*Updated Star Wars Minium ISD MK II Shielding Calcuations

Post by **Mr Bean** » 2002-10-31 07:21pm

Though I might update this now to give Warsies everyone a new and better figure for Calcuating Minium Shield Strength.

First off the Incident in Question was the Battle between the Direption and Moonshadow Battle in Issards Revenge where each ship fired broad sides the other's shield sections.

Shielding of an ISD is devided into Six areas according to Bacta War. Port, Starboard, Venteral, Dorsal, For and Aft. Each being equal in strength to the others except when shifted(The strength off all shields can be brought down to restore a faluturing one or failed one to 100% power)

Now then Since these are Minium Despite the Speed and Range of ISD Weapons we are assuming only a Single Broad-Side of all Weapons where fired despite the fact that each had time for as many as fourteen such broadsides we are because it is minium assuming only a Single Broad-side was fired

Now then onto the Calcuations

The know power of the Medium Guns is 200 Gigatons they are the same size as those on the Acclimator Transports

The Heavy Guns are nearly three times larger and thier exact Firepower is unknow however given the size disparites between. However to give us some Frame of Reference Light Guns are just over half a Medium's size meaning we could claim anywhere from 4-12 Times more powerful than a Medium based on Size alone, however we will not claim that much and simple round it to a fair Teraton, A single Teraton, easily within reach.

So that gives us
200 Gigaton-Medium TurboLasers
1 Teraton or 1000 Gigaton-Heavy TurboLasers

Now then a broadside from an ISD can bring 32 HTLs, Roughly 40(Up from Previous Estmate as I forgot the Trench Guns) and 36 LTL(No longer Incudled)

200x40=8,000
1000x32=32,000
32,000+8,000+1,000=40,000 Gigatons or 40 Teratons of Damage Per Shielding Section(Of which there are Six)

Chances are HTLs are more powerful than what we stated, Prehaps not. However one thing we HAVE ignored is there was time for a minium of FIVE Broadsides to be exchange but for purposes of Minium figures Calcuations we shall ignore that, Instead Satisfied with our Simple 41 Teratons or 246 Teratons of Total Shielding around the entire ISD

Now for the "Versies" element that makes this a Sticky for the SW VS ST Forums

Assuming Quantum Torps 128 Megatons in strength and 100% Transferance(IE no lost energy) it would take
41,000,000/128=320,312.5 Missles to take down a Single Section of the ISD's Shields or just shy of half a million Quantum Torps.

For all shields 246,000,000/128=1,921,875 or Just shy of two MILLION Quantum Torpedos to take down every scrap of Shielding on an ISD

As before for our Tradtional 100 Defiant Fleet to launch all those torps which they can do at a rate of 4000 per second it will take them...
320,313(Rounding)/4,000=80.5 Seconds to down a Section of Shields/60= Just over a Mintue twenty to Finaly start landing some Torps on the Surface of an ISD even at minium Power Figures

All the while the ISD gets roughly 64 Shots at them with as little as 38 weapons as many as 140 plus Travel Time. Any of which will Crack any Defant with a single shot....

Questions? Comments? Flaws spoted? Death Threats? Post em

Edit:However it seems I have misdone my Light Turbolaser calcuations so they will be striped from this calc as they still remain an unknow, Drops the minium power figure down to 40 Teratons instead of 41. All references to Lights besides Scalling have been removed

Alyeska · Post by **Alyeska** » 2002-10-31 07:24pm

You ought to use the disclaimer Minimum shielding using AOTC ICS. We all know that people can find lower firepower figures if they want to.

Post by **Mr Bean** » 2002-10-31 07:29pm

You ought to use the disclaimer Minimum shielding using AOTC ICS. We all know that people can find lower firepower figures if they want to.

Sure I could make the aurgment that 20 Pounds of Kenetic Energy is all thats needed to Destroy a Galaxy Class but you why I don't?

Because I'm not a dumb fucking idiot

Minium Figures as sticking to Offical/Canon Information Sources and not bullshiting

Alyeska · Post by **Alyeska** » 2002-10-31 07:32pm

Mr Bean wrote:
You ought to use the disclaimer Minimum shielding using AOTC ICS. We all know that people can find lower firepower figures if they want to.
Sure I could make the aurgment that 20 Pounds of Kenetic Energy is all thats needed to Destroy a Galaxy Class but you why I don't?

Because I'm not a dumb fucking idiot

Minium Figures as sticking to Offical/Canon Information Sources and not bullshiting

(sigh)

Piss off Bean, I was just trying to be friendly and post a slight joke.

Post by **Mr Bean** » 2002-10-31 07:33pm

Piss off Bean, I was just trying to be friendly and post a slight joke.

I know it was a joke Alyeska, Remeber I don't get pissed off(Unless its about Politics but thats usaly a Rant and not me Angrey)

For me I saw your post as a excellent way to head off the Bullshit at the Pass

SPOOFE · Post by **SPOOFE** » 2002-10-31 08:18pm

From the TESB, The Light Guns of an ISD are capable of provinding anywhere from 40-70 Gigatons of Damage,

Um... how'd you reach that figure? The turbolaser commentaries simply mention a minimum in the kiloton-range... nothing about a maximum.

Post by **Mr Bean** » 2002-10-31 08:22pm

Um... how'd you reach that figure? The turbolaser commentaries simply mention a minimum in the kiloton-range... nothing about a maximum.

Astriod Vaproization SPOOFE, The shot appears to be fired from one of the Light Guns and it stated as requiring 40.7 Gigatons of firepower to Vaporise the Astroid Completly as it was done

Ingersoll · Post by **Ingersoll** » 2002-10-31 08:37pm

I thought they said "terajoules of coherent light" in that book? 246 teratons is 1,029,264,000,000 terajoules. Or was that the assault frigates?

Grand Admiral Thrawn · Post by **Grand Admiral Thrawn** » 2002-10-31 08:51pm

Bean, maybe it was a light gun that are megaton range?

CmdrWilkens · Post by **CmdrWilkens** » 2002-10-31 08:58pm

Mr Bean wrote:
Um... how'd you reach that figure? The turbolaser commentaries simply mention a minimum in the kiloton-range... nothing about a maximum.
Astriod Vaproization SPOOFE, The shot appears to be fired from one of the Light Guns and it stated as requiring 40.7 Gigatons of firepower to Vaporise the Astroid Completly as it was done

Ummm Bean unless you somehow found a different asteroid than I did you aren't gonna get more than about 2,900 TJ or about 6.9 MT which is damn close to the 6 MT light weaponry on the /Acclamator/. See my page.

Howedar · Post by **Howedar** » 2002-10-31 09:03pm

Minimum estimate would assume that all shield power was routed to the one section, would it not?

Post by **Mr Bean** » 2002-10-31 09:21pm

Minimum estimate would assume that all shield power was routed to the one section, would it not?

Not for this example as Shorty after the(Dorsal if I remeber correctly) Shields are knocked down by the Moonshadow, Its attacked by another ISD, A Vic and a Dreadnaught each pounding on the orgional hit plus another shield section

SPOOFE · Post by **SPOOFE** » 2002-11-01 05:39am

Astriod Vaproization SPOOFE, The shot appears to be fired from one of the Light Guns and it stated as requiring 40.7 Gigatons of firepower to Vaporise the Astroid Completly as it was done

As others have pointed out, it only required a fraction of that firepower to vaporize the asteroids in TESB. Now, since the bolt continued to travel unabated, we can assume that the 6 megatons was only a small amount of the total energy of the blast... but I don't see how you can make the deductive leap from 6 megatons to 40 gigatons, especially when you're supposedly taking things as the MINIMUM.

The other two weapons figures I won't quibble too much with. But assuming that the light guns on a ISD would be in the 40 GT range would skew your conclusions far too much to be useful.

Post by **Mr Bean** » 2002-11-01 07:45am

Hmm, Then I have based part of my Calcs on a False Premise and we don't want that

Very well I will edit and strip the orgional of LTLs agian givining us slightly less 40 Teratons as a new Low-end figure

Marcus · Post by **Marcus** » 2002-11-02 12:51am

Hmm. Considering that the K-T Boundary event is argeuably around 30TT, then a single broadside from an Imperial Star Destroyer is more than powerful enough to destroy all civilzation on an entire planet, and as a side effect wipe out most forms of life thereon (Baring the resilient and lucky).

And this is a 'low end' estimate.

LMSx · Post by **LMSx** » 2002-11-02 03:22am

Marcus wrote:Hmm. Considering that the K-T Boundary event is argeuably around 30TT, then a single broadside from an Imperial Star Destroyer is more than powerful enough to destroy all civilzation on an entire planet, and as a side effect wipe out most forms of life thereon (Baring the resilient and lucky).

And this is a 'low end' estimate.

Well, they *are* supposed to destroy the surface of a world in a BDZ......

Rightous Fist Of Heaven · Post by **Rightous Fist Of Heaven** » 2002-11-02 05:33am

Yes a single ISD can melt the crust of a planet, blow away the athmosphere etc, but it takes more than a single salvo since TL's do not work like nuclear weapons and a single shot AFAIK does not affect as large area as a nuclear device of the same yield would.

Post by **Mr Bean** » 2002-11-02 09:00am

[quote]then a single broadside from an Imperial Star Destroyer is more than powerful enough to destroy all civilzation on an entire planet, and as a side effect wipe out most forms of life thereon (Baring the resilient and lucky). quote]
No acutaly its already been calcuated the effects of a 200 Gigaton Expolsion(Which a TurboLaser is not omni-directonal) that it would destroy somthing say the size of Vermont and even then not completly, A 30 Teraton Expolsion would get you somthing along the lines of a Germany or a France sized Descruction

Your thinking in Terms of Nuclear expolsions which a 200 Gigaton Blast would certunaly pollute half the US in an expolsion but thats not the nature of Turbolasers which are simplely heat and energy not radtiaon

An ISD is expected to burn away the Crust of a Planet and Blast away the Atmosphere which is considerbly more than blow up every Nuke on this planet we have

Simple Scalling IMO Marcus get us 1 Teraton sized Yields from Medium to Heavy Turbolasers which are three and a half times larger than Medium Turbolasers which clock in at 200 Gigatons minium each

Marcus · Post by **Marcus** » 2002-11-02 03:05pm

Actually, my 30TT figure for the K-T boundary comes from calulations of crater size vis-a-vis the impact crater size and assumed yeild for other gross mechanical impacts.

Its logical to assume that TLs, being energy weapons, might not yield the same cloud of dust, etc. that are so important to the K-T boundary event, yield or no yeild.

Makes sense.

Post by **Mr Bean** » 2002-11-02 04:04pm

Its logical to assume that TLs, being energy weapons, might not yield the same cloud of dust, etc. that are so important to the K-T boundary event, yield or no yeild.

However you forget the Dirctional nature of TLs if one fired a 1 Teraton TL at the Earth it will do little damage outside of the 10-15 Meter Area it course through as it would vaporise/melt anything in its way until it ran out of energy

IE like if we had a 1 Teraton Laser it would drill through the Earth but not much else

Marcus · Post by **Marcus** » 2002-11-02 04:10pm

~scratches head~ Ya kinda took a left turn at my reply, there, but I see what your getting at.

CmdrWilkens · Post by **CmdrWilkens** » 2002-11-02 06:54pm

Mr Bean wrote:
Its logical to assume that TLs, being energy weapons, might not yield the same cloud of dust, etc. that are so important to the K-T boundary event, yield or no yeild.
However you forget the Dirctional nature of TLs if one fired a 1 Teraton TL at the Earth it will do little damage outside of the 10-15 Meter Area it course through as it would vaporise/melt anything in its way until it ran out of energy

IE like if we had a 1 Teraton Laser it would drill through the Earth but not much else

Not neccessarily, given the proclivity of TL beams to heat rock very quickly without appearing to move straight through (asteroid destruction) I think its pretty clear that the beam doesn't penetrate all that far and tends to heat up the surroudning area quickly as well. Furthermore in an atmospehre even a pure laser will expend energy into the atmosphere by having to heat up all the air molecules it meets up along the way (thermal blooming). In other words a TL strike would probably be pretty close to an asteroid impact in terms of the mechanics of energy release. THe only big difference is that the asteorid is primarily KE while the TL is primarily thermal (which really is just KE on a smaller scale).

Post by **Mr Bean** » 2002-11-02 08:12pm

Ya kinda took a left turn at my reply, there, but I see what your getting at.

Just a correction making the point that 30TTs is not enough to kill every living thing on the planet unless that where a Nuclear Detonation and that would be due to Radation

320-500 TTs is where you looking for a KE impact to out and out kill most everything

Marcus · Post by **Marcus** » 2002-11-02 10:47pm

Absolutely. My 30TT figure for the K-T impact (if impact it was) includes the assumption that the dieback likely took years, mayhap centuries, to complete, as ecosystems fell apart, bit by bit.

Not 'everything dies within 1 hour of impact' but 'pretty much everything dies within a few years of impact'. Hitting planets that hard does just-plain-awful things... continent-wide firestorms, pyroclastic impacts over entire hemispheres. It only gets worse if your inbound rock hits water...

You know, its a rarely broached but valid point... we discuss BDZ, K-T Events, and the like so casually, with such intellectual detachment...

Go look at your child. Your little sister. Someone you love. Watch them sleep.

And be very, very sad that weapons technology has come as far as it has... much less so far as it may come.

Rightous Fist Of Heaven · Post by **Rightous Fist Of Heaven** » 2002-11-03 11:36am

Yup, i feel so safe when we have maniacs like Saddam Hussein possibly obtaining nuclear weapons. Lukily i live in this backwater country called Finland with no possible strategic or any other interest whatsoever.