Homewold's Ion Cannon?

FaxModem1 · Post by **FaxModem1** » 2003-01-06 05:01pm

In Homeworld, you research the Ion Cannon and it is a mighty weapon for your fleet, but, the question is, is the thing realistic or is it just a cool name for a beam weapon in the game.

Also, what weapon is the one used in B5?(the one that the Minbari, EA, and Narn use to chop up ships)

Balrog · Post by **Balrog** » 2003-01-06 05:54pm

B5 weapons are just particle beams I think

As for the Ion Cannon.......

*Runs away to let the smart people answer*

Warspite · Post by **Warspite** » 2003-01-06 07:33pm

You could name it a particle cannon/beam and it would do the same thing...
It's just a charged partticle beam weapon that kicks ass... In the Homeworld Universe, of course. (*Mental picture of Heavy Cruiser turning poor frigates into space dust*)

Anyway, estimating power output for those things is pretty dificult.

Enlightenment · Post by **Enlightenment** » 2003-01-06 08:02pm

Warspite wrote:It's just a charged partticle beam weapon that kicks ass...

Charged paricle beams aren't particularly effective as weapons because they diverge too quickly (hence very short range) and are badly effected by both ambient magnetic fields and the solar wind. Neutral particle beams are vastly superior and have the added benefit of being comprised of ionizing radiation.

Warspite · Post by **Warspite** » 2003-01-06 08:09pm

Enlightenment wrote:
Warspite wrote:It's just a charged partticle beam weapon that kicks ass...
Charged paricle beams aren't particularly effective as weapons because they diverge too quickly (hence very short range) and are badly effected by both ambient magnetic fields and the solar wind. Neutral particle beams are vastly superior and have the added benefit of being comprised of ionizing radiation.

I'm not discussing the nature of the ion cannon, but, by it's name alone it implies charged particles, not a neutral beam.

Exonerate · Post by **Exonerate** » 2003-01-06 11:21pm

Well... We've seen Ion Cannons in HW disintergrate asteroids, and incinerate a planet...

Warspite · Post by **Warspite** » 2003-01-07 06:13am

Exonerate wrote:Well... We've seen Ion Cannons in HW disintergrate asteroids, and incinerate a planet...

The incineration of Kharak wasn't by ion cannon's, it was nukes.

Xon · Post by **Xon** » 2003-01-07 06:24am

Warspite wrote:
Exonerate wrote:Well... We've seen Ion Cannons in HW disintergrate asteroids, and incinerate a planet...
The incineration of Kharak wasn't by ion cannon's, it was nukes.

The incineration of Kharak wasnt by nukes, it was by a superweapon.

A single missile, which caused the atmosphere of the entire planet to burn

And the use of this weapons is why the empire which held Higara lost, the Galactic Council(mostly made up of the Elder races of the Homeworld galaxy) doesnt like people burning worlds(and the populus of the said empire didnt like it).

Warspite · Post by **Warspite** » 2003-01-07 12:15pm

Nukes, Superweapon, whatever... *shrug*
It wasn't by ion cannons, at least.

Warspite · Post by **Warspite** » 2003-01-07 12:17pm

Shit! Forgot to add... The video recording of the attack mentions a surface/orbital bombardment as the method of deployment of the weapons...

HemlockGrey · Post by **HemlockGrey** » 2003-01-07 03:47pm

Are there any clear weapon calcs from HW?

Warspite · Post by **Warspite** » 2003-01-07 04:33pm

HemlockGrey wrote:Are there any clear weapon calcs from HW?

Aside from the total adimensional values given in the game (read, manual), and without any purpose except to compare yields, I've never seen any real ones, maybe on the Relic Boards there migth be a lost topic about some calcs.
There's a single player mission, in the original Homeworld (can't remember the name), where the "Exiles" pass through a meteor shower, and have to destroy a lot of asteroids. Maybe someone can come up with some calcs for that, but it's my experience, that only the big asteroids are targetable, and those can take a lot of pounding, resulting in several small chunks (fighter sized, maybe), with most of the original mass turned into vapor.
OTOH, 1 Heavy Cruiser, 2 Destroyers, 4 Ion Frigates and 4 Assault Frigates can probably take 5-8 seconds to shatter an asteroid, but it's necessary to take into account the fire rates of the ships.

Slartibartfast · Post by **Slartibartfast** » 2003-01-07 04:55pm

The vaporization part is debatable. Just because a game makes a certain thing disappear and the chunks do not reflect the original mass doesn't mean that it was vaporized. It would take either considerable processing power or a lot more model work (in which case all asteroids would look like they break down into exactly the same shapes) to make the rock actually crack and result in smaller chunks that could fit together like a jigsaw.

I doubt that the asteroid could endure such a big pounding intact and that the last tiny bit of damage would instantly vaporize it.

Pu-239 · Post by **Pu-239** » 2003-01-07 08:58pm

Enlightenment wrote:
Warspite wrote:It's just a charged partticle beam weapon that kicks ass...
Charged paricle beams aren't particularly effective as weapons because they diverge too quickly (hence very short range) and are badly effected by both ambient magnetic fields and the solar wind. Neutral particle beams are vastly superior and have the added benefit of being comprised of ionizing radiation.

The "ion beams" might not actually be charged particles. For example I think they have to make the "exhaust" of an ion engine electrically neutral to allow it to leave the ship.

Pu-239 · Post by **Pu-239** » 2003-01-07 09:03pm

http://www-istp.gsfc.nasa.gov/stargaze/Sionrock.htm

Incidentally, the emerging jet of ions must be combined with a stream of negative electrons from a separate electron gun. Without this addition, only positive ions would be emitted, and the satellite would quickly become negatively charged by the stripped electrons left behind. The negative charge would then pull back the ions and undo all the work of the ion gun.

StarshipTitanic · Post by **StarshipTitanic** » 2003-01-07 09:38pm

I heard 2 gigatons per second once...don't know if that's at all accurate, however.

Pu-239 · Post by **Pu-239** » 2003-01-07 11:10pm

God no one ever comments...
+1

Warspite · Post by **Warspite** » 2003-01-08 06:31am

Pu-239 wrote:God no one ever comments...
+1

Ah, forget it!

Anyway, yeah, it migth be... My opinion is that Ion Cannon was chosen as a cool name, hasn't any relevance whatsoever to it's working principles, except being a powerfull particle beam gun.

Warspite · Post by **Warspite** » 2003-01-08 08:32am

OKay, I'm wrong, it DOES have to do with it's working principles... (It's been a long time since I've played it, sue me.)

From the Game Manual, page 14:

Another weapon discipline, born in our exploration of space, is based on the focused direction of high-energy particles. Ion Beam weapons, as they have come to be known, are based in the principle if firing streams of positive ions from a particle accelerator. [...]

Page 103:

[...], which provided the room to employ a truly deadly directed beam of charged ions. The cannon draws power directly from the Capital Ship's main drive to supply not only the superheated hydrogen ions, but also the tens of metres of super-conducting magnetic coils that focus and accelerate the beam. [...]

So, they are positive charged hydrogen particles, or in other words, protons. The need to "neutralize" the beam is irrelevant, since the drive provides the necessary counter-recoil for the weapon. In the Heavy Cruiser, that's still more unimportant, since both turrets are only a fraction of the entire ship's mass.

gravity · Post by **gravity** » 2003-01-16 10:29am

Slartibartfast wrote:The vaporization part is debatable. Just because a game makes a certain thing disappear and the chunks do not reflect the original mass doesn't mean that it was vaporized. It would take either considerable processing power or a lot more model work (in which case all asteroids would look like they break down into exactly the same shapes) to make the rock actually crack and result in smaller chunks that could fit together like a jigsaw.

I doubt that the asteroid could endure such a big pounding intact and that the last tiny bit of damage would instantly vaporize it.

It doesn't do that though, you can see the asteroid slowly shrinking as it is vapourized, with the remnant shattering at the end. From that I think it's pretty clear that it *is* mostly vapourized.