photon torpedo vs Quantum torpedo
- Thread starter cwl
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One isn't necessarily "best" of the two; they could be different and used for different purposes, or each could have various strengths and weaknesses.
However, the DS9 TM suggests the quantum torpedo is a follow-on weapon to the photon torpedo, detonating a modified photon torpedo warhead as the first stage of a two-stage device with an overall higher yield than the photon torpedo.
You don't see many because, again according to the DS9 TM, their production consumes more resources and thus only a limited number are available. Presumably this state of affairs will continue for a good while, and it may be many years before quantum torpedoes become ubiquitous (if that ever takes place).
However, the DS9 TM suggests the quantum torpedo is a follow-on weapon to the photon torpedo, detonating a modified photon torpedo warhead as the first stage of a two-stage device with an overall higher yield than the photon torpedo.
You don't see many because, again according to the DS9 TM, their production consumes more resources and thus only a limited number are available. Presumably this state of affairs will continue for a good while, and it may be many years before quantum torpedoes become ubiquitous (if that ever takes place).
Okay...
First answer... they were invented to be the "next generation of weapons" which would be better than photon torpedos. That is, they were invented by the writers and producers and so forth to be that.
So there's no question that they're "better," because they were intended to be.
Now, "in-universe?" That's a little harder to answer, but not completely illogical.
It's established that in the Trek world, much like in the real world (which makes sense, really), you get a better energy yield from a matter/antimatter reaction than from a nuclear reaction. This is only reasonable, since m/am can, if handled properly, result in 100% conversion of mass to energy (by E=mc2), where nuclear reactions produce much less total conversion.
Now... is there anything that can produce more energy than a matter/antimatter reaction? Well... yeah, in theory. It's called "zero-point energy" and it's entirely hypothetical, but the idea is that you can tap into some sort of "universal etheric energy field" and thus have literally unlimited energy.
SO... a photon torpedo is far more powerful than a nuclear-tipped missile, because it's able to produce more energy. But, a "quantum" (read "zero point") torpedo is able to produce even more... for as long as it remains intact, it can tap into this unlimited universal energy field. Just a burst... but a big, big burst.
Now, is there any such thing as the "zero point energy field?" Nobody REALLY knows, but there are some physicists who think so.
That starfleet still uses photon torpedoes suggests quantum torpedoes are designed for a secondary purpose that doesn't entirely supercede photons. My guess is that they're optimized for use against people like the Dominion and the Borg who use some remarkably robust space craft that absorb punishment without employing alot of shielding. In other words "Lots of armor, little defenses." With the possible exception of the Klingons, Starfleet's never had to contend with an opponent like that, though even the Klingons seem to employ the usual alpha-quadrant scheme using shields as first line of defense and armor only as a last resort. In fact, I'd be willing to bet that quantum torpedoes are intended as the counter-weapon to ablative armor, which in and of itself may be a Jem'hadar innovation copied by Starfleet.
In this sense, quantum torpedoes probably do alot of soft damage (systems, sensors, computers, engines, etc) to their targets without creating alot of overt structural damage. For someone like the Borg or the Jem'hadar this can cripple or destroy the ship just as badly, while against a ship like the Scimitar it disables their cloak and screws with internal systems pretty badly. This would be a difference between, say, a shaped-charge warhead and a thermobaric explosive; one is designed to shred heavily armored vehicles like tanks and bunkers, the other creates a huge pressure wave that can demolish softer structures like houses, cars, knock people on their asses or shatter bones, etc. Photon torpedoes appear to be the latter, while quantum torpedoes are almost certainly the former.
In this sense, quantum torpedoes probably do alot of soft damage (systems, sensors, computers, engines, etc) to their targets without creating alot of overt structural damage. For someone like the Borg or the Jem'hadar this can cripple or destroy the ship just as badly, while against a ship like the Scimitar it disables their cloak and screws with internal systems pretty badly. This would be a difference between, say, a shaped-charge warhead and a thermobaric explosive; one is designed to shred heavily armored vehicles like tanks and bunkers, the other creates a huge pressure wave that can demolish softer structures like houses, cars, knock people on their asses or shatter bones, etc. Photon torpedoes appear to be the latter, while quantum torpedoes are almost certainly the former.
Not necessarily...
Another argument, and the one I subscribe to, is that you don't immediately scrap out your existing equipment base the instant a new technology arrives. If you were to move ahead to perhaps 40 years into the TNG-era "future," you'd see all the photorps phased out.
But in the meantime, quantorps are (1) costlier to acquire (I don't buy the "push a button and you make anything you want" argument... that's a McGuffin that latter-day Trek used sometimes, but most of the time, it was made clear that replicators had major limitations), and (2) require a significantly different infrastructure to install.
Think aerospace weapons. Just because the AAMRAM is a superior A-A weapon doesn't mean that the Sidewinder has been totally phased out, does it? Sidewinders are lighter, cheaper, and work just fine in close dogfighting... not so good in "whoever shoots first lives" scenarios, though.
So the photorp is the "bread and butter" weapon. Quantorps are the "elite" weapon, used only when the more common photorps just can't do the job.
That's how I see it.
Hopefully this isn't too off topic, but in Nemesis, the Ent-E fired all it's Photons, but it only fired a small number of Quantum, and that was near the end of the dog fighting. But shouldn't the Enterprise still have a lot of Quantorp's left?
It could done a number on the shields of the Scimitar, since I don't believe the launcher was damaged pre-ram and post-ram. Just tip of the saucer was damaged unless they decided to add the Quantorp controls in that part of the ship? O.o
It could done a number on the shields of the Scimitar, since I don't believe the launcher was damaged pre-ram and post-ram. Just tip of the saucer was damaged unless they decided to add the Quantorp controls in that part of the ship? O.o
Know your P's and Q's.
Photon:
http://lcars24.com/schem32.html
Quantum:
http://lcars24.com/schem30.html
Photon:
http://lcars24.com/schem32.html
Quantum:
http://lcars24.com/schem30.html
That's what I've always thought. That and using quantum torpedoes all the time might be overkill, like using nuclear warheads in field artillery.
Depends on how many it was issued with. Given that they are a limited resource, they'd probably only be issued to ships on an 'as needed' basis. Depending on the ENT-E's mission she might have a full load, only a few, or non at all.
^I thought Data noted that they had exhausted their complement of torpedoes rather than specifying which kind. I think they were all gone. The Badger is right that they probably only had a limited supply of the quantum torpedoes to begin with.
It looks like Enterprise-E had her q-torps equipped so as to fire through the launcher next to (RIGHT NEXT TO) the captain's yacht. Some have concluded that this means it can only fire q-torps, but that seems silly to me, and I've never believed that q-torps weren't in a casing that would make them compatible with the vast majority of existing launcher hardware just as probes are. They probably just put their best ordnance in the most capable launcher. At the rate we have seen that thing fire in the past, I'm not surprised it rapidly burned through all their available torpedoes...for all the good they did against Scimitar.
I'd figure Enterprise-E probably carries something like two hundred torpedoes, so that's a lot of boom. Either they missed with an awful lot of those torpedoes due to Scimitar's cloak and maneuvering, or they sure know how to build shields in the Romulan Star Empire. (Or both.)
It looks like Enterprise-E had her q-torps equipped so as to fire through the launcher next to (RIGHT NEXT TO) the captain's yacht. Some have concluded that this means it can only fire q-torps, but that seems silly to me, and I've never believed that q-torps weren't in a casing that would make them compatible with the vast majority of existing launcher hardware just as probes are. They probably just put their best ordnance in the most capable launcher. At the rate we have seen that thing fire in the past, I'm not surprised it rapidly burned through all their available torpedoes...for all the good they did against Scimitar.
I'd figure Enterprise-E probably carries something like two hundred torpedoes, so that's a lot of boom. Either they missed with an awful lot of those torpedoes due to Scimitar's cloak and maneuvering, or they sure know how to build shields in the Romulan Star Empire. (Or both.)
plot device
I'll buy the expense argument (maybe) but not the infrastructure. Only the E-D has separate launchers for quantum torpedoes, though in this case it's not clear she was intended to have separate launchers anyway. Defiant was originally armed with photon torpedoes, until the quantum's made their first appearance during Tom Riker's sortie into Cardassian space. Likewise, we see in "The Valiant" that they appear to have the same casings as photon torpedoes, so I doubt they even require a different type of launcher than photons.
Doesn't that support my point? We still use Sidewinders because of the need for a close-range heat seeking missile that can't be jammed; basically it's a dogfighter's missile to the AMRAAM's super-modern BVR.
Hence my thought that quantums might not actually BE better than photons, they might just have a very different use. That the E-E is equipped with BOTH is evidence enough of this; if quantums were of the do-all variety enough to replace photon torpedoes, they wouldn't have bothered to equip the more conventional weapons on the Enterprise.
Exactly what I said above. Except that I think quantum torpedoes are much more specialized than that: not more powerful per se, but more effective in (in some cases) far more important ways. Since the TNG-universe doesn't seem to leave any room for consideration as far as accuracy or firing rate, that only leaves the effect of the weapon, which--as we have seen--is extremely debilitating but not always destructive.
We only see Enterprise fire maybe a half dozen of them in the entire battle. The only way this could possibly make sense is if a single quantum torpedo has enough punch to take down an entire ship or planet or installation or what have you; in other words, if they were actually analogous to nuclear warheads. They're clearly not, Scimitar shrugs off an entire salvo and stays in the fight, and the way they're used in DS9 contradicts this entirely. Maybe they were intended to be when they were first conceived, but somebody (either writers or VFX guys) totally dropped the ball.
So now quantum torpedoes go the way of the Worfzooka: they are fancier than photon torpedoes and somehow "better" in ways that are less than obvious. I'd be happier if they were basically non-creative genesis devices that simply de-organized their targets into expanding clouds of atoms (use a visual effect similar to V'ger's glowpedo) but that would have circumvented the need for fancy treknobabble to save the day wouldn't it?
Personally, I think photon torpedoes will remain a mainstay weapon of Starfleet even if R&D develops something that will eventually replace quantum torpedoes.
Limited ammo supply.
Let's think about something though as far as Quantum torpedoes are concerned ...
By the time Nemesis events came about, the quantums were already in use for about 8 years.
That's almost a decade and you're telling me that in the Nemesis era they would still have issues with mass producing quantums?
Give me a break.
By the time Nemesis events came about, the quantums were already in use for about 8 years.
That's almost a decade and you're telling me that in the Nemesis era they would still have issues with mass producing quantums?
Give me a break.
If it requires rare materials, ones that cannot be easily replicated (and we know they exist in the Trek universe), then there will be limits as to how many can be produced.
Or if specialist equipment is needed. Converting a photon torpedo production line into one for quantum torpedoes might require a great deal of time and effort.
And it makes military sense to stockpile the newer, more effective weapon for when it is needed. If a situation developed, another Borg attack for example, it would be useful to have the quantorps where the fleet could get at them. Having them all on ships at the edges of the Federation might mean they couldn't get to the crises zone in time.
Or if specialist equipment is needed. Converting a photon torpedo production line into one for quantum torpedoes might require a great deal of time and effort.
And it makes military sense to stockpile the newer, more effective weapon for when it is needed. If a situation developed, another Borg attack for example, it would be useful to have the quantorps where the fleet could get at them. Having them all on ships at the edges of the Federation might mean they couldn't get to the crises zone in time.
How long have we been producing AAMRAM missiles now? How come we haven't entirely phased out Sidewinders entirely?
Have you been following the argument?
(1) higher cost-per-hit (and yes, "cost" is an issue in Trekdom, despite certain late-in-life declarations from a failing Roddenberry... Trek may not have CASH, but it does have "credits". That is to say, no printed "Federation paper money" and no stamped "Federation coinage." It's more like everyone having a debit card attached to their bank account, and the "credits" existing purely digitally.
That "cost per hit" is associated with manufacturing costs (material availability as well as complexity of manufacturing process). "Replication" doesn't allow you to just push a button and have anything you want magically go POOF into existence... even in the overly "magical" TNG-era Trek world. (DS9's "self-replicating mines" notwithstanding... terrible idea, those...)
Do you know how complex of a manufacturing process would be associated with making a matter/antimatter warhead versus a zero-point-energy warhead? No? Neither does anyone else... because while we at least have an idea of how a m/am warhead might be made, we have NO IDEA what would be required to create a zero-point-energy device. It's beyond our understanding of science entirely at this point. For that reason, it's not hard to imagine that it might be a BIT more complicated than the m/am device.
(2) Specialized hardware requirements. I don't necessarily buy the "Defiant fired both from the same launchers" argument. While I'd have to go back and re-watch the entire DS9 series to confirm this, I seem to recall the photon torpedos being fired from the "cowled wing launchers" while the quantum torpedos were fired from the nose-module launcher. Even if that's not true... it's not hard to imagine Defiant having multiple launchers installed under the "cowlings," is it? Clearly, when these devices were designed for the 1701-E, the intent was for them to be fired from different launchers (see the production design artwork from "First Contact" which shows, unambiguously, that this was their intent).
(3) Last... we don't know how long it takes to "heat up" a Quantum torpedo versus a photon torpedo. We know (from TMP) how long it took to arm the 1701(r)'s torpedos... pretty quick, a matter of seconds, not minutes. What if prepping a quantorp to fire requires a 15-minute prep time? That's not hard to imagine, again, since what you're talking about is creating what (in trek terms) is something like a "reversed wormhole" spouting energy into the universe from the fabric of space/time itself...
It's really sort of disturbing, hearing the "everything should be the same and everything should be the most powerful" argument. The real world never.. NEVER... works like that. The most powerful is often overkill, often has other forms of drawbacks (Army field artillery CAN fire nuclear shells... I speak from personal knowledge here... but as a general rule they don't!). You use the most cost-and-power-efficient tool available to you to do the job.
The DS9 TM lists some pretty exotic materials needed to make them, including synthetic neutronium (yikes!), and we must imagine the war had a big impact on production and depletion of stores, plus the idea that most postwar-era resources are probably going towards goals other than enhanced munitions.
We also cannot be certain if the q-torps were considered to be "in testing" when they were first seen in use on the NX-bearing Defiant, or at what point they were deemed ready for prime time and began to be deployed more widely. According to DS9 TM, in 2375 DS9 and Defiant were receiving half the q-torps manufactured, so there really were not very many out there at that point.
It should be noted that Sidewinders remain in use because no successor has been developed for them (in USAF service). The AMRAAM is not capable of performing the job of the Sidewinder: it only replaces the old SARH-guided Sparrow for medium range engagements, and can be rather easily evaded in Sidewinder-style dogfights. The older Sidewinders in the arsenal aren't even flightworthy any more, and in general older munitions don't linger: they only have a shelf life of a few decades at very best.
However, I greatly doubt that the ammo is the issue for Starfleet. Remember that starships still retain 2270s style main phasers in the 2370s. Apparently, UFP industrial capacity isn't sufficient for modernizing entire weapons systems, let alone whole starships, to the very latest standard. Now consider that we have only ever seen quantum torpedoes fired from launchers dedicated to that type of weapon - launchers that have never fired any other sort. Perhaps, for reason X, a photon torpedo launcher (or loading or arming system) is incapable of processing quantum torpedoes. If so, then photon torpedo production would continue until every last p-torp-launcher-equipped ship is retired (or, in the rare case, refitted), while q-torp production would face the bottleneck of there being very few ships out there that can use this type of ammo.
That is,
It's actually vice versa, sort of. We only really saw quantums fired twice, in "Defiant" and "For the Uniform", and they came from the cowling cheeks in both cases. We saw aft torpedoes fired from an unseen stern location in "Paradise Lost" (and dialogue in other episodes supported the existence of an aft p-torp launcher specifically), and a probe from the nose in "Rejoined".
Timo Saloniemi
However, I greatly doubt that the ammo is the issue for Starfleet. Remember that starships still retain 2270s style main phasers in the 2370s. Apparently, UFP industrial capacity isn't sufficient for modernizing entire weapons systems, let alone whole starships, to the very latest standard. Now consider that we have only ever seen quantum torpedoes fired from launchers dedicated to that type of weapon - launchers that have never fired any other sort. Perhaps, for reason X, a photon torpedo launcher (or loading or arming system) is incapable of processing quantum torpedoes. If so, then photon torpedo production would continue until every last p-torp-launcher-equipped ship is retired (or, in the rare case, refitted), while q-torp production would face the bottleneck of there being very few ships out there that can use this type of ammo.
That is,
It's actually vice versa, sort of. We only really saw quantums fired twice, in "Defiant" and "For the Uniform", and they came from the cowling cheeks in both cases. We saw aft torpedoes fired from an unseen stern location in "Paradise Lost" (and dialogue in other episodes supported the existence of an aft p-torp launcher specifically), and a probe from the nose in "Rejoined".
Timo Saloniemi
