Fourth Empire vs Lensman

Darth_Shinji · Post by **Darth_Shinji** » 2004-01-27 09:02pm

ggs wrote: One of those sun killer warheads, was biuld in a moderte side statue and shipped to Birhat. They were really worryed that it would take them out.

So they have been biult, and it didnt exactly take vastly new resources.

Yes, the've been built by the fifth (imp or emp? doesn't matter). Not the 4th emp.

Oh, and just for the record, the whole destory a star thing wasn't finalized to my knoweledge in the book. They though it could cause a supernova, they weren't sure. It could take out a planet and a massive raduis around it.

Captain Cyran · Post by **Captain Cyran** » 2004-01-27 09:04pm

Darth_Shinji wrote:
ggs wrote: One of those sun killer warheads, was biuld in a moderte side statue and shipped to Birhat. They were really worryed that it would take them out.

So they have been biult, and it didnt exactly take vastly new resources.
Yes, the've been built by the fifth (imp or emp? doesn't matter). Not the 4th emp.

Oh, and just for the record, the whole destory a star thing wasn't finalized to my knoweledge in the book. They though it could cause a supernova, they weren't sure. It could take out a planet and a massive raduis around it.

If you're talking about the super gravitonic weapon, the 4th Empire could build it, quite easily actually. I wouldn't put it past them to have actually built a few. The fact is they got ALL the blueprints of the weapon from the 4th Empire, they could build a lot of those things if necessary. And they stated that it could replicate what Colin did at Zeta Triangul. (Or however it's spelled.

Darth_Shinji · Post by **Darth_Shinji** » 2004-01-27 09:20pm

Captain_Cyran wrote:
If you're talking about the super gravitonic weapon, the 4th Empire could build it, quite easily actually. I wouldn't put it past them to have actually built a few. The fact is they got ALL the blueprints of the weapon from the 4th Empire, they could build a lot of those things if necessary. And they stated that it could replicate what Colin did at Zeta Triangul. (Or however it's spelled.

It was in devolpment at the time of the bio-weapon. Chances are it wasn't made, not that I'm saying its not going to be (unless Birhat is taken out quikly).

And no, they stated it might be able to accomplish it. It wasn't as powerful, but more forcused. But I've also pointed out the problems of using a missle or e-driving out of a system protected by a sunbeam.

Captain Cyran · Post by **Captain Cyran** » 2004-01-27 09:31pm

Darth_Shinji wrote:
Captain_Cyran wrote:
If you're talking about the super gravitonic weapon, the 4th Empire could build it, quite easily actually. I wouldn't put it past them to have actually built a few. The fact is they got ALL the blueprints of the weapon from the 4th Empire, they could build a lot of those things if necessary. And they stated that it could replicate what Colin did at Zeta Triangul. (Or however it's spelled.
It was in devolpment at the time of the bio-weapon. Chances are it wasn't made, not that I'm saying its not going to be (unless Birhat is taken out quikly).

And no, they stated it might be able to accomplish it. It wasn't as powerful, but more forcused. But I've also pointed out the problems of using a missle or e-driving out of a system protected by a sunbeam.

I don't think they ever stated when it was in development did they? You are correct they said might, though I would be willing to bet it could.

And I'm not trying to argue a point. One of these posts in here I think said that LensCraft has two galaxies to work with. That is enough for me to consider the Empire toasted.

Darth_Shinji · Post by **Darth_Shinji** » 2004-01-27 10:44pm

Captain_Cyran wrote:

And I'm not trying to argue a point. One of these posts in here I think said that LensCraft has two galaxies to work with. That is enough for me to consider the Empire toasted.

I think its two, I know its one with bases in the second one.

Currald · Post by **Currald** » 2004-01-28 12:32pm

Not all of the planets in both galaxies, but a lot of them. Several billion inhabited worlds.

consequences · Post by **consequences** » 2004-02-12 02:48pm

Lensman: 60 parsecs per hour cruising speed. thats 525600c. That figure multiplies by at least a hundred when in intergalactic space

4th Empire: 2400c, based on the Aku'ultan speed being 2% of 4th Emp hyper speed

Lensman: At the time of Children of the Lens had something like 90 billion inhabited planets in the Milky Way, and an unknown but lesser number in the second galaxy(going by the numbers presented to describe the indescribable number of Lensmen participating in the psychic attack on Eddore).

4th Empire had 5000 major inhabited worlds(going by Colin I's titles.)

Lensman has an unknown but truly vast number of ships(a figure was given in GURPS Lensman(and who knows how seriously we're supposed to take that) of 80 million ships for the invasion of the second galaxy, but they are unclear on whether this was the Eich campaign, composed solely of superdreadnoughts, or the full scale invasion later undertaken. In either case, Earth, as a 'average' member commited 80 SD plus a purpose built flagship. Going by First Lensman, the Galactic Patrol has entire worlds devoted to warship production, capable of producing thousands of ships each at a minimum. Going by the average world bit, and the number of worlds, Civilisation would be capable of fielding uwards of 9 trillion major combatants.

4th Empire has 998 thousand odd planetoids, and an unknown but much larger number of parasite warships. Production per capita is clearly vastly higher than that of Lensman

4th Empire has the capability to remove any planet they can get within range of

Lensman has the same capability, except for the fact that their range is vastly higher. To counter this, their mechanisms are much more cumbersome.

The 4th Empire has pretty much no chance of winning a long-term campaign, simply because they will be completely incapable of reaching more than a very small fraction of Civilisation in anything less than centuries. If an interuniversal wormhole is the only means of contact, and the 4th Empire holds the Lensman side of it in strength, there may be an indefinite strategic stalemate. This woud probably be the best outcome for the 4th Empire, unless you want to give them a handicap of being the only ones with knowledge of the other, and decades, maybe even centuries to build an armada and send them forth.

Currald · Post by **Currald** » 2004-02-13 12:28am

consequences wrote:Lensman has an unknown but truly vast number of ships(a figure was given in GURPS Lensman(and who knows how seriously we're supposed to take that) of 80 million ships for the invasion of the second galaxy, but they are unclear on whether this was the Eich campaign, composed solely of superdreadnoughts, or the full scale invasion later undertaken. In either case, Earth, as a 'average' member commited 80 SD plus a purpose built flagship.

The GURPS book is very well thought out; its errors are more than balanced by the sensible extrapolations, explanations and hard data that it provides. In the case of the estimated 80 million superdreadnoughts, it is right on, as the unit from Tellus was composed of 80 ships (plus the Z9M9Z) and it was one of a million units. This was for the Eich campaign at the end of Gray Lensman, as the full-scale invasion in Second Stage Lensmen was accomplished with a mixed force of ships of various classes (including scouts, light cruisers, cruising bombers, battleships, superdreadnoughts, "maulers" [probably actually supermaulers], etc.).

consequences · Post by **consequences** » 2004-02-13 02:53am

Additional note, that in the first major space battle of Children of the Lens, Two hundred thousand hyperspatial tubes were popened simultaneously for the assault on Arisia. The Galactic Patrol had enough dirigible planets and planetary mass negaspheres on hand to drop one of each into a large number of them.

Darth_Shinji · Post by **Darth_Shinji** » 2004-02-13 09:15am

consequences wrote:
The 4th Empire has pretty much no chance of winning a long-term campaign, simply because they will be completely incapable of reaching more than a very small fraction of Civilisation in anything less than centuries. If an interuniversal wormhole is the only means of contact, and the 4th Empire holds the Lensman side of it in strength, there may be an indefinite strategic stalemate. This woud probably be the best outcome for the 4th Empire, unless you want to give them a handicap of being the only ones with knowledge of the other, and decades, maybe even centuries to build an armada and send them forth.

While I though of the wormhole contat in the same way at first you forget that hypertubes can be used to travel between universes as well. So with a point of contact with the Dahak-verse I think it would just be a matter of time before they start using hypertubes to enter the Dahak-verse.

harbringer · Post by **harbringer** » 2004-02-14 09:22am

Not only do the fleets in the lensman universe have all these weapons they also still have lensmen and second stage lensmen. Who says that any missile the 4th Imperium will launch will actually be on target??.

Black Admiral · Post by **Black Admiral** » 2004-02-14 09:35am

harbringer wrote:Not only do the fleets in the lensman universe have all these weapons they also still have lensmen and second stage lensmen. Who says that any missile the 4th Imperium will launch will actually be on target??.

The computers are quite capable of punching in coordinates for hyper missiles.

consequences · Post by **consequences** » 2004-02-14 10:29am

True, but the 4th Empire doesn't like to give total control to the computers. And unless the ship is sent into battle with its communications locked down, and no one on board with the authority to order it to stand down, it could be ordered to surrender immediately. Prevention of this would require a total rewrite of the core programming, or at least multiple Priority One commands, which are kept secret from whoever is put in command.