Confused about shields

[pellaeons_scion]

Shields. Those things that somehow keep SW vessels from being destroyed in an instant.

My query is this: I have heard a few times on this board about the shields capacity to withstand an attack, with various numbers and values given. While thats fine I do wonder how exactly they work. Is it by diffusion, deflection, annulation? Is the vessel impervious to harm until the shields energy threshold has been exceeded and only then is physical damage caused?

Or does the shield start off with its energy limit, and however much energy is directed at it is subtracted from that, and as the value decreases more energy can seep through and attack the ship directly.If the threshold is breached, how long till the shield is recharged to hold off the attack. Can the shield be breached in multiple places, yet still maintain most of that shield facing, thus attacking ship components? Could this be the reason for the high rates of fire TL's have, to exploit these holes before they are closed?

Apologies if these have been answered before

[Slartibartfast]

Hm let's see, I think the only source of shield behavior is the X-Wing/TIE series of games, and they aren't official (in them, a ship's hull is invulnerable until the shields are depleted). Other than that, we'd have to see if the text of the EU is so detailed in this aspect.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

Shields. Those things that somehow keep SW vessels from being destroyed in an instant.

My query is this: I have heard a few times on this board about the shields capacity to withstand an attack, with various numbers and values given. While thats fine I do wonder how exactly they work. Is it by diffusion, deflection, annulation? Is the vessel impervious to harm until the shields energy threshold has been exceeded and only then is physical damage caused?

Or does the shield start off with its energy limit, and however much energy is directed at it is subtracted from that, and as the value decreases more energy can seep through and attack the ship directly.If the threshold is breached, how long till the shield is recharged to hold off the attack. Can the shield be breached in multiple places, yet still maintain most of that shield facing, thus attacking ship components? Could this be the reason for the high rates of fire TL's have, to exploit these holes before they are closed?

Apologies if these have been answered before

In all honesty, fairy dust. No comprehensive explanation has been given over to how the shields work. Just that there are the two basic kinds. You seem to be able to turn them on, they hug the hull, and absorb part or all of a weapon's energy. And they seem to be able to do this effortlessly until one delivers enough energy to a shield at a particular time to overload the shield generator. Then the shield suddenly stops being a shield. (I refer you to ROTJ, where things were going just fine until the Rebels overloaded part of the Executor's shields. Then it was vulnerable to having a fighter ram it.)

[Ender]

I beliee the quote from Saxton is that describing just the mechanics of the shields would have taken more pages then the entire book.

[Connor MacLeod]

I beliee the quote from Saxton is that describing just the mechanics of the shields would have taken more pages then the entire book.

you might check Saxton's site under TPM commentaries. He has a fairly lengthy discussion about the effects of shields.

Additionally, web searches on this forum will reveal plenty of discussions about shield nature and operation.

Mike goes into shields as well some in his AOTC analysis page (and I think maybe the TPM commentaries.)

[His Divine Shadow]

I believe it can shortly be summarized as this:
Ray shields = Absorb energy
Particle shields = deflect matter

Together they produce random results of deflection and absorption, thats my short take on it.

[Andras]

Watch the escape from Naboo in TPM, the ship takes damage while the shields are up, the shields do fail for a very short period of time( the ship does not get hit while they are down)

[His Divine Shadow]

Watch the escape from Naboo in TPM, the ship takes damage while the shields are up, the shields do fail for a very short period of time( the ship does not get hit while they are down)

And thats bleedthrough.

[Alan Bolte]

The debate on this subject is endless. This thread will probably spiral off into another endless debate, with no one the wiser. That said, it appears that you are more interested in how weaponry interacts with shielding than in what shields are composed of. With that in mind, here's how I understand them to work:
Some force or substance, which is usually projected just above the hull of a ship, but may be a bubble, and which seems to either dissipate or be projected in a significant volume of space, breaks up incoming beams and objects. In breaking them up, it doesn't merely do so once, it does it a lot, so that when a laser hits the shield, it appears to shatter into a million pieces, often in such a way that you can't see much more than a round flash. According to the latest declarations by Dr. Saxton (AOTC ICS), shields draw constant power. You have to exceed the power rating of the shields with your own attacks before it is at all likely for anything to get through. If your attacks are only slightly more powerful than the shield, you'll have bolt splinters hitting the armor in a somewhat random fashion. If you use a bit more power, you can really punch through and hit things. Shield generators are not a target you're likely to punch through to, but projectors are small surface targets that, if hit, will render a portion of the shielding nonexistant until either shielding from other projectors can cover it (making the overall shielding weaker), or the projector is replaced. If you bombard the shield with weaponry that is at or below the power of the shield for a long enough time, the projector will burn out from dealing with so much energy and have to be repaired (also referred to as the shields 'overloading', and accompanied by a glow of the entire shield. Of course, the projector will burn out more quickly if the beam is much more powerful than the shield (as at Alderaan), but that doesn't matter quite so much. So, to my knowledge, any holes that are made are actually a section of the shield going down.

[pellaeons_scion]

Thanks alan
Ok, from that post I can draw this

Low power attacks are no real threat, until they are numerous in number and act as a constant power draw on the shield generator.

If an attack is equal or a little greater than the shield can handle, the bolts go from a very coherent state ( a more precise attack) to a more scattered effect, similar to a shotgun. If those scattered bolts have enough energy themselves, then they can do some physical damage, albeit inaccurately. So more power, more coherency, more chance to defeat the shielding and give an accurate and powerful attack. I can now understand why the HTL's of an ISD are so dangerous. A potent and more than likely shieldbusting weapons that can maintain a bolts coherency even after passing through the shield.

Just a thought. In todays military there are all sorts of projectiles designed to deal with armor such as HESH HEAP AP Discarded Sabot etc. Perhaps when a bolt hits the shield, the energy is attempted to be dissipated, but any residual damage that is caused is not from the bolt itself, but the shields energy directed inwards, like feedback? Failing that, would there be different energy configurations for TL's to exploit this method of thinking, perhaps a weapons chief on the bridge working closely with sensor control to identify fluctuations and shield generator types and configure his weapons to suit, assuming not all shields are the same. I know armor and shields work differently, but was just a thought.

I guess you are right, it is a possibly endless question, and a hard one. Still, good to try these things

[His Divine Shadow]

You have to exceed the power rating of the shields with your own attacks before it is at all likely for anything to get through. If your attacks are only slightly more powerful than the shield, you'll have bolt splinters hitting the armor in a somewhat random fashion.

That might happen, but it's just as likely that the shield generator will absorb the energy but at an efficency penalty, since it cannot dump away the energy fast enough it manifests as heat which is detrimental, so one could lower shield efficency in a trek kinda way.

If you bombard the shield with weaponry that is at or below the power of the shield for a long enough time, the projector will burn out from dealing with so much energy and have to be repaired (also referred to as the shields 'overloading', and accompanied by a glow of the entire shield

Noo, think of it as a pool and the rating is the rate at which water can be drained from it, generally the rate is the same size as the pool so to speak.

Say you have a 1000litre pool, it then likely drains this at a rate of 1000litres a second, if it comes in at 1001liters a second then it'll overflow with one litre a second, this energy will be dissipated with conventional disspiation technuiqes as heat, but thats just temporary, if it doesn't stop the shield will overload and the increasing heat probably has detrimental effects on the ability to drain the "pool".

Also, shields require power to run yes but you do not have to put as much energy into the shield as you can absorb, thats more of the make and efficency of the shield generator and it's dissipation system(which is why the naboo yacht can absorb more energy than it's reactor can put out), from which energy from both ray and paricle shield impacts flow.