Phasers and Microtransporters

[Khas]

For those of you who don't know, 10 years ago, scientists in Australia managed to teleport a laser beam. Now, we've seen in "Field of Fire", that Starfleet's TR-116 rifle could have a microtransporter attached to it, allowing the teleportation of the bullet. Since teleportation of energy is easier than teleportation of matter, I was thinking that maybe Starfleet could attach the microtransporters to phaser rifles and cary out sneak attacks by transporting the beam. Any comments on this idea?

[Praeothmin]

For those of you who don't know, 10 years ago, scientists in Australia managed to teleport a laser beam. Now, we've seen in "Field of Fire", that Starfleet's TR-116 rifle could have a microtransporter attached to it, allowing the teleportation of the bullet. Since teleportation of energy is easier than teleportation of matter, I was thinking that maybe Starfleet could attach the microtransporters to phaser rifles and cary out sneak attacks by transporting the beam. Any comments on this idea?

Actually, there's this neat old fart that once posited that E=MC(squared), so matter and energy should pretty much be equally easy to transport in ST... :)

[Khas]

Well, I meant in real life when I said it's easier to teleport energy than matter. Even though they are interchangable, it's just that we can't teleport stuff in it's "matter" state. But anyway, just imagine what advantages putting a microtransporter on a phaser rifle would have in a ground battle.

[Cocytus]

The interaction of phasers and transporters is a little problematic to nail down precisely. Offhand, I can think of two conflicting examples:

In "Datalore," Lore is beamed out to the Crystalline Entity just as he fires a phaser at Data and Wesley. The beam is transported along with Lore.

In "A Matter of Perspective," a holographic recreation of events supposed to have occurred on the Tauga station is played in the holodeck. In it, Riker is transported off the station, and in mid-transport, he turns and fires a phaser at the station's reactor, destroying it mere seconds after he rematerialized on the Enterprise. Now, one might very well say "this was just a recreation, and it wasn't the truth." Yes, but it had to be physically plausible, because if it weren't Picard and Riker would simpy have said "that couldn't have happened, transporters always transport phaser beams."

[The Dude]

Seems it would be easier to just make the phaser beam invisible, if your looking for a phaser sniper rifle.

[2046]

I'd considered pitching the invisible beam as part of a story involving Romulans to the ENT folks, but unlike Piller they didn't accept submissions.

Interestingly, though, a surprising number of Kirk's stun shots in TOS were invisible, not to mention Scotty's cutting beam from "Naked Time".

[Mike DiCenso]

What was the "invisible beam" story about?
-Mike

[2046]

The story was conceived circa the first or second season of ENT. The tech stuff was regarding a Romulan sniper, playing with the whole invisibleness of the Romulans. Naturally, Archer and company would never see the sniper. The main action would occur in a wooded area similar to what was used for "Gambit"[TNG]. Since I didn't want their scanners getting Romulan DNA readings, I flirted with the idea that it was a sniper training/proving ground with sensor suppressors of some variety.

Plot-wise, it was intended to be a little different in that crewmen would actually die, which to that point in ENT hadn't really happened yet. Preferably, it would be someone we'd seen . . . not Cutler, preferably, but on that level. In that sense it would've been another "Archer growing up" episode, a poignant episode about meaning-of-life-stuff (after they kicked the Romulan's ass in such a way as to cause him to immolate himself with the Romulan equivalent of a photon grenade, conveniently removing all trace of his identity and giving a potential Predator nod).

But not only did I learn for sure that they didn't take pitches (I didn't think so, but still), but the time I spent batting the idea around led to them making "Archer grows up" episodes (say, like "Regeneration" where he first shoots folks out of an airlock) and then, of course, season 3.

Then there was the idea back during DS9's 4th season of Federation scientists finding (or having left during a cooperative venture) a computer back door into Klingon computers, but (a) I couldn't figure out an emotionally satisfying reason for Sisko not to 'turn off' the Klingon Empire, (b) peace was made with the Klingons but the story made less sense with the Dominion, and (c) Ron Moore apparently had the idea, too, and made a good chunk of change off of it under another name. :)

((And no, I'm not claiming credit or talent, there. After all, those were basically the only two story ideas I had, which is rather low output compared to their 20-something episodes per season.))

[Mike DiCenso]

Interesting. So what was the Romulan sniper's motivation for attacking the NX-01 crew?
-Mike

[Mith]

Interesting. So what was the Romulan sniper's motivation for attacking the NX-01 crew?
-Mike

Voyager.