Human with Time Lord knowledge

[mr friendly guy]

The scenario

Somewhere out there in an alternative time line to our own, exists the Time Lords. During the years just before the war with the Enemy in the 8th doctor BBC novels, the Time Lords already are aware that in the future they will fight a time active enemy (because present day time lords cross time lines with future ones, which isn't supposed to happen). They have been building weapons and scanning future time lines looking for signs of this enemy.

Then one day they discover this abomination. Shocked that human imagination with Time Lord knowledge leads to so much wank they decide to find a human, connect them up to the Matrix and imbue them with Time Lord knowledge, and give them time lord physiology to match. Lets face it, Donna wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed to they decide to pick someone smarter. They pick YOU. So now armed with whatever Time Lord knowledge available to DW readers, you are also aware of whatever 8 th doctor adventures have happened up to that point as the TL keep track of their errant citizen.

Your task is to design new devices, preferably weapons for them to fight anyone. There is no rebelling because they programmed you so you can't. They however are generous as they will
a) give you a type 40 TARDIS to go where you want after the Enemy has been defeated
b) give you as many regenerations as you want should you want it
c) Let you even use block transfer computations to create your own companions should you want them

These are incentives for you to do a good job. If you can't they wipe your memory and return you to your place of origin.

The rules are
a) you must build something from known TL tech or alien technology the TL have on hand (see below). So you can't do what Donna did and make whatever device that the plot dictates it needs. The human advantage is supposed to lie in designing things the TL won't think of rather than discovering new scientific breakthroughs

b) no I am going to scan for future tech and incorporate that - so the ST Henry Starling tactic isn't allowed

c) try and have it within known TL industrial capacities, so you can't build a giant galaxy size ship called the "compensating for something"

d) No I am going to incorporate wank whoverse race of the week alien tech unless the Time Lords have said technology on hand. So saying you want to use some weapon from the Deathsmiths of Goth is out, however Raston warrior robot is in since there is at least one in the death zone.

e) try to be a bit more innovative than just I will build a bigger war TARDIS with x times as many weapons etc.

f) lists the sources (if you know them) which capabilities you will mix and match

g) try and justify why this invention would be useful rather than just because it looks cool.

Some sources which might help you

discontinuity guide

Doctor who wikia

My contributions would be

a) from my own fan fiction idea a weapons platforms which is essentially a giant planet, kept in similar defenses to Gallifrey. Think of this as the TL equivalent of the SW galaxy gun (although it can have tactical as well as strategic implications) where the time active enemy most probably has the ability to defend itself against Time scoops and time loops. Its missiles are essentially small TARDISes with at least equivalent range as a type 40. Each missile's dimension on the outside will be much smaller than a TARDIS (harder to detect and hence intercept) and the inside contains various bombs such as singularity bombs (Lungbarrow) etc. The missiles can be programmed to time ram opposing ships the same way the Doctor could time ram the Master's TARDIS (The time monster).

Now you might say why don't we just turn Gallifrey into this weapons platforms. Well the advantage is the weapons platform only has to be a weapon so you can build several of them. They can also be hidden whereas Gallifrey's location is known. By having a planet size platform you increase the surface area allowing them to fire lots and lots of missiles at once for example is the enemy ships has just been detected.

Keep in mind that the Doctor's TARDIS could reach close to the big bang (Castrovavla, Timeless) and the year 100 trillion (utopia). In spaceit could reach the "edge" of the universe (Planet of evil) with the universe estimated at 93 billion LY in diameter. Given this I am pretty sure the missiles would pretty much cover most of where the war would be fought.

b) unlimited energy source, ok maybe

This smacks like a magic the gathering infinite combo, but because of what the DW writers have established over the years I am surprise somewhat didn't think to use this "cheat" long ago.

Basically in the normal universe Energy = Mass x speed of light squared. Its established in the vortex Energy = Mass x speed of light cubed (the time monster). In other words physics are different in different dimensions in the Whoverse. Even funkier in the higher dimensions (where the TL have limited knowledge) Energy = mass x speed of light to the fourth power (quantum archangel). Don't look at me, I don't write this stuff.

Now the TARDIS has a matter converter (Castrovavla) which converts rooms in the TARDIS to energy for that extra boost. We know TARDISes can enter the vortex and that several engagements in the Dalek fleet took place in the vortex. Now put your hands those that can see where this is going. Simply bring matter with a TARDIS into the vortex, convert it into energy, then bring the energy back to N- space and convert into much more matter, then bring it back into the vortex and repeat. Obviously you lose a bit of energy in the conversion process from thermodynamics, but it shouldn't offset the extra energy you gained close to c times. The possible barrier is in how much energy does it take to enter the vortex and exiting the vortex.

The limiting step is how much energy TARDISes can hold, but I am going to say a lot since war TARDISes were supposed to be able to drain stars dry and the Doctor himself used energy from a supernovae to communicate with Rose through the dimensional barrier (Doomsday).

Now I don't think this excess energy necessarily translates into much stronger shields or powerful weapons, but with it the Time Lords could theoretically build more weapons from this excess energy since they can convert it into matter.

[Patrick Degan]

Use your ship's chamelion circuit to turn the TARDIS exterior into a 10000 km focussing lens and materialise in close orbit around the Enemy's homesun, with the ship aimed at the Enemy's homeworld. Let sunlight do its work.

[Asdeed]

I'd make TARDIS infantrymen. Chameleon circuit the ships into humanoid forms (Castrovalva), one on one they could defeat just about anything. Skip the space battles and just invade the enemies bases and capital directly.

[Patrick Degan]

Well, I see this thread didn't go very far.

The whole problem with trying to dream up Gallfreyan super-weapons is that a fully-functioning TARDIS already represents a potential destructive capability far beyond any wankwork device that can be conceived of. As long as your objective is not to invade the enemy homeworld but flatten it, your options are quite open. There's the aforementioned 10,000 km focussing lens configuration for the chamelion circuit. Or for shits and giggles you can programme the TARDIS to take on the form of the Death Star and use the ship's own power sources to fuel the superlaser. A TARDIS is capable of generating and projecting gravitational forcefields powerful enough to tow a terrestrial planet through space ("Journey's End") or move a neutron star ("Creature From The Pit"). You can easily use such forcefields to hurl asteroids into the target world, tow the target into the sun, set it's moon or another in-system planet on collision course with the target, tow the target past its own Kuiper Belt and leave it there in open space where the atmosphere will freeze over, or focus the fields to the point where you can rip a continent-sized chunk out of the surface and then drop it back down again. You can scoop off the atmosphere. The latter possibilities are well within the capabilities of the Doctor's TARDIS, and his is a partially malfunctioning, obsolecent Type 40. Why bother with the goofy concept of War TARDISes or "TARDIS infantrymen" as invasion forces or dream up any sort of indulgent wankwork when you've got the tool for the job already at your fingertips and only need the imagination to know just how to use it?

If you must go the invasion route, you can already contain as many war robots in your TARDIS as you need and simply insert them at any location on the planet you choose. Your ship can essentially transit to any point in mere seconds and the drops can be timed to where troop insertions are virtually simultaneous. But that represents a waste of time and effort when the mass-destruction option is far more efficient and certain as a means of removing the enemy homeworld as a viable force.

[Asdeed]

Why bother? You only need these ideas to face off against an opponent who can challenge the Time Lords, meaning their worlds are potentially just as resilient as Gallifrey. If they weren't you just time scoop their leadership and order a surrender, or erase their entire society from time and space.

So if I had to choose between sending my TARDIS fleet out to face off against the enemies own battlefleet or drop my forces onto their planets where they only have to face soldiers, I choose option two. But I hadn't considered the war robots, so I'd add that in to.

[Patrick Degan]

Why bother? You only need these ideas to face off against an opponent who can challenge the Time Lords, meaning their worlds are potentially just as resilient as Gallifrey. If they weren't you just time scoop their leadership and order a surrender, or erase their entire society from time and space.

So if I had to choose between sending my TARDIS fleet out to face off against the enemies own battlefleet or drop my forces onto their planets where they only have to face soldiers, I choose option two. But I hadn't considered the war robots, so I'd add that in to.

Ah, but I didn't say "a TARDIS fleet", I said "a TARDIS" —period. Just one TARDIS possesses in one neat package the destructive capabilities I outlined. And invasion and conquest is really a waste of time and effort, as would be managing a planetary occupation. I merely outlined the war robot idea as a far easier solution than creating armies of "TARDIS infantry soldiers" (as well as a far less fanwank concept as well), but really an invasion strategy is pointless when the most effective way to eliminate the threat of a world is simply to eliminate that world. I spun out a range of options for using the capabilities of a TARDIS to do the job but it's logical to assume that the simplest means to destroy the target world would be the one employed —either driving a large asteroid into collision or using the very large focussing lens idea to burn the planet. The latter would probably be the easiest to execute. The lens configuration can be programmed into the chameleon circuit and your TARDIS materialises at maybe 500,000 km from the enemy homesun and in alignment with the target world, which means the beam shines the target within ten or so minutes of materialisation. The effects would be almost immediate: the landmasses on the side of the planet facing sunward get melted into slag, and the resulting thermal shockwave propagates around the curve of the planet at trans-sonic speeds, sweeping anything off the surface —which then burns. Leave the beam concentrated on the planet long enough and the atmosphere boils off into space, though that would be sort of redundant.

[mr friendly guy]

Generally I wouldn't go for the invasion route myself unless its one of those "enemy homeworld is sooooo important that destroying it outright might fuck up the web of time", although its debatable if it will hurt the web if you destroy it in the present. So I would tend to go with destroy their homeworld unless they can also put their own equivalent planetary shields up to try and prevent that. Or if you don't know where their homeworld is, the same conundrum Trekkies run into when they say the UFP travels back in time and wipes out Coruscant for the win. Then I might be forced to destroy their fleets until I can interrogate members to find out strategic locations and defenses of their homeworld.

However as per the OP, the TL are planning to fight an enemy with at least comparable to them, the novels hint they are more advanced. So a single TARDIS could potentially be intercepted by the Enemy's own time travelling ships. The purpose of the thread was mainly to see what weapons could be used against a foe with technological parity.

[Asdeed]

Ah, but I didn't say "a TARDIS fleet", I said "a TARDIS" —period. Just one TARDIS possesses in one neat package the destructive capabilities I outlined.

I know you didn't mention fleets, but I did. I even explained why. If you want to send one TARDIS against an opponent like the Dalek Empire, go nuts. You lose, good job. The thread is about dealing with opponents who could be actual threats, not just curb stomping nobodies.

And invasion and conquest is really a waste of time and effort, as would be managing a planetary occupation. I merely outlined the war robot idea as a far easier solution than creating armies of "TARDIS infantry soldiers" (as well as a far less fanwank concept as well),

How is it fanwank if I gave a canon example of what I meant? The Masters TARDIS in Castrovalva was fully mobile. Unless you're suggesting that ability was unique to the Master's TARDIS any Time Lord should be able to replicate it, then can fight the entire war from the safety of a TARDIS. And behind a massive wall of war robots, which I agreed was a good point.

And we're back to planetary destruction vs invasion, a point I also agreed with you on then explained why I'd even bring up invasion. The ability to shield entire worlds, even move them, exists. And that's canon to, not fanwank. Not everyone can do it, but the thread is about preparing for a threat that WILL be able to.

Christ, if the enemy is defenseless you don't even need to leave Gallifrey, just hurl their worlds into the nearest sun or blackhole and Bobs yer Uncle.

[Patrick Degan]

Generally I wouldn't go for the invasion route myself unless its one of those "enemy homeworld is sooooo important that destroying it outright might fuck up the web of time", although its debatable if it will hurt the web if you destroy it in the present. So I would tend to go with destroy their homeworld unless they can also put their own equivalent planetary shields up to try and prevent that. Or if you don't know where their homeworld is, the same conundrum Trekkies run into when they say the UFP travels back in time and wipes out Coruscant for the win. Then I might be forced to destroy their fleets until I can interrogate members to find out strategic locations and defenses of their homeworld.

However as per the OP, the TL are planning to fight an enemy with at least comparable to them, the novels hint they are more advanced. So a single TARDIS could potentially be intercepted by the Enemy's own time travelling ships. The purpose of the thread was mainly to see what weapons could be used against a foe with technological parity.

Well, if by "canon", we're talking about what was depicted in the television series, the only world which was able to put up any sort of planetary forcefield technology was Gallifrey, as far as I can recall, and that was more in the nature of a time-barrier. It also proved, in the end, to not be foolproof since the Daleks managed to get past it in order to attack Gallifrey itself.

It's also been assumed that the Daleks of the Time War era achieved technological parity with the Time Lords, but that is not evidenced in "Parting Of The Ways". They relied on time-jump systems in their saucer craft for time travel and those Daleks evidently had not rediscovered transdimensional engineering. What made them so dangerous was their sheer ruthlessness and hard tactical experience won over millenia of warfare, brute-force weaponry, and massive numbers. Quantity, when it is overwhelming, will defeat quality every time.

On paper, the Time Lords should have been able to win. But not having fought a war in ten million years, they very well may not have really understood what they were up against and what was truly at stake, or assumed that their superior technology would automatically give them the edge, and failed to do what was necessary to eradicate the Daleks until it was too late.

A human would be brutally practical about what would be needed to finish off an enemy power before they become too strong to defeat. Time Lords hadn't had to think that way for eons and that's what led them to their downfall. While the Time Lords would try to come up with some new technological trick and fight the war in a way which somehow doesn't cause any damage to universal history, a human would identify the most effective and devastating devices already available, order lots of them to be manufactured, and employ brute-force methods while regarding paradoxes as things to be cleaned up after the war is won.

How is it fanwank if I gave a canon example of what I meant? The Masters TARDIS in Castrovalva was fully mobile. Unless you're suggesting that ability was unique to the Master's TARDIS any Time Lord should be able to replicate it, then can fight the entire war from the safety of a TARDIS. And behind a massive wall of war robots, which I agreed was a good point.

And we're back to planetary destruction vs invasion, a point I also agreed with you on then explained why I'd even bring up invasion. The ability to shield entire worlds, even move them, exists. And that's canon to, not fanwank. Not everyone can do it, but the thread is about preparing for a threat that WILL be able to.

Christ, if the enemy is defenseless you don't even need to leave Gallifrey, just hurl their worlds into the nearest sun or blackhole and Bobs yer Uncle.

See above regarding planetary shielding. And the episode you're thinking of is "The Keeper Of Traken", not "Castrovalva", and the Melkur wasn't all that mobile, at least not in any way useful for a fight. It could walk around, slowly, but that was about it. As to why it's fanwank, let's face it; the massed war robot armies I mentioned constitute a vastly more logical solution if you go the invasion route. Far easier to produce and cheaper, they're also expendable by the millionfold. And as for keeping up with the troops, since your ship can as easily hover above any battlefield or stay in contact with the robots even in the vortex, why bother with a humanoid-form TARDIS walking around with the warbots? The concept is fanwank because it ignores the logical objections against it.

[mr friendly guy]

Well, if by "canon", we're talking about what was depicted in the television series, the only world which was able to put up any sort of planetary forcefield technology was Gallifrey, as far as I can recall, and that was more in the nature of a time-barrier. It also proved, in the end, to not be foolproof since the Daleks managed to get past it in order to attack Gallifrey itself.

It's also been assumed that the Daleks of the Time War era achieved technological parity with the Time Lords, but that is not evidenced in "Parting Of The Ways". They relied on time-jump systems in their saucer craft for time travel and those Daleks evidently had not rediscovered transdimensional engineering. What made them so dangerous was their sheer ruthlessness and hard tactical experience won over millenia of warfare, brute-force weaponry, and massive numbers. Quantity, when it is overwhelming, will defeat quality every time.

On paper, the Time Lords should have been able to win. But not having fought a war in ten million years, they very well may not have really understood what they were up against and what was truly at stake, or assumed that their superior technology would automatically give them the edge, and failed to do what was necessary to eradicate the Daleks until it was too late.

A human would be brutally practical about what would be needed to finish off an enemy power before they become too strong to defeat. Time Lords hadn't had to think that way for eons and that's what led them to their downfall. While the Time Lords would try to come up with some new technological trick and fight the war in a way which somehow doesn't cause any damage to universal history, a human would identify the most effective and devastating devices already available, order lots of them to be manufactured, and employ brute-force methods while regarding paradoxes as things to be cleaned up after the war is won.

Well as per the OP I was going by the novels and any EU stuff which I consider lower canon than the series. In any event these are the only sources which have the TL fighting the enemy whose identity was supposed to be secret hence the generic name, until it is later revealed to be the oh so stupid ancestor cell. People were speculating its daleks and the ancestor cell story was an aberration (because they fought them in the tv series) but its pretty much hinted its not in the novels. RTD himself says that was a time war in the past, while the war with the daleks were more recent. Going off tangentially for a minute I agree that the Daleks most probably had the numbers and had technology enough to be a threat, but I doubt they had parity simply because the war raged so long while they had should have been able to field many more ships, weapons etc.

However going by the Enemy from the novels, the TL didn't even know the homeworld of the enemy (as they were time travellers from the future, presumably so far in the future the TL don't know of them), although they did learn bits and pieces about them. I personally would have felt it be nice if it turned out to be humans from the far far future, however BBC changed it to the ancestor cell which had several magnitude of stupid.

You might not be too familiar with the Enemy so I will just give you a better idea of the situation
1. Its hinted they have technological superiority (maybe their time travel is just so different the TL find it hard to intercept their ships, but they can detect TARDISes).

2. Both sides while they created paradoxes did restrain themselves from blowing up entire worlds. They both sent ground troops to contest "neutral" worlds. Kind of like how the USSR and Germany contested over Poland. So the use of super ground troops is somewhat relevant if both sides still abide by this unwritten rule. Now why sides with so advance technology would want to contest over neutral worlds remains up in the air, but if one side does its a bet the other side will do so as well because they assume there must be something important on that world or else the other side wouldn't be there.

3. Given that the TL encountered them in the future, (if we assume they hail from the far future where TARDISes cannot normally travel "Frontios") then the Enemy would have already set up their industrial base, and if the TL had no idea where and when they hailed from hitting them before they become a threat isn't an option any more.

This is sort of why I suggested people design a weapon more suited to fighting the Enemy, which as you say the humans will then tell the TL to mass produce it. Also my energy arbitage idea for vast energy generation will allow them to create the vast quantity of ships to offset the Enemy's quality. If you want to go down the brutal human method, just sterilise any world you suspect the Enemy has a presence on taking their agents with them. If they field ships to intercept the TARDISes you have an idea that its important to them, and you can use that planet to bleed them like how the Germans use ?Verdun in WWI to bleed French troops.

[Asdeed]

See above regarding planetary shielding. And the episode you're thinking of is "The Keeper Of Traken", not "Castrovalva", and the Melkur wasn't all that mobile, at least not in any way useful for a fight. It could walk around, slowly, but that was about it. As to why it's fanwank, let's face it; the massed war robot armies I mentioned constitute a vastly more logical solution if you go the invasion route. Far easier to produce and cheaper, they're also expendable by the millionfold. And as for keeping up with the troops, since your ship can as easily hover above any battlefield or stay in contact with the robots even in the vortex, why bother with a humanoid-form TARDIS walking around with the warbots? The concept is fanwank because it ignores the logical objections against it.

Ack, absolutely right, I screwed up the reference. And the Melkur 'might' have been slow but it did manage to sneak through the building undetected, open doors and accomplished its mission. It then snuck away undetected. Granted the guards were idiots, but in Dr Who the guards are always idiots. If the measure of success is achieving its goal, it was successful. No, not as infantry, you were right (third time I've said so now) that expendable robots are better for that. But any job you need a Time Lord for can be done without ever leaving the safety of a TARDIS.

As for forcefields,

The ability to shield entire worlds, even move them, exists.

[/quote]

I didn't say they were infallible, even the Time Lords defenses can be breached. But this fictional enemy CAN defend itself. They have to be at least Dalek level to be worth discussing, so this enemy can shield worlds (atmospheric shields to keep them habitable while hurling across the Universe) and can move them when necessary. They are not easy targets or sitting ducks and they'll have a fleet to fight back with.

Heck the only technology that appears to be truly unique to the Time Lords is that they're bigger on the inside which makes them one on one more powerful than anything they could encounter. But not invincible, Daleks could disable them. Even a Slitheen nearly destroyed one with that ridiculous surfboard extrapolator thing. (Boomtown, I made sure to double check it this time. )

So if you try a superweapon in space they try to intercept. If they win the battle, game over. If you're winning the battle they retreat the entire world. Drop an army of robots onto the planet and they'll march out their own robots or infantry or whatever to defend. And they'll still run away.

Or land a TARDIS or three (I'll never refer to War TARDIS's, I think you're dead on with that point) which have an advantage the enemy cannot match. Not Infantry, I concede a ground army of those things is silly, I just liked the sound of the name. Plus we saw in 'The Stolen Earth' that a planet can be stolen out from under a TARDIS so it would just scare them off anyway. But if you can get some in undetected you can go take out the leadership, or shut down the defenses, or just leave a bomb. At least there's a possibility of taking the world without 100% civilian casualties.

Edit: also messed up the quotes, oy

[Patrick Degan]

The information on "the Enemy" is so maddeningly vague that it's very difficult to form any conclusions about the nature of the threat they posed to the Time Lords, what their exact capabilities were, what their range was, &c.

As for determining their homeworld's location... Timeships in Doctor Who, of whatever type, create temporal displacements of some sort which are detectable on instruments. Track enough of them converging upon what appears to be a central nexus point and you've determined the location of, at the least, a base of operations. If the displacements are particularly "thick", you've probably tagged the homeworld. Of course, that's how any time-active enemy could eventually locate Gallifrey, as presumably the Daleks managed.

[mr friendly guy]

The information on "the Enemy" is so maddeningly vague that it's very difficult to form any conclusions about the nature of the threat they posed to the Time Lords, what their exact capabilities were, what their range was, &c.

That is why generally I just assume they had at least equivalent capabilities given that war dragged on and on.

As for determining their homeworld's location... Timeships in Doctor Who, of whatever type, create temporal displacements of some sort which are detectable on instruments. Track enough of them converging upon what appears to be a central nexus point and you've determined the location of, at the least, a base of operations. If the displacements are particularly "thick", you've probably tagged the homeworld. Of course, that's how any time-active enemy could eventually locate Gallifrey, as presumably the Daleks managed.

That would most likely work. The TL had a hint that they would fight a war in the future because they met their future counterparts (something which isn't normally supposed to happen), so they tried scanning for the first sign or something not right. The other trick the TL used to counteract something like this is duplicate their homeworld and give each one its own military etc. Sort of like not putting all your eggs in one basket in case it was destroyed.