Terran Empire vs Galactic Empire

[Chris OFarrell]

Or just bring a cloaked Section 31 ship in, follow down a ship going through Courscants shields, fire the torpedo then run like hell into slipstream.

[Patrick Degan]

Or just bring a cloaked Section 31 ship in, follow down a ship going through Courscants shields, fire the torpedo then run like hell into slipstream.

CGT sensors can easily detect cloaked vessels.

[Patrick Degan]

Against what? How? Under what conditions? You'd better do better than "it's unexplainable" as an argument.

I remember that Stravo said the Genesis Torp of the TE cannot be stopped by shields...

Appeal to Authority fallacy, and a weak one as well.

If you don't believe this just use a Trilithium torpedo on the sun of Coruscant...

And naturally, there is just no chance of either the torpedo or its carrier ship being shot down...

[Crazedwraith]

Against what? How? Under what conditions? You'd better do better than "it's unexplainable" as an argument.

I remember that Stravo said the Genesis Torp of the TE cannot be stopped by shields...

If you don't believe this just use a Trilithium torpedo on the sun of Coruscant...

I can not remember anyone ever stating the TE had trillithium torps.

[Crazedwraith]

coninued from above ^


Trilithuim torps are not mentioned in HT's Tech quide for the TE. It's possibe S31 know of the tech but we have no evidence for it. They seem to prefer genisis. I mean why blow up the system when you can reformatt all it's planets.

If you don't believe this just use a Trilithium torpedo on the sun of Coruscant...

And naturally, there is just no chance of either the torpedo or its carrier ship being shot down...

Two words: phase Cloak[/quote]

[Patrick Degan]

If you don't believe this just use a Trilithium torpedo on the sun of Coruscant...

And naturally, there is just no chance of either the torpedo or its carrier ship being shot down...

Two words: phase Cloak

Hate to tell you this, but phase-cloaked entities are no more immune to gravity than ordinary objects or people ("The Next Phase", "The Pegasus") and therefore can be detected and tracked by their mass.

[Crazedwraith]

And naturally, there is just no chance of either the torpedo or its carrier ship being shot down...

Two words: phase Cloak

Hate to tell you this, but phase-cloaked entities are no more immune to gravity than ordinary objects or people ("The Next Phase", "The Pegasus") and therefore can be detected and tracked by their mass.

Yes, but would the empire really have a reason to be paying attention to such things? CGTs are bloody rare tech. Its not like every star destroyer worth its salt will have one and be paying rapt attention to its readings.

[Patrick Degan]

Two words: phase Cloak

Hate to tell you this, but phase-cloaked entities are no more immune to gravity than ordinary objects or people ("The Next Phase", "The Pegasus") and therefore can be detected and tracked by their mass.

Yes, but would the empire really have a reason to be paying attention to such things? CGTs are bloody rare tech. Its not like every star destroyer worth its salt will have one and be paying rapt attention to its readings.

CGTs are not "bloody rare tech", and what makes you imagine that the Empire's defence personnel will be anywhere near as lazy/incompetent as the Federation's —especially while an active state of war is in force?

[Crazedwraith]

Hate to tell you this, but phase-cloaked entities are no more immune to gravity than ordinary objects or people ("The Next Phase", "The Pegasus") and therefore can be detected and tracked by their mass.

Yes, but would the empire really have a reason to be paying attention to such things? CGTs are bloody rare tech. Its not like every star destroyer worth its salt will have one and be paying rapt attention to its readings.

CGTs are not "bloody rare tech", and what makes you imagine that the Empire's defence personnel will be anywhere near as lazy/incompetent as the Federation's —especially while an active state of war is in force?

Well maybe the fact that their were no CGTs at all in the entire New Reb and only 2 in thrawn's empire.

And i'm not saying the imps are incompetant just that cloaks not a major thing in their universe. No one really use cloaks for combat at allso why would they look at an anti-cloak screen?

[Chris OFarrell]

Or just bring a cloaked Section 31 ship in, follow down a ship going through Courscants shields, fire the torpedo then run like hell into slipstream.

CGT sensors can easily detect cloaked vessels.

Ah. CGT's, we meet again.

Firstly CGT's are VERY rare even in the Thrawn saga, NRI could only GET handles of three of the things. The Imperial Sourcebook makes mention that even in the Imperial high times between ESB and ROTJ only a small amount if these things existed. SO much to the point that the Imperials developing the cloak saw no purpose to even try at cloaking the ships mass as there was no way anyone would have equipment to detect it. So Courscant is absurdly unlikely to have a CGT just sitting around scanning for any cloaked ships.

Second. CGT's aren’t a magical 'press the button and watch as the cloaked ships appear' system. The operation of them takes quite high degrees of skill and training even in deep space to pick up a sensor stealthed ship. Bel Ilbs was preaty sure and Riken agreed that a CGT system would be rather useless in close to Courscant and that Courscants mass would swamp any readings of the cloaked asteriods they were trying to hunt down, even without the hoards of smaller craft running around the planet.

Third. The volume of traffic around Courscant is so absurd that the odds of a CGT getting a lock on a small starship following a far larger ship into Courscant and being able to differentiate its mass from the other ship...that’s just wishful thinking. If you have a bulk superfreighter heading into Courscant and a Defiant a dozen meters off its hull hugging tight, I somehow dobut a CGT will be able to see it. What’s a twenty thousand tons next to ten million? Courscant must have HUGE superfreighters going in, just for the food shipments alone. Stick close and your fine.

Forth. Given that a TE ship will have a subspace field removing most of its mass from realspace and into a realm the CGT can't see, its even debatable if the CGT would be able to see a cloaked TE ship on its mass. If there is too little there to pass the detection threshold, at the least it may make it horribly difficult. In close to Courscant especially, it may well be too little for a CGT to pick out.

Fifth. I'll also mention that the ability of a CGT to see through a cloak is rather hypothetical. Its never been actually observed. It was even said by most sides in the Thrawn saga that the rebels plans and plots to get hold of a CGT smacked of a degree of desperation. The asteroids in orbit were cleared out long before the NR got their CGT. We really don’t' know how effective these things are.

[Patrick Degan]

Well maybe the fact that their were no CGTs at all in the entire New Reb and only 2 in thrawn's empire.

The Imperials have cloaking technology yet would never bother to mass-produce and install sensors capable of detecting cloaked vessels, eh? The Empire Strikes Back suggests otherwise.

And i'm not saying the imps are incompetant just that cloaks not a major thing in their universe. No one really use cloaks for combat at also why would they look at an anti-cloak screen?

"No ship that small has a cloaking device."

—Capt. Needa, The Empire Strikes Back

As for "why would they look at an anti-cloak screen?" that statement is not only illogical it is not even worthy of refutation.

I sense some serious goalpost-moving at work in this thread.

[Crazedwraith]

Well maybe the fact that their were no CGTs at all in the entire New Reb and only 2 in thrawn's empire.

The Imperials have cloaking technology yet would never bother to mass-produce and install sensors capable of detecting cloaked vessels, eh? The Empire Strikes Back suggests otherwise.
.

And yet you haven't refuded the fact that there were only two such devices in the entire New Reb and Thrawn's Empire. Only TWO in avaible in the better part of a galaxy.

[Chris OFarrell]

Well maybe the fact that their were no CGTs at all in the entire New Reb and only 2 in thrawn's empire.

The Imperials have cloaking technology yet would never bother to mass-produce and install sensors capable of detecting cloaked vessels, eh? The Empire Strikes Back suggests otherwise.
.

And yet you haven't refuded the fact that there were only two such devices in the entire New Reb and Thrawn's Empire. Only TWO in avaible in the better part of a galaxy.

Three.

And if its a first strike, its rather unlikly that the Empire would be looking for cloaked ships.

Though if this is a strike after the war has been going on...given the TE's use of cloaks as standard equipment in battle, the Empire may well have said to hell with the cost and started to mass produce them (if possible) so you could dispute numbers.



back on topic. I think the campaign could potentionaly go either way, depending on where the Wormhole is, who finds it first and what actions each side decides to take. If the TE finds it first, Section 31 could probably prod the Empire in the right places to cause it to collpase in short order. If they take out the Emperor and Vader and Thrawn if possible, without a clear leader, they simply have to sit back and help push the empire into all out civil war, like it happened in the normal timeline. Fortify the other side of the Wormhole with an absurd amount of phaser lances, minefields, the most powerful energy weapons, those Hiridun ones e.t.c.

On the other side, deploy a massive minefield of cloaked mines and cloaked jammers on the probable hyperspace routes into the system the wormhole is in so any ship that happens in gets wasted and can't tell anyone.

In an all out war, the TE has bags of tricks they are not afraid to use and a few Genesis devices could conveivably total large chunks of the Imperial Starfleet. But in the endgame, the Empire SHOULD win an all out war if nothing interupts them, but at a horrific cost.

[Patrick Degan]

Firstly CGT's are VERY rare even in the Thrawn saga, NRI could only GET handles of three of the things. The Imperial Sourcebook makes mention that even in the Imperial high times between ESB and ROTJ only a small amount if these things existed. SO much to the point that the Imperials developing the cloak saw no purpose to even try at cloaking the ships mass as there was no way anyone would have equipment to detect it. So Courscant is absurdly unlikely to have a CGT just sitting around scanning for any cloaked ships.

Ah, I get it —your Terran Empire is allowed to have Genesis torpedoes, which in the Trek continuity are a lost technology, but the Empire doesn't get CGT sensors as standard warship equipment. How convenient.

Second. CGT's aren’t a magical 'press the button and watch as the cloaked ships appear' system. The operation of them takes quite high degrees of skill and training even in deep space to pick up a sensor stealthed ship. Bel Ilbs was preaty sure and Riken agreed that a CGT system would be rather useless in close to Courscant and that Courscants mass would swamp any readings of the cloaked asteriods they were trying to hunt down, even without the hoards of smaller craft running around the planet.

So who says the CGTs would be deployed so close to Coruscant that the planetary mass would swamp the system? And I suppose the carrier for a Genesis torpedo won't have to cross spaces controlled by the Empire in their own galaxy to deliver the weapon?

Third. The volume of traffic around Courscant is so absurd that the odds of a CGT getting a lock on a small starship following a far larger ship into Courscant and being able to differentiate its mass from the other ship...that’s just wishful thinking. If you have a bulk superfreighter heading into Courscant and a Defiant a dozen meters off its hull hugging tight, I somehow dobut a CGT will be able to see it. What’s a twenty thousand tons next to ten million? Courscant must have HUGE superfreighters going in, just for the food shipments alone. Stick close and your fine.

See, there's this thing called "traffic control". There's also sensor deployment at various distances from the system, and a state of defensive alert in force due to a condition of war being active. And as for your doubts about a CGT sensor not being able to spot your close tucked-in Defiant, it would not be a tremendous stretch for an Imperial to figure out that a ship having a larger mass-distortion signature than it's supposed to have signals "something wrong".

Forth. Given that a TE ship will have a subspace field removing most of its mass from realspace and into a realm the CGT can't see, its even debatable if the CGT would be able to see a cloaked TE ship on its mass. If there is too little there to pass the detection threshold, at the least it may make it horribly difficult. In close to Courscant especially, it may well be too little for a CGT to pick out.

Objects in subspace still interact with realspace, and in "Balance Of Terror", it was no challenge to track a cloaked ship with passive sensing. Contrary to what many people believe, subspace doesn't erase mass.

Fifth. I'll also mention that the ability of a CGT to see through a cloak is rather hypothetical. Its never been actually observed. It was even said by most sides in the Thrawn saga that the rebels plans and plots to get hold of a CGT smacked of a degree of desperation. The asteroids in orbit were cleared out long before the NR got their CGT. We really don’t' know how effective these things are.

CGT sensors are based on the principle of mass detection and gravitic distortion —neither of which is particularly mysterious or a massive technical challenge. Unless you can point out how gravity can't be detected, you're going to have to come up with a better argument than that one.

[Patrick Degan]

Well maybe the fact that their were no CGTs at all in the entire New Reb and only 2 in thrawn's empire.

The Imperials have cloaking technology yet would never bother to mass-produce and install sensors capable of detecting cloaked vessels, eh? The Empire Strikes Back suggests otherwise.
.

And yet you haven't refuded the fact that there were only two such devices in the entire New Reb and Thrawn's Empire. Only TWO in avaible in the better part of a galaxy.

And according to the normal Trek continuity, there are no Genesis devices. What's your point?

[Patrick Degan]

And if its a first strike, its rather unlikly that the Empire would be looking for cloaked ships.

Though if this is a strike after the war has been going on...given the TE's use of cloaks as standard equipment in battle, the Empire may well have said to hell with the cost and started to mass produce them (if possible) so you could dispute numbers.

Why? The rules of war in regards to the preparation of defences against enemy retaliation are suddenly forgotten in first-strike scenarios?

I think the campaign could potentionaly go either way, depending on where the Wormhole is, who finds it first and what actions each side decides to take. If the TE finds it first, Section 31 could probably prod the Empire in the right places to cause it to collpase in short order. If they take out the Emperor and Vader and Thrawn if possible, without a clear leader, they simply have to sit back and help push the empire into all out civil war, like it happened in the normal timeline. Fortify the other side of the Wormhole with an absurd amount of phaser lances, minefields, the most powerful energy weapons, those Hiridun ones e.t.c.

Earth will be a ragged band of asteroids and most of the TE's worlds will already have been flattened. The TE simply hasn't the speed or firepower to stop the sort of blitzkrieg they'd be up against.

On the other side, deploy a massive minefield of cloaked mines and cloaked jammers on the probable hyperspace routes into the system the wormhole is in so any ship that happens in gets wasted and can't tell anyone.

The Terran Empire hasn't the sort of equipment that can pull ships out of hyperspace, and their mines won't have the firepower to breach stardestroyer shielding. And if it's the Galactic Empire striking first, they won't get the chance to deploy anything.

In an all out war, the TE has bags of tricks they are not afraid to use and a few Genesis devices could conveivably total large chunks of the Imperial Starfleet. But in the endgame, the Empire SHOULD win an all out war if nothing interupts them, but at a horrific cost.

In an all out war, sheer raw firepower in obscene amounts beats bags of tricks any day. Think the Polish horse cavalry v. Nazi tanks —that's the sort of mismatch the Terran Empire is up against. And I find it comical that you have the Genesis device doing something it definitely wasn't designed or built to do as observed in The Wrath Of Khan.

[Crazedwraith]

The Imperials have cloaking technology yet would never bother to mass-produce and install sensors capable of detecting cloaked vessels, eh? The Empire Strikes Back suggests otherwise.
.

And yet you haven't refuded the fact that there were only two such devices in the entire New Reb and Thrawn's Empire. Only TWO in avaible in the better part of a galaxy.

And according to the normal Trek continuity, there are no Genesis devices. What's your point?

The point is we're not using official trek continuity we're using HT's Gigaton firepower weilding Mirror Universe uber-trek. And it that universe genisis was never lost.

And if its a first strike, its rather unlikly that the Empire would be looking for cloaked ships.

Though if this is a strike after the war has been going on...given the TE's use of cloaks as standard equipment in battle, the Empire may well have said to hell with the cost and started to mass produce them (if possible) so you could dispute numbers.

Why? The rules of war in regards to the preparation of defences against enemy retaliation are suddenly forgotten in first-strike scenarios?

He means if the terrans are making a pre-emtive strike than the empire won't know the terrans use clopaks yet hence they won't be looking for them.

Earth will be a ragged band of asteroids and most of the TE's worlds will already have been flattened. The TE simply hasn't the speed or firepower to stop the sort of blitzkrieg they'd be up against.

I think your fogetting TE Earth hhas huge minefields doozens of automated weapons stations, defensive battle stations platary sheilds and a defense field. They'll be able to hold of the empire in time of reinforcements to come in.

[Ghost Rider]

He means if the terrans are making a pre-emtive strike than the empire won't know the terrans use clopaks yet hence they won't be looking for them.

And why not?

Under the rules of a versus debate...both side know of the other's existence and know they are in a state of war...so the GE is going to sit on their ass and wonder about this opposing sides plans?

I think your fogetting TE Earth hhas huge minefields doozens of automated weapons stations, defensive battle stations platary sheilds and a defense field. They'll be able to hold of the empire in time of reinforcements to come in.

And any numbers to justify this assumption?

[Sarevok]

I think your fogetting TE Earth hhas huge minefields doozens of automated weapons stations, defensive battle stations platary sheilds and a defense field. They'll be able to hold of the empire in time of reinforcements to come in.

That may stop a lone star destroyer but a fleet of them would smash it quickly.

[Crazedwraith]

He means if the terrans are making a pre-emtive strike than the empire won't know the terrans use clopaks yet hence they won't be looking for them.

And why not?

Under the rules of a versus debate...both side know of the other's existence and know they are in a state of war...so the GE is going to sit on their ass and wonder about this opposing sides plans?

Under those rules, fine. I still don't beleive the empire has CGTs stationed at major planets or that they'd be as effective as people beleive.

[D.Turtle]

Weather it would make it there or not was still in question, for the space around Terra, more so than anywhere else in the galaxy, was tightly controlled. Powerful Imperial warships patrolled the travel corridors, and the most powerful fleet in the Empire defended the system. Massive spacedocks, battle stations and orbital weapons platforms were seeded thick enough that you could seemingly step from one to the next from the edge of the system nearly to Sol itself. And where the stations were thinner, vast shoals of self-replicating subspace mines swam silently in the dark void, ever watchful for enemies that stumbled into their midst. At regular intervals throughout the system, warp inhibitors were seeded nearly as thickly as the mines. They ensured that no one could sneak into Sol unannounced. The warp inhibitors also mounted sensitive detection equipment and tachyon detection grid installations, enabling them to scan for cloaked vessels trying to sneak into the heart of the Empire. The sheer scale of Sol’s defenses was amazing, as was the cost to both build and then maintain them. But the Terran Empire spared no expense to defend its homeworld from outside attack.

Thats from Reap The Whirlwind Chapter 23.

You also have to remember that this is the Terran Empire - they do have GT and TT level weaponry.

It wont be a cake walk for the GE, but they would still win (larger industrial base, population, planets, stronger ships, more ships etc)

The only way the TE might hold the GE off is if they detect the wormhole first and have enough time to massively fortify it. It would also depend on how many ships fit through the wormhole at a time. Only if the TE has such a bottleneck could they hold off the GE (so it would be a stalemate).

If the GE can secure a foothold in the TE galaxy, then they have already won.

This is of course only my opinion.

[Sarevok]

The only way the TE might hold the GE off is if they detect the wormhole first and have enough time to massively fortify it. It would also depend on how many ships fit through the wormhole at a time. Only if the TE has such a bottleneck could they hold off the GE (so it would be a stalemate).

Even if they manage to fortify the wormhole with their best defenses the TE still loses due to technological inferiority. A single star destroyer can easily take on multiple TE warships and win. Larger warships like the Executor class command ships could defeat an entire fleet. Combined with the Empires superior numbers this would mean they can destroy whatever fortifications the TE can build.

[Illuminatus Primus]

*snip*

Ralroost's gravitic sensors were expected to detect Coralskippers throughout a system in Stackpole's NJO duology. Concession Accepted.

[Patrick Degan]

And according to the normal Trek continuity, there are no Genesis devices. What's your point?

The point is we're not using official trek continuity we're using HT's Gigaton firepower weilding Mirror Universe uber-trek. And it that universe genisis was never lost.

In that case, you really have no argument for arbitrarily limiting the Empire in military force, state of readiness, or available technology.

He means if the terrans are making a pre-emtive strike than the empire won't know the terrans use cloaks yet hence they won't be looking for them.

This point, regarding each side's knowledge of the other's capabilities, has already been made. This argument fails as well.

Earth will be a ragged band of asteroids and most of the TE's worlds will already have been flattened. The TE simply hasn't the speed or firepower to stop the sort of blitzkrieg they'd be up against.

I think your fogetting TE Earth has huge minefields doozens of automated weapons stations, defensive battle stations platary sheilds and a defense field. They'll be able to hold of the empire in time of reinforcements to come in.

A planetary shield did not save Alderaan from destruction, and the Death Star does not have to make a close approach to its target. Any defence fleet, minefield, or network of battlestations in Earth orbit —or even out past Earth's Moon— will be obliterated along with the planet.

[Crazedwraith]

A planetary shield did not save Alderaan from destruction, and the Death Star does not have to make a close approach to its target. Any defence fleet, minefield, or network of battlestations in Earth orbit —or even out past Earth's Moon— will be obliterated along with the planet.

The empire doesn't have any death stars they were blow up.