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Canon

Though fascinating, and I'm sure all true, I would like to know how much of this info is actually canon. That which is should be referenced. -- Redge 16:57, 24 Jul 2004 (CEST)

Ah, my apologies. The information comes from the Technical Manuals, which as we all know can only claim to be semi-canon. I fear I would have a hard time finding concrete on-screen examples of many of the things stated in the article. Kv1at3485 09:39, 28 Jul 2004 (EST)

Well, in that case I suggest we find all info we can on-screen, and perhaps someday background info like this can also be listed on MA. Untill then, we'll need to see how much of this info we can keep. -- Redge 01:16, 29 Jul 2004 (CEST)

There is no on-screen info on photon toepdoes in TOS or the TMP movies. There is no mention that they even use antimatter nor that they travel at warp speeds. More detailed explanations occur in TNG and VOY but that is another era entirely. As such, the technical explanation of photon torpedoes in this article is non-canon and therefore anathema, yet it is not labeled as such. It's another example of how fans have totally confused canon with fanon because the entire body of Trek has gotten so large it is now unwieldy, and so it is just easier to take things for granted and believe the word of others (or trust books) rather than to research something for oneself. --Atrahasis 12:11, 12 Sep 2005 (UTC)

Point of View

With respect, I re-included my info about photon torpedoes in TOS in the article because it is the only canon info about photon torpedoes in the entire article. All the rest is from tech manuals or fanon, but every word of what I say can be verified by the episodes. --Atrahasis 06:01, 12 Sep 2005 (UTC)

  • Except that it is written it the entirely wrong perspective. Our articles are written from within the Star Trek pov, and your additions were added from the perspective of "outside looking in". They either need to be rewritten from the Star Trek universe perspective or placed into the background section, which would be written in our perspective. --Alan del Beccio 06:10, 12 Sep 2005 (UTC)
    • Yes, POV changes strangly in this article. Also, the first image is soley from Star Trek: The Magazine. - AJHalliwell 06:21, 12 Sep 2005 (UTC)
      • I've added a pna-unformatted to this, as I do not want to start an edit war by reverting this again, nor do I really want to do a make over on this article tonight. --Alan del Beccio 06:25, 12 Sep 2005 (UTC)

Actually, putting it to the end as a "background info" kind of thing works well for me, as somebody took the initiative to already do. As for POV, I think there should be a section at the very beginning of the article explaining that all of the info about the workings of a photon torpedo that follows is pure conjecture and is more or less fanon, because it is a fact that it was never explained on screen in TOS or the movies, and was rather taken for granted. The idea that they used antimatter was also not mentioned, especially since they had to come up with a seperate antimatter warhead to kill the amoeba creature in "The Immunity Syndrome"....why not just use a torpedo if all they needed was an antimatter strike? Even Andrew Probert when desiging the ST:TMP ship did not have a clear idea of what a photon torpedo was, but he does categorically say they were not capsules in his 2005 interview. In fact, he favors the idea of energy or plasma.

  • Tyler: At the time The Motion Picture was in the works, what was your take on photon torpedoes? Did you imagine them as the capsule-shaped things from The Wrath of Khan, or as something else?
    • Probert: I envisioned them as what we saw during the TV era, they were glowing globs of plasma or some sort of energy. They weren't giant capsules. I envision them as big, glowy, dangerous blobs of... scariness.

Original 2005 Probert interview can be found here:

http://trekplace.com/ap2005int01.html

The weapon may have been explained in greater detail during the run of TNG or VOY, at times even mentioning yields in "isotons", but strictly speaking those were details for that particular torpedo (like the "Type 6) that the Voyager happened to use, and not necessarily the same as what the producers of TOS and TMP envisioned.

--Atrahasis 11:46, 12 Sep 2005 (UTC)

Rewrite Needed

As has been mentioned above, this article is a mixture of information seen on the show, information from non-canon reference material, and conjecture. It needs a massive clean-up to reflect only what we know from the series, not what we might think we know based on comments elsewhere. Aholland 20:57, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

  • I agree, it reads like a "list 'o facts" rather than a coherent stream. Liu Bei 16:07, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
    • Took a stab at it. Let me know what you think Liu Bei 16:07, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

Still needs some work but its much better then it was--Illwill 18:28, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

Specifics of dispersal patterns

Was this ever adressed as to how ships can apparently fire more torpedoes at once than they have launchers? Do you think the pods queue up in the chamber and are fired at once, or are they just shot an at extremely rapid rate?

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