General Empire vs Borg musings

[Solauren]

We also need to remember

1 the Borg have assimilated Cloaking Device using races (Romulans and Klingons and minimum),

2 Cloaking Technology is rare in Star Wars, anti-cloaking tech is as well (witness in the old EU how hard it was for them to find cloaked asteroids in 'The Last Command')

3 The Klingons at least can beam down from Cloaked Vessels (witness beaming down to, and up from, Romulus on several occasions during Unification Part 1 + 2, including after the Romulans want to capture everyone for screwing up their invasion plans).

Just fly a Cloaked Cube or two (or more) into Orbit of Alderran, and start beaming up citizens as they sleep.....

[Elheru Aran]

We also need to remember

1 the Borg have assimilated Cloaking Device using races (Romulans and Klingons and minimum),

2 Cloaking Technology is rare in Star Wars, anti-cloaking tech is as well (witness in the old EU how hard it was for them to find cloaked asteroids in 'The Last Command')

3 The Klingons at least can beam down from Cloaked Vessels (witness beaming down to, and up from, Romulus on several occasions during Unification Part 1 + 2, including after the Romulans want to capture everyone for screwing up their invasion plans).

Just fly a Cloaked Cube or two (or more) into Orbit of Alderran, and start beaming up citizens as they sleep.....

Question: When have the Borg ever demonstrated cloaked ships?

[Q99]

Btw, a bit on Borg numbers- They have, according to Chakotay, 'thousands of worlds, millions of ships.' So, my prior 'a million ships' may be lowballing.

Unimatrix 01 had one trillion Borg aboard. So population wise, they are quite impressive, and that supports the idea that they're largely non-planet based, their big population centers are in space, not worlds.

The biggest individual fleet of Borg ships we've seen is 312 ships (which got destroyed by 8472), so when push comes to shove they're quite capable of throwing that many into a single engagement, and I'd think even many Wars worlds with military garrisons would be in trouble there (not the really heavily defended worlds, but that could overwhelm a fair amount).

Most assimilation attempts we've seen involve one or two cubes- Arturis's species (the ones with the quantum slipstream drive) being the exception. 23 of their colony systems fell in a matter of hours, with 'hundreds of Cubes' converging on their home system, and four used to capture Arturis's ship. One of the few times I think we can safely say the Borg wanted their technology bad, and got it. Their sentry ships were reported to be 'no match' for this concentrated effort, and it also speaks to tactical coordination, hitting two dozen targets in short order.

Oh, another thing about Arturis's species/Species 116- they used Particle Synthesis technology (which is another quantum-tech, supposed to be somehow related to the slipstream), with which on his own he was able to re-shape his ship to the point that it could fool Federation sensors into thinking it was Federation tech at close range (and 8472 also used Particle Synthesis to make their fake Federation base). The Borg have this technology. So that's another industrial tool in their toolbox, one even more sophisticated and precise than replicators.

Question: When have the Borg ever demonstrated cloaked ships?

We have not*, it doesn't seem their style (perhaps it's just not efficient with ships that have power readings as large as Cubes?).

Though, on the flip side... there were no reports or evidence of what killed the neutral zone colonies. So a somewhat stealthy approach isn't completely out of the question. Even Federation ships can hide themselves some extent, the Ent-Nil could prevent itself from being noticed in Earth's orbit.

*Well, Star Trek Online. But that's non-canon of course.

[Batman]

The E-Nil was hiding from 1960s era sensor technology. Modern day Earth could probably do that.

And the Neutral Zone colonies not sending out a report is hardly conclusive evidence the Borg used cloaks (not that you said they did). You'd think they'd report they're under attack regardless of whether they can see their attacker or not.
Besides, all that was before they knew about the Borg. Since the basic TNG Federation approach to anything unknown is to take a closer look at it, it's entirely possible those outposts DID see the Borg coming but, not knowing they were the Borg and generally Not Nice People, didn't bother to report it until it was too late.

[Q99]

The E-Nil was hiding from 1960s era sensor technology. Modern day Earth could probably do that.

There is the mark 1 eyeball and telescopes- we couldn't do that with an object a fraction of the size.

It's not some high-end feat, but just saying, some level of stealth technology is taken for granted.

And the Neutral Zone colonies not sending out a report is hardly conclusive evidence the Borg used cloaks (not that you said they did). You'd think they'd report they're under attack regardless of whether they can see their attacker or not.

If it's a cloak, they could be taken out in the first volley with no chance to report. If they're being blown up, they can often simply lack the opportunity.

The most likely other alternative is jamming- they saw what was coming but were unable to report. I view this one as very likely.

Hm... I wonder if it has to do with Borg methodology and desire to gain information- that is to say, they'd rather run with sensors hot to gain maximum information themselves, and thus put out detectable energy that renders a cloak useless, rather than rely on more passive sensors and have less info.

Besides, all that was before they knew about the Borg. Since the basic TNG Federation approach to anything unknown is to take a closer look at it, it's entirely possible those outposts DID see the Borg coming but, not knowing they were the Borg and generally Not Nice People, didn't bother to report it until it was too late.

Sure, but even then they're likely to send a message of a contact. Remember these aren't just random colonies, but outposts along the neutral zone where 'unknown contact' has a high probability of 'romulan ship,' and not just one opportunity but multiple (so it's even possible some were attacked after others went quiet, giving another reason to up alert). They'd also likely have higher grade sensors than normal since, again, Romulan.

And it's not just the Federation, but the Romulan outposts also failed to report anything beyond going silent (the Romulans were equally in the dark!), and for them an unknown contact is likely 'Federation ship,' 'rival faction romulan thing,' or 'presumed-hostile aliens because we're paranoid'. That both factions with different methodologies both failed to report on any of several lost outposts, each of whom due to their location would have more alert than normal and some level of defense, says something about the nature of the attack. It seems very likely that they were either unable to send a message or didn't even have an opportunity to.

[NecronLord]

I've got to say that in First Contact, the Borg would probably have used a cloaking device if they had one that could reliably defeat Federation sensor outposts.

[Solauren]

The Borg didn't need cloaking technology in First Contact. They nearly won without it.

In fact, if the Federation hadn't been preparing to fight the Dominion, and if the Enterprise-E hadn't showed up, the Borg probably would have won that fight.

[Q99]

For a bit of a loop- The reason the Federation had better ships to fight the Dominion is they were preparing the technologies against the Borg. The reason they had so many of them to fight the FC Cube was because they needed production against the Dominion.

Q's intervention/warning in Q Who was a huge lifesaver for the Fed a couple times over (and in Voyager, he says the Federation would've been assimilated without his help. Which I believe!).

I've got to say that in First Contact, the Borg would probably have used a cloaking device if they had one that could reliably defeat Federation sensor outposts.

Seems likely- We know the Federation had at least one major cloaking detection advancement in between, possibly more. The return of the Romulans (and possibly the unexplained-missing-outposts?) got them to step up their game.

Speaking of advancement, the Slipstream drive species was able to dodge and avoid the Borg for centuries (the Borg had been after them for some time), but right around the time of the shows the Borg had advanced enough that they had increasingly hard times running, and shortly before the 8472 war they were cornered (8472 bought them time... til that ended, and then in short order they did). So Borg capability has increased notably over time too- dunno if that was star drive, sensors, or what.

[Captain Seafort]

And the Neutral Zone colonies not sending out a report is hardly conclusive evidence the Borg used cloaks (not that you said they did). You'd think they'd report they're under attack regardless of whether they can see their attacker or not.

Besides, all that was before they knew about the Borg. Since the basic TNG Federation approach to anything unknown is to take a closer look at it, it's entirely possible those outposts DID see the Borg coming but, not knowing they were the Borg and generally Not Nice People, didn't bother to report it until it was too late.

The Neutral Zone outposts really don't have a good record when it comes to reporting being attacked - most of the them just went quiet rather than screaming for help in Balance of Terror as well. Rather worrying behaviour for a tripwire.

[DarthPooky]

I'd like to point out that with regards to the fighter issue that the Borg have shown some abysmal accuracy. The first to come to mind is in ''Best of both worlds'' hear look at 1:02 of the video.

Hear at 2:10 several shots miss the defiant.

So I think a much smaller and maneuverable fighter would do allot better at avoiding and dodging borg weapons.

As for the frequencies thing though the Borg may use different method's for adapting to frequencies it is still just that adapting to the enemy's weapons frequencies and since Wars weapons don't use frequencies there still wont be adapting the way they do with federation weapons with the lighter ship mounted Wars weapons.

Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't there dialogue mentioning torpedo frequencies?

[Q99]

I do note that in all cases those are the heavy cutting beams.

At 3:47 of the second video it fires several projectile shots that hit dead-on (on ships that look to me like they've lost shields), these are the same weapons that are used to kill the three jupiter defense units in rapid succession. Those would be fighter-killers.

As for the frequencies thing though the Borg may use different method's for adapting to frequencies it is still just that adapting to the enemy's weapons frequencies and since Wars weapons don't use frequencies there still wont be adapting the way they do with federation weapons with the lighter ship mounted Wars weapons.

I think a lot of people have the frequency thing exactly backwards.

A narrow-band frequency weapon can change it's frequency to get around current adaptations to it because changing the frequency alters the characteristics of the weapon and the best adaptation to it.

A non-narrow band frequency weapon like an explosion or the output of a star, once they're adapted to it, they're adapted and it's not going to be changing (there may be some leakage through the adaptation but they can certainly adapt to said weapons). A torpedo is an explosion of anti-matter, one may be able to alter the frequency of the shielding on a torpedo can hardly alter the basic makeup of what comes out of an anti-matter bomb.

Borg have explicitly adapted to weapons where they can't pin down the frequency by using alternate adaptations like shield geometry as well.

Being able to alter frequencies or other characteristics of a weapon is an advantage. The idea that they cannot adapt to weapons without frequency is fanon that is inconsistent with what's on screen. A broad spectrum weapon may have the potential for leakage, but it also lacks the potential to get through in a non-adapted-to-form.

[Lord Insanity]

You can whine about the Roman versus Modern day analogy all you want it doesn't make it any less true.

I'll toss that back at you. You're not defending your analogy by responding to criticisms, you're just complaining that we're not accepting it even when it doesn't fit.

And now you're trying to throw insults because you can't respond to the presented arguments.

No your just blithely ignoring the facts. Once again read the main pages this forum is attached to.

Just for fun lets pretend the Borg fleet has no smaller ships and is actually 10 million cubes. That would be a total volume of 2.7E17 m3. The Empire constructed the second death star, in secret, to about 60% complete in about 6 months. That would be a total volume of about 22.8E16 m3 or about 84% of the sum total of our pretend Borg fleet. So in less than a year the Empire can build the equivalent of the entire Borg fleet in secret. (Meaning with such a tiny fraction of the their industrial capacity that no one notices it is missing.) Romans versus modern day.

An "unarmed" Wars planet is highly militarized by Trek standards. (People don't seriously think Alderaan was literally completely unarmed when we clearly see the princess flying around in an armed corvette do they?)

As has been covered, really not. Naboo's defense forces are not very impressive by trek standards. Bajor is a high defense system by Trek standards with DS9, it's Runabouts, and the Defiant, which are a heck of a lot more forces than the light defenses of minor Wars

Amidala's personal yacht has peak shield heat dissipation of 2 billion GW. The Ent-D has a peak shield heat dissipation of 3311 GW. An unarmed planet by Wars standards is a ridiculously tough nut by Trek standards.

The first time the Ent-D encountered a Cube it blew massive craters in a cube. Any Wars ship or ships in the same ballpark as Slave I (like a squadron of Naboo fighters) could do the same thing on raw power alone.

Wars guns don't cause explosions near that big when they hit the ground or other unshielded object. Do you think that Borg ships are some sort of tinder that will expand the size of explosion caused by hits? Because they won't.

That is, btw, an example of photon torpedoes blowing away, what, a half-a-kilometer of metal wide/deep/thick section? Ironically, you're citing a firepower example that disputes your views on Trek firepower, those were considerable explosions, and are considerably powerful even if we assume a cube is no tougher than loose soil- Not surprising, considering torpedoes are anti-matter bombs.

Also we have the 'hang out near the star' example. The energy there is also well in excess of what you think Trek ships put out/they can't handle.

They were firing phasers in that scene not torpedoes. That scene isn't showing how awesome the Ent-D's weapons are. It is showing that an unshielded cube is not any stronger than any other Trek ship.

Unlike the Ent-D, Wars is using a technology base that is completely alien to the Borg.

Once they assimilate people familiar with it, it's no more alien to them than it is to the people they assimilated.

You really don't seem to get assimilation. It involves people actually changing side and imparting their knowledge to the collective.

Way to completely ignore...

From one of the main pages: "...there are relatively tiny civilizations in the Delta Quadrant which have been successfully resisting Borg assimilation for decades, and in some cases, centuries. {The Hirogen, not to mention Arturis' people, who held off the Borg for centuries despite having only one star system (see "Hope and Fear").}"

Alan Dean Foster put the nails in the coffin.

Star Wars VII Novel wrote:
"No planetary defense system can be sustained at a constant rate. It would take too much power. Besides, it isn't necessary. All planetary shields have a fractional refresh. Instead of being constantly 'on,' they fluctuate at a predetermined rate. Keeps anything traveling less than lightspeed from getting through. Theoretically, a ship could get its nose in when a shield is off. Half a second later, the shield snaps back on and-well, it isn't good for anyone on that ship."

For planetary shields at least - Han's wording in the novel implies other types of shields exist but that running without fractional refresh takes too much power for a large shield like this - frequencies exist, and the whole bag of Star Trek tricks is on the table.

Then along comes Rogue One with an original style always on planetary shield.

I think a lot of people have the frequency thing exactly backwards.

Yes you do. Read the main pages.

[NecronLord]

With regard to why don't the borg cloak, it occurs to me from writing about borg FTL in the other thread that their ships emit 'transwarp signatures' that are detectable from light years distant.

It may be that having a transwarp drive - for the borg, not the Voth - is not something that they can conceal, due to the nature and strength of these emissions.

It is after all, bloody dumb to run with shields down if the enemy can tell where you are from five light years away, or track you three days after you pass.

Then along comes Rogue One with an original style always on planetary shield.

You fucking what mate? Are you saying that because you didn't see it blinking on and off it's not doing so?

How fucking ignorant are you? The fractional refresh rate isn't something *visible* particularly not at the 25-60 FPS rate of the cinema screen.

[Q99]

Oh, good point Necronlord! That'd leave them with the choice of Cloak vs Engines, and most of the time them naturally choosing engines.

Which still leaves the question of how they did get those stealth-colony kills. Jamming or simple speed and surprise, I suppose.

No your just blithely ignoring the facts. Once again read the main pages this forum is attached to.

Yeaa, that doesn't say anything about Trek being Romans who can't possibly learn SW tech even with SW people who know SW tech and yadda yadda. It does say that Star Wars is more advanced in a variety of ways- and I agree! Which is why, the crux of this discussion is about trying to gain Wars tech and infrastructure.

That 'it can't even be learned' thing, and 'Trek industry can't be used to make Wars stuff either directly or via making tools to create wars stuff,' is an assumption on your point and not supported or by what you linked.

A larger industrial base (and note, the Borg base, while not as large as the Imperial one to be sure, is far in excess of the Federation one in the comparison, by several orders of magnitude) is not the same as incomprehensible industrial tech, especially with transfer of experts, and says nothing about machine tooling.

They were firing phasers in that scene not torpedoes. That scene isn't showing how awesome the Ent-D's weapons are. It is showing that an unshielded cube is not any stronger than any other Trek ship.

You do realize ships are made of material and that if something is made of material, it takes energy to destroy that material, right? Also, furthermore, a concentrated attack may deliver it's energy to a limited space, and it won't destroy much outside that area.

Unshielded trek ships aren't exactly fragile- surviving falls from orbit and that kind of thing- but the point is, this is a 3x3x3km thing of metal and Wars small craft weapons simply do not cause sizable areas of destruction (seismic charges and the like excepted) as big as the Enterprise D's attacks there, even when they're shooting at things that aren't protected, so they are not going to have an easy time blowing up a Borg cube simply due to it's raw size alone, before one even gets into it being shielded and adapting to those blasters.

Yes you do. Read the main pages.

That's a page that says shields have frequencies and all that- which is both true and not an argument against what I'm saying (I mean, for one thing, Borg shields are visibly different in effect than Federation shields), in that weapons not having a narrow frequency is not the advantage against Borg adaptation many assume as we see the Borg shields work fine on stuff without a narrow frequency.

Heck, fair sections of that are pretty much exactly what I'm saying- "The knife cuts both ways. An attacker could penetrate a phase-coherent shield by matching frequencies and being 180 degrees out of phase."

Or in other words, the page you linked has a section saying that a specific frequency weapon could piece a shield where a weapon not tuned to a specific frequency wouldn't.

You're just pointing to arguments on the main page that happen to have the same words as mine even though they don't disagree with and even line up with my points. "Look at the main page" is, one, both pretty lazy if you can't quote what part you mean, and two, doesn't help if reading it reveals that the argument in the articles in question are either not on the subject to which you're trying to reply or in active agreement.

[Crazedwraith]

Then along comes Rogue One with an original style always on planetary shield.

You fucking what mate? Are you saying that because you didn't see it blinking on and off it's not doing so?

How fucking ignorant are you? The fractional refresh rate isn't something *visible* particularly not at the 25-60 FPS rate of the cinema screen.

The TFA Novel quote you put up seems to state it flips on and off every half a second. And that would be noticeable. But it seems an absurdly slow refresh to be literally true.

[NecronLord]

It's in speech, not prose description there. It's pretty clear that Han isn't fucking Commander Data, and isn't going to rattle off stats in conversation.

Reading critically is a life skill.

[Crazedwraith]

Hence why I said that's unlikely to be literally true.

[NecronLord]

I might have been a bit too cranky there, sorry Wraith.

I know that you aren't that dumb obviously. I am merely frustrated with this guy.

[Shroom Man 777]

Hurm... fractional refresh might be for planetary shields, not ship shields in combat... (maybe civilian ships just have fractional refresh while warships have "solid shield wall" capability) though I forgot what our recent conversations regarding SW shields netted...

AND while in "standby" the planetary shield might be on fractional refresh, in combat they might make it "solid" for the duration of the pew-pewing. The Han quote never said how long a solid shield can be sustained. So it might be a greater drain, but it'll just be over an hour or so. After the fighting's done, the fractional refresh power-saving mode can be resumed for the rest of the year.

I'm presuming the fractional refresh is some midway between "solid shields raised in combat" and "shields dropped when there's no shooting" as some measure of protection against surprise attacks and other threats, like unwanted infiltration, aside from the usual obviously-noticeable fleet of enemy warships coming in to break things.

[Crazedwraith]

I might have been a bit too cranky there, sorry Wraith.

No worries. I was a little vague about my point and who I was supporting.

[Q99]

I do assume that is for planetary only as well. Much higher power needs, and besides, on a planet, 'let a ship or such partway through and then cut it in half,' is acceptable, while that's completely unacceptable for a ship's shields.

[Eternal_Freedom]

I think people really overstate the hyperspace-jump-through-planet-shield thing. Let's be honest, it was done once, thirty years after the Empire was around, was apparently dreamed up by one smuggler, the details were told to only two other people, and it's very dangerous, as even with Han flying they still crash-landed. It is not a magic bullet to get around planet shields.

[The Romulan Republic]

For a pilot, its a very tricky maneuver to pull off. Han is an exceptional pilot with a lifetime of experience, and barely pulled it off. I expect a strong Force sensitive pilot could, and probably someone like Poe or Wedge with a good ship, but otherwise, it would be a long-shot.

But a transporter doesn't have to worry about crash-landings. Though as I noted above, sensor jamming is a concern still.

[Lord Revan]

Transporters are rather finicky peice of technology and there's been several times where they've been jammed or disrupted by rather "minor" things.

[Shroom Man 777]

And I'd presume that for all its super-awsumness Starkiller Base had lots of defects, with subsystems not up-to-par with classic Imperial tech. Just like everything else with the First Order...