoes is the need to store all the anti matter for them, and have a method for moving it to and loading the torpedoes before firing. The casings really don't take up that much space.

[Alyeska]

Actualy we DO hear of the Scimitars cloak failure. The first nine Quantum Torpedoes fired by the Enterprise knocked out the Scimitars cloak. After this point there was 160 seconds time in which the Scimitar had no cloak and the Enterprise still had torpedoes to fire. So we have every indication that there were higher rates of fire at points we don't see.

How much of that time was offscreen, and what was the ratio during what we did see?

If you bothered to read what I posted earlier I already answered that.

[Alyeska]

Using what we have observed 500 PT and 250 QT is possible, but that means the Scimitar was taking a REAL pounding when we weren't looking. Then again its possible the Enterprise-E wasn't at fully torpedo stocks. In that case its possible they had 150 torpedoes or less.

Or just most torpedoes where missing. The only ones we saw his was the quantum salvo via mind reading as I recall. As the Enterprise was weakened they may have resorted to firing them blindly as well.

I suspect the major limiter on torpedoes is the need to store all the anti matter for them, and have a method for moving it to and loading the torpedoes before firing. The casings really don't take up that much space.

Incorrect. We saw 24 torpedoes fired and 18 hit. Using further information sources we can conclude 33 torpedoes fired with 27 hits.

[Alyeska]

The 2,000 torpedoes thing seems extraneous to me. An Akira is far smaller than a GCS, yet it carries almost 8 times the number of torpedoes?

Mind you, I'm skeptical of the whole Akira/15 launchers thing. I know many if not all of them have been IDed on the CGI model, but for some reason or another, they don't seem to be capable of dishing out quite that much punishment.

The 15 launchers are established fact. I have found every single one of them on the model.

I know, I know "First Contact" might not've been the best time for the Thunderchild to showcase such heavy torpedo firepower, as she could've depleted her torpedo inventory or have taken damage to some of her launchers.

Indeed. She had been fighting for at least three hours.

But what about "Message in a Bottle"? The Akira there didn't spew torpedoes all over the place. With even 5 fwd. launchers, it should've been unleashing holy hell on those Warbirds. Against that kind of foe, the Tal'Shiar should've gone all out to KO it, which they really didn't, splitting their fire between her, the Ds, and the Prometheus.

Actualy it has 11 forward launchers. One must ask why the Warbirds were only firing pulses and the Defiants only firing phasers and the Nebula only firing phasers... Seems the Prometheus fired the only torpedo.

Also, a nitpick: I'm pretty sure that "Conundrum" established 250 photorps, not the 275 as in the script. Maybe a writer had actually read the _TNG TM_ and decided to lower that number, figuring that some of the casings should've been pre-loaded with dinky probes and the like.

I remember 275 being stated in another episode IIRC.

I respect going out on a limb

You've got a point in that tiny Defiant managed to probably carry 100 quantums or more. We don't know exactly how many she had, or if they're necessarily the same type as those on the Sovereign as noted previously in the thread.

However, it'd seem likely that the E-E could carry more by virtue of sheer size. Defiant WAS a dedicated warship and probably DID devote a tremendous amount of internal volume to weapons, but in the end, the ship was still VERY small at ~120m in length.

Does that mean the E-E necessarily carries more? Not really, but they were used exclusively in "First Contact," even against Cochrane's shit-kicking ship. Seems rather wasteful to me if you weren't carrying a very large inventory of quantums.

Also, if "Nemesis" is any indication, the E-E carries more photons than it does quantums. So you're probably looking at well over 200 torpedoes total.

How to go from there, I dunno. Are there any Okudagrams that might depict the thing's torpedo bay?

One thing to keep in mind is that the SCS, while somewhat more militarized than the GCS, is also a lot smaller. It might not be easy for her to carry several times the GCS's full loadout. I could see 1.5x more torps, or something like that.

Maybe ~400 total? I dunno. I'm not comfortable with much beyond that, but that's purely subjective.

Strictly speaking torpedo storage is dead easy. The Akira can hold that many in something the size of two basketball courts. The Sovereign is very clearly designed for war first over the Galaxy class and has MANY more launchers then the Galaxy. Given all that we know, I would expect a bare minimum of twice the number of Photon Torpedoes. As for Quantums, I would also expect twice that of a Defiant class.

[Towlie]

Now, general consensus accepts the Akira at 2,000+ torpedoes for its launchers given its warship status.

Woah, woah. Hold it right there. "General consensus" is worth shit. Take a look at these articles:
http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/artic ... a-size.htm
"The Akira class has countless windows - probably too many for an alleged warship - that allow an easy distinction of decks."
http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/schem ... ships1.htm
"The Akira class has never been shown in its presumed role as a carrier, and fighters of the supposed Peregrine class wouldn't fit through the doors. The ship is also supposed to have 15 torpedo launchers, as stated by Alex Jaeger in Star Trek: The Magazine. Since these would be many more than on any other Federation ship and is not supported by visual evidence anyway, I assume that the ship has a more reasonable number of launchers."

The Akira's warship role is conjecture. Also, you speculate 1000+ torpedoes. You're pulling figures out of your ass.

Intrepid class ships carry only 32 torps when going into battle!
When have we ever seen more than 275 torps being carried on a Federation [war ready Galaxy-class, no less] starship? And now you're giving the far smaller Sovereign-class 1250+? Christ, even Graham Kennedy gives it only 350 for the refit!

You're building a whole argument on logical fallacies. Well, the Akira MIGHT be a warship so it MIGHT have thousands of torpedoes (defying everything else we know) and the Sovvie is PROBABLY a dedicated warship so it MIGHT have a shitload of torpedoes.

[Darth Wong]

Ok, I want a semi consensus here. How many PTs and how many QTs does the Sovereign class carry? We know the Enterprise-D as a non War GCS carried a standard compliment of 275 PTs. We also know that the Defiant carries more then 100 QTs. Now, general consensus accepts the Akira at 2,000+ torpedoes for its launchers given its warship status.

Well the Sovereign is definately designed for war, but its not ALL war designed. So, how many torpedoes does it really carry? I am going to go out on a limb here. I would say it carries easily more then 250 QTs and at least 1,000 PTs. Is that a reasonable assumption given known figures for other ships?

A few questions:

1. How do you know the Defiant carries 100 QTs? I'm assuming you're basing this on some episode that I missed or forgot.
2. What is this "general consensus" about the Akira having 2000 torpedoes? The fact that it has a lot of launchers is presumed to mean it has an order of magnitude more torpedoes?
3. Why are we assuming that all Q-torps are the same size? Couldn't it be that the Sovereign to carry a relatively small number of large high-yield torpedoes as compared to the torps carried by the diminutive Defiant? After all, we already know there are different sizes of photorps (see the little ones fired from runabouts).
4. Why does the phrase "built for war" automatically mean "huge torpedo inventory?" Couldn't it mean that it has better shields, better armour, more system redundancy, more powerful reactors, etc., all of which would take up internal space?

[Towlie]

Also note that not all Starfleet torpedo launchers are built equal. Some on older ships seem only to fire one torp at a time [hence the double-launchers on Constitution and Miranda class ships]. Others can fire bursts of 3 or 4. The Galaxy can fire 10. What makes you think all the launchers on an Akira [which has a pre-Galaxy class registry and is smaller than a Galaxy] has the huge-burst torp launchers? What makes it necessary or natural for an Akira to carry so many speculated torpedoes? The Akira's tubes may be inferior, necessatiting multiple tubes in order to match the firepower of larger starships.

[Alyeska]

A few questions:

1. How do you know the Defiant carries 100 QTs? I'm assuming you're basing this on some episode that I missed or forgot.

I recall an episode in which they were down to ~100 torpedoes. I need to find that again.

[*]What is this "general consensus" about the Akira having 2000 torpedoes? The fact that it has a lot of launchers is presumed to mean it has an order of magnitude more torpedoes?

Because it has a lot of launchers and only THREE phaser arrays. It must rely on its torpedoes.

[*]Why are we assuming that all Q-torps are the same size? Couldn't it be that the Sovereign to carry a relatively small number of large high-yield torpedoes as compared to the torps carried by the diminutive Defiant? After all, we already know there are different sizes of photorps (see the little ones fired from runabouts).

We got a good look at them in a DS9 episode. Very similar to PTs.

[*]Why does the phrase "built for war" automatically mean "huge torpedo inventory?" Couldn't it mean that it has better shields, better armour, more system redundancy, more powerful reactors, etc., all of which would take up internal space?[/list]

If you read further you will note I dropped the torpedo count. I also calculated the Enterprise had far fewer torpedoes then it should have. Fewer then even the original flight Galaxy class.

[Ender]

The Akira has 6 phaser arrays, not 3