Ground Weapon Yields: Always kT?

[Darth Garden Gnome]

AirBiscuit, it is best not to ask HOW it works; the fact that it does is what counts. You are free to speculate of course, but generally that leads to yelling and temper tantrums and, in general, fodder for the HoS.

Since we read quite clearly in the ICS that the yield of the missiles aboard the LAATs were 200 KT, we can't question that, there is nothing in the movie that directly contradicts it. True, there are no Hiroshima like explosions, but SW technology is like magic--we don't know how it works and we probably never will. I mean, look at hypermatter. How in the fuck would that ever work in RL?

[The Prime Necromancer]

And since when do field/repulsor effects appreciably effect the atmosphere?

Repulsors don't compress or blow air underneath vehicles; thermal detonators, which Connor proposed may be an application of the selfsame technology, effect nothing beyond the blast radius.

Repulsors are never seen to affect any kind of *solid* material either, let alone the material in the air.

As for thermal detonators, gee, I don't know. A weapon that disintegrates everything in the blast sphere, but just stops and doesn't hurt anything beyond it? You're right, it must be a DET weapon that violates CoE. Or, wait it could be an NDF reaction... but no, those stupid things are only reserved for Star Trek.

What the seismic charge planar waves are is immaterial; point was that it is possible to create highly-localized non-thermal high-energy detonations with SW technology?

First, there's at least one other person who disagrees with your assessment that it is "nonthermal".

Secondly, the planar waves are most definitely *not* immaterial. If they were, they would not have interacted with and destroyed the asteroids. Explain to me why they will interact with the molecules of the rock but they won't interact with molecules in the air, especially when we have never seen the weapon's use in an atmosphere.

AirBiscuit, it is best not to ask HOW it works; the fact that it does is what counts. You are free to speculate of course, but generally that leads to yelling and temper tantrums and, in general, fodder for the HoS.

Since we read quite clearly in the ICS that the yield of the missiles aboard the LAATs were 200 KT, we can't question that, there is nothing in the movie that directly contradicts it. True, there are no Hiroshima like explosions, but SW technology is like magic--we don't know how it works and we probably never will. I mean, look at hypermatter. How in the fuck would that ever work in RL?

The fact that there are no Hiroshima explosions contradicts it. If you're going to throw that away, basically the entire hypothesis is impossible to prove wrong using any measurements taken from the screen. Your comparison to hypermatter is flawed. While we're not sure how it works, we do know that it generates great power, because we've seen its affects, and these affects have been calced and their energy output decided from onscreen sources. These missiles are totally inconsistent with what a kT explosion should look like. Now, what's the more reasonable explanation, that they dialed the power down, or that Star Wars technology is "like magic". If you're going to take that route, I don't understand why SW shouldn't be tossed into the "we can't analyze it rationally" pile along with DBZ.

See that's my problem here. While we carefully and meticulously adhere to science when analyzing and calcing most sci-fi, when we get to SW we always seem to give it the benefit of the doubt, where other sci-fi would be dismissed or even ridiculed if the scene does not look exactly like science says it should. If I claimed that phasers worked by DET, but somehow "significantly reduce collateral damage" through unknown means, I'd be mocked mercilessly and rightly so. Yet you're essentially doing the same thing here, and I'm not seeing anybody descend upon you for perpetrating an affront against science.

[Illuminatus Primus]

Who the fuck cares about Hiroshima?

In order for that analysis to be worth diddly shit, you must prove that the aforementioned weapons dump kilotons of thermal energy into the immediate surroundings. I've shown several examples where weapons do not behave this way.

I'm waiting.

Thread on TDs

[Illuminatus Primus]

Repulsors are never seen to affect any kind of *solid* material either, let alone the material in the air.

Point made; it really doesn't matter what the seismic charge is. It appears to be somesort of confined explosion--akin to a thermal detonator, which slices shit up with little radiative energy or thermal release.

They can do this, and it does put out several gigatons. Canon.

As for thermal detonators, gee, I don't know. A weapon that disintegrates everything in the blast sphere, but just stops and doesn't hurt anything beyond it? You're right, it must be a DET weapon that violates CoE. Or, wait it could be an NDF reaction... but no, those stupid things are only reserved for Star Trek.

Shut the fuck up, asshole.

We already have canonical examples of contained detonations with little radiative effects with gigaton yields.

And if thermal detonators and seismic charges can contain and focus their detonations, why can't LAAT/i missile warheads.

Canon says that exotic, contained-detonation weapons can yield in the gigatons.

Official gives us other contained-detonation weapons, like thermal detonators.

Canon gives us 200 kiloton missiles.

It would appear a self-contained detonation with little radiative effects similar to canonical weapons would explain things cleanly. You're the one trying to contradict canon, so don't be an asshole.

First, there's at least one other person who disagrees with your assessment that it is "nonthermal".

Who cares? Not me. That person has not posted images showing the supposed glowing debris, nor have they crunched numbers from the heated debris to show that a proportional release from a weapon with eight orders of magnitude less firepower would create enough thermal release to have "Hiroshima"-like damage.

Secondly, the planar waves are most definitely *not* immaterial. If they were, they would not have interacted with and destroyed the asteroids.

im·ma·te·ri·al ( P ) Pronunciation Key (m-tîr-l)
adj.
Of no importance or relevance; inconsequential or irrelevant.
Having no material body or form.

(emphasis mine)

You knew what I meant, don't me a cunt.

Explain to me why they will interact with the molecules of the rock but they won't interact with molecules in the air, especially when we have never seen the weapon's use in an atmosphere.

The burden of proof is definitely on he trying to claim canon is wrong. None of you have quantified your intentionally vague claims of what things should look like.

That said, large thermal detonators are nuke-scale weapons, and create no atmospheric shock wave or thermal pulse; yet we do know that they obviously expend huge amount of energy into the target.

The fact that there are no Hiroshima explosions contradicts it. If you're going to throw that away, basically the entire hypothesis is impossible to prove wrong using any measurements taken from the screen. Your comparison to hypermatter is flawed. While we're not sure how it works, we do know that it generates great power, because we've seen its affects, and these affects have been calced and their energy output decided from onscreen sources. These missiles are totally inconsistent with what a kT explosion should look like. Now, what's the more reasonable explanation, that they dialed the power down, or that Star Wars technology is "like magic". If you're going to take that route, I don't understand why SW shouldn't be tossed into the "we can't analyze it rationally" pile along with DBZ.

Bullshit, you've never quantified why and how it should behave, even when shown canonical examples of focused weapons with little to no radiated energy.

Where's the energy go? I don't fucking know. The concept that Ender explored is that the yield is like the nuke-pumped laser, giving a yield on the nuke is what we're given, and it powers some technobabble reaction which focused the explosion and desintegrates the target.

Besides, how would Starship-grade armor like that on the Core Sphere be noticably damaged while we know from the AOTC ICS that hull cladding is impregnated with neutronium and can shrug off fusion explosions if the explosions were merely GJ range?

See that's my problem here. While we carefully and meticulously adhere to science when analyzing and calcing most sci-fi, when we get to SW we always seem to give it the benefit of the doubt, where other sci-fi would be dismissed or even ridiculed if the scene does not look exactly like science says it should. If I claimed that phasers worked by DET, but somehow "significantly reduce collateral damage" through unknown means, I'd be mocked mercilessly and rightly so. Yet you're essentially doing the same thing here, and I'm not seeing anybody descend upon you for perpetrating an affront against science.

Soapbox speeches annoy the piss out of me.

[The Silence and I]

How can the mechanism of energy delivery matter so much? If you pump 200 kt of K.E. into a stationary target, it will become heat, or mechanical work heat anyway. Can anyone find a flaw with this? To my knowledge this is a simple physics truth. The only way to allow such energies along with the visuals shown is to grant insane specific heats to Star Wars armor--not necessarily impossible... BUT, this does not appliy when 200 kt of energy (pick a form, I don't care!) hits the ground. If you strike the ground (or a Wheel Droid which falls to a few MJ-GJ beam) with that much energy you will get some truely spectacular effects--Hiroshima would have nothing on it man, nothing. That never happened not 200 kt.

I've a thought about seismic charges which I'll try out here; I am of the opinion they may be used to illustrate some concepts I hope are logical and could perhaps add to this debate. The interesting thing about the seismic charges is that they do business very differently from most weapons; they appear to be more like bladed weapons from our past! The planar shock-wave appears to act like a physical object. How much energy does it take to physically cut an object? If you apply a large force over a very small area you get a very large pressure, with which you can cut materials like an asteroid. So, non-thermally, how much energy need a seismic charge spend to simply cut a fine line through a large rock? Conceptual answer (I hope, correct me if you spot something ): Find a thickness for the shock wave other than 0, and choose a length along the leading edge, find how much pressure it takes to cut iron, use P=F/A to find the force, then multiply by distance traveled (i.e. the length of the asteroid) <Work=F*Distance> taking into account how wide the asteroid is. Obviously the thinner the planar-wave the less energy needed, and thus you've just cut a very large rock for relatively little energy. The only other thing is how the shockwave adds some K.E. to the two halves...they mosy off at a few meters/sec, this actually does most of the damage; as the wave passes it acts like a wedge on the target. Why this is cheaper energy-wise is it only takes mechanical work, and in such things you get more bang for the buck with mechanical energy than heat. So this is how Seismic charges non-thermally damage a target (but heat still happens, look for a few glowing rocks and you will find them. Give me the equipment and I'll post them IP, otherwise I can't do more than point you toward it)... if someone can show me how missiles with obvious fireball-explosions work the same way then they may have a point about the heat transfere thing, but there is still a problem with armor:
If the shockwave hits but does not cause damage, then the energy will still just become heat! Back to square one!

Edit: A thought on thermal detonators. How? It is theoretically possible to contain the energy, say in a force field, thus eliminating the shockwave and immediate collateral thermal effects. But it is generated by the device, which I assume is destroyed, so the field/whatever would drop and residue heat will escape. Unless the energy released by the detonator is put somewhere it will escape, you have to safely transfere it away. Is there anything in the literature that could explain this? I'm thinking this would require a device just as powerful as the destructive device itself to neutralize the effects of the later. This implies to me potential for a resuable warhead--if the detonator is not destroyed, and thus maintains its own field it could regain, in theory, all the energy it originally put out. However, if it is destroyed this cannot work. This could potentially be an ace in the hole IP, but I would like some info on its operation if it's not too much trouble.

[Illuminatus Primus]

Ok?

Are you saying thermal detonators do not exist, or do not have yields?

[Darth Wong]

How can the mechanism of energy delivery matter so much? If you pump 200 kt of K.E. into a stationary target, it will become heat, or mechanical work heat anyway. Can anyone find a flaw with this? To my knowledge this is a simple physics truth.

That depends on how entropic the process is. You could easily pump 200 kT of KE into a stationary object in such a way that it accelerates to high velocity rather than being destroyed.

The only way to allow such energies along with the visuals shown is to grant insane specific heats to Star Wars armor--not necessarily impossible... BUT, this does not appliy when 200 kt of energy (pick a form, I don't care!) hits the ground. If you strike the ground (or a Wheel Droid which falls to a few MJ-GJ beam) with that much energy you will get some truely spectacular effects--Hiroshima would have nothing on it man, nothing. That never happened not 200 kt.

Why is it assumed that these weapons were releasing that much energy? They have variable yields, rules of engagement which almost certainly prohibit the use of WMD close to a Geonosian city with civilians present, and variable loadouts on the LAAT missiles.

I've a thought about seismic charges which I'll try out here; I am of the opinion they may be used to illustrate some concepts I hope are logical and could perhaps add to this debate. The interesting thing about the seismic charges is that they do business very differently from most weapons; they appear to be more like bladed weapons from our past! The planar shock-wave appears to act like a physical object. How much energy does it take to physically cut an object? If you apply a large force over a very small area you get a very large pressure, with which you can cut materials like an asteroid. So, non-thermally, how much energy need a seismic charge spend to simply cut a fine line through a large rock? Conceptual answer (I hope, correct me if you spot something ): Find a thickness for the shock wave other than 0, and choose a length along the leading edge, find how much pressure it takes to cut iron, use P=F/A to find the force, then multiply by distance traveled (i.e. the length of the asteroid) <Work=F*Distance> taking into account how wide the asteroid is. Obviously the thinner the planar-wave the less energy needed, and thus you've just cut a very large rock for relatively little energy.

That might be true if it cut objects into two clean halves. However, it tends to cause a lot of pulverization and fragmentation, hence figures more suited to fragmentation are appropriate.

The only other thing is how the shockwave adds some K.E. to the two halves...they mosy off at a few meters/sec, this actually does most of the damage; as the wave passes it acts like a wedge on the target. Why this is cheaper energy-wise is it only takes mechanical work, and in such things you get more bang for the buck with mechanical energy than heat.

A few metres per second? Are you blind? You can see asteroids being shattered in such a manner that they largely disintegrate, with debris field expansion much greater than a few metres per second.

So this is how Seismic charges non-thermally damage a target (but heat still happens, look for a few glowing rocks and you will find them. Give me the equipment and I'll post them IP, otherwise I can't do more than point you toward it)... if someone can show me how missiles with obvious fireball-explosions work the same way then they may have a point about the heat transfere thing, but there is still a problem with armor:
If the shockwave hits but does not cause damage, then the energy will still just become heat! Back to square one!

You seem to have forgotten about the whole concept of reflection. Not to mention the fact that there is no such thing as a shockwave in vacuum.

Edit: A thought on thermal detonators. How? It is theoretically possible to contain the energy, say in a force field, thus eliminating the shockwave and immediate collateral thermal effects. But it is generated by the device, which I assume is destroyed, so the field/whatever would drop and residue heat will escape. Unless the energy released by the detonator is put somewhere it will escape, you have to safely transfere it away. Is there anything in the literature that could explain this? I'm thinking this would require a device just as powerful as the destructive device itself to neutralize the effects of the later. This implies to me potential for a resuable warhead--if the detonator is not destroyed, and thus maintains its own field it could regain, in theory, all the energy it originally put out. However, if it is destroyed this cannot work. This could potentially be an ace in the hole IP, but I would like some info on its operation if it's not too much trouble.

I find it highly doubtful that there is zero damage outside the perimeter.

[Illuminatus Primus]

I don't like it either, Mike. But apparently they desintegrate everything inside the blast radius and everything outside is untouched; no thermal pulse, shockwave, nada.

Thread on TDs

I argued that they were intended to be and I had always thought them to be fusion bombs-in-miniature, and regardless of what they are, the "no damage outside the fixed blast radius" claim was nonsensical. You can review the thoughts made on the nature of TDs in that thread.

[airBiscuit]

Who the fuck cares about Hiroshima?
In order for that analysis to be worth diddly shit, you must prove that the aforementioned weapons dump kilotons of thermal energy into the immediate surroundings. I've shown several examples where weapons do not behave this way.

When discussing explosive yield, you are dealing with a comparison of explosive energy. This is more mechanical than anything else. It has a lot to do with the rate of expansion at the time of explosion. It has little or nothing to do with thermal energy since that is simply a byproduct of the explosion. A device that just burns or irradiates won't have much of an explosive yield, but you could have a high pressure tank of non-combustible gas explode and you could measure an explosive yield. I believe the the Hiroshima bomb had an assessed yield based on the mechanical force of the weapon, not its thermal or irradiative effects.

So, if these Star Wars weapons are mostly thermal (and focussed), why aren't they measuring its effects in megawatts, megajoules, or BTU's?
The fact that kilotons is used to describe its effects suggests that there is a mechanical blast that applies force to the target. If you can manage to focus all of the blast energy in a narrow cone, you will invariably penetrate straight through the target and into the ground underneath it. The whole byproduct, even if there wasn't the fireball that we observe on screen, would be that the ground would shake violently in a wide radius. That excess energy has to go somewhere.

[Illuminatus Primus]

No it doesn't.

Megatons; kilotons; etc. are measurements of energy. A megaton is equal to ~4.19 x 10^15 J.

It implies nothing; Mike and others when remarking on the stupidity of the movie The Core remarked on the amount of gigatons necessary to overcome the angular momentum of the Earth's core.

[airBiscuit]

I don't like it either, Mike. But apparently they desintegrate everything inside the blast radius and everything outside is untouched; no thermal pulse, shockwave, nada.

I guess if the Essential Guide says that there is no damage outside of the radius, then we must figure out how that can be. If you are containing a destructive particle field in a 5 to 20 m radius, then when that field eventually dissipates, it seems that the destructive energy, in the form of heat or something else, must have a place to go. It must expand away in some form. Even if it scattered away as visible light, it would probably be so intense as to ignite nearby objects. Is it really possible to contain this kind of destructive force without a dissipating expansion resulting from it?

[Illuminatus Primus]

The explanation offered by Ender and Connor is that the "yield" of the weapon is from a fusion bomb that powers an apparently endothermic technobabble reaction that "desintegrates" matter with little excess energy or heat.

[Connor MacLeod]

However, I question just how often they use that ability, and if it is primarily for strategic, or for tactical purposes. In other words, are yields in the hundreds of kilotons necessary for the average SW combat operation?

Hundreds of kilotons? Not neccesarily. Kiloton range weaponry is mostly a province of starfighters, and are generally only used against hardened targets (the Hoth Shield Generator in TESB) or grrounded starships (LAATs and SPHA-Ts in AOTC, although the SPHA-T probably has a yield far greater htan kiloton range.) Most vehicle weapons (particuarily by referring to the AOTC ICS) are sub-kiloton - antipersonnel weapons for example have max outputs of only a few GJ. Hand blasters for the most part are MJ range weapons. You only need the big firepower for the heaviest ground vehicles (like AT-ATs), for fortifications (or grounded starships), or enemy fighters.

In particular, I would like someone to explain why the battlefield of Genosis was not reduced to a smouldering crater by the clash of the two armies. In that battle, missiles with yields of hundreds of kT were apparently used, but with no major affects. The Hiroshima bomb was only about 15 kT, yet it created 980 miles/hr winds at the hypocenter, and leveled nearly everything in a 1.5 mile radius. Now admittedly, the missiles used in SW are apparently focused explosives (how exactly would that work for a nuclear weapon, by the way?) but still, all that energy has to go somewhere.

It depend greatly on how the energy is delivered to and interacts with the target. A highly-concentrated beam of energy will differ from a bomb-like explosion. Delivering the energy in a single burst will differ from a more sustained delivery of energy. It can also depend on the kind of target - a bomb can transmit alot of its energy to the atmosphere and create fireballs, secondary radiation, shockwaves, etc... but it would not cause the same effects in a metal structure or in the ground. If yhou also used say, a cutting torch on that same metal structure, you could cut or damage either the ground or the metal structure, even if it survived a hit from a kiloton-range nuke (in this case its a matter of intensity)

Armor and/or shielding (either or both of which can be present on a SW structure or vehicle) can affect how energy interacts with the target (either by absorbing/storing the energgy, or absorbing it and reradiating it both over a larger surface area and at a controlled rate.)

For example, look at the AT-AT's guns in TESB, firing on the shield generator. It created a large explosion (several, so its not that the energy comes from just the generator) Same is trrue of the asteroid vaporizations in TESB. The bolts generally deliver their energy in a single, massive discharge, which results in an explosion (as I said, its not a bomb, but you can still cause things to "explode" violently - like if you convert target material to gas, for example, or if you shatter it violently enough.)

Now, contrast this with the LAAT's bubble turrets or the SPHA-T gun in TESB. The former is usually seen slicing through battle droids with a sustained beam (which means it can be firing at both a lower output, as well as "cutting" a line through teh ground where it contacts rather than blowing big holes in the ground. Subjectively, it does not appear to be "vaporizing" anything - it looks to be melting its way through, which is not going to neccesarily result in an "explosion."

As for the LAAT's missiles... remember that not all missiles are neccesarily the same, and we know from the ICS that they have varied yields and types of missiles (and we even see in the movie that the LAAT's have a cylinder-type launcher system, so they can conceivably carry different kinds of missiles) And they are highly focused explosives (into a two degree cone, whcih is VERY concentrated) - much like a shaped-charge (which incidentally also illustrates the point - most of a shaped-charrge's explosive forcec is concentrated into a single point, so it would also lack the effects of a more conventional explosion.)

[Connor MacLeod]

Well, yes it is. But that was kind of my point. My question was are 200 kT missiles (like those that the ICS says are on the LAAT) tactical or strategic weapons?

Actually, they're 100 kiloton, and thats only one kind of weapon (they carry different kinds of warheads)

Is that kind of energy used often in SW because it is necessary to defeat armor?

Depends on the target. It would obviously be overkill against a battle droid (since they can be blasted apart by the clonetrooper rifles and antipersonnel blasters on vehicles), but against something like a small starship hull, a shield generator, a starfighter, or an AT-AT, it can be quite neccessary.

And if it is, why aren't these missiles also causing massive damage to the surrounding troops and terrain, because a 200 kT missile is not going to deliver all of its energy into the target at 100% efficiency; some is going to be radiated away as waste heat, and the waste heat of a weapon of that scale could very easily approach Hiroshima levels.

As I said before, it depends alot on how the energy is delivered. A standard explosion will depositing its energy into its surrounding enviroment (not just the target or targets) - it interacts with the atmosphere, the ground, etc., which leads to the fireballs and shockwaves we associate with them. A shaped chage (or a plasma torch) by contrast does not do this - its energy is concentrated into a smaller area, meaning it does not interact quite to the same extent, even if it involves the same amount of energy. This is further complicated by how quickly the energy is delivered and the target type: Melting something will not neccearily cause it to "explode", but a rapid vaporization can be quite violent.

As another example, think of the lightsaber in TPM: By what we saw, ,it carries hundreds of MJ worth of energy, which is equivalent to at least approximately 50 pounds of TNT You would notice if 50 pounds of TNT went off next to you, but things are not blown violently apart when a lightsaber contacts them. There is nothing odd about this at all (the same thing is true of the aforementioned plasma torch.)

[Connor MacLeod]

WRT missiles: We never saw them used against anything other then starships. <snip> So that explaisnthe missiles.

The LAATs also used missiles against the wheel droids. This had the effect of blowing the wheel droids apart with only slightly more explosive force than when Jedi blow battle droids apart with Force-pushing/lightsaber strikes -- not with any amount of violence that one would expect from kiloton-range weapons. Any thoughts on that?

1.) There were alot of gunships available. Its kind of hard to think that they'd all be armed exactly the same way (especially sincee they have variable warhead types). It makes sense for some to be specialized for heavy strikes, ,and others for antipersonnel use.

2.) Even then, we also saw in the movie that the missile launchers had rotating cylinders holding the missiles. This would allow for variable loadouts (you could carry both antipersonnel and anti-ship missiles and simply switch to what was needed.)

[Connor MacLeod]

If you watch the seimic charge scene you may notice there is some thermal effect. Pay careful attention to the close-up of the destruction of the large 'roid, there are a few reddened rock fragments, i.e. glowing (This is what convinced me these were not dirty ice of some other wimpy material).

According to the various AOTC sources as I recall, the rocks in orbit around Geonosis were mostly metlalic - the Geonosians mined them for use in their factories.

I think it is safe to say that regardless of transfere mechanism waste heat will happen. If you apply 200 kt of K.E. to an armored target it can only become heat and mechanical work, which will become heat anyway: energy must be conserved, if K.E. is added to a stationary target what will happen? Will it randomly chose a vector and fly off at great speed? It can't do that--the energy will become heat or, if the armor fails, some will become work.

As said before, it depends on how that energy is transferred. Inertial dampers can involve accelerating people and things to hundreds or thousands of gees, but this would hardly incinerate or even badly burn a human now, will it (kinetic energy IIRC only will heat something via friction - or in other words, when there is resistance to the kinetic energy and some of that energy gets transferred to the target. I believe that you can lose energy in other forms - sound, etc. though as well.)

This means if you hit a tank with a 200 kt K.E. warhead, it may fail or it may not but either way the armor will heat up VERY significantly and will radiate like crazy, convect heat into the atmosphere, etc. Since we don't see this such energies were not used and may be strateigic only.

This depends on just how durable the materials are (density, specific heat, melting point, etc.) as well as the defensive properties of teh armor, whether or not shields are present or not, etc. But in general, the higher yield warheads tend to be used against the heaviest/most durable targets. (You owuldn't need/use a 100 kt missile against a scout walker, but an AT-AT would probably be a valid target.)

[Connor MacLeod]

I'll conceed that much. But what I really meant by my post was that surely the "blast effect" that comes from a seismic charge would interact with the atmosphere, causing a rapid change in pressure. Something similar should happen with the missiles.

The seismic charge is a highly focused planar effect (most likely forcefield, given the aforementioned minimal thermal effect) - it would indeed interact with the atmosphere, but such effect would be limited to mostly along the line of that plane, quite unlike how a spherical explosion interacts with the atmosphere (I also suspect the degree of heating would probably be different, since a seismic charge does not appear to use thermal effects as a primary damage mechanism.)

Also, the seismic charge is observed to be *very* different from anything else that has been seen before. What makes one think that this technology is the basis for *all* of their ground missile weapons?

Whose saying its the basis for all weapons? They can and probably do use all sorts of warhead types, but that doesnt mean all the warheads are goign to behave like a nuke just because the energy yield may be similar.

[Connor MacLeod]

Sounds to me like those kT yield values are pretty excessive. I am lost on the source of this information. What exactly did it say? I think if you compare the atomic bomb to these figures, you can see how ridiculous this would be, given what we observe in the movies.

An energy weapon does not neccesarily behave like an atomic bomb.

Even the large explosion of the Shield generator on Hoth had more to do with the generator itself, than the firepower that destroyed it. It was a secondary effect, and even that was not 200kT going off. That would have destroyed the Hoth base and the attacking Empire landing force in one swoop, I should think.

At-At Maximum firepower discussion

[Connor MacLeod]

I would have to say that on the battlefield that an adjustable yield would have had to be used, since the explosion radius in picture 44 (see previous post for link) goes not much further than the size of the wheel droids, which is, what? 10 to 20 meters wide? This is what I would expect to see from a conventional warhead, certainly not something in the kiloton range.

100 kilotons would be overkill against light support vehicles. Which is why I pointed out that they obviously carry a mixed payload (which is quite possible, given the way the missile launchers operate canonically) of antipersonnel and anti-ship weapons, aside from the fact that the gunships as a whole could have been outfitted for dedicated roles.

In any event, you're still ignoring the fact that the way in which energy is delivered affects what we see.

Is it possible that the kiloton value is not kilotons of dynamite, but some other material? Or is the ICS supposed to reflect values equivalent to our corner of the galaxy?

Equivalent.

Is it possible for a shaped-charge weapon, as this appears to be, to contain all of its penetrative energy into the target, and not kick up a huge blast radius (and I might add, a mushroom cloud)? Hiroshima was 15 KT, destroyed reinforced concrete buildings in a 500m raidus, and kicked up a mushroom cloud that could be seen from 80 KILOMETERS AWAY. Do we see that in AOTC?

Hiroshima's bomb was not a shaped charge nor an energy beam. Alot of the bomb's energy was depositied into the surrounding atmosphere (which was in fact one reason for its destructive effects - the blast wave and fireball.)

I can certainly understand how missiles of this size could *potentially* carry that kind of explosive power, but this falls more along the lines of strategic strikes and not the tactical battle we saw in AOTC. So I guess it remains to question whether these are variable-yield weapons.

They do have variable yields, yes. But I repeat that you are disregarding the fact that not all the ways energy can be transferred will create massive nuclear explosions.

[The Prime Necromancer]

Who the fuck cares about Hiroshima?

Anyone who cares about making their hypothesis fit the scene, rather than twisting the scene to fit their hypothesis, fucktard.

In order for that analysis to be worth diddly shit, you must prove that the aforementioned weapons dump kilotons of thermal energy into the immediate surroundings. I've shown several examples where weapons do not behave this way.

I'm waiting.

So now I have to prove to your satisfaction that Conservation of Energy exists.

You've shown nothing. You've shown *two* examples of weapons that act weird. The seismic charge can be explained by a forcefield affect that delivers that amount of KE into the target, and despite what you may claim, you've given no reason as to how it ignores CoE. In an atmosphere, it would behave exactly like solid matter accelerated to velocities necessary to yield gigatons of KE. Do you know what that will do to the surrounding area?

As for the thermal detonator, you've given no good reason why we should accept the idea of a DET weapon that violates CoE. Your reasoning is essentially "well seismic charges exists and my magic missiles exist, so thermal detonators must be DET too", neglecting to realize that you're citing thermal detonators as a reason the other two work like you claim.

That's called circular logic, moron.

Point made; it really doesn't matter what the seismic charge is. It appears to be somesort of confined explosion--akin to a thermal detonator, which slices shit up with little radiative energy or thermal release.

They act nothing alike. Supposedly a thermal detonator disintegrates everything in the blast sphere, leaving everything outside it unharmed. A seismic charge most likely emits a forcefield with the KE of the yield. If a thermal detonator acted like a seismic charge did, as the blast effect expanded, material would not be instantly disintegrated, but pulverized and possibly hurled far, as the effect would act as akin to a wall moving at immense speeds. Moreover, any air in the area would be forced out, creating a massive change in pressure, and generating a shockwave that would affect things outside the blast radius. A thermal detonator doesn't do that.

They can do this, and it does put out several gigatons. Canon.

Who says they can't? What canon doesn't support is the ludicrous idea that the excess energy just disappears.

Shut the fuck up, asshole.

We already have canonical examples of contained detonations with little radiative effects with gigaton yields.

And if thermal detonators and seismic charges can contain and focus their detonations, why can't LAAT/i missile warheads.

Beyond the fact that you have proven neither to be true, there's also the little matter that seismic charges and thermal detonators behave quite differently from anything else we've seen.

Canon says that exotic, contained-detonation weapons can yield in the gigatons.

See above.

Official gives us other contained-detonation weapons, like thermal detonators.

It gives us a funky effect, yes. I'd like to see your evidence for it being DET other than "I would like it to be," though.

Canon gives us 200 kiloton missiles.

Yes it does. What it doesn't say is that they're *always* fired on that yield.

It would appear a self-contained detonation with little radiative effects similar to canonical weapons would explain things cleanly. You're the one trying to contradict canon, so don't be an asshole.

I'm trying to rectify the ICS with what we see on screen. You're trying to do the same, but doing it in a way that introduces far more unknowns and makes it far more complicated.

(emphasis mine)

You knew what I meant, don't me a cunt.

So sorry, I misread your statement. Although I hope you can understand my mistake, since your hypothesis that the blast wave affects solid objects but not air is so stupid, you might as well be claiming the wave is immaterial.

The burden of proof is definitely on he trying to claim canon is wrong. None of you have quantified your intentionally vague claims of what things should look like.

Who's trying to claim canon is wrong? You're the only one who seems to think that dialing down the yields is utterly against canon. Even DW seems to think it's a valid compromise.

That said, large thermal detonators are nuke-scale weapons, and create no atmospheric shock wave or thermal pulse; yet we do know that they obviously expend huge amount of energy into the target.

"Blah, blah, blah." Once again, *prove* thermal detonators work by DET, AND that it is reasonable to assume that *all* of their ground weapons use the same unknown effect, rather than going with the simpler answer.

Bullshit, you've never quantified why and how it should behave, even when shown canonical examples of focused weapons with little to no radiated energy.

Bullshit right back at you. You only need eyes in your head to see it's not a kT explosion.

Where's the energy go? I don't fucking know.

Concession accepted, asshole. Once again, what's more reasonable? They dialed down the power, or "magic?" And this time, keep in mind that just because we see funky effects in a few places doesn't give you carte blanche to fall back on them whenever you feel like it.

The concept that Ender explored is that the yield is like the nuke-pumped laser, giving a yield on the nuke is what we're given, and it powers some technobabble reaction which focused the explosion and desintegrates the target.

Again, if I claimed phasers worked by DET but neglect to affect anything else by "technobable" I would be VIed within the day. Prove how that's more reasonable.

Besides, how would Starship-grade armor like that on the Core Sphere be noticably damaged while we know from the AOTC ICS that hull cladding is impregnated with neutronium and can shrug off fusion explosions if the explosions were merely GJ range?

Beyond the fact that that's a Red Herring, I seem to recall the SPHA-T's doing most of the work on the Core Ships.

Soapbox speeches annoy the piss out of me.

Did I offend your precious sensibilities? Boo-fucking-hoo. How about you prove me wrong, rather than whining about it?

Why is it assumed that these weapons were releasing that much energy? They have variable yields, rules of engagement which almost certainly prohibit the use of WMD close to a Geonosian city with civilians present, and variable loadouts on the LAAT missiles.

A damn good question. Ask Primus. I've asked a couple times already, and he's yet to give me a reasonable answer.

I don't like it either, Mike. But apparently they desintegrate everything inside the blast radius and everything outside is untouched; no thermal pulse, shockwave, nada.

Once again, boo-fucking-hoo. Lots of sci-fi fans have been shafted by stupid writers not knowing their science. I repeat, *in any other sci-fi* the effect described as how thermal detonators work would be labeled a chain reaction by this board. Live with it.

[Illuminatus Primus]

Anyone who cares about making their hypothesis fit the scene, rather than twisting the scene to fit their hypothesis, fucktard.

They do have variable yields, you realize. I simply told you that not all energy transfer will result in Hiroshima explosions.

SW materials have very high strengths and specific heats, and there are weapons which posess a yield but cause damage through exotic means.

Case you don't remember. AOTC ICS is canon, moron.

As for the thermal detonator, you've given no good reason why we should accept the idea of a DET weapon that violates CoE. Your reasoning is essentially "well seismic charges exists and my magic missiles exist, so thermal detonators must be DET too", neglecting to realize that you're citing thermal detonators as a reason the other two work like you claim.

That's called circular logic, moron.

Strawman dipshit, I never said anything about DET.

Only you did, and I'm not entitled to prop up your unsubstanciated demands.

I said the hypothesis of how thermal detonators work is that they have a technobabble desintegration reaction which consumes the initial energy released which would be the listed yield.

A seismic charge most likely emits a forcefield with the KE of the yield.

Been watching too much Trek, buddy? Force fields are neither visible nor so sharply defined. Force fields are not planar.

You totally distorted the hypothesis. Why don't you plug in Ep. II and notice that the mines explode, then the explosion is squashed into a planar disk.

If a thermal detonator acted like a seismic charge did, as the blast effect expanded, material would not be instantly disintegrated, but pulverized and possibly hurled far, as the effect would act as akin to a wall moving at immense speeds. Moreover, any air in the area would be forced out, creating a massive change in pressure, and generating a shockwave that would affect things outside the blast radius. A thermal detonator doesn't do that.

No shit, Sherlock. They both deal with apparently self-confined detonations or something to that effect. I never said their means of operation was identical. You're distorting the analogy, and you don't know what a force field is.

Who says they can't? What canon doesn't support is the ludicrous idea that the excess energy just disappears.

Maybe if you read you'd see the hypothesis is that the energy is consumed to drive whatever technobabble desintegrates the target matter; I never claimed DET.

Beyond the fact that you have proven neither to be true, there's also the little matter that seismic charges and thermal detonators behave quite differently from anything else we've seen.

Fine and dandy. The point was merely to illustrate that there exists the means in SW of having very destructive weapons with negligible collateral damage or energy waste.

See above.

'fraid it doesn't work so easily asshole. We know for a fact that the armor is extraordinarily durable and has enormous specific heats. What, did you think the SPHA/T's wattage is below that of fighter cannon? And what of LAAT/i attacks on the Core Ships?

We know hull-cladding can take nuke hits, and the Core Ship is supposed to be composed of the starship equivalent of wet paper towels according to you?

It gives us a funky effect, yes. I'd like to see your evidence for it being DET other than "I would like it to be," though.

Never said DET, asshole. But exotic weapons do still have an energy content, and thus a yield, y'know.

Yes it does. What it doesn't say is that they're *always* fired on that yield.

Well then when are they exactly? I personally don't believe you're getting mid-kt range detonations against wheel droids, but the Core Ship hits have to be at least around full-yield. That's Starship Armor. And there's no Hiroshima there either.

I'm trying to rectify the ICS with what we see on screen. You're trying to do the same, but doing it in a way that introduces far more unknowns and makes it far more complicated.

I'm trying to draw stuff from official we've already seen, and apply it.

Again, I ask, when do you think we did see them fire at 200 kt? Were the hits on the Core Ship only in the high GJ range?

So sorry, I misread your statement. Although I hope you can understand my mistake, since your hypothesis that the blast wave affects solid objects but not air is so stupid, you might as well be claiming the wave is immaterial.

It will effect air, but hardly as violently as an Atomic explosion, which is what this whole thing is about.

Who's trying to claim canon is wrong? You're the only one who seems to think that dialing down the yields is utterly against canon. Even DW seems to think it's a valid compromise.

Do you really think warheads stretch several orders of magnitude in firepower?

"Blah, blah, blah." Once again, *prove* thermal detonators work by DET, AND that it is reasonable to assume that *all* of their ground weapons use the same unknown effect, rather than going with the simpler answer.

More strawmen.

Concession accepted, asshole. Once again, what's more reasonable? They dialed down the power, or "magic?" And this time, keep in mind that just because we see funky effects in a few places doesn't give you carte blanche to fall back on them whenever you feel like it.

Then what are you left with? Warheads with several orders of magnitude in their dials? Give me a break. What about their "non KT" performance against Starship Hulls?

Beyond the fact that that's a Red Herring, I seem to recall the SPHA-T's doing most of the work on the Core Ships.

Who the fuck cares? Did those create "kt-range" explosions you seem to think should be there? The point of the matter is that the missiles did penetrate the hull.

(snip redundencies)

Let's hop back to the beginning, shall we?

One of the major misconceptions is high-energy weapons must be analogous to modern explosives; the 200 kt warheads are "blast-effect" warheads which implies damage without thermal explosions.

Even if you are correct, I believe that much kinetic energy will still cause thermal effects. Part of the energy will not go where it is intended, and cause the rapid expansion of the atmosphere surrounding the impact point. And we're right back to where we started.

This is what I asked you to quantify. You said, yeah, but some of the energy will go to waste.

Well then's just cute, but how much? Will that be irreconcilable with the explosions against the hulls of the Core Ship and Techno Union Transports?

If they're canonically not putting their energy into heat predominantly, and not relying on atmospheric concussion effects, than what?

I don't actually know what Saxton means by "blast-effect," really. Perhaps it uses a focused-blast effect akin to the seismic charge and sends a focused blast of mostly KE into the target. Maybe it irradiates it with x-rays or gamma rays. Maybe a combination of all the above, and the extreme strength and specific heats of the materials involved pick up most of the slack.

Point was, I disproved there that it was simple DET, or a straight explosion, and your analogy with Hiroshima does not work. Little Boy is not a comparable weapon, and Hiroshima not a comparable attack. The analogy is false.

[The Silence and I]

Ok, I think I see where your stance is, and I'm curious: if you take this nearly magic transfere of pure K.E. 100 kt warhead with its 2 degree dispersal cone and fire it at say, the ground, what do you expect will happen visually? Nothing? 4.19 E 14 J is a lot, I think people here, myself included, have a hard time accepting that collateral effects would be non-existent.
Obviously the energy must go somewhere, so where? Mike seems to think a sufficiently entropic process could result in movement of the target, ok, so 4.19E14 J hits the ground, and lets say it immediately affects 1 m^3 of the rocky soil, and ALL the energy is transfered as K.E., causing the chunk to move off into the ground at (meh, lets say 2x water density, so 2000 kg; 4.19E14 J=(.5)(2000 kg)(v)^2; v=647,302 m/s) about 650,000 m/s. Clearly this is a high speed projectile, and will immediately vaporize when it "hits" the soil beneigth it, thus releasing 4.19E14 J of energy in really, really hot gaseous form, i.e. plasma, i.e. explosion similar to an asteroid strike in appearence. Or, maybie the process isn't entropic enough, and the energy must instead become heat, like I proposed before, and will also vaporize the ground, releasing 4.19E14 J of heat into the AREA. What is the difference between an asteroid/high speed projectile strike, which is K.E. in nature, and a focused K.E. warhead strike of comperable yield? I think none-to-little. I suppose another possiblility along these lines is the process is highly entropic, but causes the affected target to fly of at some angle into the atmosphere. This would cause it to burn up quite spectacularly, but would not necessarily be like a nuke going off--I should think such an event would be quite visible during the battle, yet it was not seen.
In summation, this is what I would expect to see; that I don't leads me to believe high yield weapons were not used, but I want to know what you see. Show how you can elegantly and practically pump kt level energies into an environment without the slightest sign of it, or accept that only low yield weapons were used.

[Darth Wong]

Nuclear weapons produce a fireball and shockwave because the intense radiation from the blast heats up the surrounding atmosphere to many times the core temperature of the Sun. This takes place because the radiation is not penetrative enough; the isotherm around the bomb from the initial heating is essentially opaque to X-rays. The superheated volume then proceeds to expand at a hypersonic rate, thus both radiating the air in front of it and superheating it through hydrodynamic effects, thus creating what we know as the rapidly growing nuclear fireball.

In the case of a random energy release whose products are fairly well known (such as a matter/antimatter blast), you should see identical effects. But one could theorize that an exotic-radiation beam which was designed to punch through extremely hardened armour and/or shields would not produce such effects because it would be too penetrative. Ironically enough, this would actually make it less effective against unshielded targets; an overly penetrative weapon will actually do less damage to a soft target (as AP bullets demonstrate). In fact, as an extreme example, a neutrino gun would punch through anything, but it would do no noticeable damage (if I could build such a gun and shoot you, you probably wouldn't even notice).

Just something to keep in mind.

As for the thermal detonator, that still makes no sense, and the word of the EU alone is insufficient to force us to accept something which makes no sense. No explosive device onscreen has demonstrated such characteristics.

[Illuminatus Primus]

I agreed; I was under the impression they were super-miniaturized fusion devices, and went on that assumption.

http://www.starwars.com/databank/techno ... tor/?id=eu

Databank description.

Your remarks:

Grenades were very rarely seen in the canon films, although they are used somewhat more heavily in the novelizations. The most well-known type of Imperial grenade is the Merr-Sonn thermal detonator (seen at right). The SWEGWT claims that it uses a "fusion reaction" to vapourize everything within a specified radius while leaving everything outside that radius completely unaffected. However, it is very difficult to rationalize this explanation with known physical laws, because the rapid vapourization of all the solid material in a spherical region would produce a pressure shockwave and a huge cloud of superheated gas. It is most likely that this explanation is a bit exaggerated, and that the blast radius simply defines the range at which the overpressure is no longer fatal, rather than defining a "magical wall" beyond which nothing happens. According to the SWVD, the shell of the grenade is designed for fragmentation, so the grenade may be some sort of hybrid HE/frag grenade, with enough concussive force to be used as a demolition charge (supposedly able to blast a hole through 2 metres of permacrete) but enough fragmentation to cause everyone in Jabba's lair to cower in fear when Boushh pulled one out. The SWEGWT claims that the blast radius of a standard Imperial grenade is 5 metres while larger grenades are lethal out to 20 metres and even 100 metres (presumably, the very large grenades would be fired from a mortar or grenade launcher, since the average human being can't be expected to throw a grenade that far).

[Darth Wong]

Obviously the energy must go somewhere, so where? Mike seems to think a sufficiently entropic process could result in movement of the target

Sufficiently NON-entropic. You've got it backwards. And I was thinking of an object in vacuum.

ok, so 4.19E14 J hits the ground, and lets say it immediately affects 1 m^3 of the rocky soil,

You're assuming that one of these seismic charge weapons cannot disperse its energy more widely than that. Nuclear fireballs, as mentioned previously, exist because the radiation produced by the blast cannot penetrate the isotherm formed around the warhead.

However, I do agree that kT-range ground weapons are highly unlikely, which might explain why Mr. Saxton specified 0.001 kT weapons for the AT-TE ball turrets in the ICS. That seems to be the normal level of output for standard ground-combat weapons, with similar-sized turrets on the LAAT, while special LAAT weapons such as the superlaser turrets being much more powerful (nearly 0.1 kT, although we don't know the time interval over which this is measured), albeit probably much more penetrative as well. I'm not sure who is seriously propagating this notion of 200 kT weapons being fired off everywhere like bottle rockets at Geonosis; it seems to me like you're inventing an argument in order to attack it. The ICS only alludes to the fact that kT-ranged weapons can be fitted into the LAAT missile launchers, but at no point does it claim that they are always loaded with such weapons.