Stargate Analysis Thread

[Chris OFarrell]

So after putting it off for God knows how long now, I've decided to get started on crunching numbers for Stargate in terms of the kind of power and energy levels the universe can throw around, abilities of ships and weapons, the usual sort of stuff. I plan to keep it all in this thread and just add to it as time goes on. Of course, if other people want to jump in with their own numbers or analysis, its an open forum after all!

My current working theory is to start at Season 1 episode 1 of SG1, and then move on through SG1, then into Atlantis and then Universe. So I can take each event on its own. Now that Stargate appears to be more or less set in canon with only the end of Universe left, we don't have to really worry about new data coming in to throw a curveball one way or the other...probably.

So, to begin, Goa'uld Motherships. After that, I'll move onto Asgard ships, Earth Ships, Wraith Ships and Ancient Ships, which should directly or indirectly cover most stuff. I can pick up whatever is left over later. I'm thinking that the episodes/events that I should look at for Goa'uld Motherships will be;

Season 1

Season 1 has very little useful material, but it has at least a few bits and pieces of interest.

* There but for the Grace of God. Both for the comments in the alternate universe and some from this universe.
* Politics, mostly for a few comments about the threat the Goa'uld posed to Earth.
* Serpents Grasp/Serpents Lair, useful shots for scaling Goa'uld ships.

Season 3

* Point of View. Another AU, but again has bits of useful information.
* Jolinar's Memories / The Devil you Know, useful data for Sokar's bombardments of Netu and the destruction of said planet.
* Pretense. Zippy hitting Tollana, 'painting' targets for precision bombardment.

Season 4

* Absolute Power. Questionable canon, but has some interesting bits.
* Serpent's Venom. Data on Goa'uld ships and Aphosis' supership, its firepower e.t.c.
* Double Jeopardy. Scaling of the Goa'uld ship that landed in said episode.
* Exodus. Some interesting number crunching, acceleration calcs e.t.c.

Season 5

* Enemies. Whole lot of data here. The firepower of Pop's ship, SG1's Ha'tak orbiting a Blue Giants Chromosphere, Pops self destruct, the Ha'Tak crashing into Delmac.
* Between Two Fires. First sign of Anubis and his upgraded Ha'Tak technology.
* The Warrior. Bombardment from Lord Yu's Ha'Tak.
* The Sentinel. Bombardment from another Goa'ulds Ha'Tak.
* Revelations. More upgrades to Anubis's ships. Osiris's Ha'Tak blasts its way to an underground Asgard lab.

Season 6

* Descent. Ha'Tak impacting Pacific ocean in an uncontrolled descent and sinking. Self Destruct effects underwater.
* Full Circle. Anubis's Superweapon, his Flagship vs a fleet of Ha'Taks.

Season 7

* Fallen/Homecoming. F-302 vs Flagship, Flagship vs Goa'uld fleet II.
* Lost City 1/2, Anubis's Bombardment of Earth targets, Drones vs Goa'uld Fleet.

Season 8

* Reckoning 1/2. Replicator Upgrades of Goa'uld Ha'Taks.

Season 9

* Beachhead, Ha'taks vs Supergate Components (!), Bombardment firepower against planet.
* Off the Grid. Lucian Ha'Tak vs Ha'Tak battle. Ha'Tak against Odyssey.
* Camelot. Ha'Tak's vs Ori Motherships.

Season 10

* Flesh and Blood. Ha'Tak ramming against Ori Ship.

If anyone has any other episodes they think should be looked at, feel free to shout out.

[Juubi Karakuchi]

I've been wondering what a Goa'uld comeback would require in terms of technology (i.e., so they can survive the attentions of the Daedalus class' plasma beams long enough to actually do anything). Here's what I've come up with.

The nearest we've ever had to direct quantifications regarding Goa'uld weapons tech come in 'There but for the Grace of God' and 'The Serpent's Lair' IIRC. The former refers to blasts equivalent to 200 megaton nuclear weapons, which could imply that the heavy guns on a Ha'tak fire bolts of that potency. The latter has the 'Goa'uld buster' missiles, given as 1000 megatons (1 gigaton) each, failing to penetrate standard (as opposed to upgraded) Ha'tak shields. Aside from that (IIRC) we have a standard Ha'tak surviving inside the corona of a blue star for ten hours ('Enemies'), an upgraded Ha'tak taking on an Asgard Beliskner ('Revelations') and one Ha'tak destroying another effortlessly ('Company of Thieves').

The blue star example has been analysed quite extensively by fans, coming up with wildly differing answers. The issue of Ha'tak vs Beliskner is equally uncertain, since the only quantification I know of comes from the Roleplay books, claiming five standard Ha'taks per Beliskner. To muddy the waters further, we don't actually see Osiris destroy Thor's ship. We only see her Ha'tak's shields resist his ship's firepower, meaning we don't know whether she defeated Thor herself or merely stalemated him while the second Ha'tak clinched the victory. This raises the question of whether there is any funky 'shield penetration' going on, or if it's a simple question of how much energy is applied to a given point in a given period of time. If we keep it simple, and take the figures literally, that means that an upgraded Ha'tak is worth five standard Ha'taks in terms of firepower, shields and power supply.

That makes for 1000 mt (or 1 gt) per shot from the heavy guns. As for the shields, the 1 gt figure for the naquadah-enhanced nukes would suggest a conservative figure of 1gt for shield resistance. Then again, we're talking about an explosion here (the EMP confirms that they indeed detonated), with the explosive force being distributed equally in all directions. That would mean only around half is actually applied to the shield, giving a conservative estimate of 500 mt for a standard Ha'tak, and 2500 mt for an upgraded Ha'tak (2.5 gt). The 'Company of Thieves' example is widely considered to involve an upgraded Ha'tak (belonging to Netan) destroying a standard Ha'tak (belonging to Tenat). Evidence given for Netan's ship being upgraded is the existence of defaced Anubis busts. Netan's ship is seen firing on Tenat's ship for 14 seconds, at an average rate of 1 shot per second (I also counted 14 hits), after which it takes two direct hits in rapid succession, causing it to blow up. However, assuming this is in real time (as opposed to events taking place at the same time being covered consecutively), then there was a period of 16 seconds from Netan's "biggest fool" speech to the Odyssey escaping (the point at which Netan's ship is first seen firing), in which he might or might not have been firing.

Taking the 14 second figure as a conservative estimate, that means that a standard Hat'ak can withstand 14x 1 gt hits over 14 seconds before the shields fail (the shields glow when hit, indicating loss of energy as visible light). This means one of two things; firstly that the shield has a set value of 14 gt (meaning it cannot be replenished), secondly that more energy was applied to the shield than could be replenished. If we go with the latter, then the limit on a standard Ha'tak's shield replenishment must be less than 1 gt equivalency, or else the two ships would have been stalemated. This takes us back to 'The Serpent's Lair', specifically when Klorel managed to raise his Ha'tak's shield (with his bridge crew getting very nervous) and stop the missile. If we use the 500 mt equivalency figure, with the shield having been up for 1 second, that gives a replenishment figure of 500 mt equivalency per second. Thus, every 1gt hit scored on Tenat's Ha'tak has an actual effectiveness of 50%, half of its energy being replenished per second. If 14 hits do 500 mt each, then the maximum capacity is 7 gt equivalency for a standard Ha'tak and 35 gt equivalency for an upgraded Ha'tak. Since a 1gt nuke equates to 4200 petajoules (if I got the calcs right), that means that a standard Ha'tak's shield can manage 29400 petawatts (29.4 exajoules) maximum, replenishing at 2100 petajoules (2.1 exajoules) per second, or 2100 petawatts.

Unfortunately, this raises the question as to how an Asgard Beliskner could defeat it, since it's entire power output is only 4 Petawatts (4 generators, at 1 billion kJ per second each, 'Nemesis'), unless it's a long-scale billion (short-scale Trillion), which puts it up to 4000 petawatts, (4 exawatts). In 'Revelations' Thor's Beliskner fired six shots, waiting 2-3 seconds after the first shot was fired, then firing at 1 shot per second. The crewman states that 'shields are holding.' This could mean that there is no danger of shield drain (putting each shot within the 10.5 exawatt recharge), or that the hits are cutting into the overall shield strength (150 exawatts) but not critically so. As said before, the only available figure on Ha'taks vs Beliskners (of questionably canonicity) is 5x Ha'taks to 1x Beliskner. To survive 5x 200 mt blasts per second, the Beliskner would need a shield recharge of at least 1 gt per second (4.2 exawatts), which is slightly more than the ship's power output. To take out each Ha'tak quickly, it would need a firepower of 8-9 gigatons per second (30+ exawatts) for one-shot kills. That's 35 or so exawatts, just less than ten times its actual power output, at least until the first Ha'tak is destroyed. Admittedly it doesn't need to be actually charging the shields, since a 150 exajoule capacity (identical to the upgraded Ha'tak) would keep it safe for 35 seconds, by which its generators would have pumped out 140 exawatts, enough for 4x one-shot kills if it does nothing else.

If the Beliskner fires at 3 exawatts (just over 700 mt) then it can wear down a Ha'tak's shields at around 200 mt per second (equivalent to a heavy cannon shot from said Ha'tak), needing 35 shots to down the shields and maybe 5 more to kill. In this case, 5x Ha'taks should be able to kill the Beliskner for the loss of maybe 1 of their own. But this is only if the weapons are powered directly from the generators. The disparity can be explained by the Beliskner possessing advanced capacitors, allowing it to build up the charge it needs in advance. The best real-life supercapacitor can reportedly manage 30 watt-hours per kilogram, (1 watt-hour = 3.6 kilojoules = 108 kilojoules per kilogram). This comes to 108 megajoules per ton, and 108 gigajoules per thousand tons. Impressive when you consider that a Ha'tak weighs in at 700,000 tons, even moreso when the state of Asgard technology is taken into account. Of course, running off a battery isn't an ideal situation, but then Beliskner is neither a pure warship nor the best the Asgard can do.

So, to recap, the calculations are as follows, for what they are worth;

Standard Ha'tak
-Main gun firepower = 200 megatons per bolt/840 petawatts (1 bolt per sec)
-Maximum shield capacity = 7 gigatons equivalent per second/29400 petawatts
-Shield recharge = 500 megatons per second/2100 petawatts

Upgraded Ha'tak
- Main gun firepower = 1 gigaton per bolt/4200 petawatts (1 bolt per sec)
-Maximum shield capacity = 35 gigatons equivalent per second/147 exawatts
-Shield recharge = 2.5 gigatons per second/10.5 exawatts

[Nephtys]

One problem of direct quantification of Stargate numbers is that quite a lot of weapons and such use 'special tricks' rather than brute firepower. Shielding seems by far to be the primary defensive mechanism, and a lot of these tricks are about what goes through it. For example, the Tollan Ion Cannons skipped Goa'uld shields and rendered their advanced civilization entirely immune to attack, until Anubis found a trick that protects his vessels from them. Likewise, the Beliskner seems to have just 'vanished away' some Goa'uld vessels with no sign of shielding involved, until Anubis got some Ha'taks that were immune to such. Similarly, both the Replicators and the Ancient Drone Weapons seem to be able to penetrate a wide variety of shields with their projectiles, which is the source of their power.

Another issue is that everything seems to revolve around power generation. A Ha'tak isn't a particularly impressive capital craft compared to lots of others we see, yet when the Replicators juice up it's power grid, it can start blowing away far more advanced ships. Likewise, the human starships basically use export-version Asgard technology, get become incredibly awesome when they have ZPM access. Given the upgrades of a lot of Ha'taks as the series goes in, it'll be pretty difficult to use examples from substantially different periods to quantify their abilities at any one point.

[Xon]

Throw in that Naquadah will explicitly undergo something akin to nuclear fission when exposed to chemical reactions or an electric current, time dilation and gravity being explicitly out of sync, and Stargate technology just raping conservation of momentum in general makes analyse quite difficult.

[Chris OFarrell]

Thats mostly why I'm trying to start simple, with Goa'uld motherships and certain events that can at least give a decent indication.

I'm trying to stay away from going into crazy stuff like trying to make sense of Naquadah per se.

Should have the first bits up by this weekend, all things being equal.

[Eternal_Freedom]

And he says "one billion kilojoules per..."

And given that he'd said EACH generator did that, its not going to be "one billion kilojoules per generator"

[Juubi Karakuchi]

Unfortunately, this raises the question as to how an Asgard Beliskner could defeat it, since it's entire power output is only 4 Petawatts (4 generators, at 1 billion kJ per second each, 'Nemesis'),

I thought he said "the engines output", not the entire ship. I remember the preceding sentence was talking about generators, but I'm quite sure there was a period between that and the number.

Though, things like joules and watts are useless. Thor is a god.

I wasn't sure what to make of the engine output being measured in kilowatts. I've since looked it up, and you can measure it that way. I also managed to track down an episode transcript (http://stargate-sg1-solutions.com/wiki/ ... Transcript), and it goes like this;

THOR
The Beliskner is powered by four neutrino ion generators. In your Earth units of measurement, each engine outputs a maximum of one billion kilojoules.
O'NEILL
Yeah. My eyes glazed over about there.
CARTER
I guess I had better go through all of these recordings.
[Thor's voice continues in the background.]

THOR
…Forward propulsion is achieved by two rear thrusters.

So Eternal_Freedom has a point. All we've got for certain is 1 Petajoule. For that matter, I don't know where they get the 'per second' bit from, except that engine output should be in watts. Of course, as Destructionator XIII points out, Thor is an Asgard. The only reason he uses human measurements is for SG-1's benefit, so he may have misunderstood. It wouldn't be a surprise, considering that the SGC couldn't make sense of Tollan science in 'Enigma';

[Omoc looks to the sky, then picks up a branch.]

OMOC
The distance between these two points…
Omoc looks to both ends of the branch…
seems far. Until you do this.
[Omoc bends the branch to join the two ends together.]

DANIEL
OK…OK, I remember this from college physics. One of our scientists, Einstein, explained this the same way. You are talking about actually folding space.
OMOC
No. You wouldn't understand.
DANIEL
No, I guess not. I just hope the Nox do.

On the plus side, Goa'uld weapons aren't seen to go straight through a still-active shield (as opposed to pounding it down first), at least not in the Netan vs Tenat example (or any that I can remember). This means that we don't have to worry about shield-penetration in the case of Goa'uld weapons. If Anubis could make his shields resistant to shield-penetration, then he should logically be able to render his weapons capable of the same. This leaves a simple power boost, which Anubis would be able to do with or without resorting to Ancient technology (precisely how much Ancient knowledge he has access to is unclear). That a simple power boost is enough for his Ha'tak shields to resist Asgard weapons (at least those of a Beliskner) implies that they don't shield-penetrate either. That Anubis was able to boost the weapons and shields of his Ha'taks without significantly altering the power source (still Naquadah), and that the weapons and shields are visually identical to those of standard Ha'taks, implies that the performance boost came from improved power distribution.

The Replicators are tricky, in that they consistently improve the performance of ships they infest (the Asgard found three infested Beliskners unmanageable without the O'Neill). In 'Enemies' a 'giant beetle' replicator boosts a Ha'tak's speed to 800 times normal, in a process that involves attaching itself to the hyperdrive. Since we know that a Ha'tak doesn't put out all that much power (compared to other, more advanced ships), the most obvious conclusion is that the giant replicator was pumping its own (considerable) power into the hyperdrive in addition to whatever it was getting from the Naquadah reactors. Interestingly, this implies that a Goa'uld hyperdrive is capable in itself of trans-galactic travel, but generally lacks the power supply to do so. This makes sense in light of Anubis' interest in Naquadria, for it would explain why he didn't modify his ships more extensively (no need, if all he needed was more power) with his 'Ancient knowledge.'

[Eternal_Freedom]

Interestingly, this implies that a Goa'uld hyperdrive is capable in itself of trans-galactic travel, but generally lacks the power supply to do so.

This seems to be a very common phenomena in Stargate tech. Just about anything can be made better by adding power. Some examples, excluding the one you gave:

Daedalus hyperdrive: normally takes 18 days for a Milky Way-Pegasus flight (which works out as a crusing speed of approx 60 million c), with ZPM this is cut to four days (274 million c).

Daedalus shields: With ZPM is able to withstand a major Coronal Mass Ejection from the star. Also able to greatly increase combat duration.

The stargates themselves: Normally interstellar (>100,000 light-years based on size of Milky Way), with ZPM and special dialing program/crsytal can dial intergalactic (at least 3 million light-years (Pegasus distance stated as "3 million light years" by Landry in "The Return, Part 1") and with naquadria planet can be inter-galactic clusters (>billions of light years)

Odyssey ZPM/Cloak/Time Dilation: Crazy shit. Have ZPM, will win through plot device somehow

At any rate, a lot of tech in Stargate can be made better with more power. Now for shields and weapons and engines and communications it makes sense, but the massive boosts they get seem ridiculous, way beyond what the tech should handle. With the hyperdrive/ZPM example, why not simply pack Daedalus with more naquada generators to imrpove hyperdrive speed anyway?

Also, as another analysis example:

SGU's Destiny FTL system. They said it was "A million years into it's mission" and was "several billion light-years from home." Assuming "several" is 3-5, then the average speed is 3000-5000c, which is kinda shit for Stargate. But the ships seems to spend half it's time or more loitering in realspace, so this could go up to 6000-10000c or more. (perhaps 15,000c as an upper limit, depending on time spent in FTL compared to realspace). But is depicted as travelling between galaxies pretty sharpish.

[Xon]

Destiny can cross between galaxies inside of a month, and cross a galaxy inside of a few months.

Stargate Hyperdrive is dramatically slower inside the galaxy. Of that 18 days for the Daedalus todo the Milky Way-Pegasus mail run, over 6-8 days are nothing less than entering & leaving the two galaxies.

[Eternal_Freedom]

That's true, and that makes the hyperdrive speed even more impressive.

Nevertheless, 60 million c cruising speed is nothing to sneeze at.

[DrStrangelove]

Stargate is nigh impossible to quantify in a rational matter. Half the dialog and most the visuals support low end DET capabilities, yet the general view presented in vs. debates is the high end one only supported by bits of dialog open to interpretation and naquadah enhanced nukes

[Juubi Karakuchi]

At any rate, a lot of tech in Stargate can be made better with more power. Now for shields and weapons and engines and communications it makes sense, but the massive boosts they get seem ridiculous, way beyond what the tech should handle. With the hyperdrive/ZPM example, why not simply pack Daedalus with more naquada generators to imrpove hyperdrive speed anyway?

As you say, there should be an upper limit on how much power a ship's power-distribution system can handle without the fuses blowing. The fact that the 'giant beetle' replicator was directly interacting with the hyperdrive implies that the power conduits might not have been up to it, and thus had to be bypassed. On that basis, all Anubis has to do is improve the capacity of the power conduits, and the ship's components get more power.

There is further evidence for Ha'taks being under-powered (or over-gunned, depending on your point of view). In the Netan vs Tenat example, both ships only appear to use one or two guns at the same time. In terms of firepower distribution the Ha'tak is actually quite a good design, with four heavy staff cannons (two dorsal, two ventral) on each 'arm'. That way, based on the side-on images, it should be possible for a Ha'tak to turn four guns on an enemy by aiming one arm at it, or six guns if it rolls through 90 degrees to aim itself cap-first. Yet they are never seen to do so (IIRC), implying that they lack the necessary power. This raises the question as to how Ha'taks are able to win battles against one-another, since their shields can recharge faster than their guns (500 megatons equivalency vs 200 megatons per shot per second). The most obvious answer is concentrated fire by multiple ships. A one-on-one engagement would require a sneak attack (get a shot in before the shields go up), or for the ships to charge their shields to full capacity, then dump that 500 mt worth of power into the guns instead. The latter is doable, but rather risky. The former provides a tactical impetus for the development of cloaking devices. This problem also provides a partial explanation for why Ha'taks carry a Death Glider and Al'kesh complement (aside from planetary work), to supplement their firepower at a safe distance.

I also managed to track down 'The Serpent's Venom', allowing me to time the burst from Apophis' flagship. Apophis fires a burts of eight shots at two shots per second, all from the same weapon (flying a straight line). Interestingly Heru'ur's Ha'tak does not have its shields raised, most likely to avoid attracting mines (the meeting takes place in a minefield laid by a dead human civilization, being 'neutral ground' of sorts because weapons fire would attract the mines). The first shot shows no sign of having struck shields (there would be a visible glow passing over the bubble), and actually forces the ship back. Small explosions are visible after the second shot, with catastrophic explosions and visible disintegration between the fourth and sixth shots. 'Company of Thieves' suggests 1-2 gigatons to totally destroy an unshielded standard Ha'tak. This makes for 167-250 megatons per bolt in the case of 1 gigaton, and 334-500 megatons in the case of 2 gigatons. I personally go with 1 gigaton, with 5 shots at 200 megatons per shot, being the approximate averages of both figures and fitting conveniently with the firepower of a standard Ha'tak, making the flagship easier for Apophis (or possibly Sokar) to build with existing technology.

[JudgeKing]

On hyperdrive speeds

Cronus' mothership could travel at 32,000c. After the replicators upgraded the hyperdrive's performance to 800 times its original abilities, it had a speed of 25,600,000c, though the speed shown was much higher given that only a few hours passed.

The Daedalus-class battlecruisers regularly travel between Earth and Atlantis in eighteen days. That gives a speed of 60,875,001c. With a ZPM that speed increases to 273,937,500c.

The BC-303 Prometheus could travel to Atlantis from Earth to Atlantis in three weeks after the Asgard gave Earth intergalactic hyperdrive technology, that's 52,178,570c.

The Tel'tek that SG-1 took to Proclarush Taonas was capable of getting to Halla in 10 days. Assuming Halla is ~4,000,000 Light-years away, that equates to 146,100,000c.

When Thor towed the Prometheus back to Earth after its first hyperspace trip caused it to go 1200 Light-years in a random direction, the trip back to Earth took around 20 seconds. The speed equates to ~1,893,456,000c.

In Prometheus Unbound, the Prometheus traveled 50 Light-years in 20 minutes. That equals a speed of 1,314,900c.

In Memento, the Prometheus was supposed to take 90 minutes to travel 40.62 Light-years, that equates a speed of 237,383.28c.

[Xon]

7x14 Fallout

CARTER: Well the hardware is different. But the basic principle is very similar to a Goa'uld design.

QUINN: Well that's impossible.

CARTER: I went over it three times. I probably wouldn't have even noticed myself if I hadn't calculated that the generators were working at a 130% efficiency.

Goa'uld technology, now with >100% efficient power generators.

[Eternal_Freedom]

I'd already done the Atlantis/Earth trip calcs, but I'm still happy to see someone else got the same answer I did!

On the Asgard towing Prometheus bit, I would say the trip took much less than 20 seconds, more like 5. Thor pressed his buttons and the ships moved. O'Neill was about to say something and then they were there. If it was 5 seconds not 20 this gives a new speed of 7,573,824,000c. That kind of speed would let the Asgard ships reach the position of te Destiny in about 3-4 months. Bloody hell!

At any rate, this shows rather neatly that Tau'ri hyperdrives get faster as we go further along the story. Prometheus goes from 237,000c to 1.3 million c to 52 million c. and then up to 60 million c on the 304's.

It also appears that hyperdrive is much slower interstellar than intergalactic, as Xon said. This is explained that the intergalactic hyperdrives are much more powerful/more advanced (hence why only a few races have them; Asgard, Ancient, Replicators, Tau'ri, rather than the Goa'uld, Wraith and Travellers).

Perhaps it is alos to do with the "terrain" between galaxies: there are no stars to create gravity wells that must be avoided, perhaps allowing a simpler, straighter course, and allowing them to simply open the throttles and just let it run on max for days.

[Xon]

Gravity waves induce massive feedback into the hyperdrive which in turn hits the ship's power grid, this is how the Prometheus lost it's original naquadriah reactor. This does suggest that intra-galaxy travel is slower because running into such events is potentially quite dangerous as it dumps unexpected energy into the hyperdrive. And losing the hyperdrive is a potential BAD END.

Between galaxies there is a hell of a lot less stuff which can get in the way.

That's potentially just meaning "130% of normal".

Using an inertia manipulation device like I described in this thread to rationalise "freeze lightning" would permit what appears to be unnaturally high efficency in a heatpump. And a heatpump is an integral part of a electric generator.

[Juubi Karakuchi]

At the risk of necromancy, I have calcs for the Tollan Ion Cannon.

The Ion Cannon's first outing is in the episode 'Pretense', where it claims not one, not two, but three standard Ha'taks. The first two are in the first few seconds of the episode, where they are seen chasing Skaara/Klorel's Death Glider in orbit over Tollana. The first Ha'tak is destroyed by a burst of five shots from multiple weapons, the second by a burst of six shots. The third Ha'tak is destroyed near the end of the episode, by two shots from a single Ion Cannon (concealed by Lia of the Nox). The first Ha'tak showed a visible shield flash when hit, blowing up within the space of three more hits, while the second and third show no sign of their shields being active. The second took two hits almost simultaneously (in less than a second), showing very large explosions, while two more shots arrived almost immediately afterwards, resulting in a catastrophic explosion. The third blew up after taking only two hits in the space of one second.

Based on my previous calculations, this means that the third Ha'tak was destroyed by two 500 megaton bolts, while the second and first Ha'taks were destroyed by as many as four or five shots (based on the timing of hits and explosions), putting the firepower at 200-250 megatons per bolt. The simplest explanations for the discrepancy are variable power output and me mistakenly including too many hits in my calculations (when only two hits need to have been decisive). The only additional evidence in this case comes from the first Ha'tak, which seems to have attempted to raise its shields. That the shields were not raised can be explained by overconfidence (Narim claimed that the first two Ha'taks ignored Tollan warnings, implying that they did not consider them a threat). Overconfidence explains the third case, though with greater justification since all Ion Cannons appeared to have been destroyed. Precisely how much energy was running through the shield per second depends on when the ship began to raise shields. Judging by the difficulty they had in tracking the Ion Cannons, the First Ha'tak more than likely started as soon as they fired, which gave less than one second. If the ship managed to raise a 500 megaton-equivalent shield, then the first 500 megaton bolt would be enough to deplete it, allowing for destruction by the next two bolts. In the case of the second Ha'tak, the bolts all hit in such rapid succession that if even if the first two hits were enough, the ship did not have enough time to explode before the other bolts hit.

This of course raises a question. Why don't the Goa'uld just charge their shields to full power before heading into firing range? 'Politics' and 'The Serpent's Lair' imply that Ha'taks can emerge some distance from a given planet, and the DVD Collection 19 puts its range at 730 kilometres (cited in http://stargate.wikia.com/wiki/Ion_cann ... te-DVD19-0), so it should be possible to sit out of firing range and charge shields. Based on a 500 mt per shot figure, and 2 shots per weapon per second, then a single Tollan Ion Cannon should be able to wear down and destroy a standard Ha'tak in 15 seconds (like Netan's upgraded Ha'tak). I counted at least six guns firing in the opening sequence, and nine targetting beams in a single frame (with more in earlier frames and the sound of more beams off-camera), implying that Tollana is protected by a great many Ion Cannons widely distributed over its surface, able to combine fire over continental distances. Three Ion Cannons (the number that fired on the first Ha'tak) would be able to destroy a fully shielded Ha'tak in around five seconds, making any assault an expensive prospect for relatively little reward (they would end up trashing much of Tollana just to get the Ion Cannons). Anubis' Ha'taks, with their 1 gigaton- per-shot guns and shield recharge rates of 2.5 gigatons per second, would stand a much better chance, especially if he upgraded the targetting equipment as well. Of course he being Anubis (and not needing Tollan tech all that much), he can afford to let rip.

[Xon]

Phase-shifting in Stargate makes a mockery of physics. Broadly speaking, it lets things be moved into a slightly different dimensional coordinate set letting batshit insane stuff like moving through solid matter occur without interacting strongly with it occur.

"Naturally" occuring critters like the Reetou are wierd. Bullets just don't affect them in this state. But the Goa'uld are capable of sensing them, and built devices which forced them into normal-space when exposed to light from those devices. The Tollan phase shift devices allow people to just walk through walls but not fall through the floor, an while it is tempting to suggest the device is somehow responsible Merlin's mantle takes crazy to a new level and allows the phase shifting of entire regions and allows independant movement from the device. Merlin's mantle lets people walk through walls, but not the floor, hear people but not be heard, and generally taking the piss on the nicely constructed standard model which is handy when performing analysis of sci-fi. Oh, and they can still see after being phase-shift implying that light can crossover naturally or is being produced in that phase too.

The Sodan cloaking device permits the mimicing of the Reetou's cloaking. They still interact with base-reality, and appear to be walking on monochrome version of the planet. But they can see people who have been phased shifted by Merlin's mantle and interact with them to a limited extent.

At the most extreme end of a phase-shift I submit the hyperdrive counts.

So why bring this up?

The Reetou & the Transphase Eradication Rod mean you can project something out of phase and pull it back on demand. Energetic matter where you don't care what happens to the structure should be a heck of a lot easier than a living organism or a complex bomb. Shields would need to 'cover' that dimension or the proposed weapons would just simple continue past untill whatever mechanism pulled it back into real-space. This also explains how Asgard transporters are capable of beaming through solid matter, but fields exist which can stop them.

This neatly allows us to justify why Anubis' upgraded Ha'taks where not that much better than standard Ha'taks. The Tollan weapons relied on phase-shifting technology which Anubis was able to defend against, these upgrades to the shields probably also made them more effective against other shield piercing weapons. Hence why Thor failed to destroy 3 upgraded Ha'tak as the Beliskner's offensive transporter beams failed. Those transporter beams are capable of phasing through matter, otherwise they would not be able to transport in and out of enclosed spaces.

[Metahive]

I'm not sure if the TERs actually draw an individual into our phase rather than just shine a spotlight one them that makes them visible. Notice how individuals highlighted by a TER sometimes remain partly invisible. I don't think having only half your body shifted would be healthy, it would be like getting torn apart. Notice also that Tollan phase shifting is different from that of the Re'tou, the Re'tou can't walk through solid objects and the Tollans don't become invisible.
I think in case of the Re'tou it's easier to just consider it bog-standard sci-fi cloaking that got mislabeled.

[Zac Naloen]

Is it stated the Tollans are actually phase shifting?


You can see visible distortion in the object they walk through, I always assumed it was some kind of quantum effect on the wall/Iris.

[Metahive]

The small devices the Tollans use are actually labeled as Phasing Devices and the bombs they create in Between Two Fires are described as Phase Shifting Weapons in the episode, so I presume they're indeed meant to invoke phase shifting. In response to Xon's hypothesis above that the Tollan ion cannons use phase shifting, it's contradicted in said episode since Narim at first mistakenly considers the phase shifting bombs as replacements for the now obsolete ion cannons and a novel use for that technology, which means the ion cannons probably didn't utilize it.

[Xon]

Except there is no reason for the Tollan's to capitulate if they where capable of builing phase-shifting missiles which could ignore Ha'taks with upgraded shields.

[Metahive]

Of course there is, if they lack the means to deliver them to a target in orbit. The phase shifting bombs they created were crude devices meant to be simply shoved through a shielded stargate. Also, the Tollans were time and again portrayed as seriously lacking in common sense, so them not thinking of using phase shifting weapons against Anubis is in character.