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The NX-01's Forgotten Weapon
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[QUOTE]Originally posted by MinutiaeMan: [QB] Something that a lot of people (here, anyway) noticed in the first couple of episodes of [i]Enterprise[/i] was the sudden discontinuity between "Broken Bow," where the NX-01 made a reasonable accounting for itself firing a bunch of bolts of light that [b]sounded[/b] like disruptor/plasma-type weapons. Then, of course, in "Fight or Flight" and "Silent Enemy," it seemed like the spatial torpedoes were the only effective armaments that the ship had. For whatever reason, this inconsistency stuck in my mind, even though I never had the opportunity to go back and watch the pilot again, and more importantly, get screencaps of my own. I just borrowed the DVD set for ENT season 1 from a friend, and re-watched "Broken Bow" for the first time since it first aired. I got the opportunity to take a couple of screencaps and get some good slow-mo glimpses, and it's pretty much confirmed what I've believed for a while: the NX-01's weapons from the pilot were not the torpedoes, but most certainly plasma cannons. The effect sort of sounds like a torpedo launch effect, but also very much like the effect of a Klingon-type ship firing its disruptor bolts. Which makes sense, if we consider that a plasma cannon is probably a brute-force type weapon similar to, but not as powerful or effective as, a disruptor. Also, the weapons aren't launched from the bottom, but instead the [b]top[/b]... and now I've finally been able to go back for myself and confirm the location. It's those two circular ports just at the forward ends of the catamarans. Each of the caps below is the first frame in which the respective plasma bolt appears. [URL=http://www.st-minutiae.com/temp/plasma1.png]'Cap 1[/URL] - [URL=http://www.st-minutiae.com/temp/plasma2.png]'Cap 2[/URL] - [URL=http://www.st-minutiae.com/temp/plasma3.png]'Cap 3[/URL] [URL=http://www.st-minutiae.com/temp/plasmaports.jpg]The Ports[/URL] [URL=http://www.st-minutiae.com/temp/plasma.mov]The Whole Clip[/URL] (QuickTime 7, 4.7 MB) One little glitch, though, is that it seems as if there's maybe [b]three[/b] ports... the second bolt seems like it might be coming from somewhere between the other two. But when I rapidly switch between the three caps (man, I love OS X's Preview and its browse drawer!) one could probably argue that two of the bolts just come from the same cannon. Bernd argues in [URL=http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/inconsistencies/22nd-cent-tech.htm]his tech assessment[/URL] that there are "at least three locations"�aka cannon ports. However, the first bolt comes from too far starboard; it's almost at the edge of the catamaran. The second bolt seems to come from slightly starboard of the midline, but it's rather blurry compared to the first appearance of the first and third bolts (probably a side effect of the plasma glow mixed with the spotlight on the ship's name on the hull). I would argue that the second bolt is coming from the proper starboard-side port indicated above. And the third cap definitely comes from the port-side port. Considering all of the various effects glitches over the years, a few pixels over seems reasonable, so we can assume that there are just two plasma cannons. (BTW, I'm not 100% certain that this has never been discussed before, but I searched for ten or fifteen minutes in S&T and ENT, and didn't find anything too relevant. Is this old news to anyone?) [/QB][/QUOTE]
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