Yuuzhan Vong Invasion Fleet vs. Alpha/Beta Quadrants

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

Your three primary ideas seem to be as follows:
1) Vong hulls are very weak defensively.
2) They cannot effectively intercept incomers with dovin basals, because their sensors are generally not sensitive enough.
3) Transporters will be effective against them.

If I'm incorrect, please let me know fast.

2) OK, we'll buy that. We'll presume they're good enough to see ships. Agreed?

I'm not all that fond of the "lightspeed TL" idea either, despite what the AOTC:ICS said. But it is official, and so if one wants to use it, I'm afraid that we'll have to do something pretty substantial to counter it. Fortunately for you, I'm not one of them.

As for photorps, I'll leave that an unknown quantity. They DID stop the detonations of protorps, though...

1) Their hulls are weak. OK, maybe they are by SW standards. But one question. Do their capship hulls generally break up after being hit successfully by ONE HTL bolt? If they can take more than one hit by a capship heavy weapon (even if they DO have a hole punched in them,) they are already a hell of a lot better than the average AQ hull.

As for their offense. I would think that while the apparently destructive power may go up and down, I would think a recurring theme is that they are good enough to put significant dents in SW shielding and hull. A single good broadside (might be a single hit) on a Neb-B successfully killed the shield and holed the reinforced hull in Onslaught (one of the earliest Vong books and thus is supposed to be a "precedent setter.") If that hit can do THIS to an Imperial-design frigate, I'm not sanguine about the average Fed ship's ability to successfully defend against a hit.

Thus, you might be putting holes into them with your conventional weapons (which is a lot more than could be said than against a NR or Imp ship,) but they're most likely blowing you away. It'll be kind of like Fed-Imp battle projections by conservative pro-SW people back in say 2001.

3) Transporters. Ah, the Trekkie favorite

OK, antigravitons and tractor beams at least do interfere with transporters in the TNG episode "Attached." That implies its opposite number, the "graviton" might also cause interference by "deflecting the transporter.) Search for it in Wong's infamous Canon database. Of course, there might be context for it, but if you want to take that path, provide counterevidence.

They can be blocked by transformers (Legacy.) I would think that even a Vong ship will create some interference of the electromagnetic class.

In "The Hunted," a human can apparently avoid transport by just forcing against it. That implies that if a Vong ship maneuvers (zigzag perhaps,) it can also force its way out of a transporter beam (perhaps without even realizing what happened.) So much for the idea of beaming small parts out, and possibly even the part about beaming small bombs in.

"Skin of Evil" (telepathic forcefields.) Hmm, I would think a war coordinator (yammosk) also sends out telepathic signals to assist fleet coordination. Perhaps that means a yammosk could interfere with a transporter.

To top it all off, "Scorpion" suggests that a bio-electric field can interfere with transport, and they don't lock well on bioships. I would think with all that power running through them (enough to propel large warships through space at a reasonable pace,) these fields would be fairly strong.

In short, there are lots of potential things that could stop a transporter beaming available in Vong ships. Are they necessarily of sufficient strength? Honestly, not sure. But I believe that there is enough against the idea that one should not automatically assume that an AQ ship would be able to use transporters freely against the Vong. Maybe they'll calibrate a solution eventually, but that's a possibility.

I'm not too worried about Vong versus Fed relationships. I've always thought that it was only utter NR incompetence that led the Vong get as far as they did. Just presenting some thoughts.

[TheDarkling]

Your three primary ideas seem to be as follows:
1) Vong hulls are very weak defensively.
2) They cannot effectively intercept incomers with dovin basals, because their sensors are generally not sensitive enough.
3) Transporters will be effective against them.

If I'm incorrect, please let me know fast.

I do have other problems with the Vong but you are correct that those above are the main focus here.

2) OK, we'll buy that. We'll presume they're good enough to see ships. Agreed?

I'm not all that fond of the "lightspeed TL" idea either, despite what the AOTC:ICS said. But it is official, and so if one wants to use it, I'm afraid that we'll have to do something pretty substantial to counter it. Fortunately for you, I'm not one of them.

Fair enough.

As for photorps, I'll leave that an unknown quantity. They DID stop the detonations of protorps, though...

Well that is upto some debate - exploding a proton torp away from skips allowed them to be destroyed because the singularity can't protect an entire facing side - this was used on more than one occasion but has fallen out of favour with the Jedi who prefer shadiw bombs (Wedge still uses it though).

1) Their hulls are weak. OK, maybe they are by SW standards. But one question. Do their capship hulls generally break up after being hit successfully by ONE HTL bolt? If they can take more than one hit by a capship heavy weapon (even if they DO have a hole punched in them,) they are already a hell of a lot better than the average AQ hull.

And yet one proton torp can break a frigate in two, and a shot from 30 TL batteries (not sure what those refer to but I have heard it said that batteries refer to LTL or MTL's only - basically you guess is as good as mine) from the Venture was enough was enough to atomize a Matalok (cruiser analog).

As for their offense. I would think that while the apparently destructive power may go up and down, I would think a recurring theme is that they are good enough to put significant dents in SW shielding and hull. A single good broadside (might be a single hit) on a Neb-B successfully killed the shield and holed the reinforced hull in Onslaught (one of the earliest Vong books and thus is supposed to be a "precedent setter.") If that hit can do THIS to an Imperial-design frigate, I'm not sanguine about the average Fed ship's ability to successfully defend against a hit.

Well we have seen X-wings survive fire from Frigates and skips so I don't think they will prove to have great fire power now the higher up ships may take a huge leap in destructive firepower and the Feds would need to avoid hits from those (the Vong fleet does seem to be skewed towards fighters and frigates with less big ships - similiar to the NR in his way).

That being said the capships didn't display good firepower during the ground assualt on the Borleias with a ramming atack from a skipdoing far more damage however it could be argued that they had dailed down the ower.

Thus, you might be putting holes into them with your conventional weapons (which is a lot more than could be said than against a NR or Imp ship,) but they're most likely blowing you away. It'll be kind of like Fed-Imp battle projections by conservative pro-SW people back in say 2001.

Yes granted the bigger ships are going to hammer the Feds unless the Feds use range advantage and some tricks(transporter, nanobombs, holograms etc etc) however again (especially earlier in the war) the Vong fleet is skewed towards low end ships and fighters which the Feds can tear into like the NR started doing later in the war (Luke takes out a few frigates solo and Wedge takes on 12 Skips on his own with a damaged X-Wing but he is Wedge so... )

3) Transporters. Ah, the Trekkie favorite

Got to work with what we got.

OK, antigravitons and tractor beams at least do interfere with transporters in the TNG episode "Attached." That implies its opposite number, the "graviton" might also cause interference by "deflecting the transporter.) Search for it in Wong's infamous Canon database. Of course, there might be context for it, but if you want to take that path, provide counterevidence.

Well it isn't stated that these Anti-gravitons caused the redirection or if they are simply a by product (they are occuring on the ship) however assuming they did these doesn't prove gravitions will have the same effect but again lets say they do then the ffect will probably be the same effect which happens on TL's with the sucking and as has been shown they can't capture what they can't see and the voids can be distracted even if they can see them.

With this evidence I will allow that the Singularities may bend the transport beam in a similiar fashion to TL's but as I have said earlier these doesn't give the Vong imunity and hey are still in a bad way (thanks for providing evidence by the way )

They can be blocked by transformers (Legacy.) I would think that even a Vong ship will create some interference of the electromagnetic class.

That was blocking the sensors and beaming down doesn't require sensors (thus beaming a bomb onto a ship will not be stopped by an intense em radiation which maybe occuring, thus its needs to be shown that the Vong do produce such levels of EM radiation to block out sensor totally (the transformer didn't do that because the Chief could still find her just not get a comlpete lock) and even then a blind transport is possible (that could be messy but simply transporting antimatter would work) and even if thats not they could simply beam the bombs onto the hulls where the voids can't protect without sucking the ship up aswell.

In "The Hunted," a human can apparently avoid transport by just forcing against it. That implies that if a Vong ship maneuvers (zigzag perhaps,) it can also force its way out of a transporter beam (perhaps without even realizing what happened.) So much for the idea of beaming small parts out, and possibly even the part about beaming small bombs in.

That wasn't just yuor stadard human howeevr he had shown resistance to energy discharges (no one else has ever forced their way out of a transporter even when they didn't want to go) however all of this is of little relevance since beaming in doesn't != beaming out thus you assertion is shakey at best.

"Skin of Evil" (telepathic forcefields.) Hmm, I would think a war coordinator (yammosk) also sends out telepathic signals to assist fleet coordination. Perhaps that means a yammosk could interfere with a transporter.

Prehaps prehaps that also means the Feds can get their telepaths to monitor comms etc however the Yammosk operates mainly by very weak gravity waves and not straight foward telepathy (unless people are in close contact) and all ships don't carry Yammosk.
Then we have the fact that hte force field was actually a force field created by telepathic means and not just random telepathy waves blocking a transporter.

I think this strand is a bit silly really certyainly weaker than your others.

To top it all off, "Scorpion" suggests that a bio-electric field can interfere with transport, and they don't lock well on bioships. I would think with all that power running through them (enough to propel large warships through space at a reasonable pace,) these fields would be fairly strong.

Again thats to do with beaming up and not being able to get a sensor lock good enough for transport and you have no evidence that the Vong have similiar levels of bioelectric energy (they have beamed onto other biological ships before and been able to scan inside other lifeforms with ships sensors).

In short, there are lots of potential things that could stop a transporter beaming available in Vong ships. Are they necessarily of sufficient strength? Honestly, not sure. But I believe that there is enough against the idea that one should not automatically assume that an AQ ship would be able to use transporters freely against the Vong. Maybe they'll calibrate a solution eventually, but that's a possibility.

Well a few where sensors problems (the two relating to energy), one (the telepathic one) was very weak, the Singularity may bend the beam like a tractor beam but this doesn't prevent transporter use and ships moving whilst beaming isn't a problem (Ref Face of the Enemy among others) so I don't see that being a problem (although you are probably correct about not being able to beam up a resisting Vong warrior) so while you did raise some interesting evidence (which was a nice surprise after dealing with IP) it doesn't really stop transporters working at best it can't limit their ability to function.

I'm not too worried about Vong versus Fed relationships. I've always thought that it was only utter NR incompetence that led the Vong get as far as they did. Just presenting some thoughts.

Yeah thats true and is why it irks me when people seem to think the Vong walk on water, thanks again for bringing some interesting evidence and reasoning to the table.

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

At least it showed they can detect protorps at least some of the time, if they're to try and put a blocker at all. Maybe a photorp would even work better due to its omnidirectional properties.

You don't know the precise yield of the protorp. If they're Slave-I weapons equivalent, they are 190MT, which is about 4 TM protorps (64MT of matter, 74% efficiency = about 48MT.) With the newest canon estimates (after the ICS, pro-SW experts have apparently changed occupations from proving high SW firepower to pushing ST firepower as low as possible,) they're worth hundreds of photorps (the new estimates are made based on events like Pegasus AFAIK.) And let's not even think of the possibility of high-yield protorps

30 LTL batteries, at 6MT each, is still 180MT. But you said "atomize" which is a lot worse than break up (atomize is what happens when an Imperial HTL hits a Federation ship.) Let's say they're MTLs, then for consistency. Quads are 200GT, LTLs are 6MT. Let's suppose a MTL is around the middle, or 1GT each. So it took 30GT. Hmm, that's 600 TM photorps (or THOUSANDS of photorps using the newest estimates.) If you bombard most AQ ships with 600 photorps at once, I don't think many of them will have a lot of scrap left

I'm not too shocked that a X-Wing survived fire from a skip or even a frigate (which may even be an antiaircraft model like the Lancer.) It is possible for a X-Wing to occasionally survive "fire from an Imp frigate." Tyria survived such a hit attacking a Carrack in "Solo Command" with only wingtip damage. Yes, no joke here. However, most people would take offense with you if you translated that to "Imperial Capships are weak."

And I really don't think the average Federation pilot = Wedge or even close. Personally, I make most fleet combat projections using visually observable tactics (which sadly means the Feds will stick to visual range fighting until at least they learn better, or maybe they'll never learn.)

As for the whole transporter business, you should know that once you get out of relatively "hard" things like Offensive Power and Defensive Shielding Ability, everything becomes much more "squishy."

That's why my strategy here is "defensive." Doubt-creation. Not the most elegant tactic in the world, eh? But the fact is that it is impossible to find evidence to fully disprove the notion. The best anyone can do is to find circumstances with certain similarities to the current situation (biological, electromagnetic inteference, gravity...) that did affect transporters in one way or another, and thus suggest that it may very well not be up to the task.

OK, you want a beam out situation that was stopped. Try "Final Mission" where the natural magnetic field of what supposedly is an inhabitable moon (can't be too hostile there) interfered with transporters. They were beaming the Away Team DOWN onto the moon, so it isn't like the magnetic signal is masking them from coming back up.

Another time, "Power Play," they try everything they could to get past electromagnetic interference (pattern enhances and beam refinement.) It seems explicitly stated that the interference may cause the Chief to "rematerialize in a million pieces." So EM interference actually disrupts the cohesion of the transfer, not just getting the sensor locks or something (not that allowing a sensor lock to be broken by a transformer isn't somewhat embarassing.) Finally, a risk was taken, and because it is the an Enterprise crewman, Character Shields intervened and the transport was successful

Back to now. So now we have several pieces of data. Since Vong ships are biologic, they almost certainly produce bioelectric (a kind of EM) fields of some sort. We know that relatively weak EM interference can successfully interfere with or even stop transport. We know that the problem is not merely a sensor lock problem, but an actual detrimental effect on the cohesion of the beam and matter, so even a blind transport may very well fail and the material would never reorganize back into anything. And we also know the problem happens in both beam in and beam out situations.

Of course, you could always claim that the Vong don't produce enough interference. We'd never know. The best I can do is to show that it doesn't take all THAT much interference. The lower the limit is, the more likely the Vong's interference would be adequate. What is for sure is that you cannot say with certainty that they will be able to make it through. You can call it a "potential tactic" (kind of like what you suggested for cloaks) that is not 100% certain. I know I cannot kill the tactic out completely (and perhaps not even bring it down to under 50%,) so I'm not trying very hard in that direction. What I am trying to kill is the certainty.

I just won't be counting on it if I were a Fed planner, though if I'm the Feds, I'll definitely have tried to make it work, for it DOES have at least a chance

[TheDarkling]

At least it showed they can detect protorps at least some of the time, if they're to try and put a blocker at all. Maybe a photorp would even work better due to its omnidirectional properties.

You don't know the precise yield of the protorp. If they're Slave-I weapons equivalent, they are 190MT, which is about 4 TM protorps (64MT of matter, 74% efficiency = about 48MT.) With the newest canon estimates (after the ICS, pro-SW experts have apparently changed occupations from proving high SW firepower to pushing ST firepower as low as possible,) they're worth hundreds of photorps (the new estimates are made based on events like Pegasus AFAIK.) And let's not even think of the possibility of high-yield protorps

Coming up with torp yields is useless (both vary all over the shop) but its clear that it doesn't take a huge amount to take down the hulls of smaller craft and ground vessels (we see proton torps used on the ground and they don't see KT level let alone MT level).

Lets do a chain link - Blasters can take down Vong ships with a few shots, it takes Vong plasma canons a few shots to do the same, blasters aren't that strong (less than X-Wing lasers so low KT max if not lower).
Skips can hurt frigates with a few shots thus Vong frigates won't fare well against high KT weapons (a proton torp breaks them in two but proton torp yield is up in the area).

As you can see the low end Vong ships (Frigates on down) aren't great (X-Wings take them out left right and center) and alot of the Vongs fleet is made up of these ships.

30 LTL batteries, at 6MT each, is still 180MT. But you said "atomize" which is a lot worse than break up (atomize is what happens when an Imperial HTL hits a Federation ship.) Let's say they're MTLs, then for consistency. Quads are 200GT, LTLs are 6MT. Let's suppose a MTL is around the middle, or 1GT each. So it took 30GT. Hmm, that's 600 TM photorps (or THOUSANDS of photorps using the newest estimates.) If you bombard most AQ ships with 600 photorps at once, I don't think many of them will have a lot of scrap left

Except photon torps don't need to turn the enemy ships into gas they just need to destroy them and again thats just speculation on what batteries were used.

I'm not too shocked that a X-Wing survived fire from a skip or even a frigate (which may even be an antiaircraft model like the Lancer.) It is possible for a X-Wing to occasionally survive "fire from an Imp frigate." Tyria survived such a hit attacking a Carrack in "Solo Command" with only wingtip damage. Yes, no joke here. However, most people would take offense with you if you translated that to "Imperial Capships are weak."

Well it certainly possible that the fire was from low level weapons but when the Jedi are on board a frigate we get description on the plasma weapons and it seems the weapons are of the same grade (they don't have heavy plasma weapons and light plasma weapons on a frigate at least), now could an X-Wing take the best hit from an Imperial frigate and still have shields (this is after several minutes of combat already) - this places the fire of a frigate plasma weapons in the KT's which isn't exactly great for such a ship.
Also rememebr that the Imperial fleet was based mainly upon big triangles of death but the Vongs is based more on the NR model and few high end cap ships.

And I really don't think the average Federation pilot = Wedge or even close. Personally, I make most fleet combat projections using visually observable tactics (which sadly means the Feds will stick to visual range fighting until at least they learn better, or maybe they'll never learn.)

Well yeah but since all Wedge did was fire a photon torp for prox deternation into a squadron of skips it doesn't require good piloting, comparing Fed pilots to Wedge really has no purpose.

As for the whole transporter business, you should know that once you get out of relatively "hard" things like Offensive Power and Defensive Shielding Ability, everything becomes much more "squishy."

That's why my strategy here is "defensive." Doubt-creation. Not the most elegant tactic in the world, eh? But the fact is that it is impossible to find evidence to fully disprove the notion. The best anyone can do is to find circumstances with certain similarities to the current situation (biological, electromagnetic inteference, gravity...) that did affect transporters in one way or another, and thus suggest that it may very well not be up to the task.

Yes except you have only come up with one real incident - the tractor beam.

OK, you want a beam out situation that was stopped. Try "Final Mission" where the natural magnetic field of what supposedly is an inhabitable moon (can't be too hostile there) interfered with transporters. They were beaming the Away Team DOWN onto the moon, so it isn't like the magnetic signal is masking them from coming back up.

Two solutions - one Worf was thinking ahead of time (no point beaming people down if they can't get back up).
Two - They improved their transporters because they could do almost exactly this in Descent.

Another time, "Power Play," they try everything they could to get past electromagnetic interference (pattern enhances and beam refinement.) It seems explicitly stated that the interference may cause the Chief to "rematerialize in a million pieces." So EM interference actually disrupts the cohesion of the transfer, not just getting the sensor locks or something (not that allowing a sensor lock to be broken by a transformer isn't somewhat embarassing.) Finally, a risk was taken, and because it is the an Enterprise crewman, Character Shields intervened and the transport was successful

You mean they said there was a 50-50 chance it would work after O'Brien modded the transporter and it worked - maybe this is why during Descent they can do this again either way it worked after the confinement beam was enhanced, again however you still haven't given us any reason to think Vong ships have huge amounts of EM radiation.

Back to now. So now we have several pieces of data. Since Vong ships are biologic, they almost certainly produce bioelectric (a kind of EM) fields of some sort. We know that relatively weak EM interference can successfully interfere with or even stop transport. We know that the problem is not merely a sensor lock problem, but an actual detrimental effect on the cohesion of the beam and matter, so even a blind transport may very well fail and the material would never reorganize back into anything. And we also know the problem happens in both beam in and beam out situations.

We know that a level of EM radiation may block transporters, then later after modding it doesn't then later still EM radiation of a large amount isn't enough to block a transporter - seems like upgrading to me.
We also know that Gomtu a biological ship didn't block transport (until it raised it shields which block sensors) and thats the closest we have to a Vong biological ship and transports worked.

Of course, you could always claim that the Vong don't produce enough interference. We'd never know. The best I can do is to show that it doesn't take all THAT much interference. The lower the limit is, the more likely the Vong's interference would be adequate. What is for sure is that you cannot say with certainty that they will be able to make it through. You can call it a "potential tactic" (kind of like what you suggested for cloaks) that is not 100% certain. I know I cannot kill the tactic out completely (and perhaps not even bring it down to under 50%,) so I'm not trying very hard in that direction. What I am trying to kill is the certainty.

Its not certain but in truth nothing in these debates is really but we have seen them beam past enioughn EM interference to block their sensors and we have seen them beam onto a biological ship.

I just won't be counting on it if I were a Fed planner, though if I'm the Feds, I'll definitely have tried to make it work, for it DOES have at least a chance

Nor would I you still have many other tactics (cloaks hide gravity thats proven Vong sensors work on gravity), photon torps that are hidden from view, gravity like tactics (creating graviton beams etc to disrupt Yammosks), nanoweapons, bioweapons, phasers that account for bending (its not that complicated some NR pilots have eyeballed it before), proximity torps, ground combat is sown up (planting claymores or the like would hammer the Vong and using photon grenades for such would work).

The Feds wouldn't splinter like the NR and the Vong fleet doesn't have a huge amount of heavy ships (especially early in the war) people saying the Vong will walk the battle just subscribe to the flase reason I have already mentioned (a case can be made for the Vong no doubt but it isn't a whitewash).

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

Yes, torp yields do vary all over the place, BUT, one of the few "concrete" values we have for them is 190MT (the other is about 1kT.) I'd say that's a good starting point. Unless you really think they'd deliberately use a super-cheap protorp against a ship.

I'd say that generally for ground use, protorps seem to be degraded deliberately. If you can buy TLs being degraded for ground support operations, why not a protorp?

What kind of ship? Is it a coralskipper (fighter plane?) What kind of blaster is it? I really don't think it was a heavy capship.

It is true that we cannot decide whether they're MTLs or LTLs. On the other hand, I've ALSO made a possibility present that it is an LTL, and told you the likely firepower in such a case. They can also be a mix, in which case the number will be somewhere between the two. The point is that you cannot use the 30 battery example to prove them greatly vulnerable to ST weapons.

It has no significance that the Imperial fleet is based more on the Star Destroyer. They were attacking a Carrack in that chapter, which is a frigate-sized vessel. Even on ships with a single caliber gun, it is possible they sacrificed firepower for rate of fire, or for some other system (such as the dovin basals.)

A point blank shot by a Star Destroyer? Well, maybe if it was a QLC or LTL, there might be a chance, but that's about it.

Well, Wedge got main character shields that the average Federation pilot won't. Also, his placement would probably be better due to his higher level of experience and proficiency. Experience and proficiency do not only show up in dogfights.

Amazing how you can think of only two solutions. 2 really means the problem still exists. They might have improved on it some, but there's no reason to believe it suddenly disappeared into thin air.

And 1 is a non-starter. They obviously have to go down, so Worf suggested a shuttlecraft. But if they can beam down, FINISH their work, and call a shuttlecraft to pick them up at a rendevous point. They can save minutes that way, since they can beam down and not have to wait for the shuttle to ready itself. Also, nobody even proposed trying to put some kind of beacon (you know, what they USUALLY do when the sensors can't pick those guys up.) My possibility also correlates better with the EXPLICITLY stated problem with O'Brien - that the problem was with the cohesion itself, not any sensor lock. In fact, transport might be possible without full sensor lock.

And of course, you never even gave a second's thought to "3", that Descent might have been less harsh.

The problem most likely didn't disappear. You'd notice that O'Brien just was on the right side of the coin that day. Again, I would hope (for their sake) that they had an incremental improvement in this area, but there is no evidence of there being a revolutionary advance.

Considering that a transformer can affect their sensors, saying that they succeeded in transporting in a situation where their sensors were blocked is nothing to be proud of.

You're painting a very optimistic picture. I think we agree that EM do block transporters now. Where you made a leap of logic is trying to use an example of where it didn't happen to say the problem doesn't exist anymore.

Amazing also how you emphasized the Gomtu and de-emphasized S-8472. Even though S-8472 power levels and other characteristics may correlate at least as well as the Gomtu.

[TheDarkling]

Ok lets take the 190MT (seems far to high) going with TM vaklues thats a couple of Q torps or maybe 4 Photon torps that can split a frigate in half so 1 Q torp should cripple a frigate (once the weapons past the rather questionable hull its just flesh and bone and Flesh + MT level exlposion = bye bye).

It was a skip and the blaster canons where attached to a human sized droid, it wasn't a frigate however the chain of firepowers works as I have shown you.

I will respond with more later but I'm late for a prior engagment.

[TheDarkling]

If the weapons used were LTL's then it does show how weak higher Vong hulls are however that incident was more to show that the Vong are outclassed by the Empire (as everynoe seems to think they are on par with SW tech which they aren't).

Fire power for ROF? you can claim that but I see no proof (I also see no proof of variable yield - we know that the plasma weapon works along modern weapons loading as opposed to beam weapons (they load a plasma charge and fire - we do see the inner workings it could be SbS or DJ).

Stop going on about character shields or I will just invoke Jameways idiot shield and we can all go home, the situation was - Wedge sees Skips coming towards him and fired the Proton torp which hit a piece of debis by accident and not any of the skips therefore it wasn't excellent placement.

They have improved themn but the sitaution may still be a problem - I hqave no problem with that however you have yet to show high levels of Em coming from the Vong, I have given a biological ship example in keeping with the Vong style and it works.

Their work was getting people out of there - why beam down to see if people are down there then wait if they aren't or if they are still wait for the shuttle and they needed to do search of an area - its not a non starter if you know what the situation was.

Species 8472 come from other dimension, rip hull with their bare hands have super thick DNA etc while Gomtu was a simple bioship (not to mention that memebrs of 8472 can be beamed up as 7 of 9 did also remember it was again a sensor issue (since transporter worked using some other method of locking no).

You have pointed out some issue but I think you were right when you admitted you couldn't prove yours was the better case, you have a 50-50 chance in one incident and others were 100%, we have transporters taking place around creatures of high bio energy and transporter to biological ships (Breen ships are organic based and they use transporter aswell if I recall correctly from DS9) - you have proved that high EM fields reduce transporter efficeincy however you haven't proved Vong ships have EM fields of that level (and actually you would need to prove the levels were higher) and haven't turned aside the other biotech examples.

In short there is a little doubt but there seems to be far more evidence supporting my conclusion (even one of your own examples proves high level of Em can be overcome by transport tweaking (although this maynot always work)).

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

Well, we don't have to be on par with Imperial tech to be a major threat to the Federation (as the Borg and Dominion proved)

I only jokingly mentioned character shields. And oh fine, since you finally described what happened, I'll agree that perhaps a proximity detonation could get them. And even you put smileys when you first mentioned the Wedge part, so don't tell me you don't believe in character shields

In principle, a plasma weapon is some superheated matter. Think they must apply the same heat-energy to each, or load the precise same sized charge of plasma in every time? You do remember that used to be, the favorite theory for TLs is that they were plasma, but we can still vary the yield.

For your counter, let's say they can get the shuttle ready in five minutes, and that it is a three minute trip to the surface. Say ten minutes to search and get everyone organized for the trip home.

If you insist on waiting for a shuttlecraft, your schedule is sequential:
Wait for shuttle to ready and load - 5 minutes
Head down to surface - 3 minutes
Search and Organize your rescuees - 10 minutes
Load 'em - say 30 seconds
Return to ship - 3 minutes
Total: 21 minutes 30 seconds

But if you just beam down right now, you can use the schedule more concurrently:
Beam down: 5 seconds
Search and Organize Rescuees at Rendevous Point: 10 minutes
The shuttle arrives, even counting in an extra two minute search for your landing coordinates.
Load them: 30 seconds
Return: 3 minutes
Total: 13 minutes 35 seconds

So the Gomtu weren't too convincing, so you decide to involve the Breen. Sorry pal, but I really doubt in terms of power production, the Breen is not but a mere shadow of the Vong. Their main threat IIRC was their energy sucker...

Actually, one incident was at the very margin of possibility (even after the best available engineering solution was applied - they would probably not have time to set that up in the heat of battle.)

BTW, if we were actually there, and could take readings on just how severe the EM interference is, it would be one of the best times to determine a precise limit of the transporter's counter-EM capability. These 50-50 things are just perfect for taking a limit reading (just like the protorp turn in ANH was the very limit of the protorp turn ability.)

And we finally have a clear expression of the danger mechanism. The others were probably 100% because they were weaker in strength or at best an incremental improvement, not because some revolutionary improvement eliminated the problem.

Again. No one knows the biofield strength of the Vong. But we do know that as biologics, they most likely have one, and it'll probably be proportional to the kinds of energy they're moving around. We know that many species (Breen and Gomtu) don't make the grade (I've been expecting that.) But we also know some DO (S8472.) We also know that the grade is not that high from the other EM examples. That to me opens the possibility that interference may be possible. Just a possibility, no more.

Oh well, to be sure, they probably won't think of that anyway. I'm not even sure what I'm doing sitting here debating the precise size of a doubt hole. We're not likely to agree (since as I told you, transporter capabilities are far more "squishy" than firepower and shielding.) You're seeing all the times it did work. I'm seeing all the times it didn't.

[Admiral Johnason]

I hate to be a painin the butt, but I haven't read ay books havint to do with the Vong. As a matter of fact, I haven't read an ST book in 2 years. Could you please bring me up to speed?

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

Forget reading about ST books. They are not canon and not official and they're not accepted. If you want to use the info for debate, stick to studying episodes and movies.

To get a summary of NJO (and the whole SW history)
http://www.theforce.net/timetales/

[TheDarkling]

Oh on the contrary I find Gomtu more than enough but why not add more examples if I have them - its called building a case and I think you are seriously under estimating Gomtu (it was throwing ships around like toys across large distances) and 8472 could be beamed (besides it was a sensor issue as proved).

As you say we aren't likely to agree but you have some em interference (which was overcome) and little else while I have the same evidence you presented but backing me up and beaming of several relevant biological ships etc while theres a chance it won't work the wealth of evidence supports my conclusion (at least to my eyes).

I also understand they could take more time to charge up the Plasma but this requires far more energy (wearing out the Dovin Baslas and the ship more) expends more fuel, adds to wear and tear and end takes down the ROF and it hasn't been mentioned to be possible.

Admiral Johnason: The Vong suck, the NR sucks harder and Wedge rules all.

[TheDarkling]

Forget reading about ST books. They are not canon and not official and they're not accepted. If you want to use the info for debate, stick to studying episodes and movies.

To get a summary of NJO (and the whole SW history)
http://www.theforce.net/timetales/

ermm ST books are often good reads (especially compared to he current shows) and I think he meant SW books.

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

it isn't my fault to misunderstand him, is it?

I've ran over to get a quick read of the Gomtu at DITL (it is OK if you don't look at the stats,) and yes they're pretty good (they supposedly destroyed a Rom Warbird pretty easily.)

Thanks for agreeing there's a significant chance. I hope I've actually increased that chance in your eyes. That's really about as far as I was planning to get. The rub is that in debates, if you can't prove something beyond reasonable doubt, you have to conservatively assume that you can't use it (which is why pro-SW people emphasize power and shielding in their arguments rather than technobabble tricks, for they're relatively easily quantified and proved to beyond reasonable doubt that it is possible.)

You just admitted that they can logically take variable timings with the plasma and thus alter the yield, and even listed a shitload of advantages for doing so. Yes, they didn't explicitly mention it, but it is logical at least, and a potential rationalization as to what happened.

Yeah I know, the Vong suck. If it weren't for that, I wouldn't be here, trying to make a case for them. The case would be self-obvious (like the Empire and the Federation.)

[Admiral_K]

It seems to be pretty common knowledge that the Empire would've crushed the vong just as easily as they would crush the federation. It was a combination of factors that lead to the vong's success against the NR.

I could see the feds fighting these guys off and I could see them losing. In this case, I would think that the NDF effect would actually be to the feds advantage since they are facing primarily bio matter of various types. Also, the NR had far more problems then just the Vong arrayed against them which lead to their downfall. However, the Vong have a faster FTL drive and some unique weapons/defensive techs that would take the feds a while to get past. However, since these special techs appear to be technobabular in nature, as opposed to raw power that the Empire employs, the feds would probably find a way around them with counter-technobable.

[Helm]

The Feds can pull a number of tricks that the NR couldn't, giving the Vong one hell of a bad day. However weapons power, numbers, and production (especially production) goes to the vong. They can only really loose if they get their numbers smashed to pieces in phyric victories like they did in the NJO, or if the AQ/BQ powers develop a bioweapon liuke Alpha red and the Vong don't have a counter to it (something up in the air)

*nods* Not to mention the Federation is UNIFIED, unlike the NR. And the Federation's allies (Klingons, Ferengi Alliance, and perhaps the Romulans if you want to be so bold) would most likely, after having been invaded by the Borg and the Dominion, would rally to the cry to protect the Alpha and Beta Quadrants, though most just say Alpha Quadrant to signify maintaining galactic peace in both quadrants. but anyway...

If the Vong do not get some sort of foot hold to continue their war campaign, they will fall. The Federation is known for getting out of the most worse case scenario's and making replicators out of chunks of granite, to exaggerate a bit.

If the Vong do not get a foot hold to continue building ships and produce warriors for the campaign, it will eventually end like the German invasion of Russia in WW2, to give a analogy.

Not to mention, navigating the Star Trek universe will be very different then navigating Star Wars since Star Trek relies on real-time space continuum travel (warp drive) instead of hyperspace. Though, of course, they are still working on that. And are not too far I bet, since the Borg allready have hyperspace/transwarp conduits throughout most of the galaxy.

But, the biggest wild cards?

The Borg. Perhaps even Species 8472.

[Darth Servo]

*nods* Not to mention the Federation is UNIFIED, unlike the NR.

But the Federation is a lot SMALLER that the NR.

And the Federation's allies (Klingons, Ferengi Alliance, and perhaps the Romulans if you want to be so bold) would most likely, after having been invaded by the Borg and the Dominion,

The Klingons and Romulans never helped the Feds against the borg. They only joined the Feds against the Dominion once they realized they would be dead if they didn't.

If the Vong do not get some sort of foot hold to continue their war campaign, they will fall.

Thats a pretty big if since there are vast unexplored regions within Federation territory, let alone the entire quadrant that the Vong could occupy without needing to fight any major powers.

The Federation is known for getting out of the most worse case scenario's and making replicators out of chunks of granite, to exaggerate a bit.

Only because they were facing relatively even matchups. The worst was against the borg and the collective was getting its ass kicked by someone with the kind of power demonstrated in SW.

If the Vong do not get a foot hold to continue building ships and produce warriors for the campaign, it will eventually end like the German invasion of Russia in WW2, to give a analogy.

I repeat, that is one enormous 'if'.
Not to mention, navigating the Star Trek universe will be very different then navigating Star Wars since Star Trek relies on real-time space continuum travel (warp drive) instead of hyperspace. Though, of course, they are still working on that.

And are not too far I bet, since the Borg allready have hyperspace/transwarp conduits throughout most of the galaxy.

Prove that the borg have conduits throughout "most of the galaxy".

The Borg.

No one is going to call on the Borg for help. Besides, they have proven to be incapable of withstanding SW level firepower by S8472.

Perhaps even Species 8472.

Who are a bunch of cowards and only fight when they have overwhelming advantage. As soon as Voyager turned the tide slightly against them, they ran away with their tail between their legs.

[TheDarkling]

The Klingons and Romulans never helped the Feds against the borg. They only joined the Feds against the Dominion once they realized they would be dead if they didn't.

The Klingons did send ships to help the Federation during BOBW.

[Helm]

*nods* Not to mention the Federation is UNIFIED, unlike the NR.

-But the Federation is a lot SMALLER that the NR.[/qoute]

Is it? If you take a look at a Star Wars galactic map. you'll see something particularly peculiar. Most cases Star Wars has been primarily concerned with planets and only planets, and sometimes systems. There is no grand stellar cartography divisions that are known, or to even exist, in Star Wars. The reason is because of Hyperdrive. It makes them blind when they travel, they cannot see what is around them (they can only sense with large masses are nearby, but by then it's too late before the hyperdrive default mechanisms exit hyperspace to avoid a collision with a planet, sun, or asteroid belt) and so, charting space is drastically difficult. They may be able to jump from one point of the galaxy to another in a few days, but they cannot chart all the territory they pass by and check for suitable colonies, resources, and what not. In terms of exploration, I'd say that the Federation *and now pulls out his Star Trek atlas book* who, in comparison to the New Republic, would indeed show that it has larger borders then the Federation... but that deep in their borders, they have not utiliized every planet, every resource, every space they can because constant hyperspace jumping is stressful (there is a reason why there is a UKNOWN REGIONS in Star Wars since the great war with the Sith 1000 years before Episode 1). The Federation, with it's FTL being warp drive, can do this with relative ease, and since the Federation's mind set is to boldy go where no man has gone before etc and so forth, the Federation is going to utilize every space they find. And by this map in the Star Trek atlas I am looking at, I'd say the Federation is roughly 1/12 of it's current galaxy, the Milky Way, which is 8.33%, but only by 2 dimnensional standards. Space is 3D and I think the Federation would have utilized every inch of space in that 3D galaxy of their's. My point, if I may have allready lost you by now, is this. Yes, Star Wars/New Republic may seem to be everywhere in the map, but they have not. They do not have such a backboned structure as teh Federation does. The New Republic along with most interstellar governments of it's own galaxy rely on major planets as a key marker to how much territory they control. There really is no defined border with the New Republic because of this. With the Federation, however, there is.

And the Federation's allies (Klingons, Ferengi Alliance, and perhaps the Romulans if you want to be so bold) would most likely, after having been invaded by the Borg and the Dominion,

-The Klingons and Romulans never helped the Feds against the borg. They only joined the Feds against the Dominion once they realized they would be dead if they didn't.

Incorrect. The Klingons have helped the Federation before with Borg incursions. The Romulans and Federation have also met with discovering destroyed colonies on the Romulan/Federation Neutral Zone, which were destroyer by the Borg. Yes, they have worked together before in the past when it comes to the Borg.

If the Vong do not get some sort of foot hold to continue their war campaign, they will fall.

-Thats a pretty big if since there are vast unexplored regions within Federation territory, let alone the entire quadrant that the Vong could occupy without needing to fight any major powers.

It depends. Do the Vong have early gathered intelligence like they did with Star Wars? Will they have available starcharts and know where everything is? And it's not just as easy as finding a empty space of realty in the Star Trek galaxy and then invaded all the major powers. It's just not that easy with ST, unlike it was with SW whom had a un-unified New Republic and a rather reluctant galactic populace willing to help everyone (instead of just themselves) anyway. It's not a big IF. If the Vong are a worst threat then the Dominion, they will unite once again if they have to. At least the Klingons and the Federation.

The Federation is known for getting out of the most worse case scenario's and making replicators out of chunks of granite, to exaggerate a bit.

-Only because they were facing relatively even matchups. The worst was against the borg and the collective was getting its ass kicked by someone with the kind of power demonstrated in SW.

I'm going to assume that when you say"... the collective was getting its ass kicked by someone with the kind of power demonstrated in SW" you are referring to Species 8472. The war between the Borg and Species 8472 was not as tilted in favor of 8472 as the Borg let Voyager to believe. It was simply a means to deceive Voyager in getting what they needed, which was newly devolped nano-probes that could assimilate 8472. Later, we find even more out on this when Voyager stumbles on a Species 8472 training facility (one of many in the Delta Quadrant) that is supposed to simulate life on Earth, for 8472 agents to infiltrate the Federation and Star Fleet. When Voyager and these 8472 agents came to face to face, they said something rather interesting. Oh, that those nano probes scare the hell out of them. Oh, and that to them they were fighting for their survival of their race and had taken heavy casualties. 8472 and the Borg came to a draw, and quite possibly since the Borg could now assimilate 8472 now with the modified and upgraded nano probes, probably tip the scales in favor to the Borg if you wanted to.

But what about the Dominion? Was that a even match up? It took 3 galactic governments in the alpha/beta quadrants to end their war campaign. I'd hardly say that's a even match up.

If the Vong do not get a foot hold to continue building ships and produce warriors for the campaign, it will eventually end like the German invasion of Russia in WW2, to give a analogy.
-I repeat, that is one enormous 'if'.

Yeah yeah, we allready went over this before, so I won't answer it again.

Not to mention, navigating the Star Trek universe will be very different then navigating Star Wars since Star Trek relies on real-time space continuum travel (warp drive) instead of hyperspace. Though, of course, they are still working on that. And are not too far I bet, since the Borg allready have hyperspace/transwarp conduits throughout most of the galaxy.

-Prove that the borg have conduits throughout "most of the galaxy". No one is going to call on the Borg for help. Besides, they have proven to be incapable of withstanding SW level firepower by S8472. Who are a bunch of cowards and only fight when they have overwhelming advantage. As soon as Voyager turned the tide slightly against them, they ran away with their tail between their legs.

Go watch the last Voyager episode where they talk about their transwarp conduit hubs.

I never said anyone would call on the Borg for help. No need to put words in my mouth. I was simply stating that it's likely possible that the Federation and other governments are not too far behind in creating their own transwarp systems.

They have proven they can withstand Species 8472. And, since you staying that 8472 is SW level firepower... let me go even further with that, and your other statement. So they are SW level firepower to -you-... (I look at it very differently, but let's say what you say is true... and SW level firepower would just kick the CRAP out of anything or something)...

So the Federation scares the hell out of a SW level firepower race, 8472. Sends them screaming home. Gives them the motivation to begin infiltration training to infiltrate Star Fleet.

So... if the Federation with their "sucky ships" as you once put it so elequently, scared the hell out of Species 8472, whom to you has SW level firepower.

What can I say, you made my case with the last one. Now it's so obvious that the Federation can withstand anything the Vong can throw at them.

[TheDarkling]

8472 were taking heavy casualties from the Borg? first I have heard of it, you got a quote or something to back that up?

[SirNitram]

My my... That's a post full of hasty generalizations and previously destroyed arguments.

The Empire has a million worlds, at least. How do we know this? Well, Tarkin tells us about the Million Worlds of the Empire in ANH. These, we find when we glance over WEG, are the member worlds.. Fifty million more exist as barely-colonized, and a hundred mill are mined! It appears your claims about the NR and the Federation(Stated in FC to be 150 member worlds) being the same size are BULLSHIT, plain and simple.

Hyperdrive leaves you blind? Source, please.

The NR has no border because Hyperdrive removes the sense of one. One can skip through, or over, contested territory in minutes or hours. This makes lines about as effective as long trenches in WWII Europe..

(Alliances)

The Klingons sent a few ships for BOBW, which didn't get there in time. They sent nothing for FC. The Romulans had to be tricked, even when facing an enemy that would splatter them.

(Intelligence)

You claim there is not much space for the Vong to get a toehold in ST. Please prove this utterly unsubstantiated comment.

(Borg)

'It was all a Borg lie! REALLY! THEY WEREN'T REALLY LOSING!!!!!111'.

Prove it.

(Transwarp)

Wow, a single hub, easily destroyed, and they must have the infrastructure to attack an entire galaxy.. But they don't.

No one here claims S8472 is on par with SW in ship-to-ship(Calc's of their main guns make them pale in comparison to the guns on a 30 year old transport, for Bob's sake..), sadly. And the Federation 'scares' a bunch of pussies that run when they lose 6 soldiers. They were pussies with big guns, woopie.

I'm sure you'll continue to declare victory..

[TheDarkling]

They sent nothing for FC

They weren't allies at the time (in fact they had been at war a few months before).

[SirNitram]

They sent nothing for FC

They weren't allies at the time (in fact they had been at war a few months before).

I know. I'm just pointing out times they sent nothing for Borg incursions.

Where did we hear about the Klingon-Fed war, anyway? I forgot about that...

[TheDarkling]

Season 5 DS9.

[Helm]

8472 were taking heavy casualties from the Borg? first I have heard of it, you got a quote or something to back that up?

I'll go look for it now. I saw the episode not to long ago on TV so that's why I brought it up. If I can't find it, fair enough, strike it from the record.

[Helm]

My my... That's a post full of hasty generalizations and previously destroyed arguments.

The Empire has a million worlds, at least. How do we know this? Well, Tarkin tells us about the Million Worlds of the Empire in ANH. These, we find when we glance over WEG, are the member worlds.. Fifty million more exist as barely-colonized, and a hundred mill are mined! It appears your claims about the NR and the Federation(Stated in FC to be 150 member worlds) being the same size are BULLSHIT, plain and simple.

Hyperdrive leaves you blind? Source, please.

The NR has no border because Hyperdrive removes the sense of one. One can skip through, or over, contested territory in minutes or hours. This makes lines about as effective as long trenches in WWII Europe..

(Alliances)

The Klingons sent a few ships for BOBW, which didn't get there in time. They sent nothing for FC. The Romulans had to be tricked, even when facing an enemy that would splatter them.

(Intelligence)

You claim there is not much space for the Vong to get a toehold in ST. Please prove this utterly unsubstantiated comment.

(Borg)

'It was all a Borg lie! REALLY! THEY WEREN'T REALLY LOSING!!!!!111'.

Prove it.

(Transwarp)

Wow, a single hub, easily destroyed, and they must have the infrastructure to attack an entire galaxy.. But they don't.

No one here claims S8472 is on par with SW in ship-to-ship(Calc's of their main guns make them pale in comparison to the guns on a 30 year old transport, for Bob's sake..), sadly. And the Federation 'scares' a bunch of pussies that run when they lose 6 soldiers. They were pussies with big guns, woopie.

I'm sure you'll continue to declare victory..

I'm not here to declare victory I'm here to debate. Either you people will show me the light and I will learn that I am wrong, or I will strengthen my views that I allready have. I'm not out to conquer you like the Vong... or am I?