It is definitely a case of DS9 providing both torpedos and high-powered phasers. It is, IIRC, after the order to fire phasers that Kira reports eight Klingon ships have been destroyed.
However, the Negh'Var knocks down DS9's shields and sends in boarding parties remarkably quickly, all things considered. The shields are brought back online after not too long either.
The Klingon fleet is interesting in composition. Perhaps I miscounted, but I see on the big comm screen a fleet comprised of:
- 1 Negh'Var capital ship
- 4 Vor'Cha battlecruisers.
- 6 D7 battlecruisers.
- ~30 small birds of prey (the infamous "fighter sized" vessels EAS scales as ~50m relative to the other Klingon ships).
It is difficult to gauge the size of the Negh'Var, but it could come close to being equal to the rest of the fleet put together. Strange.
The Vor'cha battlecruisers and Negh'Var are what knock down DS9's shields so quickly... and what DS9 blows up handily are the tiny BoPs and ancient D7s. I can't for the life of me find any cases of one of the few Vor'cha cruisers blowing up.
It's still a very impressive showing; Sisko was threatening to try and hold out for fifteen minutes more of the Klingons trying to capture the station before the cavalry showed up.
I just re-read that, and there are two more things to take into account from TDM.Mike DiCenso wrote:Oddly enough, in EoT and apparently in TDM as well, the photon torpedoes cannot be armed or fired with only impulse power available.
First, "The Doomsday Machine" can't really be described as a demonstration of torpedos being unable to arm; the doomsday machine in question generated a field that suppressed M/AM reactions, which we know the torpedo warhead (not just the warp core) rely on. The torpdedos' warheads should be inert, making them useless even if they could be armed and fired.
Second, although of limited use, we have a general estimate for the order of output of the impulse engines, which we can contrast with the much better known figures for warp power. One impulse engine being self-destructed is a 99.75 megaton explosion in "The Doomsday Machine," which fits reasonably with the more moderate figures we can calculate for the warp core.