nSG Colonies VS UNSC

[Asthma Phantom]

Hi everyone, I'm a newbie here and this is my first topic.

So,this battle is between the twelve colonies of the new Battlestar Galactica before the Cylon attack, versus the UNSC from Halo before the Covenant.

Now I know that Colonies have absolutely no chance against the UNSC, so please note that this is UNSC from before the covenant attack. That means no SuperMAC platforms, no Spartans with shields, no orbital defenses around each planet.

On the other hand, the colonies are at its peak, with a 120 battlestar strong fleet, thousands of vipers and all its infrastructure.

Who wins?

How would introducing the Cylons on the colonial side affect the outcome?

[Samuel]

Now I know that Colonies have absolutely no chance against the UNSC, so please note that this is UNSC from before the covenant attack.

Why? Battle stars can take direct nuclear blasts- has the USNC demonstrated that level of ship strength?

Does the USNC have to deal with the Secessionists?

[Asthma Phantom]

Why? Battle stars can take direct nuclear blasts- has the USNC demonstrated that level of ship strength?

UNSC defense platforms can dish out projectiles that deal high gigaton/low teraton damage. I don;t think the colonies would have an answer to those.

Does the USNC have to deal with the Secessionists?

I do remember the Spartans mobilized to battle some rebels before the covenant war. I can't give any more details than that.

[Dave]

Battle stars can take direct nuclear blasts- has the USNC demonstrated that level of ship strength?

An analysis of the UNSC Frigate In Amber Clad indicates that the primary armament of the frigate (A "magnetic accelerator cannon") is capable of firing 600 ton shells at 30 km/s.

600 short tons = 544 310.844 kilograms
30 km/s = 30000 m/s

Using KE =0.5mv^2 we find that the kinetic energy of the shell fired at maximum velocity is 2.45*10^14 J, or 245 terajoules.

EDIT: grammar

[Ghost Rider]

I'll keep this because Dave has presented something to base it upon. So if someone would be as so kind to try for the colonies, fine.

Also to the newbie, present something. Don't go "XXXX vs YYYY!" and have us do the work.

[hongi]

On the other hand, the colonies are at its peak, with a 120 battlestar strong fleet, thousands of vipers and all its infrastructure.

How unified is the Colonial government? Is it like a federation of planets or equivalent to the US? One possible advantage I can think of is that the UNSC had a united, strong government (apart from the secessionists, but I understand they were crushed by the Spartans shortly before the Covenant appeared).

[Dave]

Well, I've got nothing else to do, so I might as well flesh this out. The OP, of course, is no help: the parameters of the war/battle are not even defined.

On the one hand, the OP uses the term "battle" to describe the conflict.
Merriam-Webster's third definition for battle[1] is "a general encounter between armies, ships of war, or aircraft", viz. a tactical engagement.

However, the phrasing of the language around the Twelve Colonies and the UNSC in the OP implies to me that this is, in fact a long term engagement between two large organizations, thus, a war.

In this post I will assume that the OP refers to a war, rather than a battle.

The initial military assets of the Twelve Colonies are stated by the OP: 120 battlestars, "thousands of Vipers" and "all of its infrastructure." Unfortunately, we have little understanding of the support infrastructure or proper escort fleet that goes with a battlestar, so I will presume the statement implies the battlestars are at maximum readiness (an assumption I was going to make for both sides anyway.)

Note on armament: Galactica-class battlestars have at least twelve missile tubes[2], each of which contains one warhead with, at most, a 150 kiloton yield[3], or roughly a 630 terajoule yield per warhead[4]

The maximum possible initial economic assets of the Twelve Colonies would be twelve approximately Earth-like worlds and other space-based resources (asteroid belts and their mining operations, space stations and shipyards, etc). This is overly generous, but as we will soon see, it makes little difference.

The initial military assets of the UNSC Navy is not stated by the OP, and I am unable to find any numbers that even estimate the size of the fleet. A list of identified ships[5] indicates the UNSC has at minimum:
6 Carriers (note: the armaments of this ship class are poorly defined)
6 Cruisers (note: the armaments of this ship class are poorly defined)
15 Destroyers
20 Frigates
(note, these ships existed at some point during the Human-Covenant war, and that these ships existed prior to this war is conjecture.)

The initial economic assets of the UNSC are, roughly, "more then 800 worlds [...] at various stages of development." [6]


I would hypothesize, that in a long war, the UNSC completely outproduces the Twelve Colonies and squashes them. In the short term, things get much less easy to predict.

[1]http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/battle
[2]http://en.battlestarwiki.org/wiki/Missile_tube
[3]http://en.battlestarwiki.org/wiki/Galac ... r_Warheads
[4]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ton#Ton_of_TNT
[5]http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/UNSC_Navy#Id ... d_Stations
[6]http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/United_Natio ... lonization

[Vehrec]

Battle stars can take direct nuclear blasts- has the USNC demonstrated that level of ship strength?

An analysis of the UNSC Frigate In Amber Clad indicates that the primary armament of the frigate (A "magnetic accelerator cannon") is capable of firing 600 ton shells at 30 km/s.

600 short tons = 544 310.844 kilograms
30 km/s = 30000 m/s

Using KE =0.5mv^2 we find that the kinetic energy of the shell fired at maximum velocity is 2.45*10^14 J, or 245 terajoules.

EDIT: grammar

Allow me to play devil's advocate. This is video of the UNSC fleet firing on a Forerunner Keyship, estimated to be 14 km tall. The fireballs from said firing, created presumably by the MAC guns of the ships fiting on it, is a bit too large for a double digit kiloton blast. http://halocinema.bungie.org/halo3/40_storm_closing.mov If we assume that a single MAC shell produces a fireball 1 km wide in this video, then we are left with a yield between 2.45 and 8.2 megatons, or roughly 1.03E16 to 3.43E16 joules. I would have to call this estimate conservative, because a solid projectile is not an ideal means to create a fireball of this kind. However, it does seem a clear indication that the MAC weapons are at least two orders of magnitude more powerful than your estimates allow.

[Asthma Phantom]

Okay, I realize I have not fleshed out my OP enough, My mistake.

How unified is the Colonial government? Is it like a federation of planets or equivalent to the US? One possible advantage I can think of is that the UNSC had a united, strong government (apart from the secessionists, but I understand they were crushed by the Spartans shortly before the Covenant appeared).

To my knowledge, they possessed a structure like the US.

However, the phrasing of the language around the Twelve Colonies and the UNSC in the OP implies to me that this is, in fact a long term engagement between two large organizations, thus, a war.

Yes, I did mean an all out war.

The initial military assets of the Twelve Colonies are stated by the OP: 120 battlestars, "thousands of Vipers" and "all of its infrastructure." Unfortunately, we have little understanding of the support infrastructure or proper escort fleet that goes with a battlestar, so I will presume the statement implies the battlestars are at maximum readiness (an assumption I was going to make for both sides anyway.)

By infrastructure I meant all of their shipyards and stations, which I believe they had at least , Scorpion shipyards and Ragnar.

[Asthma Phantom]

snip
Allow me to play devil's advocate. This is video of the UNSC fleet firing on a Forerunner Keyship, estimated to be 14 km tall. The fireballs from said firing, created presumably by the MAC guns of the ships fiting on it, is a bit too large for a double digit kiloton blast. http://halocinema.bungie.org/halo3/40_storm_closing.mov If we assume that a single MAC shell produces a fireball 1 km wide in this video, then we are left with a yield between 2.45 and 8.2 megatons, or roughly 1.03E16 to 3.43E16 joules. I would have to call this estimate conservative, because a solid projectile is not an ideal means to create a fireball of this kind. However, it does seem a clear indication that the MAC weapons are at least two orders of magnitude more powerful than your estimates allow.

These were preusmably SuperMAC guns from their orbital platforms, which they did not have prior to the war.

[Dave]

These were preusmably SuperMAC guns from their orbital platforms, which they did not have prior to the war.

In the video it seems fairly clear that the shots are coming from the frigates that are flying in, not from orbit. Do we have any reason to believe otherwise?

[Lord Relvenous]

How do you get SuperMACs from that sequence? I highly doubt that the Covenant would let the platforms in orbit stay operational, as by this time they are in full blown occupation mode. There are no indicators that point to a SuperMAC hit. However, the initial fireballs we see along the Keyship seem to be from the Longswords, not the destroyers. Which explosions did you use for your estimate Vehrec? The ones before the commander says "All ships, fire at will" or the ones we get a glimpse of after that?

[Asthma Phantom]

Hmm, I remember a transcript saying that Admiral Hood ordered Smacs to fire on the dreadnought and it took hem without any problem, so I didn't actually bother to see the video. Oops.

[Dave]

Ok, so that still leaves us with:
1) Not knowing the strength of the pre-Covenant UNSC Navy
2) No estimate of the KE of a battlestar's main weapons

I'm not sure we have enough information.

[Asthma Phantom]

I have been unable to find any calculations on a battlestar on this site. Has anyone done something like that?

[Ghost Rider]

Just locking.

1. Provide some of your material if the universes are ill defined. Star Wars and Trek have an amazing amount of material, as well as a few others...because of author details. But this means Halo, BSG, and a huge variety do not. We have a sticky on this. Yes, I know the research is difficult, long and usually haphazard, but if there's nothing to debate because we don't know where to start, it's spam.

2. Provide scenarios that can be handled. Going "ALL OUT WAR!!!" with no parameters becomes the same problem as Trektards that went "Q/Borg/Talosians will stomp in!!!!". If we get to this particular area of the debate it becomes increasingly harder to debate because people can introduce random variables and derail the entire scenario.