Star Trek vs Yuuzhan Vong

[Lord of the Farce]

Consider for a moment, that after being shown the new way to experience the Force by Vergere, Jacen Solo has betrayed the New Republic and embraced the Yuuzhan Vong's "True Path". Defeating his sister Jaina in mortal combat, then leading the way in the destruction of the last of the New Republic, Jacen becomes the Yuuzhan Vong's God Emperor.
Changing the entire galaxy to suit the Yuuzhan Vong's purpose, but adapting some of the more useful of the blasphemous "technology" in shaper ways, they plan for the conquest of another galaxy. Just as they are about to begin sending the first scouts through the galactic boundary, a wormhole opens and a ship named USS Cannon Fodder comes through.
Using the information on the ship's database, the Yuuzhan Vong finds out that there is a galaxy ripe for conquest just through the wormhole, and they send their first ships through.

Assuming no interventions from omnipotent and quasi-omnipotent beings, what do you think the outcome will be?

[TheDarkling]

The YV are exactly tyhe alien of the week types that SF deals with everyday, they have met races that use biotech before (8472, the breen etc) and basically the vong arent upto much at all.

The gravity wells they use could be easily dealt with since SF types can manipulate gravity well (the NR used their inertial compensators to knock out Vong Dovin Basals the Feds have similar tech and are much more familiar with on the fly modifications).

The hulls of the Vong seem like they were made to be sliced by phasers (since phasers are material dependant) and photon torps could easily be set to go off in a similar manner to a area effect weapon.

The vong sensors are a joke and thus the feds (and possibly klingons romulans) could use cloak/holo ship tech to great effect in launching surprise attacks.

The only advantage the vong have is the high speed of hyper drive which may allow them some advantages however the feds also have some advantages - first off the transporter could a dovin Basal detect a transporter beam? if not then Vong craft are just so much dead rock if they can then the feds Planetary defense could use transporters to distract Voing defense while phasers go to work.
Some sort of bio plague could also be created (if they could do it for the comlpetely alien founders the vong should be easy) this could however take time to implement.
Nano weapons could also be used to good effect and im sure ekk Admiral Janeway would be in on the war effort.

The main problem for the Feds would be ground combat but simple use of transporters could take alot of Vong out of the game until the Vong got control over such installations then the Feds would be reduced to Phton grenades and phasers.
Grenades I dont remember the power for them so I dont know if they would be effective, phasers probably dont stand much chance agaist Vong armor if Light Sabers have trouble getting past it.

In conclusion the Vong use tricks instead of raw power and that means they are playing on the feds turf and the feds do it much better than them.

[Eleas]

The vong sensors are a joke and thus the feds (and possibly klingons romulans) could use cloak/holo ship tech to great effect in launching surprise attacks.

Proof? They were superior to those of the New Republic.

The only advantage the vong have is the high speed of hyper drive which may allow them some advantages however the feds also have some advantages - first off the transporter could a dovin Basal detect a transporter beam?

Why not? Energy is energy, after all. To assume Dovin Basals track attacks visually would be a bit far-fetched.

if not then Vong craft are just so much dead rock if they can then the feds Planetary defense could use transporters to distract Voing defense while phasers go to work.

I doubt it. Even without shields, the Vong weaponry is as powerful as that of Imperial warships.

Some sort of bio plague could also be created (if they could do it for the comlpetely alien founders the vong should be easy) this could however take time to implement.

The Feds, dabblers at biotech, would assault a species whose technology is completely organic, with a virus? I doubt the Shapers would even need to intervene.

Nano weapons could also be used to good effect and im sure ekk Admiral Janeway would be in on the war effort.

Just like they used nano weapons on the Borg? No, wait...

The main problem for the Feds would be ground combat but simple use of transporters could take alot of Vong out of the game until the Vong got control over such installations then the Feds would be reduced to Phton grenades and phasers.

If that is true, how come transporters are never used in that capacity in normal battle conditions? Answer: they're either unable to do so, or they're stupid.

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

We can always make them A DANGEROUS ENEMY like the Dominion rather than the ENEMY OF THE WEEK...

The Federation does have the ability to play with gravity wells. But to say with certainty like TheDarkling does that it would work is fallacious. It is like saying that a turbolaser can be easily dealt with because like the Empire, the Federation has shields that can block energy.

I'll agree that Vong losses will be greater due to their material choice, which is more vulnerable to NDF weapons. Still, it won't be a free slice, since they COULD stop lightsabers even with body armor, which suggests some highly resistive material. However, DO remember that they apparently could take SOME TL fire on the hull (something many of us won't credit a Fed hull with doing) so a photon torp (direct thermal transfer's) effectiveness is not likely to be good.

The Vong sensors are supposedly inferior (I'm taking this off anecdotal evidence because I haven't read many NJO books first-hand,) but to be effective against the SW forces do suggest they do have some ECCM capability, and some ECM ability as well. Especially if a yammosk is on it (the detrimental effects of yammosks on technologically based equipment is detailed in the very first Vong book: Vector Prime.)

Considering how transporters are disrupted by nearly anything, a dovin basal might also do the trick. (As would a nice yammosk) And you might also remember that Vong ships ARE capable of hurting ISDs, which makes their punch better than ... better than the Feds anyway.

Here's my basic take on it. Both sides have weak chins. But one side DOES have a much better punch, and a much better industrial strength. And strategic mobility, which gives them a lot of points.

[Eleas]

Here's my basic take on it. Both sides have weak chins. But one side DOES have a much better punch, and a much better industrial strength. And strategic mobility, which gives them a lot of points.

You forget three major points that the Vong didn't have in the campaign against the New Republic.

* A nearby industrial base.
* SW technology.
* A ruler with a superior version of the Force (farseeing...).

[TheDarkling]

The vong did have a nearby industrial base in there war with the NR since the NR knew exactly where they were building there ships and did nothing about it at all.

I will grant the force may aid them but then again seeing the Vong in the force was vary hard at first and since the Feds show no force ability ....

The Vong sensors do track visually to a degree since prentending to be a falling asteriod fooled them for Lukes insertion onto Belkadan, it was Lukes theory that their sensors worked like an animals - if you acted natural and in a none panicked manner you would be ok.

The feds who can actually adapt genetics and the like however they please without being found guilty of being a heretic from inventing, and the Vong cant seem to/or be bothered to supress the immune system of the shamed ones (the religion of the vong does tie there hands somewhat).

Vong weapons seemed to become more powerfull over time, in Vector Prime the Vong Plasma weapon has no effect upon shields at all (in Vector prime its described as molten rock) only when the shields come down do the Vong attacks have any effect.

The capship weapons are more deadly but even they werent a huge success against Imp ships which are huge imagine much smalerl Feds ships flying about actually dodging vong weapons, this would require the Feds to engage and larger ranges then they often use but not beyond their maxium ranges (anyone know Vong weapon ranges, I think a frigate clocked in at <2000km from Agents of Chaos 1 ) so dependant upon range they could stay out of Vnong weapons completely.


Heres another advantage the Feds have over the NR in regard to the

As for nano weapons - the were suggested against the borg but would take weeks to kill them all (Ref Best of Both worlds part 2).
They were also deployed against 8472 very easily and 8472 were supposed to have a super immune system (normal nanoprobes didnt affect them) thus for the Vong who havent demonstarted an immune system on the level on 8472 its shouldnt be too differcult (voyager made enough nanoprobes on its own in a very short space of time).

Any TL fire that hits a vong hull is described as boil it away, I cant remember an example where a Vong hull took a TL blast and the hull withstood it with ease.

The armor on the ground does seem to be of a better construction than the ships and I did mention this.
As for not using tramnsporters AQ races have transport inhibitors but the Vong havent shown any tech on the ground that would prevent transporters use (on troops some ground vehicles have Dovin Basals).

The only real chance the Vong have is to defeat the Feds (and probably Roms/Klingons) is to use massive numbers of ships but they dont have a great population number (in Edge of victory 2 every single person able to fight is doing so and they are still running low in numbers) and to my knowledge only Vong themselves pilot their ships with the reptiles making up the bulk of ground invasion (those reptiles would get destroyed in huge numbers but the Vong on the ground would probably mow the Feds down).

We also know from Edge of Victory that a fleet of hundreds is considered a large amount (in fact it left their key ship womb with very few defending ships).

Now the Feds couldnt reasonably attack the Vong in the SW galaxy so their best hope is to get to the wormhole and destroy it but the Vong will take large losses either way.

I cant understand why the NR get hammered so badly against the Vong and the Feds have advantages over the NR when it comes to the Vong.

[Master of Ossus]

Coralskippers frequently withstand shots from X-Wings (not the stutter ones, the real ones), which demonstrates considerable resiliency to weapons. Since X-Wings do have the ability to kill them in one burst, let's place the Coralskipper's upper limits on the hull as two shots from an X-Wing.

Now, the YV do not have enormous numbers (by SW standards), but your scenario was incorrect. Yavin IV was a largely isolated area, which was dominated by a shaper colony and not by warriors. It was caught relatively unawares by the attack on it, and responded by having everybody fight. The base there also had a force of speeder-analogs, and some smaller scale capital ships in orbit. Those are considerable resources for such a small and inconsequential base. Also note that the YV were able to establish themselves there in a matter of days.

I don't see any evidence that YV numbers would be small by ST standards. In fact, they would be enormous. Remember that when they attacked Coruscant they had massive numbers on their side. They were engaging thousands of ships, along with defense stations, and planetary shields. That is the upper limit of their numbers, not the piddly base on Yavin IV. It would have required millions, perhaps billions of troops to secure Coruscant. Remember that the planet is home to billions and likely trillions of beings. Such a planet would require immense resources to subjugate, even once it was orbitally in your control. Remember that Fey'lya's bomb killed a lower limit of ten thousand YV warriors in JUST one wing of the palace. That indicates a substantial force--in itself far greater than the numbers seen in Edge of Victory, even if you combine the shapers and shamed ones with the warriors.

The YV have had little reason to invent new things. They have not needed to change their basic ships for thousands of years, and perhaps longer. The thing about being a heretic is more or less irrelevent because the Vong ships are already better than SF vessels, so there is little reason to adapt them. I agree with you that YV weapons become more powerful over time, now firing massive spheres of plasma and the like, but their ranges are in the thousands of kilometers. Further, we know the YV ships appear to be SLIGHTLY weaker than their NR analogs. This indicates that their ships would stack up reasonably favorably against SF ships, but they appear to respond to numbers poorly. I think that one on one the YV would annihilate SF. Once the numbers for SF began increasing, however, the Vong advantages would diminish very quickly. I think that SF would be able to beat a YV ship if they were only up in numbers by about eight or ten to one. Note that even if the YV lost slightly one on one, they would likely still have enough ships to defeat the Federation.

The primary advantage the YV have over the NR is their numbers. Their ships are only slightly inferior, but their numbers allow them to absorb casualties and continue on the offensive.

[Ender]

The vong did have a nearby industrial base in there war with the NR since the NR knew exactly where they were building there ships and did nothing about it at all.

That was after they entered the galaxy. They came in with nothing. And there are no reinforcements coming. They wiped out their own galaxy in a series of civil wars after they conquered it and purged most of the other species from it.

I will grant the force may aid them but then again seeing the Vong in the force was vary hard at first and since the Feds show no force ability ....

I think the force is irreleven in this debate

The Vong sensors do track visually to a degree since prentending to be a falling asteriod fooled them for Lukes insertion onto Belkadan, it was Lukes theory that their sensors worked like an animals - if you acted natural and in a none panicked manner you would be ok.

Except it has since been determined that they are gravity signature based. Luke's theory has been proven wrong by Jaina.

The feds who can actually adapt genetics and the like however they please without being found guilty of being a heretic from inventing, and the Vong cant seem to/or be bothered to supress the immune system of the shamed ones (the religion of the vong does tie there hands somewhat).

They choose not to, so as to keep them as a slave case to do the dirty work. It's another trick in which their society is dependent on to function. Of course, now that they have all the new slaves, this may change.

Vong weapons seemed to become more powerfull over time, in Vector Prime the Vong Plasma weapon has no effect upon shields at all (in Vector prime its described as molten rock) only when the shields come down do the Vong attacks have any effect.

No, they are said to be weak against shields, something that has remained consistent.

The capship weapons are more deadly but even they werent a huge success against Imp ships which are huge imagine much smalerl Feds ships flying about actually dodging vong weapons, this would require the Feds to engage and larger ranges then they often use but not beyond their maxium ranges (anyone know Vong weapon ranges, I think a frigate clocked in at <2000km from Agents of Chaos 1 ) so dependant upon range they could stay out of Vnong weapons completely.

Except that the further the range, the better chance the DB has of catching the Dovin Basal. You're right, the FEds have a huge range advantage, but how effective it will be is debatable given how Vong PD works.

Heres another advantage the Feds have over the NR in regard to the

As for nano weapons - the were suggested against the borg but would take weeks to kill them all (Ref Best of Both worlds part 2).
They were also deployed against 8472 very easily and 8472 were supposed to have a super immune system (normal nanoprobes didnt affect them) thus for the Vong who havent demonstarted an immune system on the level on 8472 its shouldnt be too differcult (voyager made enough nanoprobes on its own in a very short space of time).

If a Vong touches technology, that part of the body becomes "unclean and is removed, either by totally removing the skin from that area, or sacraficing the limb. Nanotech won't work if the Vong reacts quickly enjough, so it's use is debatable. Though I highly question how it's going to get past the Armor, and how it will adapt to every single implant (Which are all individual organisms)

Any TL fire that hits a vong hull is described as boil it away, I cant remember an example where a Vong hull took a TL blast and the hull withstood it with ease.

Parts of the hull boil away, but the ship remains. See Ruin where it took a fleet of ships to kill a Grand Cruiser

The armor on the ground does seem to be of a better construction than the ships and I did mention this.
As for not using tramnsporters AQ races have transport inhibitors but the Vong havent shown any tech on the ground that would prevent transporters use (on troops some ground vehicles have Dovin Basals).

I don't see transporters as being that useful in a fight. They'd have to overcome the constantly shifting grav fields, and even then you just beamed into a ship full of people who make the Klingons look like jokes.

The only real chance the Vong have is to defeat the Feds (and probably Roms/Klingons) is to use massive numbers of ships but they dont have a great population number (in Edge of victory 2 every single person able to fight is doing so and they are still running low in numbers) and to my knowledge only Vong themselves pilot their ships with the reptiles making up the bulk of ground invasion (those reptiles would get destroyed in huge numbers but the Vong on the ground would probably mow the Feds down).

No, Every single ship was in the fight, not every being. Hence the problems in EOV2. Besides, in under a year the Vong went from 1000 cap ships (As of the first Agent of Chaos book) to several thousand (they lost 1000 at Black Bantha, and sill managed to conquer Coruscant where they lost several thousand and and hold their territory, and conduct offensive operations against Hapes, Borealis, and several others) with only 3 Shipwombs. Their production capacity is phenominal.

We also know from Edge of Victory that a fleet of hundreds is considered a large amount (in fact it left their key ship womb with very few defending ships).

To take a single system, yes.

Now the Feds couldnt reasonably attack the Vong in the SW galaxy so their best hope is to get to the wormhole and destroy it but the Vong will take large losses either way.

This is not their best hope, it is their ONLY hope.

I cant understand why the NR get hammered so badly against the Vong and the Feds have advantages over the NR when it comes to the Vong.[/quote]The NR only got hammered do to the stupidity of their senate. See the "GE vs YV" thread for more details, as I dn't feel like retyping that.

[Ender]

The YV are exactly tyhe alien of the week types that SF deals with everyday, they have met races that use biotech before (8472, the breen etc) and basically the vong arent upto much at all.

The gravity wells they use could be easily dealt with since SF types can manipulate gravity well (the NR used their inertial compensators to knock out Vong Dovin Basals the Feds have similar tech and are much more familiar with on the fly modifications).

Please explain this theory insted of the simple assumption you have here

The hulls of the Vong seem like they were made to be sliced by phasers (since phasers are material dependant) and photon torps could easily be set to go off in a similar manner to a area effect weapon.

The cap ship hulls are weak, but they are thick, hence the huge size of their ships. I agree that photo torps could be altered in the same method as Proton Torps have, but I don't entirely argee with the Phaser bit. The best guess is that the hulls are similar to limestone, but the fact that they are dependent on the environment in which the ship was grown means A) the assumption that the phasers will behave the same each time is faulty B)IT may be different to limestone and actually incorporate some dense material.

The vong sensors are a joke and thus the feds (and possibly klingons romulans) could use cloak/holo ship tech to great effect in launching surprise attacks.

Please explain how a hologram is going to hide the gravity signature of a ship.

The only advantage the vong have is the high speed of hyper drive which may allow them some advantages however the feds also have some advantages - first off the transporter could a dovin Basal detect a transporter beam? if not then Vong craft are just so much dead rock if they can then the feds Planetary defense could use transporters to distract Voing defense while phasers go to work.

The Vong also have Numbers and the strength of their weapons as advantages.
As the DB can learn (IE how it learned to strip shields in the course of a single engagement), the distraction technigue won't be to effective for long.

Some sort of bio plague could also be created (if they could do it for the comlpetely alien founders the vong should be easy) this could however take time to implement.
Nano weapons could also be used to good effect and im sure ekk Admiral Janeway would be in on the war effort.

The shapers create bioplagues that eat all life on a planet in seconds. Their control of biotech is far beyond what the feds have shown. I doubt your plague would be a problem, but Destiney's Way may prove me wrong if the new superweapon is indeed a bioweapon
As for Nanotech I already addressed that.

The main problem for the Feds would be ground combat but simple use of transporters could take alot of Vong out of the game until the Vong got control over such installations then the Feds would be reduced to Phton grenades and phasers.

How would transporters be used in such a manner? And please explain why they weren't used this way in the ground wars against the Dominion

Grenades I dont remember the power for them so I dont know if they would be effective, phasers probably dont stand much chance agaist Vong armor if Light Sabers have trouble getting past it.

Sadly, the Feddies heve lost those TOSera genades when Roddenberry cut the federation's balls off with TNG

In conclusion the Vong use tricks instead of raw power and that means they are playing on the feds turf and the feds do it much better than them.

They use tricks because the NR has the advantage in firepower. Against the Feds, the situation is reverse.

[Master of Ossus]

Incidentally, the NR inertial compensators don't knock out dovin basals. They merely provide protection for small ships from the basal's ability to pull of their shields. They have no ability to kill a black hole or a basal, and they don't even completely protect the ship, as sustained fire from YV vessels will still kill them.

[Ender]

Coralskippers frequently withstand shots from X-Wings (not the stutter ones, the real ones), which demonstrates considerable resiliency to weapons. Since X-Wings do have the ability to kill them in one burst, let's place the Coralskipper's upper limits on the hull as two shots from an X-Wing.

Now, the YV do not have enormous numbers (by SW standards), but your scenario was incorrect.

Yes they do. These guys had conquered their entire galaxy before they had to leave. The NR only had about 80% of theirs. They have so many people that it is a problem, hence the need to invade the galaxy.

Yavin IV was a largely isolated area, which was dominated by a shaper colony and not by warriors. It was caught relatively unawares by the attack on it, and responded by having everybody fight. The base there also had a force of speeder-analogs, and some smaller scale capital ships in orbit. Those are considerable resources for such a small and inconsequential base. Also note that the YV were able to establish themselves there in a matter of days.

Hours actually. And the shaper colony managed to beat Karrdes' forces before the Errant Venture popped up.

I don't see any evidence that YV numbers would be small by ST standards. In fact, they would be enormous. Remember that when they attacked Coruscant they had massive numbers on their side. They were engaging thousands of ships, along with defense stations, and planetary shields. That is the upper limit of their numbers, not the piddly base on Yavin IV. It would have required millions, perhaps billions of troops to secure Coruscant. Remember that the planet is home to billions and likely trillions of beings. Such a planet would require immense resources to subjugate, even once it was orbitally in your control. Remember that Fey'lya's bomb killed a lower limit of ten thousand YV warriors in JUST one wing of the palace. That indicates a substantial force--in itself far greater than the numbers seen in Edge of Victory, even if you combine the shapers and shamed ones with the warriors.

I agree with this

The YV have had little reason to invent new things. They have not needed to change their basic ships for thousands of years, and perhaps longer. The thing about being a heretic is more or less irrelevent because the Vong ships are already better than SF vessels, so there is little reason to adapt them.

I agree with you that YV weapons become more powerful over time, now firing massive spheres of plasma and the like, but their ranges are in the thousands of kilometers.

NO, we are just seeing more cap ship combat. Weapons power has remained consistently in the low KT- low GT range

Further, we know the YV ships appear to be SLIGHTLY weaker than their NR analogs. This indicates that their ships would stack up reasonably favorably against SF ships, but they appear to respond to numbers poorly.

Everyone does. Even an Executor could be beaten by starfleet with enough numbers. Granted it would take over 36000 Sovies, but still.

I think that one on one the YV would annihilate SF. Once the numbers for SF began increasing, however, the Vong advantages would diminish very quickly.

How so? They can out produce the Feds, and according to the start of the thread, they have a much more stable base then they did attacking the Republic.

[Ender]

Incidentally, the NR inertial compensators don't knock out dovin basals. They merely provide protection for small ships from the basal's ability to pull of their shields. They have no ability to kill a black hole or a basal, and they don't even completely protect the ship, as sustained fire from YV vessels will still kill them.

Incorrect. Everytime a YV ship tries to rame them, it's DB void gets caneled out by the field adn it only impacts with the force of the ship, instead of the Void swallowing most of it. See the Battle of Duros, the Battle of Fondor, and the Evacuation of Gyndine for more details.


I'm beginning to thisk that I need the title "Warmaster" here, because It seems I'm the only NJO/Vong fanboy here on the boards.

[TheDarkling]

Yes I realise that the NR only got defeated by, well themselves really but when the Vong first turned up they established bases and the NR didnt attack them hell the NR didnt even protect its own systems, going on the books leading upto star by star you could be forgiven for thinking the NR had 100 ships (most battles see 3 maybe 4 NR caps ships).

Their ability to produce ships isnt in question but their ability to crew more than a few thousand is, I also dont think that small fighter craft will last long against a few photon torps (or even bombs like the DS9 800 km blast radius bomb) set for area effect, the vong are going to take some heavy man power losses.

In vector prime Vong weapons (from skippers) have no effect on fighters shields yet later on the Vong weapons can actually hurt the falcon and some other small ships, I dont actually think they got better its just inconsistent writing.

The idea of the transport isnt just to beam forces onto Vong ships it could beam bombs of chemical agents but the main idea was if the Dovin Basals can track a transporter then transporter beams could be used to further distract and weaken the Dovin Basals.

Yes but the question is how quickly can the vong react but the use of nanotech against ships ala Voy Vs 8472 was what I was thinking.

Now a chemical agent that affects only Vong or some of their tech (their armor for example) can be dispersed in an atmosphere by the use of two Q torps (Ref For the Uniform) so if the feds can come up with such an agent (which its possible to do for cardies and Humans with ease) entire planets could be made off limits to the Vong.
However I suspect that once the vong learned of this they would just try and drop moons or thei own bio weapons, this would deny them the ability to take new slaves and places to grow new tech.

In effect the entire galaxy wouldnt be worth the effort for the Vong who I have always seen as lacking in numbers (of people not ships) especially when all they can do is destroy, this wouldnt stop them since they are fundie morons who believe they are on a mission from god.

[Master of Ossus]

Incidentally, the NR inertial compensators don't knock out dovin basals. They merely provide protection for small ships from the basal's ability to pull of their shields. They have no ability to kill a black hole or a basal, and they don't even completely protect the ship, as sustained fire from YV vessels will still kill them.

Incorrect. Everytime a YV ship tries to rame them, it's DB void gets caneled out by the field adn it only impacts with the force of the ship, instead of the Void swallowing most of it. See the Battle of Duros, the Battle of Fondor, and the Evacuation of Gyndine for more details.


I'm beginning to thisk that I need the title "Warmaster" here, because It seems I'm the only NJO/Vong fanboy here on the boards.

Hmmm... Concession granted. Sorry about that, I didn't think they were powerful enough to cancel black holes.

[TheDarkling]

The majority of Vong grouind forces are made up of those reptile creatues and they start creating those human warriors aswell - it is said that the Vong are low on numbers since every single able bodiedperson was needed to fight the war, only those in some way unable to fight were left aboard the worldships.

Also remember that it would likely be Feds/Rom/Kling alliance again since the Vong area big threat Im not sure how many ships that is but its around the 20,000 or so mark according to some figures (the dominion had 30,000 ships and a portion of those was breen and Cardy and since both those races are minor players).

The question of Vong infiltration is open to debate but I would love to see a Vong go into a transporter then have explained what happened to them .

[Ender]

Yes I realise that the NR only got defeated by, well themselves really but when the Vong first turned up they established bases and the NR didnt attack them hell the NR didnt even protect its own systems, going on the books leading upto star by star you could be forgiven for thinking the NR had 100 ships (most battles see 3 maybe 4 NR caps ships).

OK

Their ability to produce ships isnt in question but their ability to crew more than a few thousand is,

A) They clearly can operate several thousand ships
B) The fact that their ships are largely run by the ships themselves allows them to not be nearly as crew intensive as most ships. A frigate has a crew of 98 or something.
C) I will repeat this once again: The reason they are attacking this particular galaxy, against the advice of their then current Warmaster, is the pressing need to handle the population. They are invading because they have too many people on the worldships and the ships are dying as a result While the grunts may be deluded into thinking this is yet another holy war, the higher ups know the truth: This is a war for the survival of thier species.

I also dont think that small fighter craft will last long against a few photon torps (or even bombs like the DS9 800 km blast radius bomb) set for area effect, the vong are going to take some heavy man power losses.

Define Manpower. These guys ram their ships into the enemy instead of a standard bombardment. Clearly the loss of millions of thier lives is not an issue. If it was, Tsavong Lah would not have had them ram the Coruscant shields. He may be a fanatic, but he isn't so far gone the he can't tactically command. He has been shown to accept heresy and handle technology on more then one occasion.

In vector prime Vong weapons (from skippers) have no effect on fighters shields yet later on the Vong weapons can actually hurt the falcon and some other small ships, I dont actually think they got better its just inconsistent writing.

The weapons are weak in initial power, but the plasma keep eating at the shields throughout the way. It adds up.

The idea of the transport isnt just to beam forces onto Vong ships it could beam bombs of chemical agents but the main idea was if the Dovin Basals can track a transporter then transporter beams could be used to further distract and weaken the Dovin Basals.

Chemical agents are nullified by gnulliths. Bombs may be an effective tactic. As I said in my earlier post, the DB (or more accurately, the yammosk) will learn about the trick quickly and ignore the beams trying to distract it quickly.

Yes but the question is how quickly can the vong react but the use of nanotech against ships ala Voy Vs 8472 was what I was thinking.

How would it get through the hull? It was my understanding that 8472 hulls were literally the skin of the ship, and thus vulnerable. The hulls on Vong ships are limestone or some other type of metal.stone thingy.

Now a chemical agent that affects only Vong or some of their tech (their armor for example) can be dispersed in an atmosphere by the use of two Q torps (Ref For the Uniform) so if the feds can come up with such an agent (which its possible to do for cardies and Humans with ease) entire planets could be made off limits to the Vong.

Until the Vong land with gnulliths on.

However I suspect that once the vong learned of this they would just try and drop moons or thei own bio weapons, this would deny them the ability to take new slaves and places to grow new tech.

They have the Wars galaxy to give them all the slaves they want, and the bioweapons are what makes the place suitable to grow things. The moon trick is what they do to create their shipwombs. So they will be doing both anyways

In effect the entire galaxy wouldnt be worth the effort for the Vong who I have always seen as lacking in numbers (of people not ships) especially when all they can do is destroy, this wouldnt stop them since they are fundie morons who believe they are on a mission from god.

Numbers is, contrary to your opinion, not an issue. And while the grunts are fundie morons, the leaders are not.

[Ender]

The majority of Vong grouind forces are made up of those reptile creatues and they start creating those human warriors aswell - it is said that the Vong are low on numbers since every single able bodiedperson was needed to fight the war, only those in some way unable to fight were left aboard the worldships.

No, the majority of the ground forces we saw in the beginning were Chazrach and thralls because they were testing them. Those now appear to be relegated to holding the territory they have captured. Look at all the recent books, and it is clear that the warriors are now the primary ground forces.

Also remember that it would likely be Feds/Rom/Kling alliance again

I have always assumed it would be as much in these debates.

since the Vong area big threat Im not sure how many ships that is but its around the 20,000 or so mark according to some figures (the dominion had 30,000 ships and a portion of those was breen and Cardy and since both those races are minor players).

OK. THe Vong have thousands of Cap ships, and God knows how many Worldship (hundreds of theousand to millions would be my guess, as they are carrying the entire population in them)

The question of Vong infiltration is open to debate but I would love to see a Vong go into a transporter then have explained what happened to them .

I dpon't even want to think about the level of resulting carnage.

[Crazy_Vasey]

All the Vong have to do is find a nice cluster of isolated systems, which wouldn't exactly be difficult in Trek, and turn them into their equivalent of construction yards so they could mass produce ships to fight whoever they attack. Remember they could probably do it piecemeal taking the isolated and weak powers of the galaxy like the Kazon and use their planets for construction as well. The numbers game could be tipped in their favour quite quickly, I think, if they followed those tactics.

We've seen their ships stand up in knock down slugfests with the NR fleets at times and they haven't exactly been easily defeated so i'd take an educated guess than on a ship vs ship basis they have far greater firepower than your average Trek ship.

Their basals could prove to a pain in the rectum for feddy ships at least because they only ever seem to fire one phaser at a time nice and slow which a wouldn't be too hard for the basals to absorb/deflect or whatever well apart from the defiant of course.

Speed is unquestionably in the Vongs favour, hell aren't the Vong even faster in hyperspace than the standard Wars ship? That's a big advantage when their bases could be inaccessible to Trek ships due to distance.

They have some bad ass planet killing toys as well looking at what happened to Ithor and we know they have no compunctions about using them.

Range I have no idea off hand. Trek ships in the shows only seems to engage at really close range but I ain't watched much Trek in a long time so that might have changed.

[TheDarkling]

About the yammosk learning to ignore the transporter beams, as soon as they start to do that the transporter transports a bomb over thus the transport is an effective weapon either way.

I will answer you other points later I have to pop out for an hour.

[Ender]

About the yammosk learning to ignore the transporter beams, as soon as they start to do that the transporter transports a bomb over thus the transport is an effective weapon either way.

I will answer you other points later I have to pop out for an hour.

Fair enough. I have always seen the bomb as a valid tatic in this situation. Only problem is getting in range and surviving there long enough to beam the bomb.

[Ender]

Speed is unquestionably in the Vongs favour, hell aren't the Vong even faster in hyperspace than the standard Wars ship? That's a big advantage when their bases could be inaccessible to Trek ships due to distance.

No, they are slower then NR ships. They travel at the equivlent of a 3x hyperdrive, while the NR is at 1x or lower.

[Crazy_Vasey]

Where on earth did I get they were faster from then hmm. Oh well no matter almost certainly still faster than warp drive :p

[Ender]

Where on earth did I get they were faster from then hmm. Oh well no matter almost certainly still faster than warp drive :p

The microjump the frigate did in the Hero's Trial maybe?

[Crazy_Vasey]

I honesty can't remember, it's been a fair bit of time since I last read most of the earlier NJO books and most of them I have no intention of reading again.

[TheDarkling]

OK. THe Vong have thousands of Cap ships, and God knows how many Worldship (hundreds of theousand to millions would be my guess, as they are carrying the entire population in them)

I am just wondering where you got this from - I have only read upto star by star so I dont have much knowledge of the later engagements with the Vong.

My conclusion about the Vong not being very large is that in Rebirth it was said every single capable warrior and shaper was off fighting the war so it doesnt seem like the Vongs population (warriors able to fight) is that high, they couldnt spare any shapers or ships from the war effort.
The same book pegs a few hundred ships as a very large amount since it weakens the Vongs defenses to gather that many ships for an attack.

Now you keep saying they have to many people on the worldships and I understand that but that doesnt mean they have alot of warriors ready to fight, a large proportion of their species seem to be shamed ones.

The suicide runs were used because if they didnt use them in further lose of ships/life would occur - it was the correct tactic to use.

Chemical agents could be dealt with my their breathing equipment but it would render the planets unusable for tech growing and it would also cause problems for the tech (prehaps including the breathers).
It wont win a war since the vong would likely come up with a creature that got rid of the chemical agent it would just be something the feds could use to battle the vong on a few occassions.

The hull of vong ships are limestone type materials encasing a living creature right? the nanoprobes would break down the hull and move in for the kill - its a viable tactic.

Transporter ranges are 30,000 km so coming into transporter range wouldnt be a problem really.