Super Heated Gas inside borg cube

[Darth Wong]

I have my own doubts on this idea. After all, the Borg are convinced of their superiority and essentially rely on sheer brute force in every encounter. A "culture" such as that (insofar as the Borg can be said to have any sort of culture at all) isn't likely to place a high value on intangibles such as psychological warfare.

Yet they lied about Data's "primitive" nature in "Best of Both Worlds" and postured in front of the Federation, when it became clear in STFC that certain aspects of Federation technology (particularly with regards to Data's brain) are actually beyond them. Why lie and denigrate Data's technology if you don't have any regard for psychological warfare?

It is more likely that the large interior space is for either accomodating captured vessels, providing a large workspace for the construction of certain devices, or to provide room for expansion of the hive inhabiting that particular cube.

The huge target profile and massively increased wiring lengths required by the hollow cube design seem like rather heavy penalties to take for these applications. The Borg can haul ships along with them at transwarp speed (as we saw in "Scorpion", when a Borg cube fled the exploding planet with Voyager in tow), so they have no need of a giant internal cavity for captured ships. The idea of combining manufacturing facilities and tactical vessels together would be horribly foolish (although I admit that the Borg are known to be rather stupid, so I can't rule it out). And it would make more sense to expand a cube by starting from a small core and growing it out, rather than making a giant fixed frame and then filling it in, since we know that they can manipulate the exterior of their vessels from "Q Who".

At Wolf 359, Admiral Hanson stupidly sent his ships in ones and twos to make strafing runs instead of massing his available firepower. This was what made it easy for Locutus to pick off Hanson's ships like clay pigeons; instead of facing a massed formation of 39 ships, the Borg only had to contend with one or two at a time; sometimes up to four from only two different angles. But the effect was that in each attack run the odds were overwhelmingly in Locutus' favour; especially as having all of Picard's knowledge enabled the Borg to devise easy counters to the formalised sheaf of battle strategies Starfleet practises.

Agreed. Makes you wonder how one gets to be an Admiral in Starfleet.

[Isolder74]

Yes the Feds lost a Wolf359 because they still used standard federation tactics even though they knew that the Borg had assimilated Picard. So Locutus was able to predict the feddies every move and so they got their butts kicked

[Robert Walper]

The movie does suggest some time between the approach of the Queen's
cubeship and the state it was in when the Enterprise arrived on the scene. If you recall, Picard and his crew monitored the battle over subspace communications before he decided to break orders and head back for Earth.
[\quote]

Data initially estimated the time to reach the battle zone as 13 hours at maximum warp. Yet the E-E didn't leave right away, in fact it moved to the Romulan neutral first, where it completed several scans. They then heard the battle begin and under Picard's orders then headed to the battle, which had progressed to Earth by the time they arrived.. I'd say a extremely conservative estimate would be 6.5 hours battle time, assuming the E-E left as soon as Data gave the figure for ETA and that the fleet and cube moved at equal speed in the E-E's direction.

I would tend to think that the scenes seem to show the Federation fleet was in far more trouble than the cube was.

The fleet flagship had been destroyed.

Agreed.

Decapitating command and control does tend to throw any fighting force into disarray, and that's when the tide of battle began to turn against Starfleet.

The tide of the battle seemed against them right from the start as the crew listened to the Federation battle progress.

"Emissary" shows the fleet making strafing runs in ones and twos, not just advanced units. Hanson had already gathered his fleet at Wolf 359 ("Best Of Both Worlds" pt. 2), so there weren't any "advanced units" attacking prematurely.

But the fleet was most likely spread out somewhat, since they didn't know the specific trajectory the ship would be on. Being spread out would allow at least two or four ships to enter the fray and try and delay the cube before the rest of the fleet arrived. Don't forget, we only see a small portion of the beginning of the battle. We have direct and canon evidence that the cube was making an indirect course for Earth. In "Best of Both Worlds pt. 2" Worf informed Riker "I'm detecting extremely strong eddy current bearing..." giving some trajectory I forget. Data then suggested that these "eddy currents" undoubtably are a clue as to the course of the cube. Riker orders a course to follow the currents. Very strange if the cube was on a "direct" course for Earth. Just go to Earth! Undoubtably it was mapping new territory along the way, and since it was uncorncerned about Starfleet's defenses, they had no need to rush.

I'm afraid the opening teaser of "Emissary" was quite clear on that point.

I suspect our interpretation of the events isn't compatible.

Not in reference to Wolf 359. Starfleet didn't adopt the massed wall formation until after that battle.

I suspect they using a swarming pattern. I fail to see how one could judge the entire battle tactics by a minute of footage that showed only a few vessels engaging the cube offhand.

The DS9 pilot makes the opposite clear.

I'm afraid that all it makes clear is that several vessels reached the cube first before the whole fleet arrived. I gave my reasons why I think it was pruent that the fleet was spread out a bit.

Hanson's ships went up individually, with little to no support, and got blown away as they came into range.

The ship that got there first of course got blown away. But as the numbers increased more and more, the cube had to deal with larger numbers of targets, and explains why Sisko's ship wasn't destroyed as quickly as the first Excelsier class was, despite being a lower class ship.

The damage inflicted upon the second Borg cubeship at Earth in First Contact indicated the usage of massed firepower at some point in the battle before the flagship was destroyed, killing the admiral and his staff. The loss of command in the field resulted in the disorganisation found by Picard when he reached Earth.

And it seems that any further discussion along this vein might best be transferred to the Tactical Stupidities thread, since I think we're wandering quite off-topic on the subject of this thread.

Agreed then.

[Robert Walper]

Yet they lied about Data's "primitive" nature in "Best of Both Worlds" and postured in front of the Federation, when it became clear in STFC that certain aspects of Federation technology (particularly with regards to Data's brain) are actually beyond them.

I saw no evidence that Data's technology was beyond them. They were easily able to start modifing him into a cyborg and adapt his brain to perceive what we call "pain". They were also able to link his mind to the hive just enough that even Picard could hear Data call him in his mind.

Data is essentially a computer. Any computer shoud be able to purge information from it's systems extremely quickly, especially a sentient computer with the ability to act far faster than any biological lifeform could. Hence, any attempt to directly assimilate Data would have undoubtably led to him deleting any information that would help the Borg before direct information extraction would be possible.

Unless you would deny that a computer, like Data, is incapable of deleting information stored in his brain.

Why lie and denigrate Data's technology if you don't have any regard for psychological warfare?

You're assuming they lied instead of asking why extracting information from a sentient computer system might be impossible without the computer's consent. The computer system may be vastly inferior, but that doesn't mean you can extract data it purged from it's own systems.

The huge target profile and massively increased wiring lengths required by the hollow cube design seem like rather heavy penalties to take for these applications. The Borg can haul ships along with them at transwarp speed (as we saw in "Scorpion", when a Borg cube fled the exploding planet with Voyager in tow), so they have no need of a giant internal cavity for captured ships.

(Nit pick: It was warp speed, not transwarp. :p)

You're forgetting they weren't assimilating Voyager. ST:VOY "Collective" showed plainly that vessels to be assimilated are captured and taken inside the cube.

The idea of combining manufacturing facilities and tactical vessels together would be horribly foolish (although I admit that the Borg are known to be rather stupid, so I can't rule it out).

May I ask why? Seems efficent to me if you don't want to wait for "central" to manufacture something you need fairly quickly and then send it to you.

And it would make more sense to expand a cube by starting from a small core and growing it out, rather than making a giant fixed frame and then filling it in, since we know that they can manipulate the exterior of their vessels from "Q Who".

I haven't seen any evidence the Borg cube volume is meant for expansion of the vessel itself.

Besides, if a cube were to assimilate potential target species, capturing ships and transwarping them back to central for complete analysis would be a good idea. Warp would be too slow, and using transwarp while towing a vessel wouldn't work since vessels in transwarp are subject to extreme "gravimetric" and "temporal" stress (SY:VOY "Shatttered"), something "inferior" vessels wouldn't handle very well.

[Darth Yoshi]

Question. How would the borg survive transwarp when other ships can't? IIRC, Borg hulls are at least as flimsy as Fed hulls.

[Darth Garden Gnome]

Darth Yoshi, the Borg probably have some kind of stabalizer that holds the ship together through the transwarp dimension.

[Darth Yoshi]

Ah. Still, that doesn't speak well for Borg ships if they need force fields to prevent disintegration.

[Cpt_Frank]

Well, pretty much all ST ships rely on special forcefields/structural integrity fields and on strange devices to transfer parts of their weight into subspace to prevent their flimsy hulls from falling apart. That problem is not borg-specific.

[Darth Yoshi]

Oh yeah, that's right. I remember that episode with fake-Voyager now. They needed the force field to remain intact. Man that was a shitty episode.

[seanrobertson]

Said Darth Wong:

"Yet they lied about Data's "primitive" nature in "Best of Both Worlds" and postured in front of the Federation, when it became clear in STFC that certain aspects of Federation technology (particularly with regards to Data's brain) are actually beyond them. Why lie and denigrate Data's technology if you don't have any regard for psychological warfare?"

'Tis true, my lord, that Data's neural net was probably more sophisticated
than Locutus admitted. However, it would be a significant leap to conclude
that, because Locutus attempts psycho-warfare, the Borg must therefore
build ships with such a role foremost in mind.

I think the Borg realize that a terrified enemy is, potentially, an easier enemy to destroy or assimilate; thus, to *some* extent, huge cubes
are meant to frighten their quarry.

But, it'd be a false dichotomy to conclude that "either the cube's volume
is entirely functional *or* it must be lots of 'hot air' space to scare
victims," in so many words, because both factors could well play
a role in cube designs.

The huge target profile and massively increased wiring lengths required by the hollow cube design seem like rather heavy penalties to take for these applications.

Yes, my lord : )

Of course, that is the primary function of the standard cube: assimilation.
The only known Borg warship we've seen, the tactical cube, didn't seem
to have as much room for the drones to lumber about in.

Further, these are only heavy penalties in the context of going toe-to-toe
with Star Wars-level capships. Against the Federation, Dominion et al.,
the ability to contain enemy starships obviously outweighs the potential
detriments like huge profiles, lack of maneuverability, etc.

The Borg can haul ships along with them at transwarp speed (as we saw in "Scorpion", when a Borg cube fled the exploding planet with Voyager in tow), so they have no need of a giant internal cavity for captured ships.

Again, with respects, regardless of the need, they do have such a cavity:
we've seen it in the "Borg kids" episode. (What was it, Robert? "Collective"?)

And nitpicking, I don't think the cube was travelling at transwarp
when it escorted VGR. Cacahuate told Janewad, "Tell the Borg we don't
need a leash (tractor beam). We can match their course and speed,"
or words very close to that meaning.

Then again, we HAVE seen Borg ships travelling at mere warp more
often than not.

Sean
Analyst http://www.babtech-onthe.net/

[seanrobertson]

Ah. Still, that doesn't speak well for Borg ships if they need force fields to prevent disintegration.

Your avatar is a picture of...what, DY? She's cute for a cartoon
character : )

To the point: I dunno about force fields and disintegration. All I know
is that the Borg would project some kind of technobabble field in front of a cube to keep it safe from "gravimetric stress" caused by a transwarp
conduit--*IIRC*. (Seven gave a few lines about this in some VGR ep.
Since I didn't like much of VGR...well. You know : )

Since I don't know how much "shear" a TW conduit might have, it's really hard to say if it entails "weak Borg ships" or the like.

Sean
Analyst http://www.babtech-onthe.net/

[Robert Walper]

Question. How would the borg survive transwarp when other ships can't? IIRC, Borg hulls are at least as flimsy as Fed hulls.

Your evidence for flimsy Borg hulls?

It's appalling how often this remark is made without evidence to back it up.

[Robert Walper]

Ah. Still, that doesn't speak well for Borg ships if they need force fields to prevent disintegration.

Again, what is your evidence that trasnwarp stresses are somehow insignificant or that travelling at warp has very little stress on a ship's hull.

I believe you are automatically assuming that since warp is slower than hyperdrive, it must have a great deal less stress applied to ships. For all we know, any Imperial ship that used simple warp drive would get ripped apart, regardless of the fact it is a slower FTL travel. And transwarp apparently has even greater stress on vessels travelling in it's dimension.

[Robert Walper]

Well, pretty much all ST ships rely on special forcefields/structural integrity fields and on strange devices to transfer parts of their weight into subspace to prevent their flimsy hulls from falling apart. That problem is not borg-specific.

And your evidence that their hulls are flimsy, or is this simply an automatically assumed fact without evidence backing it up?

I grant Federation hulls may be weaker than Imperial ones, but where's the evidence?

[Darth Garden Gnome]

I grant Federation hulls may be weaker than Imperial ones, but where's the evidence?

You mustbe kidding right? First off, Imperial vessels are warships, they're designed to have super tough hulls in the event of shield failure. Secondly we have scenes of the MF taking damage to its hull after its shields fail from LTL blasts. Said attacks would no doubt kill/render inoperable a GCS or similar class craft.

Unlike the Federation ships, who when the shields fail, begin exploding and taking horendous damage. Its quite clear that the Feds don't focus on armor, at least until they got a brain and developed ablative armor.

[Lord of the Farce]

Your avatar is a picture of...what, DY? She's cute for a cartoon
character : )

I think that would be Commanding Officer "Sami", from the GBA game "Advance Wars".

[Darth Wong]

Question. How would the borg survive transwarp when other ships can't? IIRC, Borg hulls are at least as flimsy as Fed hulls.

Your evidence for flimsy Borg hulls?

It's appalling how often this remark is made without evidence to back it up.

The ease with which a Federation fleet carved a giant hole out of a cube in STFC, when the unshielded Defiant can take a minute of pounding without obvious surface damage (and Voyager can be hulled by S8472's claws).

In other words, S8472's claws are harder than Voyager's hull. Voyager is of similar construction to Defiant. Defiant's hull is much more weapon-resistant than a Borg cube's hull. Therefore, a Borg cube's hull is shit.

Simple, no?

[Darth Wong]

I think the Borg realize that a terrified enemy is, potentially, an easier enemy to destroy or assimilate; thus, to *some* extent, huge cubes are meant to frighten their quarry.

But, it'd be a false dichotomy to conclude that "either the cube's volume
is entirely functional *or* it must be lots of 'hot air' space to scare
victims," in so many words, because both factors could well play
a role in cube designs.

With all due respect, an empty cavity is not "functional" by definition. At most, it gives them space to do things; space which could just as easily be outside the vessel, thus vastly improving the design, unless there is some pressing need to have it inside. I have already demonstrated (and you have agreed) that there is no pressing need to have it inside. Therefore, it's a lousy design.

Of course, that is the primary function of the standard cube: assimilation. The only known Borg warship we've seen, the tactical cube, didn't seem to have as much room for the drones to lumber about in.

Of course, this leads to the next question: what is the use of all those drones anyway? Shouldn't a cube be mostly full of heavy equipment rather than hundreds of thousands of drones in alcoves? What purpose do the drones serve? Processing? That seems rather wasteful, particularly given the pathetic combat initiative and response time of Borg cubes in combat. Power, a la "The Matrix"? It would be pretty pathetic if Borg cubes derive their power from biochemical reactions. So what's the point of having them all there? The only reason I can think of is repair, since they seem to disconnect themselves from their alcoves and move about only when it's time to fix something.

Further, these are only heavy penalties in the context of going toe-to-toe with Star Wars-level capships. Against the Federation, Dominion et al., the ability to contain enemy starships obviously outweighs the potential detriments like huge profiles, lack of maneuverability, etc.

So they're optimized for vastly inferior opponents? I suppose that could be true. That would also explain why they were getting their asses kicked by Species 8472, whose fighters don't even have particle shields. Sure, they had powerful weapons, but the Borg should have been dealing heavy casualties in light of this weakness, if they were halfway-competent.

Again, with respects, regardless of the need, they do have such a cavity: we've seen it in the "Borg kids" episode. (What was it, Robert? "Collective"?)

They have the cavity, but AFAIK, there was no record of them pulling starships inside and carrying them around. Did this actually happen anytime?

And nitpicking, I don't think the cube was travelling at transwarp
when it escorted VGR. Cacahuate told Janewad, "Tell the Borg we don't
need a leash (tractor beam). We can match their course and speed,"
or words very close to that meaning.

Then again, we HAVE seen Borg ships travelling at mere warp more
often than not.

Hmmmm ... interesting. Why wouldn't they always use transwarp? Does it create dangerous stresses on the ship, or use up fuel at a prodigious rate?

[Doomriser]

What is this "Borg Cube hulls aren't weak" nonsense? We see that a Borg Cube is a mostly hollow mass of pipes and tubing no stronger (and probably weaker) than Starfleet armour. Canon visuals of Galaxy class ships under construction [Dominion-war era] gives them an armour thickness of what, 1 metre? Meanwhile, ISDs have about 20 metres of armour by scaling data.

Phasers were extremely effective against the Borg cube in Picard's first contact situation with Q, even though phasers are GW/low-TW level at best and have poor effectiveness against metals.

[Sea Skimmer]

Hmmmm ... interesting. Why wouldn't they always use transwarp? Does it create dangerous stresses on the ship, or use up fuel at a prodigious rate?

When in a transwarp conduit, they likely can't use their sensors to see outside of it. Thus normal warp patrols would be needed to search for things to Assimilate. Voyager did show Cubes and spheres using normal warp several times.

[Patrick Degan]

Yet they lied about Data's "primitive" nature in "Best of Both Worlds" and postured in front of the Federation, when it became clear in STFC that certain aspects of Federation technology (particularly with regards to Data's brain) are actually beyond them. Why lie and denigrate Data's technology if you don't have any regard for psychological warfare?

But the question is, did Locutus lie? Or was it that at that point in time the Borg had insufficent information? At the time of Picard's assimilation, as far as we know, the Borg had not encountered a Soong-type android. They may have had all the information Picard had about Data, including the fact that he had a positronic brain, but the cubeship's databanks might not have fully analysed the information on Data from Picard's mind; having prioritised combat information. It is possible that Locutus' statement was based on previous Borg encounters with androids which may have been less sopisticated with Data. Alternatively, the idea of artificial creatures may have been considered "primitive" in the same sense as purely biological creatures, given the Borg concept of merging technology with biology to produce what in their view is the superior lifeform —the cyborg. That was clearly the direction of the "New Order" Locutus spoke of.

Of course, we can thank Brannon Braga for screwing up the Borg beyond recognition from whatever original concept Maurice Hurley may have envisioned.

The huge target profile and massively increased wiring lengths required by the hollow cube design seem like rather heavy penalties to take for these applications. The Borg can haul ships along with them at transwarp speed (as we saw in "Scorpion", when a Borg cube fled the exploding planet with Voyager in tow), so they have no need of a giant internal cavity for captured ships. The idea of combining manufacturing facilities and tactical vessels together would be horribly foolish (although I admit that the Borg are known to be rather stupid, so I can't rule it out). And it would make more sense to expand a cube by starting from a small core and growing it out, rather than making a giant fixed frame and then filling it in, since we know that they can manipulate the exterior of their vessels from "Q Who".

All very valid observations. I was trying to reach for a remotely logical theory for the internal cavity.

My sense is that, as envisioned by Maurice Hurley (writer of "Q Who?"), the Borg were conceived as essentially a nomadic civilisation; "organised" so to speak into the collectives found aboard each cubeship. The cubeships operated as seperate, self contained "worlds", combining all manufacturing and combat functions and distributing the Collective's population amongst thousands if not millions of cubeships. This seems to fit in with what was expounded upon in the actual episode, particularly in their concept of widespread decentralisation. The nearest historical precedent I can recall for such a culture would be the Mongol hordes which ravaged the Central Asian steppes in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. They carried their villages right along with the march of their armies.

This may have been the original idea behind the Borg Collective, before Brannon Braga turned them into humanoid cyberbees servicing a Queen.