Apparently 6 phaser strips (2 fwd, 2 on nacelles, 2 aft), an extendable micro-torpedoe launcher (below the ship?), and the ability to use both photon AND quantum torpedoes would constitute a lightly armed vessel.
The article then goes about to label those extensions on the hull just in front of the bussard collectors as "phaser banks" (what happened to the strip? and don't we usually see phaser beams emitted from below the ship?), and neglicts the other phasers. We kinda know the area just above the bussard collector itself had some sort of phaser bank, it was in that episode where Keko was obsessing over the Chief's coffee drinking habits. But those were phaser pulses, which doesn't come from phaser strips.
The ability to use quantum torpedoe does support the idea of photon and quantum torpedoes being fired from the same launchers, as no one would waste their time making a new runabout sized quantum torpedoe launcher.
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[ July 03, 2002, 16:17: Message edited by: David Templar ]
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Runabout armament fluctuates very wildly depending on whom you ask. Rick Sternbach initially designed the runabout to have the phaser strips on the nacelles, on the port/starboard blisters, and aft only - the model shows two strips on each nacelle just aft of the bussard collector, one each on the p/s blisters, plus two strips aft. However, the VFX boys never got that memo, and so they frequently showed phaser beams coming out of almost anywhere. However, most analyses of episodes tend to conclude that there are probably TEN phaser emitters on a Danube: the eight mentioned, one somewhere on the dorsal section (fired in "The Maquis", "The Jem'Hadar" et. al.), and a corresponding one on the ventral side. This creates a helluva lot of overlap for the phaser banks, especially in the forward arc.
As for the torpedoes, the DS9TM does mention something aobut the launchers being able to fire photon or quantum microtorps that are about pencil-sized. I've never realy been able to wrap my head around this, or where exactly these launchers are. Some people say that there is one forward launcher each in the p/s blisters, but there's only one episode that suggests that ("The Search Pt. II"). We *used* to think the dorsal pod contained the launchers ("Past Prologue"), but this has since been disproven. The pod itself is essentially redundant after the fouth season, when the model was essentially replaced with podless CGI.
posted
I was just watching a vidcap of "Treachery, Faith, and the Great River"[DS9], and it looks like the aft phasers on the runabout are in a single bank, centered under the two middle windows of the aft cabin. When the ship fires phasers aft toward the Jem'Hadar battlebug, it also seems to come from the center (though that, in and of itself, doesn't say much . . . the same was true in "The Maquis, Pt. II").
Can anyone confirm whether the two phasers have gone uni-brow in that ep? Or am I hallucinating?
(BTW, according to Cpt. Kyle's shiplist, the runabout in question was the Rio Grande, which would seem to suggest that this isn't just a mod for new-build runabouts.)
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posted
Just like the magic phaser emitters on the Defiant, the Danube didn't do a good job of following obvious points on the hull as where phaser beams should come from.
As for the torpedoes, in my mind, it seems to suggest in the TM that the little pods in the middle can be fitted with full-sized torpedoes. My problem with this is the actual firing of the torpedo, because on starships we have nice, large magnetic and gas launchers to help send that glowing thing off at high-speeds. On the Danube, the pods in the middle seem just long enough to fit the torpedo... does it just drop out of there, coast a bit from runabout's momentum and then fire up its engines to fly at its target?
I suppose it could be possible to use the entire craft as a launcher, lining up with the target, dropping the torpedo much like a Japanese Zero lining up with a boat, and let interia take it into the thing.
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quote:Originally posted by Siwiak: My problem with this is the actual firing of the torpedo, because on starships we have nice, large magnetic and gas launchers to help send that glowing thing off at high-speeds. On the Danube, the pods in the middle seem just long enough to fit the torpedo... does it just drop out of there, coast a bit from runabout's momentum and then fire up its engines to fly at its target?
That would be my first guess, too. Although, a torpedoe being fired from the upper pod would mean a blinding flashing ball of light travelling directly over the cockpit window. I hope those windows have some sort of anti-glare protection, otherwise the crew would be at least temperory blinded.
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quote:Originally posted by Siwiak: Just like the magic phaser emitters on the Defiant, the Danube didn't do a good job of following obvious points on the hull as where phaser beams should come from.
No, I mean the actual emitters themselves seemed to be in one bank. A phaser beam coming from nowhere I wouldn't mind . . . I'm used to that. :-) I refer to to their being an apparent unified aft phaser strip.
If you're interested, it is observed just after Odo and Weyoun first realize they're under attack from a battlebug. It cuts to an external at warp, just off the runabout's aft port quarter.
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posted
I like Siwiak's explanation for the torpedo launcher thing: the underbelly "exchangeable sections" could be fitted with "bomb wells" for the torpedoes, and those would then drop free and travel at the speed of the launching vessel (whereas a proper starship could fire the torps at a speed higher than that of the ship).
The dorsal module would not fire any weapons by itself - but it might be essential for long-range targeting of the big torps. In multi-ship ops like "Maquis II" or "Jem'Hadar", the runabouts could share targeting information, so only one craft would have to be hobbled by this module.
Since the underbelly modules are pretty large by DS9 TM account, one could easily fit multiple torpedoes up to the classic photorp size there. And of course, the photorps and q-torps could have differently shaped and sized "bomb wells", so they wouldn't have to be compatible launcher-wise...
A drop launch would nicely agree with the VFX of "The Search II" - two lines of torpedoes would emerge from below the craft, since there are two lines of modules straddling a central corridor in the underbelly section.
As for the "microtorp" launcher, this is probably centrally mounted directly below the cockpit, amidst all the greeblings there. If so, then we could say that the bomb in "Past Prologue" was launched from this apparatus. I'd speculate that this microlauncher is primarily a scientific tool - a probe launcher that is impractical as a weapon. It was only given an inventory of "microtorps" because it was thought the runabouts wouldn't carry the underbelly torp racks very often.
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