Aliens invade 1950s Earth.

kinnison · Post by **kinnison** » 2007-12-27 07:27am

Some more:

Kzin, protectors, definitely Grogs, all from Niven.
Lensverse troops - just about any of them.
Predators - if they wanted to do a mass assault in the first place, of course.
Any of the powers from the Traveller RPG.
Sardaukar, Fremen from Dune.
Line Marines or Falkender's Legion from Pournelle's Future history - or if they are not alien enough, perhaps the Sauron cyborgs.
From the same canon; the Moties.
Wells's Martians (either film version).
Cardassians, Jem Hadar, Borg, Species 8472.

The point is that 50s Earth is pretty well the bottom of the tree, really, in this sort of company.

Jadeite · Post by **Jadeite** » 2007-12-27 04:16pm

kinnison wrote:Some more:
...
Sardaukar, Fremen from Dune.
...
The point is that 50s Earth is pretty well the bottom of the tree, really, in this sort of company.

Fremen and Sardaukar? Please.

Dune's demonstrated capabilities are fucking pathetic. There's no way in hell they could win this on the ground or air.

Invictus ChiKen · Post by **Invictus ChiKen** » 2007-12-27 06:44pm

The Tau would curb stomp 1950's Earth. I think with the superior tech and maneuverability. Simple take over ever Nuke installation via orbital drop and then it's just a matter of time.

IF they fail there is always Da Orkz! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!!!

Gullible Jones · Post by **Gullible Jones** » 2007-12-27 07:46pm

Re Saurdaukar and Fremen: I'm a bit rusty on how wanky the Holtzmann shields were, but I think a nuking would be way over the limits of what a personal shield could take. And IIRC, none of the major Dune powers has a decent air force. They couldn't take Earth, unless they were willing to start throwing around their own "nukes" (which they don't have a whole lot of).

Vendetta · Post by **Vendetta** » 2007-12-27 08:20pm

Peptuck wrote:About the only interstellar civilization I can think of that would have trouble fighting this kind of a defense would be the Citadel races from Mass Effect, and that's because they're bound by law to not bombard habitable planets from orbit.

Then again, if they realized how trigger-happy the stupid humans are with their nuclear arsenal, they'd probably write the humans off and bomb the planet from orbit anyhow.

Even then, given enough ground forces, they could probably do it, there's no problem using nukes once you're on planet, Doing so on Virmire leads to mild tutting, and that wasn't even in a hot war situation. Most of the Citadel races except the Salarians probably have a fairly large military as well. (Humanity has about 3% of it's population enter military service, and that's considered quite low by other races, Turians have compulsory military service for all, so they probably have a very large army indeed).

If they did go for orbital bombardment, even their weapons, which are distinctly low end for sci-fi (38kt for a Dreadnought mass driver) would be enough to cause serious harm.

paladin · Post by **paladin** » 2007-12-27 09:42pm

Why waste nukes? Use asteroids. There cheap and plentiful!

Hawkwings · Post by **Hawkwings** » 2007-12-27 11:38pm

There's a wonderful 40K piece about how using asteroids to bombard is wasteful, and nukes (or their equivalent) are much cheaper.

of course, that doesn't matter here because there's nothing 50's Earth can do about Rocks from Space.

Zor · Post by **Zor** » 2007-12-27 11:43pm

Gullible Jones wrote:Re Saurdaukar and Fremen: I'm a bit rusty on how wanky the Holtzmann shields were, but I think a nuking would be way over the limits of what a personal shield could take. And IIRC, none of the major Dune powers has a decent air force. They couldn't take Earth, unless they were willing to start throwing around their own "nukes" (which they don't have a whole lot of).

Nukes not required, Holtzmann shields will do a good deal of jack and shit against napalm.

Zor

The Grim Squeaker · Post by **The Grim Squeaker** » 2007-12-28 01:51am

Zor wrote:
Gullible Jones wrote:Re Saurdaukar and Fremen: I'm a bit rusty on how wanky the Holtzmann shields were, but I think a nuking would be way over the limits of what a personal shield could take. And IIRC, none of the major Dune powers has a decent air force. They couldn't take Earth, unless they were willing to start throwing around their own "nukes" (which they don't have a whole lot of).
Nukes not required, Holtzmann shields will do a good deal of jack and shit against napalm.

Zor

Proof? Not to mention that you'd need a shit-ton of napalm, for use against every enemy target.
Dune also has nukes that are stupidly scalable (as in "from blow up a hanger, to blow up the planet's crust") albeit injunctions against using them or bioweapons.
Lasguns also pack some decent firepower, slicing through metal like cheese and all that. Have there ever been calcs for Dune lasguns?

Lord of the Abyss · Post by **Lord of the Abyss** » 2007-12-28 06:42am

Hawkwings wrote:There's a wonderful 40K piece about how using asteroids to bombard is wasteful, and nukes (or their equivalent) are much cheaper.

This one ?

Rocks are NOT ‘free’, citizen.

Firstly, you must manoeuvre the Emperor’s naval vessel within the asteroid belt, almost assuredly sustaining damage to the Emperor’s ship’s paint from micrometeoroids, while expending the Emperor’s fuel. Then the Tech Priests must inspect the rock in question to ascertain its worthiness to do the Emperor’s bidding. Should it pass muster, the Emperor’s Servitors must use the Emperor’s auto-scrapers and melta-cutters to prepare the potential ordinance for movement. Finally, the Tech Priests finished, the Emperor’s officers may begin manoeuvring the Emperor’s warship to abut the asteroid at the prepared face (expending yet more of the Emperor’s fuel), and then begin boosting the stone towards the offensive planet.

After a few days of expending a prodigious amount of the Emperor’s fuel to accelerate the asteroid into an orbit more fitting to the Emperor’s desires, the Emperor’s ship may then return to the planet via superluminous warp travel and await the arrival of the stone, still many weeks (or months) away. After twiddling away the Emperor’s time and eating the Emperor’s food in the wasteful pursuit of making sure that the Emperor’s enemies do not launch a deflection mission, they may finally watch the ordinance impact the planet (assuming that the Emperor’s ship
does not need to attempt any last-minute course correction upon the rock, using yet more of the Emperor’s fuel).

Given a typical (class Bravo-CVII) system, we have the following:

Two months, O&M, Titan class warship: 4.2 Million Imperials
Two months, rations, crew of same: 0.2 MI
Two months, Tech Priest pastor: 1.7 MI
Two months, Servitor parish: 0.3 MI
Paint, Titan class warship: 2.5 MI
Dihydrogen peroxide fuel: 0.9 MI

Total: 9.8 MI

Contrasted with the following:

5 warheads, magna-melta: 2.5 MI
One day, O&M, Titan class warship: 0.3 MI
One day, rations, crew of same: 0.0 MI
Dihydrogen peroxide fuel: 0.1 MI

Total: 2.9 MI

Given the same result with under one third of the cost, the Emperor will have saved a massive amount of His most sacred money and almost a full month of time, during which His warship may be bombarding an entirely different planet.

The Emperor, through this – His Office of Imperial Outlays – hereby orders
you to attend one (1) week of therapeutic accountancy training/penance.
Please report to Areicon IV, Imperial City, Administratum Building CXXI,
Room 1456, where you are to sit in the BLUE chair.

For the Emperor,
Bursarius Tenathis,
Purser Level XI,
Imperial Office of Outlays.

Zor · Post by **Zor** » 2007-12-28 07:28am

DEATH wrote:
Zor wrote:
Gullible Jones wrote:Re Saurdaukar and Fremen: I'm a bit rusty on how wanky the Holtzmann shields were, but I think a nuking would be way over the limits of what a personal shield could take. And IIRC, none of the major Dune powers has a decent air force. They couldn't take Earth, unless they were willing to start throwing around their own "nukes" (which they don't have a whole lot of).
Nukes not required, Holtzmann shields will do a good deal of jack and shit against napalm.

Zor
Proof? Not to mention that you'd need a shit-ton of napalm, for use against every enemy target.

You get a flamethrower tank like a Churchill Crocodile and you send it up against the Fremens and flame them down. If they move they move into burning death, napalm on the ground gets underneith and they die. You can drop it from the sky from aircraft which are for all intent and purposes unhittable by small arms and equip infantrymen with flamethrowers to reduce the bastards to cinders.

Zor

Post by **Ghost Rider** » 2007-12-28 11:00am

Zor wrote:
DEATH wrote:
Zor wrote: Nukes not required, Holtzmann shields will do a good deal of jack and shit against napalm.

Zor
Proof? Not to mention that you'd need a shit-ton of napalm, for use against every enemy target.
You get a flamethrower tank like a Churchill Crocodile and you send it up against the Fremens and flame them down. If they move they move into burning death, napalm on the ground gets underneith and they die. You can drop it from the sky from aircraft which are for all intent and purposes unhittable by small arms and equip infantrymen with flamethrowers to reduce the bastards to cinders.

Zor

He asked for proof dumbfuck, not your assertion restated.

Vendetta · Post by **Vendetta** » 2007-12-28 05:42pm

Fremen aren't shield fighters anyway, so the interaction between napalm and shield would make no difference.

They are practised in guerilla warfare though, and they do have some lasguns. As do Sardaukar. And if the enemy is unshielded, they'll have no qualms using them.

Jadeite · Post by **Jadeite** » 2007-12-28 07:08pm

Vendetta wrote:Fremen aren't shield fighters anyway, so the interaction between napalm and shield would make no difference.

They are practised in guerilla warfare though, and they do have some lasguns. As do Sardaukar. And if the enemy is unshielded, they'll have no qualms using them.

And they'll still be outgunned.

Dark Hellion · Post by **Dark Hellion** » 2007-12-28 07:33pm

Well, Dune does have planet killing nukes, so they are no where near outgunned. They fight in an incredibly stagnant environment where troop transportation is nearly unaffordable, meaning that there is no possibility for any force projection by anyone outside of small groups of special forces fielded by the riches and most powerful factions. But they still have about ten thousand years of nuke tech on us, and can kick the crap outta planets with contemptuous ease. And standing one dude on the ball of glass that was earth is still a victory.

Patrick Degan · Post by **Patrick Degan** » 2007-12-29 01:19am

The Daleks.

First invasion of Earth, they bombarded the planet with plague missiles and waited until the population thinned out and the survivors fell to barbarism and internecene warfare, after which they simply moved in and took over.

The Time War era Daleks would be even worse.

WesFox13 · Post by **WesFox13** » 2007-12-29 01:27am

Well one race of aliens that could take over 50's Earth would be the Necrons. Seriously, they are millions of years ahead of Earth during this time and that living metal would be very useful.

The Eldar could also take over 50's Earth if they wished to.

Even the Chaos Marines could take it over, Nice fresh souls to sacrifice for the Chaos Gods

.

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2007-12-29 01:31am

I think it would be a lot cooler to ask who could actually invade and occupy Earth. Allowing aliens to simply bombard the planet into submission seems like a pretty low bar to set, since even a moronic alien race would be able to pull back after initially being bounced and just drop stuff on us. The only way to get around that is if the alien race commits its entire force at once and has some totally absurd vulnerability, a la Independence Day.