I prefer the Starfleet Museum's explanation that when Scotty said the ship's drive was powered by 'simple impulse' he was referring to a fusion power derived warp drive which would definitely give it a lower warp speed compared to the Enterprise.
Yeah, it doesn't matter how you generate plasma, as long as it goes to warp coils in the end. I would also say that all of it's power generation was directed to impulse and it's plasma weapon. Later versions probably used the artificial black hole power source, and removed the plasma weapon. The ship in the show is a testbed...Romulan style. Send it to the front and see if it comes back.
@@LordTalaxexcept as we know Shuttles like the F class could also achieve warp speeds. Really BoT was so early on that much of the Rules we know are retroactive
@@LordTalax Really? The context was with regards to a question Kirk had about reasonable expectation of victory, with Scotty's answer focusing on the power of the ship being 'simple impulse.' Normally 'impulse power' is used with regards to the sublight engines, but it comes from a fusion reactor, which is where 'impulse power' as a term comes from. And it wasn't just restricted to the engines as it could be used to power or reinforce other systems (shields, tractor emitters, sensors). Impulse power has been referenced a few times (such as Wrath of Khan with regards to Reliant's repairs) as a power source. For ships like the Enterprise, it appears to function as the ship's main sublight power source, but can function as an auxiliary power source in the event that the warp core is inoperable (the drawback being it consumes fuel rapidly). if memory serves, the Enterprise-D had an incident once where its warp and impulse engines were disabled, but was still described as having 'impulse power.' Additionally, during the Motion Picture, Kirk ordered the use of Impulse Power at 'Warp 0.5', suggesting it can be used to generate a warp field.
Fun fact: The actor who plays the commanding officer of the Romulan Bird of Prey in “Balance of Terror” was Mark Lenard who would later play the role of Sarek, Spock’s father. Confused the hell out of me as a kid lol.
@@deadon4847 Cool. I actually didn’t know that. I was always intrigued by how Star Trek “recycled” actors for different roles. For instance, David Warner, the guy who played the Terran ambassador to Nimbus III in Star Trek V was Chancellor Gorkon in Star Trek VI. It made it harder for me to suspend my disbelief whenever I noticed things like that.
"You and I are of a kind. In a different reality, I could have called you friend...We are creatures of duty, Captain. I have lived my life by it. Just one more duty to perform."-Romulan commander to Kirk Balance of Terror still one of the best ST episode
In Balance of Terror, the Bird of Prey lost to the Enterprise. One on one the T'liss is not that good. But in a wolf pack, the T'liss could be a terror. Imagine one ship anchors the Enterprise with a tractor beam. While the Enterprise tries to break free, two or three ships decloak and fire. Ouch. 3 ships firing at close range would be devastating.
The bird of prey came very close in destroying the Enterprise and would have if the romulan Commander didn't want to go home she had the Enterprise at her mercy that one mistake cost them a victory.
It wasn't a mistake so much as the Romulan captain was simply wrong in his assessment of how badly damaged the Enterprise was. Returning home with all the data from the test/attack was of top priority over using up so much fuel finishing off an already crippled ship that they'd have to scuttle and suicide to avoid capture... or dying when life support ran out anyway.
I always thought the T'Liss and the B'rel should have been working as a wolf pack formation. Why else would you have such ships in active combat? On their own they're great for reconnaissance but outmatched in combat.
That plasma weapon was massively powerful. Far outclassed any phaser, disruptor, or torpedo in terms of power. A Constitution could only survive 2 or 3 hits at most.
Imagine the last thing survivors of an outpost attack saw before the BoP warped off was the painted livery; it’d give certain ships a “Red Baron” sort of intimidation factor!
I like to think that the reason that ships of this ERA had a specific protective COATING almost all races would apply to Outer surfaces of ships that made them all look so clean and smooth. But deflectors got so much better that they stopped using it. But those surfaces being painted on allowed some races to get creative with the DECALS they could do on the ships. Like the pin stripes on some Federation ships and the Birds on the romulan ships. And later on when they did not need it anymore or they figured it was no necessary for the cost they all just dropped using it.
@@Thundercracker87-b5f Yeah, it was just a type of tech that they did for a few years that made everything look clean. Like those pre WW1 warships that were painted white.
Man, I hated using that ship in Starfleet Command…the cloak was a huge resource hog, and the ship never had enough power even with it off. I suppose it was accurate to the lore, at least :)
nothing's changed, it's the same in STO. At least in the early levels, but even later, it can be hard to manage power. At least in that game, it's only shield power we have to sacrifice for cloak though.
@@markfergerson2145 Early warp drives were fusion powered. They could attain low warp speeds. Sensors detect the fusion reactor and no other power sources therefore simple impulse.
Fun real life lore that affected in universe lore was the original model of this BOP was lost/destroyed in a fire which lead to the use of the D7 model in the episode The enterprise incident (which was ret-conned in the remastered effects of the TOS series). Which lead to the in universe cannon explanation of a brief tech alliance between the Klingon and Romulan empires swapping ship designs for cloaking. Which has been retconned with the Enterprise series when they had Klingon ships with cloaks and also added on this by the discovery series as well. In addition the BOP in ST III TSFS was originally intended to be of Romulan origin hence why it has such a noticeable raptor wing markings as it was to be a call back tribute livery design to this BOP as discussed in the video. As always I enjoy these content videos as you do a grate job in giving extra summarized lore information, even noting when things are ether ret-conned or beta cannon. Keep them coming.
The bird of pray used a large fusion engine. They used it to power the plasma weapon they used. This was pushing an easy(relatively speaking) warp system normally replaced with an antimatter system earlier on in most starfaring race. Antimatter escaped them until they traded for it with the klingons.
Back in Starfleet Command: Orion Pirates, i was a Romulan specialist and I used this very ship to great effect. The trick with the plasma torpedo is to get your tractor beam locked on the enemy before firing.
Of all ships in Star Trek, the Romulian ones still are the stuff of nightmares. Remastered effects, CGI model or the original stage model - this design doesn't even look like it would be crewed by humanoids. It truly looks alien and yet plausible in Star Trek's framework.
"The Federation will never expect us! All we have to do is- uhh..." "Sir?" "Okay, don't panic, but someone *might* have stolen the Warp Drive." "That...but...how?" "I can't quite remember, but there's a non-zero chance something happened that involved Klingon Ale, an Orion dancer, and my missing ship keys." "..."
I love how "bird-of-prey" became a defacto class of starship in Star Trek (presumably because of the borrowing incident in Wrath of Khan where Kruge's b-o-p was meant to be a stolen Romulan ship) such that Romulans and Klingons both have starship classes that fit this description, but Starfleet does not. What would a Starfleet bird of prey look like??
Since later shows have shown Birds of Prey in both Romulan and Klingon hands before that I think the best in universe explanation for the pair of rivals having the same name scheme is both having borrowed the concept in the pre-Federation (probably pre-2060s) period from another power in the region and evolved them in different directions. A Federation BoP would probably look a lot like a smaller Norway Class kitted out with oversized phaser cannons and torpedoes compared to usual.
Search for Spock, but yeah I always loved that explanation. It gave a background that clearly showed Romulans and Klingons still hate each other. As for a Starfleet Bird of Prey, while Parasfarmer says the Defiant class, I agree, but considering the era it always comes off as more of a Starfleet Jem Hadar Bug Ship. Arguably the Miranda or perhaps the Saladin or Hermes classes. The thing is that the Bug Ship and Birds of Prey were all raiders, which is a ship class that Starfleet would never use. You could go with a scout class vessel, but any Starfleet science ship can serve a scout function. If you're looking for a fast light attack craft, then you could probably use a Nova class with the original Defiant project specs, namely a bow full of torpedo launchers. The only T'Liss contemporary ship Starfleet fielded that was that small is.....well....the Oberth. So just...no.
My understanding from Scottie's statement was it was not Matter-Antimatter powered but Reactor powered warp system making it SUBSTANTIALLY Slower than the Enterprise!!! 🤠👍
5:18 A Quality of Mercy provided a good explanation for that "tracking sensors" thing: it's tracking gravitational microlensing! Microlensing is real-world science - we use it for detecting exoplanets. It is detectable as a tiny _change_ in a star's apparent position or magnitude. So it wouldn't let you see a ship just sitting there idly, but you would be able to see the stars change ever so slightly as it flew around. It's one of my favourite examples of Trek recontextualising and explaining an earlier comment.
From what I remember the plasma was fired at near point blank range which allowed the Enterprise to pull backwards at emergency warp and the plasma was caught in the warp bubble as they were at full warp yet it stuck with them inching closer until it hit.
One of the biggest problems in trying to fit a lore around the Bird of Prey is that the whole story of "Balance of Terror" is based on a similar but not matching storyline. It is based on a naval vessel and a submarine, specifically a submarine that is going on battery power underwater. Just as a sub can't use diesel engines underwater, the BoP could not use warp engines while cloaked and thus you could mistakenly assume that it didn't have any. (As a side note, a cold start to a warp drive isn't an instant matter in the Enterprise either, I believe the first time Spock gave that solution that wound up with a minor time warp as a result - but I forget the exact episode when that happened.) This makes sense, the plasma needed for the nacelles was being used for the plasma weapon.
My personal explanation of Mr Scott’s line about “simple impulse” is that he means the ship squirts something out the back. In physics that’s basically what impulse means. It’s likely the Bird of Prey, in line with later Romulan ships artificially reduces its mass to enable travel at superluminal speeds with a slight impulse from the engines. The Enterprise doesn’t do that to travel faster than light, it warps space-time.
I just watched Balance of Terror a few days ago! Thank you for all these fun videos on Trek lore. I quite enjoy them. God be with you out there, everybody. ✝️ :)
I think the crew numbers are too high. 100 spread across three watches would be more likely. Warbirds biggest strength is that its small. Hence mass producible .Essentially its a Destroyer or Frigate. Taking on anything bigger than a Federation Light Cruiser would be suicidal for an individual ship. So deploying them as divisions would be best.
I remember Balance of Terror episode in TOS. Mark Leonard played as the Romulan commander too and my Dad pointed out that's Spock's Dad. Plus this was the first time the Federation has seen the face of a Romulan too.
In the novel Sarek, Spock mentions that he was unsettled by how similar the Romulan commander looked to his father. I thought that was a fun little nerdy joke.
The accepted fan theory is that Scotty said, 'Their power is simple impulse.' Scotty never says they have no warp drive only that their power system is the same as an impulse drive aka fusion only. Meaning the Romulan Bird of Prey did have warp drive, but not matter-antimatter based, rather a much simpler possibly cruder more primitive and mostly likely slower (based on how Scotty said it), fusion powered warp drive/main power system. With the Romulan Bird of Prey having a max speed of Warp 3 TOS scale, but could cruise at 2.2 for long periods to so as to not tax the drive system. This would make it just fast enough for its mission of attacking the Outpost and run back to Neutral Zone before Starfleet reinforcements could arrive. Its also suggested by fans that the reason for a fusion based warp drive is that the first true cloak (that apocrypha says is based on the Romulans crude understanding, even by the 24th century, of a Slaver personal cloak found in the only Stasis box found in Romulan territory), as all early devices were sensor blinding/ECM based and not a true invisibility to visual/sensors scanners. Was not powerful enough to hide a matter-antimatter warp reactor. Strange New Worlds epo. says the motion tracker is picking up the dust and trace gases in the path of cloaked Romulan Bird of Prey being moved/compressed as it went by/through it. Which created motion Starfleet sensors were sophisticated enough to detect, something the Romulans didn't account for. Said disturbance wasn't localized so was only detectable in space of half a kilometer around the Romulan Bird of Prey. Which is why Kirks Enterprise had to bombard space with quick bursts of phaser fire (rather than sustained beams) within a half km box to try and hit the Romulan ship. Which is what we saw in the TOS epo. essentially smaller explosions, like depth charge blasts hit the Romulan ship with small energy impacts, so death by a thousand cuts.
In BoT the BOP is stated as operating at warp speeds even well cloaked . So another possibility that is backed canonically is that having FTL speed doesn’t mean it has a Warp core. Rather the statement may mean that the BOP is running on its fusion power system which means it’s not as fast or powerful as the Enterprise which had a matter antimatter reactor on top of its impulse fusion plants. This said it was likely towed to the Neutral Zone as they are constantly worried about fuel.
Another lore video that would be interesting is something about the mangled Roman ideas used with the Romulans. Did the writers just know some words like praetor and centurion and went with it, or was it more intentional? I think there's been mention of an emperor, but no consuls. Also only the one praetor. Etc.
🖖😎👍Very totally very cool and very nicely greatly wonderfully well done and very nicely informatively explained and executed in every detail way shape and format provided on the "Romulan Bird of Prey" known as the T'Liss class, And I myself have always loved this design and own quite a few of these in various different scales and sizes in plastic,resin and Die-cast Models and soforth, Any ways a job very fabulously well done indeed Sir!👌.
My theory is that Impulse Drive was believed to be faster than we know it to be today. Like it takes 2-4 weeks at Impulse to reach some planet within range. Otherwise, the "no warp drive" falls apart when you consider it flying around destroying the listening outposts. That's at least my theory here but I think the whole thing is analyzing too deeply a throw-away line.
This is easily one of the most iconic ships that isn't the Enterprise or a Klingon Battlecruiser. It has a such a simple and elegant design, a fairly sleek and compact warship that would later go on to inspire ships like the fan-favorite Defiant.
Hm, that's bigger than I thought. From _Balance of Terror_ I always thought it was crewed by maybe 12 people at most. Like one of those really tiny early submarines, or a big runabout. But nearing 200 is actually pretty sizeable, like some of the Constitution-class's smaller mid-size Starfleet contemporaries.
I always preferred the theory that this was the first Romulan ship with singularity drive, and the Enterprise thought it incapable of warp drive for the simple fact that they could not recognize and identify it.
I mean watching the early episodes of the first series of Star Trek is like watching a different series. The ‘Federation’ doesn’t exist yet, you have to radio orders to the fire the phasers and the ship’s chapel is a community focal point. But still the story sets up with enough lore so you know that these Space Roman Dark-Elves like to use MAD and asymmetric space-submarine warfare.
I'll have to watch "Balance of Terror" again. So I'm working from memory here. There have been many complicated explanations of this "Bird of Prey" for myself. I prefer a much simpler one. Spock remarks he could not detect warp drive technology. To me, this does not mean it was sub light only. The Romulans are supposed to be mysterious, a now unknown entity. So it could turn out they developed a faster than light technology not based on warp theory such as jump drive, Stargates, etc. They technology may not be as fast or maybe not as efficient. Even the ships of the first Romulan War needed to be faster than light, given the position of the agreed boarder. Given the secretive nature of the Romulans, I don't think they would risk giving away leading technology, so even the cloaking device would be of an older type. The Romulans have estimated the technological advancement, and this is them forcing the Federation to show their hand and confirm their estimations. So, if caught, it was not coming back. Allowing the Romulans to claim a rogue for element. This, to me, fits better with the mysterious adversary plot of this episode.
You left out the SFU fed reporting names: Warbird (no tactical warp) and War Eagle (tactical warp capable). Note that the SFU takes the impulse speed mentioned in TOS S1 E1 WNMHGB to allow speeds of up to about warp 3 on impulse drives alone.
I think that the initial ship encountered by James Kirk was a "quickly" assembled prototype and therefore expendable, "a let's throw it out there and see if it gets lucky starship".
I had a question kind of related to this that I'd wondered for decades. I had been fascinated with the plasma torpedo that this ship possessed in TOS and had wondered where it had gone in canon prior to Enterprise. I had always wondered, considering the old canon that the Klingon Bird of Prey was Romulan in origin (which I really liked), if the unnamed energy weapon the Klingon BoP possessed in Star Trek III and V (in the place that would later house a standard photon torpedo launcher) was supposed to be a variant of the plasma torpedo? Is there any indication, published or not, that this was true or intended to be true?
I have never seen any canon info addressing this. I would assume it is just a standarrd KPT and looks different only due to the limited SFX of the time.
Now that you mention it Kruge's Bird of Prey Torpedo launcher looks much more plasma-ey in execution and effect than any Photon Torpedo. The spinning apparatus wouldn't permit a physical photon torpedo to emerge, but it could be like a rotor in an alternator building the plasma charge before releasing it. When it hit the Enterprise it overloaded everything and had plasma arcs all over the saucer section. As opposed to Chang's Bird of Prey which had a clearly normal photon torpedo launcher (a necessity for the central plot of the Bird of Prey imitating and framing the Enterprise) with a visible torpedo tube, and a completely different torpedo impact blowing holes in the Enterprise's saucer. I also wouldn't assign the torpedo effect in Star Trek III as an effects limitation as Photon Torpedoes both Starfleet and Klingon were fully established and consistent between TMP and Wrath of Khan.
@@3Rayfire See that's pretty much exactly what I thought. While the bolt of energy wasn't colored the same as the plasma torpedo in TOS it felt very similar in looks aside from that. And, like you stated, the photon torpedo special effect was not only used in the first two films but also in STIII so if anything it would likely be more expensive to create a new SFX for the BoP's weapon than simply reusing the normal torpedo look from II and III.
'Warp or not?' The line from the Enterprise briefing scene was about *power* generation, where it apparently had 'simple impulse'. Kirk replying to this by saying 'So we can *outrun them?*' would *seem to imply* the ship had no warp capability, but this is honestly nonsensical given that later in the very same episode the Romulan Birb of Prey shot at the Enterprise with its plasma torpedo - and the Enterprise *even at warp speed* was in danger of being overrun by it. Meaning it HAD to have been fired at warp and from a ship at warp, from everything we know about torpedoes in Star Trek. Not to mention the fact the subspace monitoring stations were in interstellar space and could only be reached by a warp capable ship. And finally, the ship literally has warp nacelles. So how can we reconcile this with the briefing scene? Two ways IMO: strict interpretation of the line was about power generation, so saying it had 'simple impulse' is another way of saying it had fusion power only, so the Enterprise still had the qualitative edge which preserves the point of the dialogue that the Enterprise wasn't completely outclassed. This is very clunky imo because of the line Kirk says in reply to it specifically referring to speed and because impulse had at that point of the show been established as the sublight manoeuvre drive for the Enterprise, but it's passable and used to be how I reconciled it. The second way is an amalgamation of what you point out in your speculation and I think it's the most reasonable idea: they had a warp drive, it was running on singularity drive tech instead, this tech was chosen specifically for its low-emissions nature thus would benefit it for its cloaking device, and because it was unfamiliar with the Enterprise they didn't detect conventiona matter/antimatter emissions, and it would still be a power hungry or fuel intensive system to reconcile with later developments in the episode (when the Romulan Commander bemoans that they've expended their fuel in their battle with the Enterprise). Anyway good video!
I always thought that the roluman ship was towed into position. It had one mission, to destory starfleet bases and test starfleet combat willingness. No wrap drive needed.
Ah, the ol' cloaking field ripple. Old star trek video games such as Starfleet Academy and Judgement Rites had it entirely possible to play cat and mouse with cloaked ships because of it. Best part is that depending on the game, it could work both ways. Nothing quite like having a Klingon battleship unleash hell unto your cloaked Romulan bop because you made the mistake of flying between your opponent and the planet it was facing. No skill unlocks or special scanners. Just, oh hey, did that start just shimmer. Fiyah everything!!
i always figure that thier experimental weapon draw so much power that thier couldnt have both active at the same time. or that the weapon draws so much power that thier need extra power generation and it would be tucked by a diffrent ship to it target.
Regardless of the later explanation for the "lack of a warp drive", this seems to have been a classic error in spaceflight sci-fi: forgetting how big space really is. Otherwise, even the crew of the Enterprise would have questioned how the ship made it to all the Federation outposts without warp. Either they were wrong in their assessment of the warp capabilities, or there was another ship nearby capable of towing the prototype vessel, without being detected, all the way to the vicinity of each Federation outpost.
Yeah so the romulans aka the second most uptight race is the only one doing hotrod paint jobs? No nose art on ships, i mean the klingons seem like a group that would put their planets version of a shark on the nose of a bird of prey
Adding the Romulan's reverse engineering Federation Tech NOT a good idea?!?! It would establish the overall "evilness" of the race, it would boost the reputation of the Federation as a tech leader and superior to the Romulans, it could be the basis for future episodes involving Romulan spies, Federation counter-intelligence, etc. This is one aspect of TOG that TNG improved upon; Continuity of storyline, foreshadowing, and general quality of episodes and multi-episode/series arcs. I suppose, this this in mind, it would have been better to keep out as it would have been 'too sophisticated', for lack of a better phrase, for TOG given the show's design and goals at the time "satisfying the audience's interest in all things Space." While people were tuning in thanks to the Cold War and Kennedy's push to fight the USSR in a "space race", TOG's audience was largely under-educated/ignorant to the finer points of science, technology, politics, etc.. This audience had only a generation ago, survived as the victors of WWII, lived under constant threat of nuclear annihilation, were nearing the peak of the Hippy Era, and in short, just didn't watch TOG for any of the reasons we do today. They just wanted a Space Show to escape from their own realities. Something that made them think too hard about or was 'too close to home' given the recency of WWII and being in the midst of the Commie Scourge, could have taken away viewers and negatively impacted ratings, which were not the greatest to begin with so I'm certain editorial eyes were watching carefully for sensitive material to ax if it meant staying on the air for more episodes and/or selling more laundry detergent or cigarettes.
I prefer the Starfleet Museum's explanation that when Scotty said the ship's drive was powered by 'simple impulse' he was referring to a fusion power derived warp drive which would definitely give it a lower warp speed compared to the Enterprise.
Yeah, it doesn't matter how you generate plasma, as long as it goes to warp coils in the end. I would also say that all of it's power generation was directed to impulse and it's plasma weapon. Later versions probably used the artificial black hole power source, and removed the plasma weapon. The ship in the show is a testbed...Romulan style. Send it to the front and see if it comes back.
That's a reach. The only time they mentioned impulse was when they were talking about the sublight drive.
@@LordTalaxexcept as we know Shuttles like the F class could also achieve warp speeds. Really BoT was so early on that much of the Rules we know are retroactive
@@LordTalax Really? The context was with regards to a question Kirk had about reasonable expectation of victory, with Scotty's answer focusing on the power of the ship being 'simple impulse.' Normally 'impulse power' is used with regards to the sublight engines, but it comes from a fusion reactor, which is where 'impulse power' as a term comes from. And it wasn't just restricted to the engines as it could be used to power or reinforce other systems (shields, tractor emitters, sensors). Impulse power has been referenced a few times (such as Wrath of Khan with regards to Reliant's repairs) as a power source. For ships like the Enterprise, it appears to function as the ship's main sublight power source, but can function as an auxiliary power source in the event that the warp core is inoperable (the drawback being it consumes fuel rapidly). if memory serves, the Enterprise-D had an incident once where its warp and impulse engines were disabled, but was still described as having 'impulse power.' Additionally, during the Motion Picture, Kirk ordered the use of Impulse Power at 'Warp 0.5', suggesting it can be used to generate a warp field.
The writers of Balance of Terror meant the Bird of Prey was powered by impulse engines only. Why is everybody trying to change that?
Fun fact: The actor who plays the commanding officer of the Romulan Bird of Prey in “Balance of Terror” was Mark Lenard who would later play the role of Sarek, Spock’s father. Confused the hell out of me as a kid lol.
He was also the Klingon commander encountering V-GER in the opening of the first movie.
@@deadon4847 Cool. I actually didn’t know that. I was always intrigued by how Star Trek “recycled” actors for different roles. For instance, David Warner, the guy who played the Terran ambassador to Nimbus III in Star Trek V was Chancellor Gorkon in Star Trek VI. It made it harder for me to suspend my disbelief whenever I noticed things like that.
@@Chris_Lohmann Warner was also Picard's Cardassian interrogator. Y'know, the guy who needed the good Captain's help counting lights.
@@Chris_Lohmann I remember my Dad pointed that out while I was watching that episode. My Dad just announced, 'That's Spock's Dad!'
@@Sasuke81a 😂 Sounds like something my dad would do.
"You and I are of a kind. In a different reality, I could have called you friend...We are creatures of duty, Captain. I have lived my life by it. Just one more duty to perform."-Romulan commander to Kirk
Balance of Terror still one of the best ST episode
Those words always bring tears to my eyes
The SNW take on it was ... an interesting concept. Poor execution, however. Balance of Terror will forever be one of the best Star Trek episodes.
That kind of sentiment towards the captain of an enemy vessel reminded me of the 1957 movie "The Enemy Below".
In Balance of Terror, the Bird of Prey lost to the Enterprise. One on one the T'liss is not that good. But in a wolf pack, the T'liss could be a terror. Imagine one ship anchors the Enterprise with a tractor beam. While the Enterprise tries to break free, two or three ships decloak and fire. Ouch. 3 ships firing at close range would be devastating.
Or they take turns declaring, firing and recloaking. Making it harder to track and predict or know how many enemy ships there even are.
The bird of prey came very close in destroying the Enterprise and would have if the romulan Commander didn't want to go home she had the Enterprise at her mercy that one mistake cost them a victory.
It wasn't a mistake so much as the Romulan captain was simply wrong in his assessment of how badly damaged the Enterprise was.
Returning home with all the data from the test/attack was of top priority over using up so much fuel finishing off an already crippled ship that they'd have to scuttle and suicide to avoid capture... or dying when life support ran out anyway.
It would only take a few hits from the plasma weapon.
I always thought the T'Liss and the B'rel should have been working as a wolf pack formation. Why else would you have such ships in active combat? On their own they're great for reconnaissance but outmatched in combat.
That plasma weapon was massively powerful. Far outclassed any phaser, disruptor, or torpedo in terms of power. A Constitution could only survive 2 or 3 hits at most.
I like the idea that each Bird of Prey has it's own raptor design painted on it.
Imagine the last thing survivors of an outpost attack saw before the BoP warped off was the painted livery; it’d give certain ships a “Red Baron” sort of intimidation factor!
Like a coat of Arms.
I like to think that the reason that ships of this ERA had a specific protective COATING almost all races would apply to Outer surfaces of ships that made them all look so clean and smooth. But deflectors got so much better that they stopped using it. But those surfaces being painted on allowed some races to get creative with the DECALS they could do on the ships. Like the pin stripes on some Federation ships and the Birds on the romulan ships. And later on when they did not need it anymore or they figured it was no necessary for the cost they all just dropped using it.
Like a anti beam coating for phasers/disruptors
@@Thundercracker87-b5f Yeah, it was just a type of tech that they did for a few years that made everything look clean. Like those pre WW1 warships that were painted white.
Man, I hated using that ship in Starfleet Command…the cloak was a huge resource hog, and the ship never had enough power even with it off. I suppose it was accurate to the lore, at least :)
nothing's changed, it's the same in STO. At least in the early levels, but even later, it can be hard to manage power. At least in that game, it's only shield power we have to sacrifice for cloak though.
I think that ship had warp drive, but it was powered by fusion reactors. That's why Scotty said "simple impulse"
This. He said impulse power or such, not "it has only impulse drive or impulse engine"
@@alexhurlbut What powers impulse?
@@SilverFox-qr1ciFusion reactor burning pellets of deuterium one by one rather than in a constant stream, hence the power output comes in impulses.
@@markfergerson2145 Early warp drives were fusion powered. They could attain low warp speeds. Sensors detect the fusion reactor and no other power sources therefore simple impulse.
Love the old Bird of Prey. Balance of Terror was my introduction to Star Trek when I was 6. Been hooked ever since.
My favorite non-Fedration ship from TOS.
Not really spoiled for choice. BoP, D7 and tholian web spinner every other ship is a glowing light.
Edit forgot doomsday machine.
Fun real life lore that affected in universe lore was the original model of this BOP was lost/destroyed in a fire which lead to the use of the D7 model in the episode The enterprise incident (which was ret-conned in the remastered effects of the TOS series). Which lead to the in universe cannon explanation of a brief tech alliance between the Klingon and Romulan empires swapping ship designs for cloaking. Which has been retconned with the Enterprise series when they had Klingon ships with cloaks and also added on this by the discovery series as well. In addition the BOP in ST III TSFS was originally intended to be of Romulan origin hence why it has such a noticeable raptor wing markings as it was to be a call back tribute livery design to this BOP as discussed in the video. As always I enjoy these content videos as you do a grate job in giving extra summarized lore information, even noting when things are ether ret-conned or beta cannon. Keep them coming.
The bird of pray used a large fusion engine. They used it to power the plasma weapon they used. This was pushing an easy(relatively speaking) warp system normally replaced with an antimatter system earlier on in most starfaring race. Antimatter escaped them until they traded for it with the klingons.
Back in Starfleet Command: Orion Pirates, i was a Romulan specialist and I used this very ship to great effect.
The trick with the plasma torpedo is to get your tractor beam locked on the enemy before firing.
Nice to see another Starfleet Command player! This ship was always too slow for my liking, but I admired players who knew how to use it.
That tactic is quite effective when running Wolf Packs!!! 🤠👍
Of all ships in Star Trek, the Romulian ones still are the stuff of nightmares. Remastered effects, CGI model or the original stage model - this design doesn't even look like it would be crewed by humanoids. It truly looks alien and yet plausible in Star Trek's framework.
"The Federation will never expect us! All we have to do is- uhh..."
"Sir?"
"Okay, don't panic, but someone *might* have stolen the Warp Drive."
"That...but...how?"
"I can't quite remember, but there's a non-zero chance something happened that involved Klingon Ale, an Orion dancer, and my missing ship keys."
"..."
I think you might have got it right.
Romulans don't get enough credit for manufacturing singularities.
I love how "bird-of-prey" became a defacto class of starship in Star Trek (presumably because of the borrowing incident in Wrath of Khan where Kruge's b-o-p was meant to be a stolen Romulan ship) such that Romulans and Klingons both have starship classes that fit this description, but Starfleet does not. What would a Starfleet bird of prey look like??
Since later shows have shown Birds of Prey in both Romulan and Klingon hands before that I think the best in universe explanation for the pair of rivals having the same name scheme is both having borrowed the concept in the pre-Federation (probably pre-2060s) period from another power in the region and evolved them in different directions.
A Federation BoP would probably look a lot like a smaller Norway Class kitted out with oversized phaser cannons and torpedoes compared to usual.
One could argue the Defiant is a star fleet take on the Bird of Prey style of ship
Search for Spock, but yeah I always loved that explanation. It gave a background that clearly showed Romulans and Klingons still hate each other. As for a Starfleet Bird of Prey, while Parasfarmer says the Defiant class, I agree, but considering the era it always comes off as more of a Starfleet Jem Hadar Bug Ship. Arguably the Miranda or perhaps the Saladin or Hermes classes. The thing is that the Bug Ship and Birds of Prey were all raiders, which is a ship class that Starfleet would never use. You could go with a scout class vessel, but any Starfleet science ship can serve a scout function. If you're looking for a fast light attack craft, then you could probably use a Nova class with the original Defiant project specs, namely a bow full of torpedo launchers. The only T'Liss contemporary ship Starfleet fielded that was that small is.....well....the Oberth. So just...no.
I remember staying up late at my aunts to catch the original Star Trek on some random channel. It is some good memories.
My thought for the whole warp anomaly was that the Romulans had a secret base on a nearby planet or moon, and it came from there.
My understanding from Scottie's statement was it was not Matter-Antimatter powered but Reactor powered warp system making it SUBSTANTIALLY Slower than the Enterprise!!! 🤠👍
Romulan ships are my favorite. They are what drew me to Star Trek.
Loved this ship I used my old DJI drone as the guts in flying model of this 3 feet wide balsa .The Nebula class is next.
5:18 A Quality of Mercy provided a good explanation for that "tracking sensors" thing: it's tracking gravitational microlensing! Microlensing is real-world science - we use it for detecting exoplanets. It is detectable as a tiny _change_ in a star's apparent position or magnitude. So it wouldn't let you see a ship just sitting there idly, but you would be able to see the stars change ever so slightly as it flew around.
It's one of my favourite examples of Trek recontextualising and explaining an earlier comment.
I've always wondered why Enterprise had to back away from the plasma torpedo instead of going over or under it .
I assumed it had tracking capabilites.
Probably the warp sheath containing it was drawn to the Enterprise’s warp core or nacelles.
I wonder if that qualifies it as a subspace weapon?
I was of the understanding that the plasma was expanding as it traveled until it extinguished itself!!! 🤠👍
From what I remember the plasma was fired at near point blank range which allowed the Enterprise to pull backwards at emergency warp and the plasma was caught in the warp bubble as they were at full warp yet it stuck with them inching closer until it hit.
@@markfergerson2145 Before the Khitomer Accords, not that the Romulans would necessarily care.
One of the biggest problems in trying to fit a lore around the Bird of Prey is that the whole story of "Balance of Terror" is based on a similar but not matching storyline. It is based on a naval vessel and a submarine, specifically a submarine that is going on battery power underwater. Just as a sub can't use diesel engines underwater, the BoP could not use warp engines while cloaked and thus you could mistakenly assume that it didn't have any. (As a side note, a cold start to a warp drive isn't an instant matter in the Enterprise either, I believe the first time Spock gave that solution that wound up with a minor time warp as a result - but I forget the exact episode when that happened.) This makes sense, the plasma needed for the nacelles was being used for the plasma weapon.
3:22 a ship can achive low warp with simple a large impulse powerplant.
Star Fleet Battle's Romulan Mauler & Star Trek the RPG Romulan Winged Defender were also both a certifiable hoot
_SFB's_ mauler device was, largely, an alternate explanation for what was already in game as the plasma torpedo.
My personal explanation of Mr Scott’s line about “simple impulse” is that he means the ship squirts something out the back. In physics that’s basically what impulse means. It’s likely the Bird of Prey, in line with later Romulan ships artificially reduces its mass to enable travel at superluminal speeds with a slight impulse from the engines. The Enterprise doesn’t do that to travel faster than light, it warps space-time.
I just watched Balance of Terror a few days ago! Thank you for all these fun videos on Trek lore. I quite enjoy them.
God be with you out there, everybody. ✝️ :)
I think the crew numbers are too high. 100 spread across three watches would be more likely. Warbirds biggest strength is that its small. Hence mass producible .Essentially its a Destroyer or Frigate. Taking on anything bigger than a Federation Light Cruiser would be suicidal for an individual ship. So deploying them as divisions would be best.
One of my favorite Trek ships, love the painting on it.
One of my favourite Star Trek ships
I remember Balance of Terror episode in TOS. Mark Leonard played as the Romulan commander too and my Dad pointed out that's Spock's Dad.
Plus this was the first time the Federation has seen the face of a Romulan too.
In the novel Sarek, Spock mentions that he was unsettled by how similar the Romulan commander looked to his father.
I thought that was a fun little nerdy joke.
The accepted fan theory is that Scotty said, 'Their power is simple impulse.' Scotty never says they have no warp drive only that their power system is the same as an impulse drive aka fusion only. Meaning the Romulan Bird of Prey did have warp drive, but not matter-antimatter based, rather a much simpler possibly cruder more primitive and mostly likely slower (based on how Scotty said it), fusion powered warp drive/main power system. With the Romulan Bird of Prey having a max speed of Warp 3 TOS scale, but could cruise at 2.2 for long periods to so as to not tax the drive system. This would make it just fast enough for its mission of attacking the Outpost and run back to Neutral Zone before Starfleet reinforcements could arrive. Its also suggested by fans that the reason for a fusion based warp drive is that the first true cloak (that apocrypha says is based on the Romulans crude understanding, even by the 24th century, of a Slaver personal cloak found in the only Stasis box found in Romulan territory), as all early devices were sensor blinding/ECM based and not a true invisibility to visual/sensors scanners. Was not powerful enough to hide a matter-antimatter warp reactor.
Strange New Worlds epo. says the motion tracker is picking up the dust and trace gases in the path of cloaked Romulan Bird of Prey being moved/compressed as it went by/through it. Which created motion Starfleet sensors were sophisticated enough to detect, something the Romulans didn't account for. Said disturbance wasn't localized so was only detectable in space of half a kilometer around the Romulan Bird of Prey. Which is why Kirks Enterprise had to bombard space with quick bursts of phaser fire (rather than sustained beams) within a half km box to try and hit the Romulan ship. Which is what we saw in the TOS epo. essentially smaller explosions, like depth charge blasts hit the Romulan ship with small energy impacts, so death by a thousand cuts.
Hi Rick!
My second favorite ship design next to the FASA games Loknar class... thanks and cheers.
I still like that design best.
In BoT the BOP is stated as operating at warp speeds even well cloaked . So another possibility that is backed canonically is that having FTL speed doesn’t mean it has a Warp core. Rather the statement may mean that the BOP is running on its fusion power system which means it’s not as fast or powerful as the Enterprise which had a matter antimatter reactor on top of its impulse fusion plants.
This said it was likely towed to the Neutral Zone as they are constantly worried about fuel.
Fascinating 🤔
I love the eagle design on the original Bird of Prey, which fits the name of a T.
One of my fav classes
Hello All.
Another lore video that would be interesting is something about the mangled Roman ideas used with the Romulans. Did the writers just know some words like praetor and centurion and went with it, or was it more intentional? I think there's been mention of an emperor, but no consuls. Also only the one praetor. Etc.
Thanks for sharing this info on the original Bird of Prey. It's always nice to learn more about the Star Trek Universe.
The ship that gave us one of the best TOS episode.
🖖😎👍Very totally very cool and very nicely greatly wonderfully well done and very nicely informatively explained and executed in every detail way shape and format provided on the "Romulan Bird of Prey" known as the T'Liss class, And I myself have always loved this design and own quite a few of these in various different scales and sizes in plastic,resin and Die-cast Models and soforth, Any ways a job very fabulously well done indeed Sir!👌.
My theory is that Impulse Drive was believed to be faster than we know it to be today. Like it takes 2-4 weeks at Impulse to reach some planet within range. Otherwise, the "no warp drive" falls apart when you consider it flying around destroying the listening outposts. That's at least my theory here but I think the whole thing is analyzing too deeply a throw-away line.
This is easily one of the most iconic ships that isn't the Enterprise or a Klingon Battlecruiser.
It has a such a simple and elegant design, a fairly sleek and compact warship that would later go on to inspire ships like the fan-favorite Defiant.
I would point out that early TOS came off like it was treating Impulse as an FTL drive just considerably slower than Warp drive.
One of my favorite designs, so stark and simple, it's delicious.
Hm, that's bigger than I thought. From _Balance of Terror_ I always thought it was crewed by maybe 12 people at most. Like one of those really tiny early submarines, or a big runabout. But nearing 200 is actually pretty sizeable, like some of the Constitution-class's smaller mid-size Starfleet contemporaries.
It's very much the Ford Escort of the Romulan Empire.
This is still my favorite Romulan ship.
I always preferred the theory that this was the first Romulan ship with singularity drive, and the Enterprise thought it incapable of warp drive for the simple fact that they could not recognize and identify it.
I mean watching the early episodes of the first series of Star Trek is like watching a different series. The ‘Federation’ doesn’t exist yet, you have to radio orders to the fire the phasers and the ship’s chapel is a community focal point.
But still the story sets up with enough lore so you know that these Space Roman Dark-Elves like to use MAD and asymmetric space-submarine warfare.
I'll have to watch "Balance of Terror" again. So I'm working from memory here. There have been many complicated explanations of this "Bird of Prey" for myself. I prefer a much simpler one. Spock remarks he could not detect warp drive technology. To me, this does not mean it was sub light only. The Romulans are supposed to be mysterious, a now unknown entity. So it could turn out they developed a faster than light technology not based on warp theory such as jump drive, Stargates, etc. They technology may not be as fast or maybe not as efficient. Even the ships of the first Romulan War needed to be faster than light, given the position of the agreed boarder. Given the secretive nature of the Romulans, I don't think they would risk giving away leading technology, so even the cloaking device would be of an older type. The Romulans have estimated the technological advancement, and this is them forcing the Federation to show their hand and confirm their estimations. So, if caught, it was not coming back. Allowing the Romulans to claim a rogue for element. This, to me, fits better with the mysterious adversary plot of this episode.
do some vulcan ships, B'joran or some other lesser known race
You left out the SFU fed reporting names: Warbird (no tactical warp) and War Eagle (tactical warp capable).
Note that the SFU takes the impulse speed mentioned in TOS S1 E1 WNMHGB to allow speeds of up to about warp 3 on impulse drives alone.
I think that the initial ship encountered by James Kirk was a "quickly" assembled prototype and therefore expendable, "a let's throw it out there and see if it gets lucky starship".
I had a question kind of related to this that I'd wondered for decades. I had been fascinated with the plasma torpedo that this ship possessed in TOS and had wondered where it had gone in canon prior to Enterprise. I had always wondered, considering the old canon that the Klingon Bird of Prey was Romulan in origin (which I really liked), if the unnamed energy weapon the Klingon BoP possessed in Star Trek III and V (in the place that would later house a standard photon torpedo launcher) was supposed to be a variant of the plasma torpedo? Is there any indication, published or not, that this was true or intended to be true?
I have never seen any canon info addressing this. I would assume it is just a standarrd KPT and looks different only due to the limited SFX of the time.
@@joerussell9574 KPT? Klingon photon torpedo?
Now that you mention it Kruge's Bird of Prey Torpedo launcher looks much more plasma-ey in execution and effect than any Photon Torpedo. The spinning apparatus wouldn't permit a physical photon torpedo to emerge, but it could be like a rotor in an alternator building the plasma charge before releasing it. When it hit the Enterprise it overloaded everything and had plasma arcs all over the saucer section.
As opposed to Chang's Bird of Prey which had a clearly normal photon torpedo launcher (a necessity for the central plot of the Bird of Prey imitating and framing the Enterprise) with a visible torpedo tube, and a completely different torpedo impact blowing holes in the Enterprise's saucer.
I also wouldn't assign the torpedo effect in Star Trek III as an effects limitation as Photon Torpedoes both Starfleet and Klingon were fully established and consistent between TMP and Wrath of Khan.
@@3Rayfire See that's pretty much exactly what I thought. While the bolt of energy wasn't colored the same as the plasma torpedo in TOS it felt very similar in looks aside from that.
And, like you stated, the photon torpedo special effect was not only used in the first two films but also in STIII so if anything it would likely be more expensive to create a new SFX for the BoP's weapon than simply reusing the normal torpedo look from II and III.
@@crosana01 Yes :).
Thanks for sharing 👍
'Warp or not?' The line from the Enterprise briefing scene was about *power* generation, where it apparently had 'simple impulse'. Kirk replying to this by saying 'So we can *outrun them?*' would *seem to imply* the ship had no warp capability, but this is honestly nonsensical given that later in the very same episode the Romulan Birb of Prey shot at the Enterprise with its plasma torpedo - and the Enterprise *even at warp speed* was in danger of being overrun by it. Meaning it HAD to have been fired at warp and from a ship at warp, from everything we know about torpedoes in Star Trek. Not to mention the fact the subspace monitoring stations were in interstellar space and could only be reached by a warp capable ship. And finally, the ship literally has warp nacelles.
So how can we reconcile this with the briefing scene? Two ways IMO: strict interpretation of the line was about power generation, so saying it had 'simple impulse' is another way of saying it had fusion power only, so the Enterprise still had the qualitative edge which preserves the point of the dialogue that the Enterprise wasn't completely outclassed. This is very clunky imo because of the line Kirk says in reply to it specifically referring to speed and because impulse had at that point of the show been established as the sublight manoeuvre drive for the Enterprise, but it's passable and used to be how I reconciled it.
The second way is an amalgamation of what you point out in your speculation and I think it's the most reasonable idea: they had a warp drive, it was running on singularity drive tech instead, this tech was chosen specifically for its low-emissions nature thus would benefit it for its cloaking device, and because it was unfamiliar with the Enterprise they didn't detect conventiona matter/antimatter emissions, and it would still be a power hungry or fuel intensive system to reconcile with later developments in the episode (when the Romulan Commander bemoans that they've expended their fuel in their battle with the Enterprise). Anyway good video!
The Romulans decorated their ships in that way as they were influenced by ancient broadcasts of obscure Disney movie 'Condorman'
Looking forward to a t'Liss refit vid 👀
That would be too cool. :D
I always thought that the roluman ship was towed into position. It had one mission, to destory starfleet bases and test starfleet combat willingness. No wrap drive needed.
I like it.very practical
Ah, the ol' cloaking field ripple. Old star trek video games such as Starfleet Academy and Judgement Rites had it entirely possible to play cat and mouse with cloaked ships because of it. Best part is that depending on the game, it could work both ways. Nothing quite like having a Klingon battleship unleash hell unto your cloaked Romulan bop because you made the mistake of flying between your opponent and the planet it was facing. No skill unlocks or special scanners. Just, oh hey, did that start just shimmer. Fiyah everything!!
Romulan commander coldly: I invite you the meet the T'liss. Learn to fear it.
Smarmy Startfleet Capt.: I invite you T'liss m'balls.
My favorite non Federation ship!
One of these, a case of Romulan ale and we'd have a good old time..
Yeah, it's basically a constellation class with the saucer and drive sections combined into one piece.
V-8? Are we saying that the last thought through the Romulan Commander's head was "I coulda had a V-8?"
i always figure that thier experimental weapon draw so much power that thier couldnt have both active at the same time. or that the weapon draws so much power that thier need extra power generation and it would be tucked by a diffrent ship to it target.
Regardless of the later explanation for the "lack of a warp drive", this seems to have been a classic error in spaceflight sci-fi: forgetting how big space really is. Otherwise, even the crew of the Enterprise would have questioned how the ship made it to all the Federation outposts without warp. Either they were wrong in their assessment of the warp capabilities, or there was another ship nearby capable of towing the prototype vessel, without being detected, all the way to the vicinity of each Federation outpost.
Please consider going to nexus and downloading the mod to disable the in game engine and nacelle trails.
Ah the Enterprise G killer, no need for a scimitar
Who are you NOW Rick?
Yeah so the romulans aka the second most uptight race is the only one doing hotrod paint jobs? No nose art on ships, i mean the klingons seem like a group that would put their planets version of a shark on the nose of a bird of prey
I’d love to see a Star Trek tv series showing the views from other races apart from those ufp members.
🖖
Straight away, a ship in the purple void.
“Hello, Mr All! I’m one of your viewers lucky enough to be named Ric! :D “
So why is one wing red and the other gold/yellow?
We are all, Rick.
I'm not one to contradict Rick, but where is "T'liss" named in canon?
He said beta canon.
Hello Rick, all here
👍
*_Definitely_* reverse engineered Star Fleet tech...well...in my head canon, anyway...
Third!
Adding the Romulan's reverse engineering Federation Tech NOT a good idea?!?!
It would establish the overall "evilness" of the race, it would boost the reputation of the Federation as a tech leader and superior to the Romulans, it could be the basis for future episodes involving Romulan spies, Federation counter-intelligence, etc.
This is one aspect of TOG that TNG improved upon; Continuity of storyline, foreshadowing, and general quality of episodes and multi-episode/series arcs.
I suppose, this this in mind, it would have been better to keep out as it would have been 'too sophisticated', for lack of a better phrase, for TOG given the show's design and goals at the time "satisfying the audience's interest in all things Space." While people were tuning in thanks to the Cold War and Kennedy's push to fight the USSR in a "space race", TOG's audience was largely under-educated/ignorant to the finer points of science, technology, politics, etc.. This audience had only a generation ago, survived as the victors of WWII, lived under constant threat of nuclear annihilation, were nearing the peak of the Hippy Era, and in short, just didn't watch TOG for any of the reasons we do today. They just wanted a Space Show to escape from their own realities. Something that made them think too hard about or was 'too close to home' given the recency of WWII and being in the midst of the Commie Scourge, could have taken away viewers and negatively impacted ratings, which were not the greatest to begin with so I'm certain editorial eyes were watching carefully for sensitive material to ax if it meant staying on the air for more episodes and/or selling more laundry detergent or cigarettes.
Right off the bat, a lil oopsie.
markiplier did the same thing with his intro.
671
Hello, er, you
I like the name "bird of prey"
But i feel like "Ass kicker 3000" would have been better......