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[Lord Shonus]

The second is pretty dumb (I don't remember it though, was it in Voyager? That was the main source of ludicrous crap in the series), but the first isn't so bad. The ship guns are just extremely big versions of the hand weapons, so why can't they have the same settings? Sure, if you were designing the tech and wanted it to be impossible it would be easy to find a reason to disallow it, but it is also perfectly easy to justify not preventing it.

[Neonivek]

The second is pretty dumb (I don't remember it though, was it in Voyager? That was the main source of ludicrous crap in the series), but the first isn't so bad. The ship guns are just extremely big versions of the hand weapons, so why can't they have the same settings? Sure, if you were designing the tech and wanted it to be impossible it would be easy to find a reason to disallow it, but it is also perfectly easy to justify not preventing it.

Because there is simply too much energy in the Forward phaser array.

It would be like loading a cannon with knockout syringes and going "Yep, non-lethal".

[Rolan7]

I'm with Shonus on this, I think.  Phasers work on a remarkable range of power levels, I don't see a reason that the ship phaser wouldn't.

I don't know the specific case you're talking about, but stunning a massive space organism or something?  Totes legit.  Wide spread, relatively low intensity.
Stunning people within an enemy starship... yeah... that'd bother me a lot.

[Lord Shonus]

In the TOS episode "A Piece of The Action", Spock uses one of the ship's forward phasers to stun a street mob.


As for "There's too much power", you can take the most powerful cutting laser on the planet and dial it down so low it won't even singe your hair. The cannon analogy does not work.

[Neonivek]

In the TOS episode "A Piece of The Action", Spock uses one of the ship's forward phasers to stun a street mob.


As for "There's too much power", you can take the most powerful cutting laser on the planet and dial it down so low it won't even singe your hair. The cannon analogy does not work.

Ignoring that I question the validity of that statement (as... well... with most machines there is an absolute minimum it can run at... It would be like saying you can run your computer at 1w but it would be really slow. Even lightbulbs have a minimum. Then again the power drain at that level would probably be sizable even if all that energy isn't in powering just the laser)

We are talking about something many more magnitudes above even that... And the fact that it isn't even about turning it down so much as setting the laser to frappe...

As in... There is no power difference between stun and kill (and stun is more deadly in Star Trek anyway )... So I just picture the stun setting essentially frying someone's insides when fired by the phaser array.

Now the deflector array doing that? I can understand... the forward phasers? GOODNESS!

Then again the writers seem to agree with me because we never see that again... Even when it would have been incredibly useful and convenient.

[Lord Shonus]

So it makes more sense to you that a device specifically designed to knock space rocks out of the way is a more logical one to use for stunning people than a device that is simply a huge version of a device used to stun people?

As for lasers, it is simple fact. Put less energy into it, you get a weaker beam. As for your "no power difference between stun and kill" statement, it completely invalidates your "they have too much power to stun" argument. Your argument collapses on itself no matter how you come at it.

The writers never do it again, but there's a plausible argument for that. The one time it was used, it was against a culture with 1920s (literally, their entire society was based on "Chicago Mobs of the Twenties) in a time with a very, very weak Prime Directive. In later shows, you can infer that anyone they could legally use the phasers on had the tech to block stun-level shots.

[Flying Dice]

(I don't remember it though, was it in Voyager? That was the main source of ludicrous crap in the series)

There's a fan-theory that Voyager is actually an in-universe series of adventure novels Janeway wrote when she was a junior officer on a really dull posting. It's the most sensible explanation I've heard for that tripe.

[Neonivek]

So it makes more sense to you that a device specifically designed to knock space rocks out of the way is a more logical one to use for stunning people than a device that is simply a huge version of a device used to stun people?

As for lasers, it is simple fact. Put less energy into it, you get a weaker beam. As for your "no power difference between stun and kill" statement, it completely invalidates your "they have too much power to stun" argument. Your argument collapses on itself no matter how you come at it.

The deflector array in the show is basically a device that can create any energy (heck I think the tractor beam uses the deflector array), at least as far as it is used.

As for... "Invalidates"... No, I already said why it doesn't make sense to me. Sure you are firing the HUGE FREEKEN SHIP CANNONS on Stun... But there is no way I am buying that it wouldn't just kill people or act like normal phasers at that level.

[TempAcc]

Energy based weapons are far more easily controlled if they've got the necessary systems to do it. Considering this is the star trek universe we're talking about, one can easily assume that even their biggest energy beam weapons have calibration and dialing mechanisms that allow you to use even a capital ship weapon to stun personnel or push shit out of the way without destroying it.

Just think of it like this: you've got a weapon that lets you have complete control over its firing output, from how much energy it gets to throw at your target to how focused that energy can be.

And ye, voyager is crap.

[Neonivek]

The writers never do it again, but there's a plausible argument for that. The one time it was used, it was against a culture with 1920s (literally, their entire society was based on "Chicago Mobs of the Twenties) in a time with a very, very weak Prime Directive. In later shows, you can infer that anyone they could legally use the phasers on had the tech to block stun-level shots.

Ignoring that the Prime Directive has never been stronger in the original series (Kirk has broken it often, but typically in situations where it needed to be broken), mostly because it is the original series where the idlydicness was never more poignant.

There are still so many situations where it could be used throughout the series.

It is far better to take it as canon discontinuity or that Scotty pulled off some engineering bastardry that no one has been able to replicate (or they didn't put it in the record books).

It wouldn't be the only thing the old series pulled that was never copied... Such as the fact that the environmental controls could... apparently create weather on the ship.

Or that women aren't allowed in Starfleet as captains. Or that the ship has perfect 24 hour ship surveillance that saved everything all the time.

[Lord Shonus]

So it makes more sense to you that a device specifically designed to knock space rocks out of the way is a more logical one to use for stunning people than a device that is simply a huge version of a device used to stun people?

As for lasers, it is simple fact. Put less energy into it, you get a weaker beam. As for your "no power difference between stun and kill" statement, it completely invalidates your "they have too much power to stun" argument. Your argument collapses on itself no matter how you come at it.

The deflector array in the show is basically a device that can create any energy (heck I think the tractor beam uses the deflector array), at least as far as it is used.

As for... "Invalidates"... No, I already said why it doesn't make sense to me. Sure you are firing the HUGE FREEKEN SHIP CANNONS on Stun... But there is no way I am buying that it wouldn't just kill people or act like normal phasers at that level.

If there is no power difference between "erases you from existence" and "puts you to sleep for a few minutes" (both of which are settings on hand phasers), in which case the amount of energy put into the beam is completely and utterly irrelevant to the stun setting and your argument falls into dust, or there is a power difference and extrapolating not only from the closest existing tech but in-universe references to the main guns having multiple power levels means they simply put less energy into the beam for stun and your argument falls into dust.


As for "the Prime Directive has never been stronger in the Original Series", I'm not sure what you mean. The Prime Directive barely existed in TOS, which is what I meant by "an era when the PD was very weak". It is extremely strong in every series set afterward.

[Rolan7]

Mmrgh, you know what, if you two hate voyager that's fine.  You've been around long enough to give it a shot.  Different strokes.

Or that women aren't allowed in Starfleet as captains.

What are you-
Oh, you edited in "as captains".  Okay then.  That's still surprising, but not as much.

[Neonivek]

If there is no power difference between "erases you from existence" and "puts you to sleep for a few minutes"

Hey! Erase from existence is the high power kill setting! Setting the phaser to vaporize!

The Prime Directive barely existed in TOS

It is more that the TOS era wasn't riding is soapbox and crying tears of blood about the Prime Directive all the time... all while butchering the point of the prime directive.

They mention it plenty of times.

Oh, you edited in "as captains".  Okay then.  That's still surprising, but not as much

Honestly given that no woman has had a big role in the series... (Diplomat, nurse, secretary... Uhura is basically a call switch lady)... I wouldn't be surprised if it was larger then that.

THANK GOODNESS that the episode that drops that particular bombshell that woman is crazy enough that we can just write it off as she is a crazy woman who didn't get into Star Fleet and blamed it on sexism.

Like that guy who did the same with Engineering School... except without it ending as tragically.

[TempAcc]

The prime directive was kind of a joke in the original series in which you have kirk sexing everything vaguely female looking, space faring or not.

Also, this whole "guns with varying power levels" reminds me that the US once attempted to use actual cannon weapons that allow you to have control of the firing output by using liquids that are inert when separate, but when mixed become a powerful explosive. Link tanks of those to a cannon and a computer controlled pumping system and you got yourself a cannon that can actualy change the ammount of fuel it uses to fire a projectile.

[hector13]

Bearing in mind this was on telly in the '60s, when it was bizarre to have a black woman in a role that was not a servant, and then that omginterracialromance.