Tech Understanding

[Admiral Felire]

DarkSilver posted

If they torture the Engineers onboard the ship, and have access to the Computer Cores, I imagine they'd be able to create a Warp Drive cira Cochrane-era within 5-15 years, with comprable TNG capable Warp Drives within a decade there after. With the constraints you placed the Imperial Ships already, given that in this scenario, thier trying to recreate the native drive systems, they would eventually have to replace thier tech, with the Fed/Klingon/Romulan variety, until the Alpha Quadrant infrastructure could be updated to support Imperial tech.

Thank you for the time scale. 5-15, plus decade is nothing in the timescales that they will be working with. So its definitly a possibility.

In addition, you mentioned that you would have to give up Impeiral tech until some time as they are able to update local technology. They are hidden within the fringes of the galaxy, officially unknown to the Alpha powers. AT their main base, they have the means to reproduce Imperial tech. Not as good, of course, as it would be at home, but none the less Imperial level. This is taking a while, its not instantaneous, but they do have people who understand the underlining basis of Imperial technology. All this means is that they won't have to give up Imperial tech.

See, the goal is to understand the tech of the Federation (and other local powers) so as to be able to counteract any such things they do. Eventually, when the Empire declares war this will help them immensly. In fact, they will no so much about the enemeis but the enemies won't know anything about them.

In the same vein, I have another question that you all may help me with (its to small for its own page). I was wondering if you would thing that they need to change their name. I mean they are offically the Galactic Empire. Their leader was given the posistion of Grand Moff by the Emperor before his death. Still, they only control one small system. To introduce themselves as the "Galactic Empire" is kinda overdoing it. Thus, should they change the name to something like Pendragon's Empire (the Grand Moff is named Pendragon), the Empire, or keep it as the Galactic Empire and fudge the fact that they don't actually have a galaxy.

Thanks for all replies, it has been very helpful and interesting.

[Stark]

You thank people for giving you a timeframe, even though that timeframe is totally groundless? Just an off-the-cuff pie-in-the-sky figure? Is that what you wanted? Christ.

[Admiral Felire]

You thank people for giving you a timeframe, even though that timeframe is totally groundless? Just an off-the-cuff pie-in-the-sky figure? Is that what you wanted? Christ.

No, I thanked him because he gave me ideas. If you notice I sent a message near the begining thanking people. Then the discussion got off somewhat, he brought it back and provided some information, and thus I thanked him again. The idea was useful and helpful, even though it might have been pulled out of his ass. It was polite.

Thank you for your opinion on the discussion in question, it was very helpful. As was your thoughts on the topic.

[Winston Blake]

In the same vein, I have another question that you all may help me with (its to small for its own page). I was wondering if you would thing that they need to change their name. I mean they are offically the Galactic Empire. Their leader was given the posistion of Grand Moff by the Emperor before his death. Still, they only control one small system. To introduce themselves as the "Galactic Empire" is kinda overdoing it. Thus, should they change the name to something like Pendragon's Empire (the Grand Moff is named Pendragon), the Empire, or keep it as the Galactic Empire and fudge the fact that they don't actually have a galaxy.

Once they establish a power base around a remote M-class planet i'd expect Pendragon would declare himself Emperor of New Coruscant (he's bound to be ambitious enough).

Here are some ideas for your fic:

I could see the group of ISDs capturing trek vessels in short skirmishes and gradually building up a fleet. Imperial engineers are put on a crash course in Trek-physics, taught by tortured prisoners.

When the hypermatter gauge is nearing the big E, they'd park the ISD fleet in orbit of the recently named New Coruscant and leave them there as a kind of command centre/base of operations. The captured ships have their shuttlebays filled with fighters/bombers/gunboats/etc and plunder convoys for supplies. When they become strong enough, they let everyone know that they were responsible for the recent mysterious attacks.

The Federation would probably try to negotiate a non-agression pact, while the Romulans and Klingons organise a covert strike force to retaliate now that they know where the pirates are coming from. They go in cloaked and approach New Coruscant, only to discover bizarre wedge-shaped behemoths in orbit, which open fire with strange green pulse weapons...

At some point the ISDs could use up their remaining fuel to suddenly jump in and devastate a huge combined fleet, or to BDZ one or more (capital?) planets.

[Myrmidon]

I would put warp drive, ST style shields and maybe phasers on the TIE fighters, but not the ISD's. As to obtaining larger warp ships to act as fleet auxiliaries, I would send my intelligence people into Federation space, sell some simple droid designs or something and just buy equipment and training courses for my men.

It might be much easier to buy ships from some local shipyard than to capture them intact. After all, it is the Empire, not a bunch of pirates. If they wanted native ships they would just issue contracts. If they need trained warp engineers, they could just just offer high pay and recruit some.

If not that, then surely the Ferengi would be glad to serve as go-betweens for equipment acquisitions until the time came to liquidate the partnership.

[Myrmidon]

Your biggest problem would be mutiny. Unless you had plenty of women with you there would be no way to keep all those horny Imperial Stormtroopers from deserting en mass to do terrible things to the Naughty Cheerleaders of Planet Nymphomania.

Now seeing something like that would REALLY scare the Federation.

[Jawawithagun]

Okay, change of plans everyone! Pack up!
Our new first base in this galaxy will be the planet Risa.

[Stark]

Isn't it contingent on what hypermatter IS? If its just exotic matter, then can't they just build a wacky machine to make more? They hardly need much; a single ISD tour of the Fed would be enough to ensure local support. I doubt ISDs carry such machines, but if its just 'take normal matter, do wierd-science x to it', then they should be able to produce some. I guess the limit would be indigenous fusion power to create hypermatter; but I hear SW drives can run slower to use less fuel.

[Winston Blake]

Isn't it contingent on what hypermatter IS? If its just exotic matter, then can't they just build a wacky machine to make more? They hardly need much; a single ISD tour of the Fed would be enough to ensure local support. I doubt ISDs carry such machines, but if its just 'take normal matter, do wierd-science x to it', then they should be able to produce some. I guess the limit would be indigenous fusion power to create hypermatter; but I hear SW drives can run slower to use less fuel.

Well Dr Saxton's description is

hypermatter, consisting of intrinsically faster-than-light subatomic particles, which must release all of their mass-energy as they accelerate towards infinite speed;

www.theforce.net/swtc/power.html

The 'intrinsically' part suggests to me that you can't just throw waste matter in and get hypermatter out. AFAIK no-one knows how hypermatter is produced or how difficult it is, it might even be harvested from natural phenomena (e.g. black hole jets??).

[jegs2]

According to what I can recall about hypermatter-based power generation, it is on an immensely grander scale than power generation capabilities in the Trek universe. If that is the case, would the stranded Imperials retain the giagantic edge they first enjoyed in shielding and weapontry? Seems to me that Trek universe power generation wouldn't be able to provide the necessary juice for MTLs, much less heavy turbolasers and the shields used on Imperial ships.

If that is the case, then I'd be one to paint those limitations into the scenario, depending first upon massive reconnaissance by the Imperials and relying on quick and very-targeted raids for garnering of critical Trek technology and/or personnel.

[Winston Blake]

According to what I can recall about hypermatter-based power generation, it is on an immensely grander scale than power generation capabilities in the Trek universe. If that is the case, would the stranded Imperials retain the giagantic edge they first enjoyed in shielding and weapontry? Seems to me that Trek universe power generation wouldn't be able to provide the necessary juice for MTLs, much less heavy turbolasers and the shields used on Imperial ships.

Yeah, I doubt a million garden-variety warp cores could even keep an ISD idling, much less fully power shields and weapons or make a hyperspace jump. If engaging a hyperdrive is remarkably huge in its power drain, then it would make sense to leave plenty of hypermatter in the tank for shields and weapons and downgrade to warp drive for FTL ASAP.

OTOH, this is an interesting way of limiting Imperial technology to 'even the playing field' for easier writing and perhaps even allows scenarios where Trek might win that are actually realistic.

[jegs2]

The impending tech limitations imposed on the Imperials by a lack of hypermatter in the ST universe would give them a measurable timetable, after which they would be hamstrung by the limitations of warp-based FTL and ST-universe power generation levels. That being the case, I would write into the scenario a massive reconnaissance effort by Imperial spies and "fifth-columnists," leaving Imperial operatives in all Alpha-Quadrant civilizations and empires. Use their limited time to map as much of the Milky Way galaxy possible, locate and identify the "Super Demigod races" discovered by the likes of Kirk centuries earlier (possibly infiltrating their civilizations as well); setting into motion a long-term goal of power consolidation by intrigue and political manipulation. Moreover, the Imperials should put one or two ISDs on ice, saving them for decisive operations based on that long-term timetable (assuming the stored hypermatter in the ships doesn't somehow degrade or "leak" over time).

[Admiral Felire]

All these restrictions would only be if they couldn't duplicate it or recreate hypermatter. It might not be that impossible for the engineers to manufacture a droid or a facility that would produce it. Remember, the galaxy has existed in a rough level of technology for some 25,000 years something like that would be routine technology. Somewhat advanced but not beyond the understanding of the engineers and techicians of the Imperial Fleet. I mean they might not understand the theoretical underpinings of hypermatter, but they might have an ability to create a facility that can harness it. It proably would be crude at first, but after a while they would be able to increase its production ability. Remember, one does not need to know what something is to be able to use it.

[Enola Straight]

Isn't it contingent on what hypermatter IS? If its just exotic matter, then can't they just build a wacky machine to make more? They hardly need much; a single ISD tour of the Fed would be enough to ensure local support. I doubt ISDs carry such machines, but if its just 'take normal matter, do wierd-science x to it', then they should be able to produce some. I guess the limit would be indigenous fusion power to create hypermatter; but I hear SW drives can run slower to use less fuel.

Well Dr Saxton's description is

hypermatter, consisting of intrinsically faster-than-light subatomic particles, which must release all of their mass-energy as they accelerate towards infinite speed;

www.theforce.net/swtc/power.html

The 'intrinsically' part suggests to me that you can't just throw waste matter in and get hypermatter out. AFAIK no-one knows how hypermatter is produced or how difficult it is, it might even be harvested from natural phenomena (e.g. black hole jets??).

How do you store particles of "matter" when those particles are intrinsically travelling faster than light?

I believe I have an explanation.

The Empire has spy probots which can orbit in hyperspace.
Simply reduce the orbital radius from a planetary distance to a subatomic one. Or even reduce the radius to zero, thus the superluminal particle has a hyperrelativistic spin.

[AdmiralKanos]

Okay, before you all start screeming troll. I have a question. But before I ask it I will need to explain a background a little.

A small group of Imperials have managed to make it into the Star Trek galaxy. They have all the time in the world as they can't go back home. They also have individuals trained in almost all scientific and engineering disciplines that can be learned in the military academy.

If their society is like ours, that does not give them a complete tech base. Our society is massively interdependent, and theirs would probably be even more so. However, they would have at least some grasp of the basic principles. For example, a modern navy technician is not going to know much about all of the technical details of refined metal casting processes (certainly not as much as an engineer with experience in the field), but he'll be able to cite a very superficial textbook description of what they are.

Okay, during their adventures exploring the galaxy they capture a Federation starship. Now, my question is: given some time and understanding could the Imperials manage to understand Warp technology and replicate it on their starships. I also would like to know how long this would take, roughly. I don't expect it to be quick because that would be simplistic, but I do think it would be possible.

This is a bit like asking whether it would be possible to mount a sail on an aircraft carrier. Sure it's possible, but how well would it work since the whole platform was never really designed for that kind of propulsion? Their biggest problem would be trying to figure out some way to "live off the land" with the reduced tech base of their new environment. Over a sufficiently long period of time, I expect that they would have to modify their equipment to run off locally available supplies, albeit at greatly reduced efficiency. Sort of like a group with modern automobiles and a reference library being thrust into a pre-industrial era; they would be able to maintain their vehicles for much longer than it takes to run out of fuel by scrounging up fuel replacements, but they wouldn't be able to keep them running forever. However, they would probably elevate the local understanding of science and technology considerably, if only by bringing so many proven new ideas to the table. Even many years later, their particular enclave would be far more advanced than other regions.

[Myrmidon]

Yeah, the human engineering staff would be stumped about a lot of things, but their R2 droids would know.

[Ghost Rider]

Just a wee bit of necronizing to stae the bloody obvious.

Locked.