Species 8472 v.s The Protoss

[Demiurgas]

The Undine open a portal through fluidic space, to the Star Craft Galaxy. Rogue Undine attempt to capture Protoss for study (I couldn't think of an original OP) and as a result, the Protoss are now at war with the Undine.

[Sarevok]

What the heck are Undine ?

[Captain Seafort]

8472, presumably, based on the title. Christ knows where the name comes from.

[Demiurgas]

Star Trek Online.

[Sarevok]

Probably the same people that taught inhuman lifeforms to beautifully and phonetically pronounce words like Yautja, Sangheli and Lek Golo.

[Sarevok]

Star Trek Online.

Meh,

S8472 was one thing Voyager did right. They were an actual alien species. Anthropomorphism them is counterproductive.

Ontopic :

S8472 lives in an inaccessible universe. Unless Protoss locate junctions between fluidic space and the milky way S8472 is unassailable. On the other hand the Protoss are planet bound. To my knowledge the Protess do not posses planetary shielding. There is little they can do against hit and run planetbuster Bioships attacks.

[Imperial528]

While the Protoss do not posses planetary shields, they still had quite a powerful space fleet after the fall of the main fleet and the fall of Aiur, especially with the motherships being put back into service for the war against the Zerg. Provided warning of an incoming planet buster fleet, a Protoss force could intercept it while under cloak, and even remain cloaked during the battle itself. Of course, this is all speculation until we get some calcs for Protoss firepower, which I will attempt to find.

However, one thing I would like to point out is the Protoss's use of warp gates and warp portals (don't know what else to call them) which by game evidence (cinematic, not game play) provide near-instantaneous travel to the other warp gate or whatever made the warp portal. Should a planet fall to a planet buster, I would imagine that at least a quarter of the forces could escape. Another interesting piece of fluff I remember is that Protoss Zealots are teleported to the nearest safe base when mortally wounded (this being the explanation of the flash and lack of remains seen in-game) where the ones capable of being saved are placed into dragoons.

As for planetary combat or boarding action between the two, the Protoss have several advantages. For one, every Protoss soldier, vehicle, and structure possesses some form of shielding against most (if not all) attacks, and widespread use of cloaking technology, such as dark templar and arbiters.

Unfortunately, I don't know much about 8472's capabilities either, so I'm going to brush up on that.

[Imperial528]

Missed the edit window:

PS: Do we know if species 8472 ever employed any sort of body armor for their soldiers? Or if they ever used vehicles? If not, in any army combat they will be destroyed by the Protoss, which posses a varied amount of soldiers and vehicles.

Reading up on them and their telepathy, it would be very interesting to see how a 8472 would react to the strong psionic powers of the Protoss and the Khala. (The Khala is a sort-of collective mind formed by all Protoss except for certain groups who refused to partake, I guess it is sort of like a more local version of the force, or perhaps comparable to a species-wide wi-fi network. The lore in StarCraft hasn't really shown much about it.)

And given the Protoss' knowledge of warp gate technology, if they were able to establish a foothold in fluidic space, they wouldn't need to guard the quantum singularities they entered through in the beginning.

Personally I think the Protoss would treat them like the next Zerg.

[Batman]

Missed the edit window:
PS: Do we know if species 8472 ever employed any sort of body armor for their soldiers? Or if they ever used vehicles? If not, in any army combat they will be destroyed by the Protoss, which posses a varied amount of soldiers and vehicles.

Because soldiers and vehicles means automatic win. How about you prove the Starcraft Protoss army can actually BEAT unarmoured Species 8472 infantry.
And of COURSE they use vehicles. Starships? Hello? If you mean LAND vehicles kindly say so.

[Srelex]

How much do we even know about S8472 anyway? Was what we saw in the show representative of their full military strength?

[Formless]

Of course, this is all speculation until we get some calcs for Protoss firepower, which I will attempt to find.

The protoss are known to be able to preform crust melting orbital bombardments comparable to a Base Delta Zero. So there is that.

[Imperial528]

Yes, I know. But I want exact numbers on that so that I can quantify the firepower available to a Protoss fleet, however due to the lack of cinematics portraying the bombardments I have little to start on. I found one nice video where three carriers, one being Tassadar's flagship, destroyed the surface of Mar Sara in less than five minutes. Alas, it is not a cannon video, the only piece of cannon in it is that the Gantrithor was capable of destroying three Confederate battle cruisers with a beam weapon it possessed.

[Demiurgas]

How much do we even know about S8472 anyway? Was what we saw in the show representative of their full military strength?

http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/Species_8472

[Sarevok]

As seen in the planet destruction scene Bioships just appear near a world and shoot their beams. There is also no fancy power up sequence like most other fictional superweapon which gives the Protoss time to attack. The whole process from arrival to planet exploding takes a few seconds. The bioships are uninterceptable while at FTL due to Protoss not possesing trek style warp drives. Thus the Protoss have to detect, find and engage incoming planet busters very quickly.

If the Protoss can not find a link to fluidic space they will lose each planetbuster attack that slips through costs them an entire planet.

[Imperial528]

Because soldiers and vehicles means automatic win. How about you prove the Starcraft Protoss army can actually BEAT unarmoured Species 8472 infantry.
And of COURSE they use vehicles. Starships? Hello? If you mean LAND vehicles kindly say so.

I am trying to find the numbers for Protoss firepower that can be scaled for ground based forces, and yes I do assume that the Protoss would win during a ground battle or boarding action, since armor would prevent Species 8472 from clawing at them effectively, of course I don't know if 8472 would be able to go through Protoss plasma shields the way they can go through Federation and Borg force fields. Unfortunately, their are very few cinematics to go off of for the Protoss, and the few that are some of which seem useless (since we don't know Zerg bone density and one of the newer cinematics features Zerg being bisected by Zeratul, which can't be used without a few assumptions about the Zerg). And yes I was implying land vehicles, which seem to be scarce in Trek.

[NecronLord]

The best evidence for Protoss Firepower is one of the pictures in the SC2 install screens of them bombarding a planet. It was quite impressive as I recall. Certainly multi-megaton and probably beyond anything a Borg Cube has. But one would have to find it to be sure if my recollection isn't faulty.

[Sarevok]

I am trying to find the numbers for Protoss firepower that can be scaled for ground based forces, and yes I do assume that the Protoss would win during a ground battle or boarding action, since armor would prevent Species 8472 from clawing at them effectively, of course I don't know if 8472 would be able to go through Protoss plasma shields the way they can go through Federation and Borg force fields. Unfortunately, their are very few cinematics to go off of for the Protoss, and the few that are some of which seem useless (since we don't know Zerg bone density and one of the newer cinematics features Zerg being bisected by Zeratul, which can't be used without a few assumptions about the Zerg). And yes I was implying land vehicles, which seem to be scarce in Trek.

S8472 comes from a universe where there are no stars or planets. It is reasonable why they would not design ground vehicles. The idea of solid ground is an alien concept in their plane of existence. S8472 treats planets as floating rocks to be busted open by planet killer. The Protoss ground forces would not come to play in this conflict.

[Imperial528]

What of boarding actions? I don't know if 8472 has ever tried those, but boarding actions seem very common in ST. That and I found a good cinematic with the Protoss Dragoon.

Also, we don't know if 8472 has any sort of large installations, aside from the terraspheres which they simulated the Alpha Quandrant with.

[Imperial528]

Oh and NecronLord, I just looked up the image you mentioned-it's there. (I'm surprised I didn't notice it when I installed SC II) And the ships in it definitely seem to be carriers.

[Sarevok]

What of boarding actions? I don't know if 8472 has ever tried those, but boarding actions seem very common in ST. That and I found a good cinematic with the Protoss Dragoon.

Also, we don't know if 8472 has any sort of large installations, aside from the terraspheres which they simulated the Alpha Quandrant with.

Boarding actions do not win space wars. And S8472 ships are actually living organisms with a single pilot for crew. I don't see how one can physically enter and walk inside one.

[Serafina]

Oh and NecronLord, I just looked up the image you mentioned-it's there. (I'm surprised I didn't notice it when I installed SC II) And the ships in it definitely seem to be carriers.

So what?
It's more reasonable to conclude that those are just ships with simialr (or even identical) hulls to carriers who have been fitted with these weapons instead of production facilities and hangars, than to conclue that carriers have a giant weapon they never use for some reason.

[NecronLord]

Oh and NecronLord, I just looked up the image you mentioned-it's there. (I'm surprised I didn't notice it when I installed SC II) And the ships in it definitely seem to be carriers.

So what?
It's more reasonable to conclude that those are just ships with simialr (or even identical) hulls to carriers who have been fitted with these weapons instead of production facilities and hangars, than to conclue that carriers have a giant weapon they never use for some reason.

In fairness, such a weapon would simply obliterate a starcraft map including your own ground forces.

[Imperial528]

Oh and NecronLord, I just looked up the image you mentioned-it's there. (I'm surprised I didn't notice it when I installed SC II) And the ships in it definitely seem to be carriers.

So what?
It's more reasonable to conclude that those are just ships with simialr (or even identical) hulls to carriers who have been fitted with these weapons instead of production facilities and hangars, than to conclue that carriers have a giant weapon they never use for some reason.

It could simply be that the weapon is too inaccurate to be used otherwise. From cinematics the carriers seem large enough to carry such a weapon unless their interceptor factory is huge.

[Lord Relvenous]

Oh and NecronLord, I just looked up the image you mentioned-it's there. (I'm surprised I didn't notice it when I installed SC II) And the ships in it definitely seem to be carriers.

Do you have a link to the image?

Oh and NecronLord, I just looked up the image you mentioned-it's there. (I'm surprised I didn't notice it when I installed SC II) And the ships in it definitely seem to be carriers.

So what?
It's more reasonable to conclude that those are just ships with simialr (or even identical) hulls to carriers who have been fitted with these weapons instead of production facilities and hangars, than to conclue that carriers have a giant weapon they never use for some reason.

Debatable, IMO. While assuming these are different ships gets rid of the "why don't they ever use that weapon?" problem, it is creating a new class design that has never been alluded to in the universe. There have been some explanations for why the Carriers would not use such weaponry posted, and I think that going that route might be the best option.

[Lupercal]

Didn´t S8472 pull back to the liquid universe after very few casualties in Voyager?