Scimitar Observations

Alyeska · Post by **Alyeska** » 2003-02-11 11:00pm

After reviewing the Nemesis battle scene again I have come to some realizations. First, the ability to fire through the cloak was an advantage to the Scimitar, but not as decisive one as one might first think. When the Scimitar wasn’t firing, the Enterprise and the Valdore’s had to randomly fire to find it. However when the Scimitar fired its weapons, the Enterprise was hitting the target most of the time. What this means is that firing while cloaked allows for a nice alpha strike advantage, but in the case of Federation ships they will return fire.

There is also something else I have noticed about the Scimitar. Its shields were good enough to shrug off impacts of disrupters, photon torpedoes, and phasers. There was no apparent seepage damage through the shields. On the other hand the Quantum Torpedoes seemed to cause relatively high amounts of damage to the shields and penetrate to an extent. 9 Quantum torpedoes caused more damage to the Scimitar then any of the other previous fire.

Considering this, I think that Battlegroup Omega would have been more then enough to take down the Scimitar. With 9 ships the Scimitar would open fire. This would immediately attract the entire attention of the fleet. They will continue to fire on the Scimitar. Shield impacts means they will be hitting most of the time even when the Scimitar ceases to fire on its own. Additionally if the Valiant is again a Defiant class, its torpedoes and PPCs along with its maneuverability will be a major threat to the Scimitar.

There are things the Remans or Romulans could have done to improve the Scimitar for battle. They could have scrapped the Thelaron radiation system. This would allow for improved weapon systems. They could also have properly armored the ship at this point. By doing that it would have been able to sustain Quantum Torpedo damage better and be able to destroy even a Sovereign in a single volley. That would make it a true battleship and superb battleship.

Sr.mal · Post by **Sr.mal** » 2003-02-11 11:03pm

But then that would be the smart thing to do. Designing ships to be effective in battle somehow is lost on ship designers in Trek.

Alyeska · Post by **Alyeska** » 2003-02-11 11:07pm

Sr.mal wrote:But then that would be the smart thing to do. Designing ships to be effective in battle somehow is lost on ship designers in Trek.

Not entirely true. The Scimitar was designed around the Thelaron weapon itself. All things considered, it did quite well. I am just pointing out how that removing the weapon would make it a superior capitalship.

Master of Ossus · Post by **Master of Ossus** » 2003-02-11 11:25pm

I think it was a pretty foregone conclusion that Battle Group Omega could defeat the single Scimitar. The problem would have been what would have happened if Skippy had come with more ships.

Darth Fanboy · Post by **Darth Fanboy** » 2003-02-12 01:06am

get rid of the Thalaron weapon and make it larger, then give it some better weapons. Then throw enough firepower into the Alpha strike to destroy a Sovereign in one strike (granted the Scimitar would have done that if theydidn't need Picard.)

neoolong · Post by **neoolong** » 2003-02-12 01:31am

Master of Ossus wrote:I think it was a pretty foregone conclusion that Battle Group Omega could defeat the single Scimitar. The problem would have been what would have happened if Skippy had come with more ships.

Isn't that the same with the Borg?

Gil Hamilton · Post by **Gil Hamilton** » 2003-02-12 04:26am

Alyeska, I'm curious on your take on the Enterprise ramming scene in Nemesis. Specifically how the battle with the Enterprise and two Valdores only took down the shields by 30%, but the slow ramming crashed straight through the shields, even given the relatively tiny amount of KE involved.

EmperorMing · Post by **EmperorMing** » 2003-02-12 06:30am

Gil Hamilton wrote:Alyeska, I'm curious on your take on the Enterprise ramming scene in Nemesis. Specifically how the battle with the Enterprise and two Valdores only took down the shields by 30%, but the slow ramming crashed straight through the shields, even given the relatively tiny amount of KE involved.

Would this be evidence that Trek shielding more suitable for energy based weapons?

Col. Crackpot · Post by **Col. Crackpot** » 2003-02-12 06:46am

if Skippy had succeeded in destroying the Enterprise, the battle group would have been a moot point because he would simply have bypassed it and gone straight to Earth.

apocolypse · Post by **apocolypse** » 2003-02-12 10:51am

Theory about Skippy's shields failing had to do with the mass of the E-E overloading the generators....least that's what I've heard.

Alyeska · Post by **Alyeska** » 2003-02-12 11:13am

Gil Hamilton wrote:Alyeska, I'm curious on your take on the Enterprise ramming scene in Nemesis. Specifically how the battle with the Enterprise and two Valdores only took down the shields by 30%, but the slow ramming crashed straight through the shields, even given the relatively tiny amount of KE involved.

I think the entire scene is fucked up. We have seen far worse impacts in planetary crashes for Federation ships yet they didn't cause near so much damage. Then there is the whole shield aspect. It just doesn't make sense that shields would play no role. The best I can think of is that Schinzon lowered the shields on the Scimitar knowing the Enterprise had no more weapons and was waiting for Picard to finally relent and beam over. Then when Picard decided to ram the Scimitar he panicked and made an incorrect snap order. He was already not in the best of mental states and the situation at hand was going downhill for him.

Anyway, thats my take on what happened.

Darth Garden Gnome · Post by **Darth Garden Gnome** » 2003-02-12 04:19pm

Alyeska wrote:I think the entire scene is fucked up. We have seen far worse impacts in planetary crashes for Federation ships yet they didn't cause near so much damage. Then there is the whole shield aspect. It just doesn't make sense that shields would play no role. The best I can think of is that Schinzon lowered the shields on the Scimitar knowing the Enterprise had no more weapons and was waiting for Picard to finally relent and beam over. Then when Picard decided to ram the Scimitar he panicked and made an incorrect snap order. He was already not in the best of mental states and the situation at hand was going downhill for him.

Anyway, thats my take on what happened.

Well with all due respect Alyeska, it seems highly unlikley that Shinzon would just sit there for several seconds and and stare dumbly at the ramming Enterpirse without putting his shields on. And we all know it would take but a press of a button and whoosh, the shields are up. And even if he had, it would seem damn obvious to the tac officer to turn them on even without specific orders (common sense, after all). Anyways, is there any point in the battle when the action was cut away from the Scimitar long enough for them to turn their shields off without us seeing it?

Aside, I agree, the scene is fucked up. The saucer in Generations easily took more KE from impact than the E-E or the Scimitar, and yet there the Scimtar is crashed all to hell after impact. I'd just as well write off the whole scene than try to make sense of it.

Admiral Johnason · Post by **Admiral Johnason** » 2003-02-12 05:51pm

Maybe the sheilds are like the one in Dune, the more energy you put into the impact, the more resistance you get. The less energy you put into it, the more the thing peneterates. However, once the power of the weapon hits a cretian point, the sheilds can no longer handle it.

Uraniun235 · Post by **Uraniun235** » 2003-02-12 07:21pm

Master of Ossus wrote:I think it was a pretty foregone conclusion that Battle Group Omega could defeat the single Scimitar. The problem would have been what would have happened if Skippy had come with more ships.

Out of curiosity, where does the name "Skippy" come from?

Master of Ossus · Post by **Master of Ossus** » 2003-02-12 07:56pm

Uraniun235 wrote:
Master of Ossus wrote:I think it was a pretty foregone conclusion that Battle Group Omega could defeat the single Scimitar. The problem would have been what would have happened if Skippy had come with more ships.
Out of curiosity, where does the name "Skippy" come from?

I don't know. Someone else was using it, and I thought that it was pretty funny, so I adopted it for Shinzon. I also sometimes call the Scimitar, "Skippy's fortress" or similar.

Admiral Johnason · Post by **Admiral Johnason** » 2003-02-12 09:44pm

I would like to say one thing right now avout Spacebattles.com, they have some of the best joke about Star Trek and Star Wars I have ever heard.

Howedar · Post by **Howedar** » 2003-02-12 09:48pm

Alyeska wrote:I think the entire scene is fucked up. We have seen far worse impacts in planetary crashes for Federation ships yet they didn't cause near so much damage. Then there is the whole shield aspect. It just doesn't make sense that shields would play no role. The best I can think of is that Schinzon lowered the shields on the Scimitar knowing the Enterprise had no more weapons and was waiting for Picard to finally relent and beam over. Then when Picard decided to ram the Scimitar he panicked and made an incorrect snap order. He was already not in the best of mental states and the situation at hand was going downhill for him.

Anyway, thats my take on what happened.

To be honest, this is the best theory I've seen.

The Silence and I · Post by **The Silence and I** » 2003-02-12 10:32pm

I think the damage to the ships' hulls can be explained by the near failure of the E-E's SIF, and the flimsy construction of the Scimitar. In Generations, if I remember rightly, all power was added to SIF, allowing the hull to survive. In Nemesi, just after the dorsal shields failed, at least two disruptors impacted the bare hull, plus the seepage from the entire 15 min. battle, and someone on the bridge stated SIF was fluctuating or something.

The shields... who can say? The E-D took heavy K.E. hits without damage during the series, the E-E took a heavy hit without distress, then this...

Right now I think the whole scene was badly shown, and the ships were actually farther apart, and moving in slow motion. My evidence is very little. It depends on the scene just before the Scimitar blows up, where was the Enterprise? No where to be seen! The ship couldn't have moved away, and if it really was only a Km, (if that) away, it would have been fried! Or at least visible! It must have been fairly distant, and this *could* mean the ships were farther apart before the ramming scene, and actually moved at a respectable speed. Otherwise this contradicts everything else. Oh well, I have a single screenshot to work with, but it is one way to explain the ramming scene.

Edit: At least one grammer mistake

beyond hope · Post by **beyond hope** » 2003-02-12 11:09pm

There's another possibility for the increase in distance: perhaps Shinzon didn't have his crew kill their backwards movement away from the E-E after pulling free from its saucer. They could also have been putting some distance between themselves and the E-E as the thalaron emitter charged for safety's sake.

Helm · Post by **Helm** » 2003-02-13 03:11am

I've noticed (or remember/recall at any rate) that collisions with vessels occurr regardless of shields. Jem'Hadar ramming attacks, are a example.

It could be that the shields cannot even begin to resist such a force (and a ramming ship is quite a powerful force indeed) and so they don't even try to push it back.

That's just a theory though. Not entirely sure on it. It's late at any rate for me.

Gil Hamilton · Post by **Gil Hamilton** » 2003-02-13 07:55am

Alyeska wrote:I think the entire scene is fucked up. We have seen far worse impacts in planetary crashes for Federation ships yet they didn't cause near so much damage. Then there is the whole shield aspect. It just doesn't make sense that shields would play no role. The best I can think of is that Schinzon lowered the shields on the Scimitar knowing the Enterprise had no more weapons and was waiting for Picard to finally relent and beam over. Then when Picard decided to ram the Scimitar he panicked and made an incorrect snap order. He was already not in the best of mental states and the situation at hand was going downhill for him.

Anyway, thats my take on what happened.

Here is my reply on SB.com, copy and pasted from there for your enjoyment:

That's the thing, Shinzon didn't lower his shields and the Enterprise wasn't entirely out of juice for it's weapons. They even specifically addressed this.
Picard suggested that they take what was left of their phaser power (stated to be 4% of normal) and fire it in one big burst at the Scimitar, which had parked in front of him. Geordi said that it was a no go, since the Scimitar's shields were at 70% of what they were at the being of the battle and their phasers would be all but useless. So Picard decided to do his sloooooow ram, which easily punched through the Scimitars shields and smashed into the ship. If the shields were down, Geordi would not have been able to have just measured them and they wouldn't have protected the Scimitar against the last ditch phaser burst idea Picard had thrown out there anyway.

Howedar · Post by **Howedar** » 2003-02-13 05:59pm

I also kinda like the shields canceling out idea.

Gil Hamilton · Post by **Gil Hamilton** » 2003-02-13 07:08pm

Howedar wrote:I also kinda like the shields canceling out idea.

Speculation, really. Besides, the Enterprises forward shields were gone at that point during the battle, considering that the front of the Enterprise had taken enough damage to blow out the viewscreen.

The Silence and I · Post by **The Silence and I** » 2003-02-13 10:09pm

beyond hope wrote:There's another possibility for the increase in distance: perhaps Shinzon didn't have his crew kill their backwards movement away from the E-E after pulling free from its saucer. They could also have been putting some distance between themselves and the E-E as the thalaron emitter charged for safety's sake.

I thought of that, the distance, whatever it was, remained visibly constant after the ramming scene until the Scimitar blew up.

Master of Ossus · Post by **Master of Ossus** » 2003-02-14 01:14am

Alyeska wrote: I think the entire scene is fucked up.

The whole movie's fucked up.

We have seen far worse impacts in planetary crashes for Federation ships yet they didn't cause near so much damage. Then there is the whole shield aspect. It just doesn't make sense that shields would play no role. The best I can think of is that Schinzon lowered the shields on the Scimitar knowing the Enterprise had no more weapons and was waiting for Picard to finally relent and beam over. Then when Picard decided to ram the Scimitar he panicked and made an incorrect snap order. He was already not in the best of mental states and the situation at hand was going downhill for him.

I don't think that this is correct. We heard no mention of him lowering the shields, and to claim that he did just because the E-E went through is circular reasoning. I don't think that there's any way to explain what happened in that scene, though I suppose Alyeska's is as good as any I can think of.