Why do people assume that the Empire has better tech?

[Connor MacLeod]

I do not know where you get the high power shot from. But the point is not, that they may be able to scale the power down. The point is they do, even if it is ineffient. (Aka: I could kill all the infantery or not. So they choose not)

I got the firepower figures from here. AS to the rest, you aren't being very clear, so I have no clue what you are trying to say with this "inefficient" bit.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWjj8EKTkWE
So this is the scene with the walkers I was refering too.
It says naturally nothing about beeing shielded, only about the armor beeing to strong.
Where to you see blast of magnitude of severel kT?

You do realize that taking dialogue literally does not always work? Otherwise we should assume they really are lasers despite they sometimes move faster than a moving car, or that Jedi can really destroy planets. Moreover, shields and armour have been used interchangably many times (ROTJ novel for example. The ANH novel also mentions Stormtrooper armor as being shielding.) That's just yet another reason why you don't just assume dialogue is always 100% literal - dialgoue is by nature open ended.

In any case, we see flashes, which are consistent with shielding effects in other sources, that suggests shielding of some sort. It doesn't matter if its deflector shielding or not.

The point is, that if the death star is shooting a low power shot, it would not need to reload. So it could shoot a lot of low level shots. Quite fast, as a matter of fact. So the republic fleet would have been dealt with very quickly. (This could be met with increasing their shild, therefor you woul need to increase their weapon, therefor you woul need to increase the weapons of the fighters which would be again inconsistant with the planetary battles.

Um, no. How quickly does the energy from the reactor get transferred to the guns and charge the capacitors? How long does it take the guns to transmit the energy from capacitors to the firing emitters? How much can they transfer at any given time? How efficient is the transfer? How much waste heat does it generate? Hell we KNOW there is a long delay between firing, even with low powered (ship killing) shots, so saying it "does not need to recharge" is silly.

And yet again I have to say, I have no fucking clue what the rest of the stuff you are saying means. Is english your first language?

So why think of numbers if they do no mean anything?

Again, I'm not following you. Try again?

As for canon, one fucking single ship would be able to do this with a hole solar system within a minute.
(It could even be argued it would be able to do it deathstar like)
And we are not talking about some galaxy class ship, we are talking about ships with a crew of 30 to 150.

Do I have to like that kind of things to write here?
Again I do not have a problem with a photon torpedo beeing as stronger than 10 Fusion bombs. But ripping planets apart one shot?
I do not have a problem with devices, which blow up suns. As long as they are hard to get quest devices.
The same may be said about StarWars. I am OK with the Deathstar blowing up a planet. (I do not actually care how. Of course I would prefere explaination putting the requiered energy on a lower level, because this would be more consistant with fighters penetrating his shields and the death star not beeing able to blast all the attack ships.)

Okay this tops everything else. I still have trouble following what the hell you are trying to say. You're going to have to do a far better job explaining yourself than you have if you expect me to respond to any of this.

[Metahive]

Not really, just turning their "homeworld" into an unfertile wasteland and therefore depriving the tribbles of food would suffice. They can't get off planets under their own power after all. The Klingons could have used that unnamed biosphere annihilator from TNG's The Chase for this purpose.

[Mercenario]

@Connor MacLeod

You do realize that taking dialogue literally does not always work? Otherwise we should assume they really are lasers despite they sometimes move faster than a moving car, or that Jedi can really destroy planets. Moreover, shields and armour have been used interchangably many times (ROTJ novel for example. The ANH novel also mentions Stormtrooper armor as being shielding.) That's just yet another reason why you don't just assume dialogue is always 100% literal - dialgoue is by nature open ended.

Depends on the dialog. Some mystic dialogs do not count of course. But I guess if Han Solo says we go with speed X now, I guess their ship is suppoed to go with that speed and we do not have to check it with the movement of star and planets.

Hell we KNOW there is a long delay between firing, even with low powered (ship killing) shots, so saying it "does not need to recharge" is silly.

So in episode 6 they did not need to take cover by engaging the Star Destroyer, because the deathstar could not do them any harm?

Is english your first language?

No, it is not.

Again, I'm not following you. Try again?

Yeah, the "no" was meant to be a "not".

I still have trouble following what the hell you are trying to say.

Do you really think, there were never planets, astoriods or other stuff blown up in StarTrek?
Do you really think the ships doing so did not fire at Starfleet ships? Do you think those starfleet ships were destroyed? (No, of course not, because it is quite hard to make the following episode without them. This is Jean Luc Picard, sitting in a retirement home since his Starship and his crew were obliterated by a planet killer. Watch his adventures as he trys to get the last muffin.)

Of course I may base my calculation on this, yes. Then voyager would just shake a bit, if beeing hit by the death star.

Of course I could run calculations on the energy the Enterprise would need to get close to light speed with their impuls engines (The number 0.92c is given).
(I guess I would come up with something about the amount needed to blow up a planet. Lest so +/- 10^4)
Don't you think for each big explosion in StarWars caused by ships beeing a bit small for that, are around 100 in StarTrek? Just look at the amount of material available.

I mean the phaser alone spits at thermodynamics and any reasonable energy assumption. And he is on the set almost every episode.
(A device, as big as a fist, is vaporising stones of more than human size. Without depleting its energy.)
You want a destroyed Planet in StarTrek? Right, here you go:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4LR6Ev27FQ
Needed, a few seconds to find this with google.

My point is, that I do not get what this number crunching is trying to achieve?
Really, it is beyond me. It would make sence if it would have been said in StarTrek, that blowing up a planet is beyond their capabilities. But it is never said and from the few I have seen I really do not guess it is. (Well, as a matter of fact, they tend to blow up hole sectors by accident)

[Whiskey144]

I looked at some of Mercenario's post and was unable to believe the sheer amount of unadulterated stupid that is present.

Here we go:

Do you really think the ships doing so did not fire at Starfleet ships? Do you think those starfleet ships were destroyed?

Evidence beyond "I'm saying this and it's true"?

Of course I may base my calculation on this, yes. Then voyager would just shake a bit, if beeing hit by the death star.

Except of course, that the DS1's superlaser couldn't be fired off-axis at a ship, while DS2's could. And I'm doubtful that any ship in ST could shrug off a superlaser blast, not the least because most planetary demolition/destruction we see in ST is, AFAIK, not the whole "make planet go boom by shooting laser at it", and is more a "[insert Treknobabble phrase] blew up a planet!", or occasionally hyperbole, like ST:VOY's "What does she want to do, blow up a small planet?!"

IIRC, the ST tech manuals are canon at present. Which means photorps have a 1.5kg antimatter payload, and presumably an equal amount of matter. Which gives, at most, a 64.3 megaton detonation. In contrast, we have 200 gigaton/shot turbolasers mounted on a transport that's bigger than the Enterprise D or E. What's my point? There's simply a limit to durability, and technobabble doesn't equal durability.

Of course I could run calculations on the energy the Enterprise would need to get close to light speed with their impuls engines (The number 0.92c is given).
(I guess I would come up with something about the amount needed to blow up a planet. Lest so +/- 10^4)

The amount of energy that they can put into their propulsion system != the amount of energy they can pour into the phaser strips. It also has no effect on photon or quantum torpedo armaments, as those are self-contained warheads that are not affected by the ship's powerplant.

You want a destroyed Planet in StarTrek? Right, here you go:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4LR6Ev27FQ

I'm not going to claim this is irrelevant. But I will say that it's only partially relevant. Here's why:
1) It says nothing about Federation capabilities, as it was S8472 that did that, and S8472 is supposedly much more advanced than a great deal of powers in the entire ST galaxy.
2) Because of the delay in the detonation, it also indicates that the weapon is likely operating on some kind of chain reaction. Obviously not directly comparable to, say, the DS1 or DS2, which had such power generation as to allow them to simply zap planets and make them go boom.
3) It's still relevant, because yes, it is planetary destruction in ST. However, I don't think that anyone is seriously trying to argue that "lol ST doesn't blow up teh planetz". So it's not very useful.

Really, it is beyond me. It would make sence if it would have been said in StarTrek, that blowing up a planet is beyond their capabilities. But it is never said and from the few I have seen I really do not guess it is. (Well, as a matter of fact, they tend to blow up hole sectors by accident)

If it's beyond you, then why do you participate? Also, source on "blow up whole sectors by accident", as well as an indication of how large a "sector" is?

[Batman]

Err-since when are the Trek TMs canon again? Last I checked is still was televised/movies only (minus the stuff Paramount declared noncanon amongst that).

[Whiskey144]

Err-since when are the Trek TMs canon again? Last I checked is still was televised/movies only (minus the stuff Paramount declared noncanon amongst that).

I was under the impression that at this point in time, Trek TMs are canon. If not, then my point could probably be disregarded.

If I put some water on the stove and it takes a few minutes to start boiling, does that mean my stove is operating on a chain reaction, or simply that its power output is more gentle?

Perhaps I should have phrased it differently. In any case I will do so now; after I watched the video clip, it seemed to me that the weapon used some sort of chain reaction to accomplish the destruction, especially as there was not a large amount of appreciable debris, though there was apparently enough to destroy two Borg cubes.

Moreover, if it is a chain reaction, it doesn't really matter. When looking at energy, you want to look at before and after. Before, it was all a nice ball. After it was pulled apart. The energy it now has in speed and gravitational potential has to come from somewhere.

And I don't deny this. However, I do dispute the idea that something which uses a chain reaction, as it appeared to be with the S8472 bioships, can be readily analysed as the chain reaction's energy does have to come from somewhere, but the problem is finding out where it comes from, without, say, breaking thermodynamics.

Finally, energy is arguably not important either since the mission objective probably doesn't give a fuck if you achieve it via calorie overload or the power of EVERYBODY...... LOVE.... AND.... PEACE!!! as long as it gets done.

I would say that it's important insofar as having enough energy to get the job done. Using a readily at hand example, both Death Stars pretty obviously self-generate all of their available power. In contrast, the S8472 demolition example requires a total of nine ships; the specialized planet-killing-beam-firing ship, and eight additional vessels that provide what appears to be beam-transmitted power to the firing craft.

I'm going to hazard a guess here, but I'd say that the weapon either wouldn't work, or would work at vastly reduced efficiency and/or speed if one were to start firing on the bioships.

[Mercenario]

@Whiskey144

Evidence beyond "I'm saying this and it's true"?

8472 Vs Voyager?
Yes it needed 9 ships to blow up a planet but still Voyager blew up more than that anyway.
So its only getting hit by 1/20 or even 1/100 or so of the planet killing force. Still more than enough.
Considering that the voyager is an outdated ship now anyway.

IIRC, the ST tech manuals are canon at present. Which means photorps have a 1.5kg antimatter payload, and presumably an equal amount of matter. Which gives, at most, a 64.3 megaton detonation. In contrast, we have 200 gigaton/shot turbolasers mounted on a transport that's bigger than the Enterprise D or E. What's my point? There's simply a limit to durability, and technobabble doesn't equal durability.

Yeah, the turbolaser beeing based on some number crunching with a list of assumptions as long as the thread.
(Not that photon torpedos have not been seen to blow even bigger astroids to pieces one shot )
Thats exactly the point I was trying to make: There is no use in this play with numbers, because you have the same images in StarTrek, too.
Not to mention, that those were quite the low end of photon torpedos anyway.

2) Because of the delay in the detonation, it also indicates that the weapon is likely operating on some kind of chain reaction. Obviously not directly comparable to, say, the DS1 or DS2, which had such power generation as to allow them to simply zap planets and make them go boom.

Not really. Chain reaction may be extreamly fast or slow.
Not not really comparable yes, because the destruction caused by 8472 was several magnitudes higher. Even blasting ships quite a bit away from the planet. (Vaporising them too)
And well, they did not seem to leave any asteroids behind.

If it's beyond you, then why do you participate? Also, source on "blow up whole sectors by accident", as well as an indication of how large a "sector" is?

Take the omega particle for the start. Normally a solar system and a bit around it.

[Batman]

@Whiskey144

Evidence beyond "I'm saying this and it's true"?

8472 Vs Voyager?
Yes it needed 9 ships to blow up a planet but still Voyager blew up more than that anyway.
So its only getting hit by 1/20 or even 1/100 or so of the planet killing force. Still more than enough.

Err-no. The planetkiller was obviously a chain reaction so the firepower is completely up for grabs and there's no evidence VOY was ever hit by a blast from a planetkiller ship to begin with.

Yeah, the turbolaser beeing based on some number crunching with a list of assumptions as long as the thread.

200 GT MTLs on a Clone Wars era troop transport are canon until and unless you find movie evidence to the contrary or Mike changes the rules of the game on this forum.

(Not that photon torpedos have not been seen to blow even bigger astroids to pieces one shot)

Where, pray tell, would that have been? Especially as we never see Acclamators fire a single shot throughout all of televised/movie Star Wars?
If you were referring to ESB, those asteroids were vapourized by light turbolasers and I'm still awaiting your evidence for photon torpedoes even shattering larger asteroids in one shot.

Thats exactly the point I was trying to make: There is no use in this play with numbers, because you have the same images in StarTrek, too.

Err no we don't. You obviously don't know beans about physics.

Not to mention, that those were quite the low end of photon torpedos anyway.

Oh really. Show me a single photon torpedo detonation that even approaches the TM's 64MT.

2) Because of the delay in the detonation, it also indicates that the weapon is likely operating on some kind of chain reaction. Obviously not directly comparable to, say, the DS1 or DS2, which had such power generation as to allow them to simply zap planets and make them go boom.

Not really. Chain reaction may be extreamly fast or slow.

Which makes a difference why exactly? The DSes could brute force kabloiee a planet. S8472 can NOT (or at the very least has not demonstrated the ability to do so so far).

Not not really comparable yes, because the destruction caused by 8472 was several magnitudes higher. Even blasting ships quite a bit away from the planet. (Vaporising them too)
And well, they did not seem to leave any asteroids behind.

Evidence.

[Connor MacLeod]

So in episode 6 they did not need to take cover by engaging the Star Destroyer, because the deathstar could not do them any harm?

Um, how does one invalidate the other? Having a refire rate does not automatically mean that the Death Star stops being a threat to capital ships. There weren't that many ships present at endor. If it toko only seconds to refire the entire fleet would be blasted out of space pretty damn quick, wouldn't you say? Or at the very least, the big ships.

The importance of the "move into range of the Star Destroyers" was to make it harder for the DS to use its guns, thereby giving the ground team more time to disable the shield (and to give the fighters eventually enough time to attack the reactor.) That won't change regardless of what the recharge rate is.

No, it is not.

OK I just wanted to be clear on that.

Do you really think, there were never planets, astoriods or other stuff blown up in StarTrek?
Do you really think the ships doing so did not fire at Starfleet ships? Do you think those starfleet ships were destroyed? (No, of course not, because it is quite hard to make the following episode without them. This is Jean Luc Picard, sitting in a retirement home since his Starship and his crew were obliterated by a planet killer. Watch his adventures as he trys to get the last muffin.)

I'm not getting your point. Are you under the impression I'm trying to argue that Trek cannot destroy planets? I'm pretty sure that's what I said (even pointing out that they could do it if they amassed a number of ships together loaded with megaton range photorps.) I don't get what you're so irate about over that.

Of course I may base my calculation on this, yes. Then voyager would just shake a bit, if beeing hit by the death star.

Of course I could run calculations on the energy the Enterprise would need to get close to light speed with their impuls engines (The number 0.92c is given).

Except for that whole supposed mass lightning/warp thing. We don't know how it works for sure, but it makes doing those calculations more imprecise at the least.

Besides, velocity is irrelevant compared to acceleration. You can accelerate up to near speed even at low accelerations as long as you have enough fuel/propellant to pull it off (Case in point: alistair reynolds' lighthuggers from the Reveliation Space novels.) And that just means you have a pretty advanced fuel source in large quantities. The actual power generation will depend on mass and acceleration and how your propulsion system works.

(I guess I would come up with something about the amount needed to blow up a planet. Lest so +/- 10^4)
Don't you think for each big explosion in StarWars caused by ships beeing a bit small for that, are around 100 in StarTrek? Just look at the amount of material available.

Dude, I'm having a very HARD time following what you're trying to say here. you need to do a better job of explaining what exactly you're trying to get across. I understand english isn't your first language, but I can't argue if we're having trouble communicating.

I mean the phaser alone spits at thermodynamics and any reasonable energy assumption. And he is on the set almost every episode.
(A device, as big as a fist, is vaporising stones of more than human size. Without depleting its energy.)

What? Just because phasers are weird in some ways doesnt mean we throw science out the window. If we're going to resort to the "its science fiction" argument it doesn't matter how many tons, watts, or joules of anything it is, as it is pretty much on par with looney toons, and having any meaningful discussion about comparisons is pointless.

If we WANT to do comparisons, we have to make allowances for phasers, hyperdrive, warp drive, and other oddities, even if they present potential inconsistencies.

You want a destroyed Planet in StarTrek? Right, here you go:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4LR6Ev27FQ
Needed, a few seconds to find this with google.

My point is, that I do not get what this number crunching is trying to achieve?
Really, it is beyond me. It would make sence if it would have been said in StarTrek, that blowing up a planet is beyond their capabilities. But it is never said and from the few I have seen I really do not guess it is. (Well, as a matter of fact, they tend to blow up hole sectors by accident)

Well, if I was trying to say they couldn't destroy planets, I might care about that. But since that isn't my point, it doesn't really bug me much or invalidate anything I've said.

My point was it's stupid to argue whether or not they can destroy planets, blow them up, annihilate stars, vaporize moons, or what teh fuck ever. The actual outcome is less important than the implications one can derive from it. EG how many ships are involved, what mechanisms are used to blow it up, how much in terms of resources, effort, and time are needed to do so, etc.

[Connor MacLeod]

If I put some water on the stove and it takes a few minutes to start boiling, does that mean my stove is operating on a chain reaction, or simply that its power output is more gentle?

Moreover, if it is a chain reaction, it doesn't really matter. When looking at energy, you want to look at before and after. Before, it was all a nice ball. After it was pulled apart. The energy it now has in speed and gravitational potential has to come from somewhere.

Maybe some magic device transforms magical matter into magical energy.... but who cares? The end result is what matters - that energy had to come from somewhere and the guys blowing up the planet can control it.

This actually plays into the "interpretations matter than the outcome" I mentioned. You can say without a doubt that 8472 blew up. you can even say it required energy to do so. (the planet was mass-scattered, it was moving at velocity, it had momentum, etc.) But what is important there is the manner in which the energy is applied, where it may have come from, and what implications that has for their capabilities in other ways. You're right - the fact the planet did blow up does mean it involved some measure of energy, but also (I believe which you allude to, so forgive me if I am missing something) it may not be in a brute force manner (because there would be some problems with that. Recoil issues for one. hell, there's problems with that as fara s the Death Star goes...)

Thus, the fuel idea isn't necessarily impossible with the movie.... but again, the EU, I'm told, explains that they didn't stop for gas or meet up with a big ass fuck supply ship after blowing up Alderaan so apparently the canon didn't like this idea.

I don't see where the contradiction is. For all we know the DS is only capable of one "maximum power" burst. Maybe it can do more but we've never been told. That may even be why they never bothered blasting yavin. It wuold also make sense to have at least some fuel left over even after a max power blast so you can move around and shit, but we dont know how long it would last. Since Yavin IV may not be a full sized planet and isn't shielded, you don't need to do much to destroy it anyhow, so we could even say they didnt even intend to blast it to bits.

From a security standpoint, making the Death Star dependent upon fuel, especially for high/max power bursts, actually makes sense. We know from the Radio Drama Tarkin was contemplating rebellion, but he wouldnt have gotten far without the neccessary logistics to back him up. There's lots of planets that don't have full planetary shielding, and those are the main ones you want to threaten. But at the same time, having the ability to blast apart a shielded planet can't hurt either - but you don't want to risk the possibility of the weapon turned against you too easily. So, limiting how many full power shots it can execute probably makes some sense even if it does cripple the Death STar somewhat. Besides, it's not as if the Death Star is impressive as an "efficient means of geocide" - its just an indication of the sorts of resources the GE can throw at something if they have a motivation to.

[Mercenario]

@Batman

The planetkiller was obviously a chain reaction

And where do you get that from?
The same argument could be brought up for the death star.
A nuclear Bomb is a chain reaction too, you know?

If you were referring to ESB, those asteroids were vapourized by light turbolasers and I'm still awaiting your evidence for photon torpedoes even shattering larger asteroids in one shot.

Quick google search and allready found someone who crunched the numbers. So you do not just get the video this time.
http://www.st-v-sw.net/STSWrise.html
I do not want to get into detail about that one or any other, because it is quite beside the point I am trying to make.
You may arguee up and down. But this is can be said about the SW scence too. So there can't be any contradiction to what I am trying to say.

Evidence.

I linked the damn vid.

@Connor MacLeod

Um, how does one invalidate the other? Having a refire rate does not automatically mean that the Death Star stops being a threat to capital ships. There weren't that many ships present at endor. If it toko only seconds to refire the entire fleet would be blasted out of space pretty damn quick, wouldn't you say? Or at the very least, the big ships.

Yes.
So there are two options?
First: It takes as long to recover from a high power shot as it takes from a low power shot.
Second: The planet was not destroyed by brute force.

The importance of the "move into range of the Star Destroyers" was to make it harder for the DS to use its guns, thereby giving the ground team more time to disable the shield (and to give the fighters eventually enough time to attack the reactor.) That won't change regardless of what the recharge rate is.

Yes, it will. If the recharge rate is about a day, you do not have to take cover, because it won't refire.
So to stay consistant I would go the way of saying there is some mojo to make it blow up planets and to reload this mojo takes around a day. (Would not have any impact on lesser shots, which could be fired at any rate you need for the story)

Dude, I'm having a very HARD time following what you're trying to say here. you need to do a better job of explaining what exactly you're trying to get across. I understand english isn't your first language, but I can't argue if we're having trouble communicating.

I do not think my english is the problem, since you tend to understand my sentences quite well.
I have to admit, that my point is quite hard to grasp since it is quite a meta topic of the VS debate.

But the essance is quite an easy one: Sifi TV shows tend to be drawn to higher and higher power levels.
The best example here is StarGate. Started out with a punch of guys with MPs shooting up a bunch of guys looking like big iron snakes.
Ended up with a bunch of guys having ships arguably far superior to StarWars and StarTrek.
In StarTrek you find this mostly in Voyager. Started with a little ship lost in space. (Well, they had to take back some travel time from the movies, but was a nice concept) ended with a little ship having the punch to blow up borg cubes or even planets in the end.)

StarWars on the other hand is mainly based on the six films. So due to amount of material it is quite likely you find everything in StarWars also in StarTrek. If you are looking for on screen evidence.

This leads to my question why there is any merit in trying to establish the superiority of StarWars by holding up some numbers from calculations based on stuff which is mostly down in StarTrek too.
This had some merit if you looked at TOS, granted.

EG how many ships are involved, what mechanisms are used to blow it up, how much in terms of resources, effort, and time are needed to do so, etc.

Of course. The awnsers for voyager are nine (combined far smaller thand the death star), powerful shot, none, minimal, short. Drop in blow up planet move to next.

But this is besides the point anyway. The point was, that the calculation of the death star was used to show who mighty StarWars ships are. Well, now you would assume this (and arguably even worse*) for much smaller StarTrek ships.
*Since the sxplosion of the planet was much more violent and destructive to the ships around. (I could now start to argue about how far away the cubes where and how much energy is needed to vaporise everything even in this distance, but that is not the point)

Simlpy but I am trying to ask a question, thats i bugging me the second I found this site.

@Whiskey144

especially as there was not a large amount of appreciable debris, though there was apparently enough to destroy two Borg cubes.

Radiation would be enough to vaporise those cubes. Given the imagery it is the most likely assumption. But well, the energy requirements for that will go through the top though.

And I don't deny this. However, I do dispute the idea that something which uses a chain reaction, as it appeared to be with the S8472 bioships, can be readily analysed as the chain reaction's energy does have to come from somewhere, but the problem is finding out where it comes from, without, say, breaking thermodynamics.

From the bioships, most likely. (The huge beam made it quite a give away.)

I'm going to hazard a guess here, but I'd say that the weapon either wouldn't work, or would work at vastly reduced efficiency and/or speed if one were to start firing on the bioships.

Well, same is true for everything.
You just would have to find something you could fire at them, as they tend to not care about energy weapons at all.

[Darth Yoshi]

Just a couple of points.

And where do you get that from?
The same argument could be brought up for the death star.
A nuclear Bomb is a chain reaction too, you know?

That's a pretty poor comparison. In this context, a chain reaction weapon is one for which you don't need to supply all of the energy yourself, because the weapon reacts with the target to generate the necessary energy. All of the energy released by a nuke is generated by material in the nuke itself, rather than the target.

From the bioships, most likely. (The huge beam made it quite a give away.)

Again, you're not understanding how chain reaction weapons work. The difference between a chain reaction weapon and a direct effect weapon is that the only energy involved in a direct effect weapon is energy imparted by the weapon itself. For instance, if I were to apply a blow-torch to a sheet of metal, it'd heat up. But if I turn off the torch, I would no longer be applying energy to the metal, and thus it would not continue to get any hotter. But if I had a magic blow-torch that triggered a chain reaction in the metal instead, then even after I turned off the torch the reaction in the metal would continue to generate heat on its own. That's why the others are saying the bio-ships work by triggering a chain-reaction. Because the planet doesn't explode while the ships are still firing, the ships aren't supplying enough energy to detonate the planet themselves, which means the energy difference has to be made up somehow afterward, suggesting a chain reaction of some sort.

[Mercenario]

That's a pretty poor comparison.

Hell, it is an example of a(The) chain reaction. Give me an other one.

Again, you're not understanding how chain reaction weapons work.

Well, I gave you an example for one. So I guess I know what they are.

Because the planet doesn't explode while the ships are still firing, the ships aren't supplying enough energy to detonate the planet themselves, which means the energy difference has to be made up somehow afterward, suggesting a chain reaction of some sort.

Ever heard of delayed boiling? Thats the easyiest and most common example for things going metastable before becomming instable/detonating. (So you apply even more energy to it than needed but the results are not shown directly.)
Your kind of thinking tends to get punished by burning yourself with hot liquids.

And you can't even tell if they stoped to fire. They are probably on the other side of the planet. (Since you did not actually see them stop or disappear.)

Well but this is an other point, I actually did not want to address, called wishful thinking.
(Not even to go into what you would need to start such a chain reaction. Something like inversing the spin of part of the matter of the planet. This would be an KILL EVERYTHING ANYTIME kind of weapon by the way, because there is no way to shield you. Yeah 8472 might be scary, but they are not that scary.)

[Darth Tedious]

Is this guy actually saying his coffee gets hotter after he has made it?

Not sure if trolling or just really stupid...

Mercenario, I would actually like to see your argument for why the Death Star is a chain reaction weapon. I could use a good laugh.

[Mercenario]

@Darth Tedious

If you had spend a single day in laboratory or even in a chemestry class you would know, that if you head up liquids
like water or acid they tend to boil if heated. But since the world is not pefect they do not start to boil if they reached the right temperature/energy.

At one point (if there is a center where the first bubles are able to build) the boiling starts.
Even if you get the thing of the heat source the boiling will increase. Because the energy is already there, and the movement in the liquide is benefitial to the process. (Not that you have much time anyway)
(It is possible the boiling start even if you do not apply heat at the given moment)

Of course after a while the boiling will decrease and finally stop (if no more energy is applyed).
But this won't be helping much because you got the acid splattered all over you right now.

Mercenario, I would actually like to see your argument for why the Death Star is a chain reaction weapon. I could use a good laugh.

So let me get this straight. You do not have a clue about the physics behind cooking noodles and think you could laugh at any explaination involving things in the reach of quantum physics? Ignorance is a bless, right?

[Darth Tedious]

I stir my noodles as I cook them, thus preventing superheating, which only occurs in undisturbed liquids. I also stir my coffee.

Given that your explanation for the occurrence of superheating was:

But since the world is not pefect

I would have a fucking great laugh at your attempt to explain how the Death Star is chain reaction based. Explain away.

[Norade]

Can you blow up a planet with a 'slow' input of energy though? I would expect that you would tend to waste more energy that way due to not sublimating things and instead possibly just melting them and then transitioning them into a gaseous state. Obviously if you put in the energy slowly enough you'd just get a purely molten planet that slowly vents gas into the atmosphere.

[Darth Tedious]

Given that the whole process took around a minute IIRC, the energy input couldn't be too slow.

How the fuck an input of direct energy is meant to induce a metastable state upon a whole planet would be an interesting theory to hear.

It's somewhat of a logical leap to suggest "boiling retardation can occur in an undisturbed liquid, therefore a planet could be brought to a metastable state before being destroyed."

[Azron_Stoma]

Well, I gave you an example for one. So I guess I know what they are.

No, you don't, a nuke functions internally by a chain reaction to create the blast used to destroy, It does not start a chain reaction after going off causing random particles in the surrounding buildings to undergo fission/fusion.

The 8472 gun DOES start a chain reaction, as do phasers, into the target. You are confusing Chain Reaction causes and Chain Reaction effects. If for example the weapon's energy came from a chain reaction within some sort of pre-fire chamber and then fired said energy out of the barrel (Like a Yamato Cannon from Starcraft) then your comparison would be apt, but since the weapons we are talking about start the chain reaction when the energy hits the target the comparison is indeed poor.



As an aside is anyone even going to bother responding to his Darkstar link?

[Darth Tedious]

I think a large part of the reasoning behind it being a chain reaction stems from the implications that would arise if were DET- if S8472 had that kind of firepower, they should have been killpwning the Borg on a much grander scale than they were. It's an indirect line of reasoning, but makes sense.

[Metahive]

8472 (anyone opposed to using the name STO gave them, "Undine"?) was killpwning the Borg on a grand scale. When Seven led the Voyager into fluid space the Borg were on the verge of total defeat. What exactly should have topped that? I mean Borg space is honking big and the Undine ships weren't shown to be any faster than the "standard".

[Mercenario]

@Darth Tedious

How the fuck an input of direct energy is meant to induce a metastable state upon a whole planet would be an interesting theory to hear.

You know that metastabil states are more the rule than the exeption?
They are only ignored in most cases, because they are not observed. They just come back and bite you in theoretical chemestry.



@Azron_Stoma
You make the big mistake believing chain reactions are somehow slow. They are not. Exotherm chain reaktion in high temperatures are damn fast. The nuklear one is the only(real, today used) one which is close to the regions we are talking.
(Here you got your energy input in form of a TNT explosion)
But even if you get lower scale boiling a liquid with a exotherm chain reaction is mostly much faster than heating it up.
This is a reason I do not like this kind of explaination for anything. It is just to damn powerfull. (Because it could do that to almost every material)

In short: A guy with a "chainreactionpistol" could shoot at the death star and it would blow up in a matter of seconds or even less.
Thats kind of the supervillian weapon. Because there is simply nothing you could do about it. Thats the kind of death ray you know from some comic books. Kills everything one shot. No questions asked and no refound.

@Destructionator XIII
This is mostly due to the fact, that the state of a substance is not only depending on the current situation but also on the situation it went through before. Mostly this has neglectable.
But there are instances where those factors might even get the upper hand.
Neural networks, weather for example.
(Now it is getting hard for me because of the translation. If you have systems, which are only depends on the input (and they change their state without delay) you sometimes call them "perfect" because there is no error caused by their "history".)
They normaly only exist in theory.

@Darth Tedious

I would have a fucking great laugh at your attempt to explain how the Death Star is chain reaction based. Explain away.

Why should I try? You have already proofen, that you would have no idea what I would talk about. So you would just jump to conclusion based on your delusion. There is no sence in theorizing anything if there is no one interested in it who has at least a grasp on the physics behind it. (And it does not give me anything if there is not anyone who has a (much) better grasp on this matter than I do, so...)

@Norade
Space is quite a good isolator, even considering how cold it is out there. Thats why you got a lot of radiators at all the space stations. Just getting rid of the heat is quite an issue. So the enery loss should not be that severe I guess.

How it exactly works I could only guess. I would say it depends on the size of the planet and the compostion.
For a small astoroid you would be right. How it is for a Planet is quite hard to say, because you would need to factor in Gravity.
But yes, if you do it extreamly slow you should have a molten planet at some point. But due to the fact, that the gravity is holding the "liquid" together you might already reached the temperature you would need for "vapor".
So if it overcomes the gravity (thus reducing its impact) the "parts of the molten planet" would meet the environement of space, having 0 bar of pressure and expanding in volume extreamly fast. (Oh well, and here was the metastabil state already)
If nothing like this happens it would just cool off.

[Darth Tedious]

Wow, really? Actually using the "my argument is too intelligent for everyone here" line?



Seriously though, the funniest thing about the Death Star being chain reaction based would be that it would put it into the realm of "comic book death ray" superweapons you're saying you don't think S8472 could possibly have.

Before you claim hyperintellect, you might want to learn to string together an internally consistant argument. Otherwise you just come across as a trolling fucktard.

[Mercenario]

@Darth Tedious
I said I could arguee for that point, that does not mean I think it should be that way.
There is a huge differance.

Wow, really? Actually using the "my argument is too intelligent for everyone here" line?

No, actually not. It is just nobody intelligent interested, as it seems.
(Thats quite an give away: Why should somebody who knows his way around and really wants to discuss possible physics behind it be interested in me arguing for solution which is seen as suboptimal from anyone from the start?)

You are the only one asking, and sorry since you seem to only interested in a flame war, which was made quite obvious from your first response to me, I see really no reason to proceed.

I mean one argument ad homin and backed up with a line clearly indicating you did not read nor understood what I was writing?
Thats quite the definition of flame.

Before you claim hyperintellect

Beeing able to read is not hyperintellect. But honestly I think it is more a thing of attitude than intellect in your case. You do not even try to understand what someone else is writing. You just assume everyone around you is a moron and would contradict themselve in the most obvious way possible.
So you go with the interpretation of the text which would make your counterpart look the most stupid instead of the one beeing the most probable or reasonable assumption (or just reading the text).



@In General
I was simply asking the question, why there is such a fixation around some numbers, which say crap?
Neither the amount of energy needed to negate gravitie nor some calculation about an astroid says anything important. (Yes, they are fun to do if would not just consist in the use of a single forular, which makes them quite "cheap".

There is a lot you could really talk about:
Approch of AI in StarTrek/StarWars.
Form of government.
Approach and value of technology in the story.
Storyarc, systematic structures of the stories written.
Etc. etc. Yes, this would not be discussion of "who has the longer dong", but some which could really have a result and the potential to be interesting beyond flaming. So my question is, if this is just not wanted or do people feel unable of doing so for whatever reason there might be?

[Whiskey144]

Quick google search and allready found someone who crunched the numbers. So you do not just get the video this time.
http://www.st-v-sw.net/STSWrise.html
I do not want to get into detail about that one or any other, because it is quite beside the point I am trying to make.
You may arguee up and down. But this is can be said about the SW scence too. So there can't be any contradiction to what I am trying to say.

.......................................

I'm going to be brutally honest here, and say straight up that you're an idiot for presenting things from Robert Scott Anderson's site, as the man is known to be a liar and spin-doctor, who is obsessed with the STvsSW debate to the point of arguing about canon with the people who decide canon for SW and ST!

I linked the damn vid.

And the video was of no use, as it's resolution was so poor that, I, at the very least, could draw very little conclusion from the clip. It also provides no evidence to show that the S8472 bioships are several orders of magnitude more powerful than the Death Star.

But this is besides the point anyway. The point was, that the calculation of the death star was used to show who mighty StarWars ships are. Well, now you would assume this (and arguably even worse*) for much smaller StarTrek ships.
*Since the sxplosion of the planet was much more violent and destructive to the ships around. (I could now start to argue about how far away the cubes where and how much energy is needed to vaporise everything even in this distance, but that is not the point)

*facepalm* The Death Star is manufactured using similar techniques, weaponry, and power generation systems to every other bloody ship used by the Empire. S8472 bioships have no bloody bearing on any other ST power's capabilities. It's also somewhat of a poor showing; S8472 requires a very vulnerable array of 8 normal, power-supplying bioships and a specialized beam-shooter. Take out the beam shooter, and you have an instantly useless planet-killer, because the actual "killship" no longer exists. I'll also note that it's likely that, considering the amounts of energy used, the normal bioships are probably unable to retaliate against attack whilst supplying the beam-shooter power.

Radiation would be enough to vaporise those cubes. Given the imagery it is the most likely assumption. But well, the energy requirements for that will go through the top though.

*facepalms again* You're daft, you know that right? I mean really; while I wasn't able to tell a whole lot thanks to the terrible terrible resolution of the video clip, I was still able to see quite plainly that some fucking rocks took out the two Cubes, and not bloody "radiation".

Incidentally, energy requirements ostensibly go through the roof; given ST's love for chain-reaction type weapons, a la the phaser and disruptor, it's quite possible that a sufficiently large phaser could phaserize a planet into nothingness.

From the bioships, most likely. (The huge beam made it quite a give away.)

Completely Missing the Point

We know that the bioships supplied some energy, because it's quite obvious. What we don't know is how much, and given the visuals and the delay, I'm inclined to say that there was some sort of chain reaction induced in the target.

Well, same is true for everything.
You just would have to find something you could fire at them, as they tend to not care about energy weapons at all.

They tend not to care about the energy weapons used by the Borg and presumably the Federation, you mean. Seeing as how, AFAIK, we've only ever seen S8472 in combat with the Borg and the Voyager, your blanket statement is quite fallacious. We have no idea how '8472 would react with, say, Romulan or Klingon disruptors, or the phaser cannons used by the Defiant class, or the numerous torpedo types used by the various ST powers.

More to the point in a vs debate, we have no idea how they'd react/respond to, say, SW turbolasers or 40K lance batteries.

As an aside is anyone even going to bother responding to his Darkstar link?

Done.

Space is quite a good isolator, even considering how cold it is out there. Thats why you got a lot of radiators at all the space stations. Just getting rid of the heat is quite an issue. So the enery loss should not be that severe I guess.

Just thought I'd point out that space is a good insulator because it's a vacuum, and that space itself has no temperature. Objects in space, are however, quite cold themselves........well, depending on the object. A ship is obviously quite a bit hotter than a piece of dust.

EDIT:

There is a lot you could really talk about:
Approch of AI in StarTrek/StarWars.
Form of government.
Approach and value of technology in the story.
Storyarc, systematic structures of the stories written.

And it wouldn't be a versus debate if we did so, now would it? That's the point of all the number-derivations and the calcs. To provide objective evidence with which to determine an outcome. That the 'problem' is a "who wins in a war?" is fairly irrelevant.