One ISD in ST galaxy (serious)

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

1.
If the numbers I found on the web are right SF does have a hope against a single ISD, a lousy chance I'm sure, but it's better-than-nothing. We've seen the E-D accelerate a moon massing about 6 * 10^13 kg. The common figures for an ISD I found from Google were about 25 million tons which, if I'm converting right, is 2.5 * 10^10 kg. So the ISD would be about 1/1000th of the mass of of the moon in "Deja Q". So the only way I can see for a collection of GCS, SCS, etc. is to tractor the ISD and push it somewhere bad (like the centre of the sun, a blockhole, etc.). This will of course mean high casualties (as in get a tractor lock, push, kiss you ass goodbye as you get blown to smithereens, then the next ship repeats the procedure). Mike's numbers say an ISD can accelerate at about 30 km/s/s so if we assume Geordi is right and each GCS can push with enough force to acheive 4 km/s/s of acceleration against a moon with massing 1000 times as much, they should be able to push hard enough to acheive 4000 km/s/s of acceleration (and yes I'm just using Newton's F = ma). So the question then becomes how fast can I keep the GCS's pushing before being blown to shreads?

I don't know. But assuming the weapons are useless, I don't have enough mass to ram the sucker, and I can't find some treknobabble to save my ass I'd go for pushing the ISD into:
1. A nice blackhole. Not likely (you'd have to get a tractor up, go to warp and fly into a blackhole ... all without the ISD managing to escape).
2. The centre of the sun. Possible, but assuming respectable rates of fire from the ISD you'd need a *lot* of GCS, etc. to push the sucker from say earth to the sun.
3. Planetside. An orbiting ISD's gravitational potential energy is about 5*10^18 joules if its orbiting at about 20,000 km and I'm doing the calc right. Which is roughly equivalent to 50,000 heavy TL shots. No idea how much of that energy would be go into breaking apart the ISD (as oppposed to the planet it hits), but if enough goes in ... it would do the trick.

So here's my best half-assed feddie tactic. Use your cap ships to push the ISD into a gravity well. Screw weapons and sheilds as they don't matter all that much anways. Just try to push/pull the sucker *down*. You are still going to end up losing billions of people if you do down the sucker, but they are going to die anyways, at least you have some faint hope of killing the sucker.

Its one thing I've always wondered about all sci-fi battles that occur in orbit ... one good solid push downward should kill most ships, yet nobody big has ever done it to the best of my recollection.

Sorry, pal, won't work. While you are taking numbers from Wong's webpage, you MIGHT note that he also rated the GCS power as 30,000TW, max. And it is apparently not accelerating by 4km/s per second. The TOTAL acceleration is 4km/s, spread over a period of NINE hours.

Let's say you're pushing against a weak Acclamator instead of a much tougher ISD. That produces 7E22W of power generation, and does up to 35km/s/s of acceleration (3500Gs.) If you calculate from THAT using the KE formula, an Acclamator's mass can be up to 1.14E14kg (admittedly, that is a derived figure, but so is the 25 million ton or 50 million ton figure - from an early Mandel blueprint.) Still think a few GCS can push an ISD into anywhere without it agreeing, even if it doesn't shoot back?

By the way, 5E18 joules is nothing. A single gigaton is 4.186E18J. While KE is not the same as thermal, a single gigaton is not "50000 heavy TL shots."

[Akira]

nope. Sorry. BDZ is only in the books. The books are not canon.

No but they are official. Hence, allowed. Just because the Trek EU in not counted, does not mean this is true for all series. You are committing the fallacy of "generalizing from self"*.

On the other hand, the fact that you seem to know what a BDZ is means ou are simply trying to apply your personal opinions as to what the standards should be. The is the fallacy of "I am the world".

*source "Chapter 9: You are wrong because...", The Joy of Work, Scott Adams

:rolleyes:

Ok then, the SW books are "official". Just like the ST TMs and a few other ST books. Yet whenever a ST fan tries to bring them up in a debate, all the SWs fans say they are not allowed to.
Why do SW fans have one thing for thier "official" "items" and one for others?

Would you have the same problem with the B5 SM?

I know what a BDZ is b/c I have been at Spacebattles for almost 4 years.
also someone said that I should join STGN. What makes you think I have not already? (although all i do there is the RPGs, i stay away from the debates there)

I have no problem with SW. I like SW just as much as most of the people here do. I just don't see the Emipre running over the UFP and other ST powers as quickly and as easily as most SW fans do.

and who is this "Darkstar" person?

[Ender]

OK, lets give you the benefit of the doubt

:rolleyes:

Ok then, the SW books are "official". Just like the ST TMs and a few other ST books. Yet whenever a ST fan tries to bring them up in a debate, all the SWs fans say they are not allowed to.
Why do SW fans have one thing for thier "official" "items" and one for others?

Because LucasFilm has one thing for their official material and Paramount has another.

Would you have the same problem with the B5 SM?

No, because that is canon

I know what a BDZ is b/c I have been at Spacebattles for almost 4 years.
also someone said that I should join STGN. What makes you think I have not already? (although all i do there is the RPGs, i stay away from the debates there)

What SB nick?

I have no problem with SW. I like SW just as much as most of the people here do. I just don't see the Emipre running over the UFP and other ST powers as quickly and as easily as most SW fans do.

Then you are a fool. Even Alyeska agrees that the Empire would mow through the AQ.

and who is this "Darkstar" person?

Scroll down the page

[Master of Ossus]

nope. Sorry. BDZ is only in the books. The books are not canon.

No but they are official. Hence, allowed. Just because the Trek EU in not counted, does not mean this is true for all series. You are committing the fallacy of "generalizing from self"*.

On the other hand, the fact that you seem to know what a BDZ is means ou are simply trying to apply your personal opinions as to what the standards should be. The is the fallacy of "I am the world".

*source "Chapter 9: You are wrong because...", The Joy of Work, Scott Adams

:rolleyes:

Ok then, the SW books are "official". Just like the ST TMs and a few other ST books. Yet whenever a ST fan tries to bring them up in a debate, all the SWs fans say they are not allowed to.
Why do SW fans have one thing for thier "official" "items" and one for others?

Would you have the same problem with the B5 SM?

I know what a BDZ is b/c I have been at Spacebattles for almost 4 years.
also someone said that I should join STGN. What makes you think I have not already? (although all i do there is the RPGs, i stay away from the debates there)

I have no problem with SW. I like SW just as much as most of the people here do. I just don't see the Emipre running over the UFP and other ST powers as quickly and as easily as most SW fans do.

and who is this "Darkstar" person?

Fool! In SW, official material means that it is canon unless contradicted directly by the movies, scripts, novelisations, and radio dramatizations (collectively known as canon). In ST, "official" means none of that. It means what in SW would be spoken of as "licensed." In short, it does not mean that it is remotely accurate. These are the policies of LFL and Paramount. Those are the policies we use for these debates.

DarkStar is a complete idiot who came onto this board using arguments identical to yours. He also created his own utterly illogical website, if you would like to look at it (usually referred to as DarkStar's hideaway, or similar) If you would like, you can read through some of his old threads. You will soon realize how stupid he actually was. The best example of this is the incredible beating I gave him in "Ripping Apart DarkStar's cowardly attempt to avoid criticism." You can find the now closed thread just a little ways down. DarkStar starts seriously posting to defend himself at about page 5, so pick it up there and try to figure out how you would attack his arguments. When I begin my first attack, try and figure out that there is no reasonable way for him to respond, other than to concede defeat. Then read how he attempts to rebut my arguments, prompting my second massive attack, which he similarly rebuts irrationaly.

DarkStar was named a Village Idiot very quickly. The "broken record" (debating irrationally by ignoring rebutals and posting your original argument) is occasionally referred to here as the "DarkStar Defense" because he is so fond of using it. Thanks to Kynes, we were able to learn a considerable amount about DarkStar. His other aliases were Guardian2000, Scooter, Scotty, and many others. His nicknames here are DumbShit (which I christened him due to the thread "Prooving BaldStar wrong," an excellent example of the infamous DarkStar defense), and RSA (for "Robert Scott Anderson," his real name, according to Kynes).

You will forgive us for being suspicious, assuming that you are actually not DarkStar. DumbShit uses many of your arguments in an identical manner, insisting that only the films can be used as canon (sometimes he acknowledges novelisations, but he also ignores them much of the time), and has a history of concealing his identity through smurfing.

[Akira]

OK, lets give you the benefit of the doubt

I know what a BDZ is b/c I have been at Spacebattles for almost 4 years.
also someone said that I should join STGN. What makes you think I have not already? (although all i do there is the RPGs, i stay away from the debates there)

What SB nick?

Look at my Profile. My sig at SB has the same info.

[Master of Ossus]

You essentially have no personal information there. Much like DarkStar, but I will give you the benefit of the doubt until a moderator shows up to confirm or deny the connection.

[Akira]

You essentially have no personal information there. Much like DarkStar, but I will give you the benefit of the doubt until a moderator shows up to confirm or deny the connection.

Look again. I fixed it.

Also my avatar should be the same as my SB one.

[Master of Ossus]

Hmmm.... It appears as if you really are not DarkStar. Our apologies. If I were you, I would go through some of DS's former BS threads and read his arguments to find out what NOT to use here.

[tharkûn]

Sorry, pal, won't work. While you are taking numbers from Wong's webpage, you MIGHT note that he also rated the GCS power as 30,000TW, max. And it is apparently not accelerating by 4km/s per second. The TOTAL acceleration is 4km/s, spread over a period of NINE hours"

The exact quote is "We'd need to apply a delta-vee of at least four kilometers per second."

I apoligize for not noting that Geordie screws the hell out of units, again.

The lower limit for the power requirement for the ISD situtation is actually *zero*, no work is being done to the ISD. Its actually a negative net energy balance so whomever hits with the most amount of force wins.

"Let's say you're pushing against a weak Acclamator instead of a much tougher ISD. That produces 7E22W of power generation, and does up to 35km/s/s of acceleration (3500Gs.) If you calculate from THAT using the KE formula, an Acclamator's mass can be up to 1.14E14kg (admittedly, that is a derived figure, but so is the 25 million ton or 50 million ton figure - from an early Mandel blueprint.) "

Yes that is the extreme upper limit, one most likely to be far off. As I understand it, the most power draining actions are: the Hyperdrive, the Weapons, and then the STL drive. Running your numbers on the DSI gives us 10^33 joules after 1 second and a velocity of 10km/s. This gives us a mass of 2*10^25 kg. Thus the DSI, which is only 160 km across, outmasses the earth. Further we see no evidence of that type of gravitational effect on Yavin (the moon does not change velocity with respect to the gas giant) nor does the larger DSII at Endor (after it gets blown the derbis falling into the gravity well should seriously disturb the planet if we are talking that order of mass).

So yes that is an upper limit, but its likely off by huge amounts as the limiting factor is likely the strength of the engines and not the power supply. If you take an electric motor and replace the batteries with a lead to a gigawatt power plant you do not get a really fast motor, you get a smoking lump of metal. Eventually something on the engine gives out.

"Still think a few GCS can push an ISD into anywhere without it agreeing, even if it doesn't shoot back? "

Doubt it. If the GCS can pull some low energy tricks like in "Masterpeice Society", possibly, but that has too many variable. Remember this is called grasping at straws because the standard stuff won't work.

By the way, 5E18 joules is nothing. A single gigaton is 4.186E18J. While KE is not the same as thermal, a single gigaton is not "50000 heavy TL shots."
5*10^18 joules is hardly "nothing" the asteroids in TESB are running with hellishly less KE than 5E18 joules, which are described as multimegatonne. If an ISD could shrug of 5 exajoules as "nothing" they wouldn't have *bothered* to vape the asteroids.

The 50,000 is an egregious error on my part, namely dropping the "million" from 94 million terajoules. I'm right ... if you correct by six orders of magnitude, sorry I blew that big time.

All told the feddies weapons suck against an ISD. They just don't put out the energy needed to beat down an ISD fast enough. Swarm tactics might work, but hyperdrive gets you out of dodge fast. The only easy source of energy that would be sufficient to beat down an ISD is its own gravitational potential energy and some natural phenomena. Pushing an ISD into the centre of the Sun might work ... if you can get it there and there is something to bang it against. The sun being 300,000 times as massive as the earth creates a gravity well 300,000 times as deep. Pushing an ISD in there would result in 10^24 joules, but I have no clue how much of the energy would end up going towards crushing the ISD.

[tharkûn]

I think it's entirely plausible to assume that the Imperials have sensing technology that's at least on par with the Hubble telescope. The Hubble, of course, is capable of resolving images that are billions of lightyears away. I see no problems with the Imperials mapping out an around of a hundred lightyears or so in either direction, rather rapidly.
Hubble has yet to resolve a planet of the size of earth. Remember we do *not* see planets from their light (even Jovian ones). We observer them because they (large gas giants) cause the stars to "wobble" due to gravity. Even when we observed a direct "eclipse" of a star by its presumed planet all we saw was a decrease in luminosity ... not the planet itself.

Planets emit *very* little radiation, and are all but completely drowned out by the emission for the star. That is why we detect large planets around other stars by their *gravitational* effects and not the emissions. The gravitational effects of something earth sized on the sun are going to be *very slight*. If you want to map a galaxy using simple optics, you can very easily position stars. Finding large planets will take time. Finding small habitable planets will take longer. I'd still go with buying the map (assuming Q did not provide one), its cheap, quick, and painless ... you can always kill the Ferengi if they pawn off shoddy merchandise.

If Hubble has found earth sized planets, I'd love to read about it.

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

Actually, in this case, Geordi did use an appropriate unit. Delta-V is velocity change, and he is describing accurately the magnitude of velocity change he needs - 4km/s. The fact you didn't notice he was going to spread the task of accelerating by 4km/s over nine hours is not relevant

And AFAIK, this situation will require work, for you are probably going to change the speed, probably for the positive. There are in theory ways to TURN something (change velocity without changing speed) so you don't do real work, but if you accelerate, you have to do work.

I know about the problems with making the Acclamator so heavy. However, it is possible. I really have problems with that idea that the reactor runs at partial power in a desperate gunfight (1/7th power or so in an Acclamator for the weapons, say double it for the engines, add 25% of total engine power for the shields from the Sourcebook, and we get just over half power.) Maybe they only do that for the really big ships. After all, impregnating neutronium in the same density on a very large object will be more difficult structurally than in a small object because mass goes up faster than structural force bearing area, increasing stresses.

OK, I exaggerated a little to call it "nothing," but one should have been easily able to see what I'm comparing it to. COMPARED to 200GT, a little over a single gigaton is nothing, or nearly so

[tharkûn]

One does not apply "at a delta v", you accelerate "at" a specific quantity, you change velocities "by" a specific quantity. Any event my mistake, I took 4km/s and through on another /s.

And AFAIK, this situation will require work, for you are probably going to change the speed, probably for the positive.
Nope. Let's do this with balances. At start let's put the ISD at 35,000 km above the equator (say bombing the hell out of Quito) in geosynchronous orbit . Now we take our frame of reference to be at the earth's surface directly underneath the ISD. The orbital motion is the same so for all intents and purposes the ISD starts with 0 KE. It does have
343,000,000 * its mass of gravitational potential energy (gravitational potential energy = mgh).

Now let's look at the other side. The ISD is on the ground, its immobile. So again in this frame of reference it has 0 KE. However it also has 0 potential energy. This means net we exchange 10^18 (using my figures) of potential energy for some other form.

So where does it go? Some went into superheating the atmosphere as it entered, lots went into making a bigass crater, but some undoubtedly went into deforming the ISD. How much, I haven't a clue, but even if it's just a fraction ... that's far more energy than a GCS can dump out the phaser banks. Maybe pulling along side and suiciding, which Mike says is about 10^21 joules (or about 100 HTL shots assuming nearly all the energy ends up hitting the ISD, which it won't) would be better use, but SF just doesn't have that many weapons with huge yeilds and when I ran the numbers on pushing the thing down it looked good.

OK, I exaggerated a little to call it "nothing," but one should have been easily able to see what I'm comparing it to. COMPARED to 200GT, a little over a single gigaton is nothing, or nearly so
Its about half a HTL shot. Certainly more than "nothing", that's more firepower than a good number of smaller rebel ships. That is also a helluvalot of KE, by Mike's estimate a ship in the TESB asteriod feild received 10^20 joules, after being in there for 1-2 days and being hit by 1 asteroid per second. We are talking an impact with 1000 times as much KE as a TESB asteriod colllision which were causing damage.

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

Maybe they don't, but I think you are reading it wrong.

"We'd need to apply a delta-vee of at least four kilometers per second."

The "at least" here is totally optional. He could omit it or relocate it to after "second." He could easily have said "We'd need to apply a delta-v of four km per second." Even if it is not linguistically perfect (my grammar skills ain't the best,) it'll be unambigious. In short, come on, don't blame anyone else for your own goof

If you are starting from 0 KE and a PE of X joules, and you allow the object to free-fall, then yes, the PE will be converted into KE. As it falls through the atmosphere, some of the KE will turn into thermal, even as more and more PE goes into KE. Then it hits the ground, and there is no PE left, and no KE as the object finally stops. The free-fall should require no effort on your part whatsoever.

However, there are some problems with this simple model.

Remember the role of air resistance, which eventually neutralizes the increase in KE from release of potential energy. When you hit the ground, the KE is about what does damage to you and the ground. The rest has been wasted into TE over a LONG period of time (your whole period of fall.)

And a Star Destroyer when falling on its belly is near as unaerodyamic as a BRICK.

Two, your numbers only work if you use a free fall solution. If you are shoving it down faster than the natural transfer rate (9.8m/s^2) then you WILL have to put in extra effort. Your hand exerts effort on the basketball every time you slap on it so it'll bounce higher than it otherwise would (can you tell I'm not very fond of basketball? ) You are adding your own energy into the what the GPE transfer will be.

Let's say the basketball is 1m off the ground and let's say it weighs 1 kilo. The GPE is 1J. Not counting air resistance, the KE on impact will also be 1J at perhaps 2m/s impact.

However, if you want to accelerate it further, then you will increase the KE at impact. What can do that except for extra work, from your hand?

Not only are you actively trying to accelerate it towards the ground, BUT you are also fighting the ISD. Let's say you win this little shoving contest, but it is even enough that the ISD barely scrapes the floor at ONE m/s. Then the actual KE figure will be eons from your GPE hopes (1.25E10J of KE impact.)

The ISD is actively producing force, and when at full thrust, it is doing 1.125E19W to accelerate (your numbers.) That's more than the GPE can possibly hold it down with. Gravity is on your side, but the more significant thing is the ISD's own resistance. You have to fight that to push it closer to the ground, and force and work will be required.

In fact, let's do it REAL far from Earth, where the gravitational potential energy of Earth nears INFINITY. But that isn't going to help you much practically at all. The ISD is still accelerating with 1.125E19W, and you are still trying to drag it another with 3E16W. The victor is clear using something simple like the KE formula.

BTW, yes, I've read those numbers, but these days, a single HTL now goes for 8.372E20J. Do the math.

[Master of Ossus]

I think it's entirely plausible to assume that the Imperials have sensing technology that's at least on par with the Hubble telescope. The Hubble, of course, is capable of resolving images that are billions of lightyears away. I see no problems with the Imperials mapping out an around of a hundred lightyears or so in either direction, rather rapidly.
Hubble has yet to resolve a planet of the size of earth. Remember we do *not* see planets from their light (even Jovian ones). We observer them because they (large gas giants) cause the stars to "wobble" due to gravity. Even when we observed a direct "eclipse" of a star by its presumed planet all we saw was a decrease in luminosity ... not the planet itself.

Planets emit *very* little radiation, and are all but completely drowned out by the emission for the star. That is why we detect large planets around other stars by their *gravitational* effects and not the emissions. The gravitational effects of something earth sized on the sun are going to be *very slight*. If you want to map a galaxy using simple optics, you can very easily position stars. Finding large planets will take time. Finding small habitable planets will take longer. I'd still go with buying the map (assuming Q did not provide one), its cheap, quick, and painless ... you can always kill the Ferengi if they pawn off shoddy merchandise.

If Hubble has found earth sized planets, I'd love to read about it.

I'd also like to see Hubble detecting things FTL.

[tharkûn]

The "at least" here is totally optional. He could omit it or relocate it to after "second." He could easily have said "We'd need to apply a delta-v of four km per second." Even if it is not linguistically perfect (my grammar skills ain't the best,) it'll be unambigious. In short, come on, don't blame anyone else for your own goof

Yes but little words like "at: and "by" do have a meaning. I could be wrong in my problem with Geordie's phrasing, but the mistake is mine whatever the outcome.

"If you are starting from 0 KE and a PE of X joules, and you allow the object to free-fall , then yes, the PE will be converted into KE. As it falls through the atmosphere, some of the KE will turn into thermal, even as more and more PE goes into KE. Then it hits the ground, and there is no PE left, and no KE as the object finally stops."

Look the energy has to go somewhere, most of it will be left over for the the impact unless I'm horribly wrong. You claim an apreciable amount of energy will go to thermal waste, fine let's see your calcs.

"Two, your numbers only work if you use a free fall solution. If you are shoving it down faster than the natural transfer rate (9.8m/s^2) then you WILL have to put in extra effort. Your hand exerts effort on the basketball every time you slap on it so it'll bounce higher than it otherwise would (can you tell I'm not very fond of basketball? ) You are adding your own energy into the what the GPE transfer will be. "
Of course its called a low end estimate. The ISD could be going faster, but that only makes a *bigger* impact. So long as the GCS(s) is (are) pushing harder than the ISD you will go down and the minimum amount of total energy will be at least equal to the GPE. Anymore is just "bonus" =)

"However, if you want to accelerate it further, then you will increase the KE at impact. What can do that except for extra work, from your hand? "
lower limit approaches zero (depending on how lightly contact is made) upper limit is without bound (at least until something in your hand or the basketball gives).

The point is no matter how you dice it the basketball hits the ground with at least 1J, some is of course bled out by wind resistance, but any work done by your hand is going to be extra. If you want to say the GCS makes an appreciable *increase* in total energy ... fine by me =)


"Not only are you actively trying to accelerate it towards the ground, BUT you are also fighting the ISD. Let's say you win this little shoving contest, but it is even enough that the ISD barely scrapes the floor at ONE m/s. Then the actual KE figure will be eons from your GPE hopes (1.25E10J of KE impact.) "
That only occurs if the ISD is pushing harder than the GCS(s) at some point in time. Let's say the GCS is pushing at 10^11 N (numbers not correct). Let's say the ISD is pushing back at 9*10^10 N. Now let's say that happens the entire time. The net result is 10^10 N towards the Earth. Which means net you have all the KE derived from GPE and *then* some. There are 3 forces at work here. The GCS(s) pushing down. The ISD (pushing up presumably). Gravity pulling down. If the |Fgcs| >= |Fisd| then you will have at least the amount of energy specified by GPE, possibly *more*.

The only way an ISD can impact at anything close to slow speeds is if |Fgcs| < |Fisd| < |Fgcs + Fg|.

If |Fisd| > = |Fgcs + Fg| then ISD won't even budge.

Where Fisd is the force supplied by the ISD's engine pushing up
Fgcs is the force from the GCS pushing down
Fg is the force of gravity on the ISD

The ISD is actively producing force, and when at full thrust, it is doing 1.125E19W to accelerate (your numbers.) That's more than the GPE can possibly hold it down with. Gravity is on your side, but the more significant thing is the ISD's own resistance. You have to fight that to push it closer to the ground, and force and work will be required.
First off an ISD only does work if it moves up from the gravity well. To see if that happens we need to look at forces.

Yes but by my original numbers the GCS would be hitting with an effective 2.4*10^17N. An ISD can push back with 1.8*10^15N. In other words the ISD would have done jack didly squat. The only reason I figure from GPE is because we don't what mechanism is used to produce the force which pushes this thing down, it might be some treknobabble device which does not require vast amounts of energy (so that when it's turned off the object it had been pushing slows down). But regardless of how the treknobabble works you *always* have a net change equal to GPE if you go from "up" to "down", that energy may go into deforming the impact site, heating air on the way down ... but it goes somewhere.

Any way using more correct numbers (I think) a single GCS will push with about 10^13 N. So about 200 of em could bully an ISD around (until they become cannon fodder) =) In this case even a dozen 10 GCS will only push with 10^14 N, which means that net motion (if the ISD pushes with max engines) is up, and the ISD is also doing work (as its moving out of the gravity well).

"In fact, let's do it REAL far from Earth, where the gravitational potential energy of Earth nears INFINITY. But that isn't going to help you much practically at all. The ISD is still accelerating with 1.125E19W, and you are still trying to drag it another with 3E16W. The victor is clear using something simple like the KE formula"
Sigh look this is a fairly simple problem (I think) you have 3 forces. 1 going up (the ISD), one going down (the GCS) and another going down gravity. The first two can employ all sorts of fun tricks (indeed something screwy has to happen considering the bridge crew stays standing while these suckers accelerate), so that the energy requirement goes down. So looking at magnitudes here there are several possibilities:
1. Fgcs > Fisd - ISD goes down hard, an extremely conservative lower limit is the GPE of the ISD, upper limit is whatever energy the GCS can impart.
2. Fgcs <= Fisd <= Fgcs + Fg - ISD goes down, but not as hard. Lower limit here is 0 joules, upper limit is GPE.
3. Fisd > Fgcs + Fg - ISD goes wherever the hell it wants to. Lower limit is 0, upper limit is also 0 if the ISD does not want to move.

Which means given my earlier incorrect figures we were in case 1. The ISD goes down hard with at least GPE.

Given the corrected figures we are in case 3.

Given a few hundred GCS pushing the ISD you get back to case 1.

The victor is clear using simple forces and accelerations. I avoid working out force problems with power.

BTW, yes, I've read those numbers, but these days, a single HTL now goes for 8.372E20J. Do the math
Why do SW ships even bother having HTL's? With that type of energy you can make damn powerful railgun (gaus gun ... whatever the hell you like) which would shread your opponents immensly weaker KE sheilds with ease. I mean hell does *anyone* give a damn about fighting economically in SW? I mean seriously supposedly ISD's can fight for several volleys, yet ships (even damaged ones) were getting crunched by a small fraction of that in KE. Not to mention they'd actually be faster in flight than TL (we are talking enough rKE to be going .995 c if the missile is 1000 kg).

Let's pump out orders of magnitude more energy for the hell of it so we can have equivalent firepower of a much less energy intensive KEM.

[SirNitram]

Railguns are bad, compared to plasma based guns. You have to support against the structural stress of firing the round, the recoil, and most of the energy must come from you, not the plasma which contributes large amounts of thermal damage.

[Master of Ossus]

Just because an Acclamator can apply that amount of thrust to itself does not mean that it can apply that amount of thrust to a small projectile, or even anywhere near that much thrust. Further, railguns must be essentially built into the hull, and would likely have far more limited firing arcs than the weapons an ISD or similar carries, and they might not be as capable of doing other operations like bombarding planets from orbit. Also, for all we know it is much cheaper to generate power and use it for TL batteries than it is for them to get ammunition. And in the book Before the Storm, a modified ISD takes several shots from a powerful, lunar-based railgun and without losing shields.

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

"If you are starting from 0 KE and a PE of X joules, and you allow the object to free-fall , then yes, the PE will be converted into KE. As it falls through the atmosphere, some of the KE will turn into thermal, even as more and more PE goes into KE. Then it hits the ground, and there is no PE left, and no KE as the object finally stops."

Look the energy has to go somewhere, most of it will be left over for the the impact unless I'm horribly wrong. You claim an apreciable amount of energy will go to thermal waste, fine let's see your calcs.

Come to think of it, you are right in most of these, even though in the case of being way far away from the gravity well, it'll be so weak you'll have to push it, or else you'd never accelerate significantly. That kinda threw me off. Conceded.

The stuff that's left are the points I still wish to contend.

The ability to precisely calculate the Star Destroyer's impact velocity with the ground is a question for aerodynamics (since the gravity acceleration part is really easy, the hard part is the drag and friction.) I doubt either you or I have a degree in THAT, and even the experts supposedly don't know all the nooks and crannies.

However, there ARE some things we can use. Empirical results of aerodynamics can be used to give us a start. Remember that to get the full load in KE that GPE predicts, you are moving about 20km/s when you hit the ground (and you should be close to that when you hit the atmosphere.)

Consider a modern fighter's speed records at sea level. These days, fighters have a combat T/W ratio of close to 1:1 - that is, their engines are pushing them with a similar force that gravity would have. Notice how they generally only do 700-800mph (less than 500m/s.)

Notice how a human being's maximum free fall speed in the air is a lousy 620MPH (277m/s.) That's the kind of sustainable speed you can expect in atmosphere, especially low atmosphere. Sure, a Star Destroyer is denser, but it is a really lousy aerodynamic shape compared to fighters, and air resistance goes up much faster than relative velocity.

Notice how a Space Shuttle loses half its speed during its atmospheric re-entry maneuver (no, not the long glide, just the red-hot part) and it started out at Mach 24. You are starting at Mach 60 (the equivalent anyway.) The result is predictable.

And remember for every 50% you use in impact velocity, you lose 75% in impact KE. If these numbers are usable to within to even a single order of magnitude (that should help compensate for the greater mass and faster velocity at the atmospheric entry point.

As an aside, using my masses for Acclamators...drag will play a much lesser role in proportion, but it'll be much harder to drag them down

[Vertigo1]

Excuse me Mr. Wong, but there's a HUGE flaw in your little quip. See, telescopes are all fine and good, but it takes TIME to map stars. We've been mapping stars for CENTURIES and we have only mapped a small portion of our galaxy. The only viable method I know of that they could obtain a ready-to-use map is to either board a vessel and steal it or purchase one from a trader. That way the crew wouldn't die of old age before they found out where Earth is.

You're a fucking moron. Did they have modern technology throughout all those centuries? The reason it took so long was that they were figuring out the tricks and techniques for the first time! If we had to start over with modern technology and knowledge of astrophysics, we'd obviously be orders of magnitude faster. I can't believe the dumb-shits they allow to operate computers nowadays ...

Wow, such elaborate use of personal insults. No wonder you "win" every arguement. This is EXACTLY why most trek debaters can't stand you. Notice how you ignore the fact that regardless of tech level, it will take time to find landmarks and plot a safe route. It is far easier to aquire one by means of purchase or theft. Hell, they could slice into their systems and nab the maps while sitting safely out of range of weapons fire, import the maps, plot a course and jump before being ID'd by the ship they hacked into.

[off-topic] Look, we're both adults here. I'm willing to debate with you as long as you drop the insults. You don't see me going around here calling anyone that disagrees with me a "fucking moron" so why the attitude? [/off-topic]

[SirNitram]

I can see Vertigo won't last long, if he's that thin-skinned...

[Darth Wong]

Wow, such elaborate use of personal insults. No wonder you "win" every arguement.

You're committing the style over substance fallacy, you idiot. I dealt with your point, and you should have expected harsh treatment when you came waltzing into this thread spouting ancient and long-dead Trekkie bullshit. If you go to any newsgroup on the Web and act like a complete newbie troll, asking questions or making points that have already been answered a thousand times before, that is precisely the response you tend to receive. Learn some netiquette before you accuse others of breaking it.

This is EXACTLY why most trek debaters can't stand you.

No, they can't stand me because they can't defeat me logically, so they have to resort to "style over substance" criticisms in a vain effort to hang onto their delusional little Trekkie-masturbatory world in which Fed ships kick the shit out of ISD's without breaking a sweat.

Notice how you ignore the fact that regardless of tech level, it will take time to find landmarks and plot a safe route.

Strawman. I never said it would take no time at all. I said it take a short time, not a long time, while you make the absolutely ridiculous claim that they would all die of old age first. They only need to know where the star systems are, remember? Not difficult, since each star system contains a star which glows brightly and can be seen with ordinary telecopes from across galactic distances. Rogue planets should be so rare that the chance of running into one accidentally is negligible, and in the worst case scenario, a probe droid could be used to test a route anyway.

Of course, it didn't occur to me that your astrophysical knowledge would be so pathetic that you don't realize stars can be mapped easily from space and with advanced technology (or even modern technology), or that any navigational hazards will be located close to the aforementioned stars, so they don't need to map out the location of every rock, asteroid, and planet.

Besides, small obstacles might not be an issue anyway. Need I remind you that they flew through the Alderaan debris field without incident until they dropped to realspace? Something in realspace has to be pretty energetic before it will affect something in hyperspace. It's trickier to jump to hyperspace in a debris field because you'll hit something during your acceleration, but flying through a debris field is easy.

It is far easier to aquire one by means of purchase or theft.

True, but that doesn't mean the other method is not feasible. You said they would all die of old age before they could map their way to Federation star systems, which is one of the dumbest things I've ever heard. It's easy to see stars from very far away, and you need only jump to the general vicinity of the star system to get a closer look, and then make one more short jump to any planet you're interested in.

Hell, they could slice into their systems and nab the maps while sitting safely out of range of weapons fire, import the maps, plot a course and jump before being ID'd by the ship they hacked into.

Thanks for pointing out yet another way they can do it. What's your point? That I'm even more right than you thought?

Look, we're both adults here. I'm willing to debate with you as long as you drop the insults. You don't see me going around here calling anyone that disagrees with me a "fucking moron" so why the attitude?

Because you are being a fucking moron. Your original statement that they would die of old age before figuring out how to map paths is so incredibly stupid that I find it difficult to imagine it coming from an adult. Your transparent attempt to accuse me of ad hominem attacks at the beginning of your "rebuttal" was pathetic, and your gratuitous use of the strawman fallacy was even more pathetic. You have also shamelessly atempted to change the subject (from "they would die of old age because it takes centuries to map stars" to "it would easier to buy a map") rather than admit error, which is hardly indicative of a mature adult either.

If you want to be a mature adult, act like one. And by that, I mean making rational arguments, admitting your mistakes, and researching before you leap in, so that you don't break all rules of netiquette and then whine like a baby when you receive the inevitable response.

[Darth Wong]

By the way, if you want a civilized response, here's a hint: if you march in combatively, saying things like "there's a HUGE flaw" in someone's reasoning, you're being rude. If you can't back that up, you'll take the inevitable heat; that's why it pays to speak cautiously unless you're 100% sure of what you're talking about.

The fact that you refrain from "naughty words" is irrelevant.

[HRogge]

Excuse me Mr. Wong, but there's a HUGE flaw in your little quip. See, telescopes are all fine and good, but it takes TIME to map stars. We've been mapping stars for CENTURIES and we have only mapped a small portion of our galaxy. The only viable method I know of that they could obtain a ready-to-use map is to either board a vessel and steal it or purchase one from a trader. That way the crew wouldn't die of old age before they found out where Earth is.

"We are mapping stars for centuries."

Nice sentence, but perhaps you should activate your brain before you post something like this.

What do you need to calculate the position, mass and type of a star ? You need TWO pictures of the sky and you need the position of the camera while shooting the two pictures. The rest is work for a computer.

So how long would it take an ISD to map the alpha quadrant ? I would say it could be done within less than an hour ! Jump out of the galactic plane ( to get out of the dust ! )... a few thousand lightyears are enough. Then use your passive EM sensors to take a picture of the galaxy below. Jump to a place one lightyear near the last one and take a second picture.

Wait a few seconds until the computer says "operation completed"...

and your star chart is ready.

[tharkûn]

Railguns are bad, compared to plasma based guns. You have to support against the structural stress of firing the round, the recoil, and most of the energy must come from you, not the plasma which contributes large amounts of thermal damage.

Who said anything about not using plasma? With a proper design you can still use plasma with a a railgun in a vacuum. There is no reason why you can't accelerate plasma to high relative velocities ... its just another form of matter. Besides which, I thought to do thermal damage you had to, I dunno make contact with the hull of the ship (or something else that can conduct heat to the ship)?

As for recoil ... um no. You can have your KEM's provide their *own* acceleration in flight so the recoil on the ISD is *zero*. Such systems are already being developed by the military (granted theirs are tank busters running off chemical rockets going mach speeds or so).

I'm not saying that one needs to use a railgun, but the asteriods in TESB are hitting with energies somewhere around 10^15 ... and they are doing damage. You are telling me that there isn't *some* mechanism which can operate at say 1% efficiency and make viable KEM's?

Just because an Acclamator can apply that amount of thrust to itself does not mean that it can apply that amount of thrust to a small projectile, or even anywhere near that much thrust.
Yeah logically it should be able to apply *more* thrust. You see KEM's don't need to worry about fragile crap like computers, droids, and oh say fleshy organic beings who have this nasty habit of making smudges on the walls when subjected to large forces. Besides which the mass:area ratio goes *down* by orders of magnitude so whatever mechanism you use its going to be easier.


Further, railguns must be essentially built into the hull, and would likely have far more limited firing arcs than the weapons an ISD or similar carries, and they might not be as capable of doing other operations like bombarding planets from orbit.
Only if built by feddie egineers.

No they don't you only need long railguns if you are dealing with low numbers, if you increase the voltage and current you get more accelaration in a smaller space.

As far as bombarding planets goes ... umm they'd likely be better. Which is better at killing people ... "small" scale explosions or large reletavistic inbound masses giving off a helluvalot of wake radiation? Further as has been demonstrated, SW sheilds are *better* at absorbing energy weapons that KE impacts.

"Also, for all we know it is much cheaper to generate power and use it for TL batteries than it is for them to get ammunition. "
So somehow the Imps have the ability to move massive SSDs, hell frikking DEATHSTARS with ease put can find an effective way to accelerate say iron to high velocities? Exactly how incompotent do you think they are?

The fact of the matter is historically its *always* been easier to accelerate the shot than to accelerate the ship. Scientifically size matters, if you can easily accelerate km long ships you should have *0* problem accelerating m long KEM's.

And in the book Before the Storm, a modified ISD takes several shots from a powerful, lunar-based railgun and without losing shields.
Numbers please. How much mass, KE, and type of shot are we talking? Given that in the TESB you had ships receiving damage from shots that were allegedly 1/100,000 the energy of their normal tactical shot I doubt the sucker was punching anywhere near the strength of a HTL blast (energy comparison).

The ability to precisely calculate the Star Destroyer's impact velocity with the ground is a question for aerodynamics (since the gravity acceleration part is really easy, the hard part is the drag and friction.) I doubt either you or I have a degree in THAT, and even the experts supposedly don't know all the nooks and crannies.
Nope, however it should be noted that as the object in question gets bigger the effects of aerodynamics become less. The forces caused by resistance are portional to *surface area*, so as one knows an ISD has a VERY high mass:surface area ratio.


"Consider a modern fighter's speed records at sea level. These days, fighters have a combat T/W ratio of close to 1:1 - that is, their engines are pushing them with a similar force that gravity would have. Notice how they generally only do 700-800mph (less than 500m/s"
This has to do with safety concerns and with the engine type. Civillians don't like to hear sonic booms so most fighters don't typically go that fast. Likewise most planes need to stay aloft, very few *ever* go into a prolonged nose dive (say from 100km up or more).

Take my favorite fighter plane the SU-37, its rated max is about 1,500 mph. An F22 can get up over mach without even touching an afterburner. It is not a product of aerodynamics that planes don't exceed 700-800 mph, rather its a different problem.


"Notice how a human being's maximum free fall speed in the air is a lousy 620MPH (277m/s.) That's the kind of sustainable speed you can expect in atmosphere, especially low atmosphere. Sure, a Star Destroyer is denser, but it is a really lousy aerodynamic shape compared to fighters, and air resistance goes up much faster than relative velocity. "
BS. Asteroids are thought to hit with 10-20 km/s velocities. The impact that caused the Barringer Crater is thought to be 11 km/s, exactly how much worse a an aerodynamic profile do you think an ISD is than an asteroid? (yes I'm just pirating numbers from NASA and physics departments found with a quick net search)

You are forgetting that the difference in magnitude. The more KE you are trying to burn, the worse you are at dumping it. Do falling humans, jet fighters, etc. create plasma as because they are dumping so much energy? No. Do asteroids and oh say falling ISD's? Yes. Remember as you heat air its density goes down so it becomes *worse* at transferring more energy away.

"Notice how a Space Shuttle loses half its speed during its atmospheric re-entry maneuver (no, not the long glide, just the red-hot part) and it started out at Mach 24. You are starting at Mach 60 (the equivalent anyway.) The result is predictable"
Irrelevant. The differences in magnitude are hideous. All of your examples mass significanly less, have hideously lower mass : surface area ratios, are dealing with orders of magnitude less energy, etc. Try looking at asteroid impact, I beleive the ISD collision would be much closer to something so disimilar as a fighter plane (designed to keep densities *down*).

[tharkûn]

Fun quote I found, I forgot to include.

"For meteorites larger than a few hundred tons (which fortunately are quite rare), atmospheric friction has little effect on the velocity and they hit the Earth with the enormous speeds characteristic of their entry into our atmosphere. " emphasis added

http://csep10.phys.utk.edu/astr161/lect ... pacts.html

Take what you will from that.