Star Trek unit preview thread

[Flamand]

Sure thing, I'll PM him...

 

[Balthasar]

2-3. It takes 2-3days to go to the moon, 9 months to go to Mars, years for the outer planets. Space travel is slow, even with early warp. There is a warp factor map though that speeds up the ships a bit.

What you need is a Warp Chart.

 

[Flamand]

Thanks... I think Thor is already using that one though...

 

[volbound1700]

A couple of rebutts to your points.

1. The federation ONLY formed due to the Earth-Romulan war. So it should be hard to form the federation without a war impetus.
2. The ships become available when you research their techs. My advice is speed up your research.
3. Do you realize before the development and usage of Anti-Matter for creating a warp field with its higher speeds that the maximum speed was warp 2.5 or 15.6C? Now with the maximum speed of warp 2.5 that meant that a journey of 10 ly would take at least 234 days! So speeds SHOULD be slow till you research the proper techs.
4. I agree.
5. They would not be neutrals if they had fully developed fleet lists.
6. As far as I know, the new scen is not for multi-player. But Flamand would be more able to tell you that.
7. Thats flamand's baby, he can answer this one.
8. Why? So you can conquer the map with ease? Seems to me somebody wants a cheat feature.
9. I may not be the boss on this project, but I am doing all the grunt work and Flamand knows I will REVOLT if we add that crap.
10. Umm, no they were not. Ever hear of the Earth-Romulan War? or how about how they kept the klingons at bay even though they had lost said war? The Romulans were definitely not weak.
11. Not needed. just make the minor civs with a beginning amount of planets and no way to expand. We are doing that with the Fallout Mod and it works great.
12. Actually Bajor is close enough to Cardassia to allow a freakin solar sail ship to get there. Thats pretty darned close.
13. In the new map, based on the Star Fleet maps book, the Roms are closer to the Boneheads but have the Feds between them and the Cards.
14. Once again revolting will occur if that trash is used.
15. Actually I think we had plans for making the barbs a Orion Pirate Cartel.
16. Yup resources do need balancing.
17. They are scheduled for a player slot, IIRC.
18. Absolutely freakin not!

Once we finish up the Fallout Mod and Flamand can begin unit making again and gives the word, we are going to begin working on this mod in the Sci Fi Workshop next.

So keep your eyes open for some announcements.

Does ANYBODY ever watch the Original Series? Which IS and always will be Star Trek, not the abortion Berman vomited up. The Major races are as follows: Federation, Klingon, Romulan, Tholian and the Gorn. And if you wish to get technical the Invaders from the Andromeda Galaxy could be classified as 'major'. Added by Gene Roddenberry in TAS are the Kzinti. Added in the Next Generation by Roddenberry was the Ferengi. Period. End of statement. ALL other races were added by that bumbling boob Berman and his blue-bearded buffoon Behr. Now I have nothing against the Borg, Dominion, Cardassians or the Breen, but to say they ARE the races of Star Trek shows just how limited your viewerahip of ST is.

Cheers, Thorgrimm

Thorgrimm for number 10, I meant the Romulans in the Scenario are too weak, not in the series lol. Understandable error though. I was saying you guys should beef them up with better ships other then BOP and BOP 2.
Actually, I don't play Borg or Dominion but they are too weak. Also I never watched "Enterprise." My main series are Deep Space Nine and Voyager although I am familiar with TOS and TNG. So I measure the strength by the time of DS9/Voyager era when the Tholians and Gorn were no longer the powers.

Seems to me in the newer ones you have big 4 in alpha (Federation, Klingon, Romulans, Cardassians). Thanks for response. No to address Flamand's response to my additions.

 

[volbound1700]

I didn't see anything pressing to add to Flamand's comments as he addressed everything I stated. I did make an 8 player multi (since they limit to 8 player) and like I said called the Civ Minor Civs and gave them most the Civs on the game. After that, the other countries in my multiplayer game are Borg, Cardassians, Romulans, Klingons, 8472, Federation (with Vulcans, Tellarites, and Andorians) and the Dominion. I just added colonies with units on such as Benzar, Talaxia, Capella, Balcor, Minosians, etc. Even added some made up ones (Added the homeworlds from Master of Orion 2 like Mentar, Cryslon, Nazin, etc. to count as those races stuck in Star Trek universe lol). Although the Minor Civ has the potentially to fight back somewhat effectively, this civilization as a whole is meant to be bullied around by the other 7 in my scenario (actually right now the Fed is trying to defend them from Klingon and Romulans. The latter two have been ganging up on Federation).

Currently on Scenario I am playing Cardassia has conquered Talos, Fieras, and Bajor (although at times I have Cardassians give Bajor back when they are unable to hold it due to Civil Wars, I have nations fight each other by deleting units). Klingons and Romulans are at war with Federation for second time, Fed won first one but right now is losing with Klingons invading the Gorn, defeating Fed fleet near Rigel and conquering Rigel which joined Fed through Membership. Romulans conquer Bolarious and Benzar put are busy with Xindi and Federation is about to retake Benzar. Dominion has taken totally over Gamma but does not have Tech to go into Alpha yet (still at TOS time). Borg and 8472 are computer controlled but from maps I gather 8472 is crushing Borg. Romulans are trying to save them by giving them couple of planets in Alpha and Tech.

 

[Thorgrimm]

Thorgrimm for number 10, I meant the Romulans in the Scenario are too weak, not in the series lol. Understandable error though. I was saying you guys should beef them up with better ships other then BOP and BOP 2.
Actually, I don't play Borg or Dominion but they are too weak. Also I never watched "Enterprise." My main series are Deep Space Nine and Voyager although I am familiar with TOS and TNG. So I measure the strength by the time of DS9/Voyager era when the Tholians and Gorn were no longer the powers.

Seems to me in the newer ones you have big 4 in alpha (Federation, Klingon, Romulans, Cardassians). Thanks for response. No to address Flamand's response to my additions.

The Roms have an entire fleet list of different ships for eaxh of the four eras. The major players, Feds, Roms, Klingons will have different ships for each of the four eras. The other major powers will have a complete fleet list, but will use the same model for the eras, just with adjusted stats for each era. At least that was the plan a few months ago. Flamand has not said to me whether he still wants to do that still.

Even the Borg and Dominion had a beginning. You really need to watch something else beside VOY/DS9. You are missing the majority of the Trek Universe by limiting yourself to those shows.

I am always willing to talk Trek. So np for the response.

@Balthasar, Flamand is correct. I have that already, but it is a sweet chart.



Cheers, Thorgrimm

 

[Flamand]

No to address Flamand's response to my additions.

Not sure what you are saying...

 

[volbound1700]

Not sure what you are saying...

Typo, I was at work sorry. Meant to say nothing to address in your response.

I don't remember the Tholians too well other then reference to them making peace in DS9. Remember episode where Kirk fought the Gorn I believe. He was alone with one on a planet and he made gunpowder to kill it.

Good Star Trek Question, the Borg always adapt to laser/phaser whatever but could they adapt to missles or bullets since those are projectiles?

 

[sum_aar_jam]

The Borg could not adapt to projectile weapons since their personnal shielding had to adapt to a frequency of a weapon being produced. Since a bullet of a Klingon Bat'leth has no frequency a Borg Drone's shielding could not adapt to it, however the armor of a Borg Drone is very tough.

Picard had a Thompson Sub Machine gun with a Fifty round drum clip when he killed those Drones in the holodeck in the movie "First Contact." Picard had to empty the fifty round clip to kill two drones (in essence twenty five rounds each). Firing at twenty Borg Drones with projectile weapons will take a long time to kill them.

A Borg Cube could adapt to projectiles since their shielding blocks solid as well as energy based weapons. Borg Drones only emit anti-frequencies not full blown star ship shield generators.

 

[Thorgrimm]

The Borg could not adapt to projectile weapons since their personnal shielding had to adapt to a frequency of a weapon being produced. Since a bullet of a Klingon Bat'leth has no frequency a Borg Drone's shielding could not adapt to it, however the armor of a Borg Drone is very tough.

Picard had a Thompson Sub Machine gun with a Fifty round drum clip when he killed those Drones in the holodeck in the movie "First Contact." Picard had to empty the fifty round clip to kill two drones (in essence twenty five rounds each). Firing at twenty Borg Drones with projectile weapons will take a long time to kill them.

A Borg Cube could adapt to projectiles since their shielding blocks solid as well as energy based weapons. Borg Drones only emit anti-frequencies not full blown star ship shield generators.

Umm, no he did not need the entire drum to kill the drones. He emptied it because he wanted to keep firing and keeping shooting them. The broad he was with even commented on how she saw the look of enjoyment he had on his face when he was shooting them. So he was shooting for joy, and so did not need the entire clip.

The .45 ACP round was designed to knock an enemy off his feet. The drones cannot stop projectiles so a .45 or two to the face will kill them just fine. Their non-existant brains exiting out the back of their skulls in those nice big holes the .45 ACP rounds provided.

As for their cube, please, get a mass going fast enough near C and it will blow a Borg cube up just fine. ST hangs on the premise that Projectile Weaponry will become obsolete when energy based weapons tech is discovered. Nothing could be further from the truth.

One thing folks do not realize is for a energy based shield to stop a kinetic weapon it MUST use MORE energy to deflect that projectile than what was used to put it into motion and if that kinetic energy is focused in a small area, the potential energy transferred to that point becomes Ginormus and an amount above that energy must be used to deflect it. Now, say you have a 500KG object going even .10 C, do you honestly think a Borg cube could stop it? And that is tiny compared to what could be thrown at them.

Thats why Gauss Weapons are seen as devastating is due to their incredible damage potential due to the kinetic energy it can impart on a target.

The way to deal with projectile weaponry is to be fleet of foot and nimble to dodge the incoming round. And Borg ships are NOT nimble or fleet of foot. So that is why they would be so susceptible to Kinetic Energy weapons.



Cheers, Thorgrimm

 

[sum_aar_jam]

Torpedoes are Kinetic Energy Weapons. During the second Borg invasion, The Federation Fleet fought a three day battle with the Borg Cube and even the Torpedoes made some hull damage, the Borg were able to regenerate the Hull armor fast enough that it did not make enough damage. Even Borg Drones have nanite armor which makes it very resilent to projectile weapons. In the episode "Drone" in Voyager the twentieth seventh century version of a Drone had reactive body armor which hints at the possibility of the Borg in the Twenty Fourth century having the same (abiet a little less advanced) technology. And if projectile weaponry is so effective against the Borg, why hasn't the Federation used them against the Borg. The Federation is praised for being able to come up with solutions to problems. Another thing is that nanoprobes can hold bonds to one another at the subatomic level, making the strength of the nanite armor of Drones that much more stronger. Now multiply this nanite armor on the hull of a Borg Hull and coupled with the regenerative properties of the hull and you got a pretty effective defense against any projectile weapon no matter what speed it is going or how big it is.

 

[Thorgrimm]

Torpedoes are Kinetic Energy Weapons.

During the second Borg invasion, The Federation Fleet fought a three day battle with the Borg Cube and even the Torpedoes made some hull damage, the Borg were able to regenerate the Hull armor fast enough that it did not make enough damage.

Even Borg Drones have nanite armor which makes it very resilent to projectile weapons. In the episode "Drone" in Voyager the twentieth seventh century version of a Drone had reactive body armor which hints at the possibility of the Borg in the Twenty Fourth century having the same (abiet a little less advanced) technology.

And if projectile weaponry is so effective against the Borg, why hasn't the Federation used them against the Borg. The Federation is praised for being able to come up with solutions to problems.

Another thing is that nanoprobes can hold bonds to one another at the subatomic level, making the strength of the nanite armor of Drones that much more stronger. Now multiply this nanite armor on the hull of a Borg Hull and coupled with the regenerative properties of the hull and you got a pretty effective defense against any projectile weapon no matter what speed it is going or how big it is.

1. Fed torpedoes are NOT kinetic weapons They use a magnetic bottle to contain the anti-matter till it impacts the target. The kinetic energy imparted from a photon is irrelevant. A Photon's damage is energy release from the interraction of anti-matter/matter, Energy which can be directed away by energy shielding since, like a hand grenade, the energy seeks the path of least resistance. So a significant amount of the energy is bled away before it can adversely affect the target.

2. See number one as to why the Borgies were able to regenerate.

3. I think you need to take a physics course my friend. Since it seems you have no idea just how much energy a mass nearing C has. Lets put it this way, accelerating a 1 gram projectile up to a mere 1% of light speed would produce enough force to send a 100kg (220 pound) man flying backward at 3000 meters per second (9800 feet per second or 6000 miles per hour). Now if a one gram mass can contain that much energy at only 1% of C, just how much energy do you think a 500kg mass going at 10% C would have? Then add in if someone is chucking around RKV's, Relativistic Kill Vehicles, they are going to be throwing more than just one at a time.

You have to understand at these relativistic velocities the mass could carry immense amounts of kinetic energy, potentially several times that of its rest mass energy equivalent (i.e. the amount of energy that would be released if its rest mass were totally converted into free energy). A matter/anti-matter explosion only has a little over 50% mass to energy conversion, IIRC. So imagine, if you will, 500 KG's of mass releasing several times its mass in kinetic energy at 100% mass/energy conversion. Then do that for several dozen of these. You do the math. So unless the Borg are the fairies of space and use magic they are STILL bound by the laws of physics.

Furthermore, since the destructive effects of the RKV are carried by its kinetic energy, destroying the vehicle near its target would do little to reduce the damage; the cloud of particles or vapor would still be travelling at nearly the same speed and would have little time to disperse. Indeed, some versions of the RKV concept being studied by the various militaries around the world call for the RKV to explode shortly before impact to shower a wide region of space.


Now, this lil' bit may be just a wee bit complicated, but I love SCIENCE fiction, not science fantasy so I try to study all the theories and formulas.

Newton's formula for kinetic energy, given as one half mv squared, is only an approximation for the kinetic energy of an object, reasonably accurate for speeds well below c, approximately 3 × 108 m s-1. For higher speeds, Einstein's formula for kinetic energy, Ek, must be used.

Ek = γmc2 − mc2

Where:
m is the object's mass in kg,
c is the speed of light in m s-1,
γ is the Lorentz factor

ARGH!!!! Curse forums that cannot support scientific formulas!!!!

So, you want science fantasy? Fine thats all the Borg really are in the stupid show Voyager.

You know, you really should read the post before you comment on it. I answered your question as to why the Feds do not use them. See previous post.

Actually you have that wrong, any substance that is not a solid, bunches o nanites for example, are much weaker structurally speaking. Buffoon Berman would have you believe they are made of unobtanium and uses handwavium to get rid of what nanites would be good for, cellular level repairs and construction. By themselves they add no strength, BUT used in construction they could construct stronger materials one molecule at a time.

Your nanite construction speed is just silly nonsense unless they are the space fairies and use magic and not physics.

Just go ahead and try to refute my science with your magic, we will see who has the last laugh.




Cheers, Thorgrimm

 

[sum_aar_jam]

One last note and I'm done, since when did real life physics ever stopped the producers of Star Trek (whomever they are) from disregarding Newton and coming up with their own ideas. Although much of Star Trek tech is based on real theories, they are very advanced (such as the concept of antimatter and dilithium). My point is that even though in the real world a rail gun from the Stargate ship Daedalus will devestate a Borg Cube apparently kinetic weaponry dosen't work against the Borg or else the Federation would have tried that instead of losing some 500 ships of the line to Borg invasions. The Federation has experimented with kinetic hand rifles, but has stopped because of some reason or another. A person can argue physics all they want, but in the Star Trek universe real world physics can be changed or ignored as is the case in many episodes. Kinetic weaponry is one of these cases.

And as far as nanite regeneration goes, a Borg Cube was able to repair phaser damage from the Enterprise in a short time span (Q Who episode)

 

[Flamand]

My point is that even though in the real world a rail gun from the Stargate ship Daedalus will devestate a Borg Cube apparently kinetic weaponry dosen't work against the Borg or else the Federation would have tried that instead of losing some 500 ships of the line to Borg invasions. The Federation has experimented with kinetic hand rifles, but has stopped because of some reason or another.

I really dislike this kind of discussions, because they serve no purpose whatsoever. But Thor's explanation is correct and take my word for it as a PhD in physics.
Stargate rail guns are not relativistic, meaning the projectiles go fast, but nowhere near the speed of light. Therefore there energy level are by far insufficient to do any damage to anything but Gu'ould ships.
In real life one of the biggest problems to ISS or any satellites in orbit is space debris, tiny "trash" in Earth orbit with high speed (and again nowhere near relativistic) able to totally devastate any equipment sent out there.

 

[Balthasar]

I'm no PhD, but I'd think that the greatest impediment to using kinetic weapons in space would be the kickback. That said, I haven't heard the term "broad" used to refer to a woman in some time. I didn't think anyone used it anymore (except in isolated sections of the Northeast). I'm not offended - I'm not a woman. It's just. . . .anachronistic.

 

[Flamand]

The matter is how to transfer energy to the target. The thing is that many people, including Sci Fi writers, think that just because you send some kind of projectile it must by definition be primitive. It is of course much “cooler” to send some kind of beam to a target.

Using the formulas that Thor gave you find that if you accelerate a regular bullet to various speeds:

MASS_______SPEED__________% of c__________KINETIC ENERGY
=========================================================
0.01 kg______10^3 m/s______bullet speed_________5*10^3 J___(Newton)
0.01 kg______10^7 m/s______3.3_____________2.18*10^11 J___(Newton)
_________________________________________2.18*10^11 J___(Einstein)
0.01 kg______10^8 m/s______33_____________2.18*10^13 J___(Newton)
_________________________________________2.37*10^13 J___(Einstein)
0.01 kg______1.5*10^8 m/s__50_____________5.00*10^13 J___(Newton)
________________________________________ 6.19*10^13 J___(Einstein)
0.01 kg______2.7*10^8 m/s__90_____________1.62*10^14 J___(Newton)
_________________________________________5.18*10^14 J___(Einstein)
0.01 kg______2.97*10^8m/s_99______________1.96*10^14 J___(Newton)
_________________________________________2.44*10^15 J___(Einstein)

This little list shows two things:
1. Newtonian and Einstein mechanics diverge considerably at speeds over 0.1 c (2*10^7 m/s): where Newton increases linearly, Einstein uses the Lorentz factor to increase to a mathematical singularity at c.
2. A regular bullet at half the speed of light has as much kinetic energy as the Hiroshima bomb

If you replace the bullet with a torpedo of say 100 kg, you have to multiply all the energy figures by 10000. All this energy is transferred to the target in case of a non-elastic collision. So Thor has a good point there.

The problem is of course how to accelerate this bullet to these speeds, because these are not the energies released upon impact, but also the amount required to get this bullet to fly at these speeds. At this moment only particle accelerators can do this, and only for tiny elementary particles using a long circular tunnel filled with a series of superconducting magnets after warming up for a while. Granted that new technologies may arise in the future that will allow to wrap the equivalent of CERN into a handheld device, the enormous power requirement for such a device would be a entirely different problem.
As far as the kickback is concerned, you are right Balthasar, if the projectile is propelled through classic means. In that case, even though you can dampen the kickback, it would also be quite challenging to do that for a relativistic projectile . But if you use a gradual acceleration, with lots of small “pushes” by a long series of magnets this is not that much of a problem anymore.

If you use some kind of radiation on the other hand, the energy transfer only depends on the amount of photons you put in your beam, the energy of those photons and the interaction rate of these photons with the targeted matter. You can imagine you need much more light to interact with a glass window than with a black surface (provided you use some kind of laser beam). Currently the strongest laser beam ever was a pulsed beam of 1.25*10^15 W (= J/s), which comes already pretty close to the above figures. And of course you could elaborate that to gamma ray beams with a much higher energy content if you have a way of generating such beams.

Quite honestly I have no idea how to block a beam of radiation with some kind of “shield”. Two beams of radiation do not interfere in free space, only when some kind of hard surface (such as a screen) is involved. So your laser beam and your shield beam will happily pass each other uninterrupted.
The only non-optical thing I know that divert a beam is a gravitational singularity, which means all you need to do is create a bubble in space-time and anything (either matter or radiation) just goes around you. This is exactly the thing they do all the time when they go to warp…

That being said, I think relativistic ammo is far too inefficient to consider for now until a suitable acceleration mechanism is found as well as a power supply that can readily supply the required amounts. For the near future radiation based weapons seem the way to go.

But either way, warp bubble shielding would make either one useless… until you drop out of warp…

 

[Thorgrimm]

@Balthasar, thats because I AM archaic.

@ Flamand, yup it is the 'getting' the mass to relativistic speeds. But think of this, Think more along the lines of something like a RKV 'rocket' instead of something like a linear accelerator if you will. Add say a bus that uses a matter/anti-matter conversion as 'thrust' if you will. Using something like that would impart quite a bit of energy converted into motion. Now say you use that thrust in pulses you can increase the speed many fold since kinetic energy is not lost in the vacuum of space.

I see RKV's more along the line of say Star System defense platforms. Since the enemy fleet would have to drop out of warp to attack they become vulnerable to RKV's.

So say I am defending the Sol System with a RKV based defense system and I detect a incoming fleet. Well, that fleet is going to have a real hard time surviving in real space against said type of defenses. Even if they retreat back into warp you have achieved your objective and drove off an attacking fleet giving you time to reinforce with your mobile fleet elements.

To be quite honest to have a successful defense you do not need to kill the enemy, only keep him from attacking and destroying what it is you are defending.

And I think any fleet commander silly enough to lose trillion credit starships to essentially a rock should be drawn and quartered by his fleet.

Now, that we may have established that RKV's can be a valid defense platform think of this, imagine the devastation a RKV could cause to a planet. Can we say ELE?




Cheers, Thorgrimm

 

[Flamand]

Now, that we may have established that RKV's can be a valid defense platform think of this, imagine the devastation a RKV could cause to a planet. Can we say ELE?

Give me an E!
Give me an L!
Give me an E!

E-L-E...!

Still no match for warp bubble shielding though...

 

[sum_aar_jam]

Can't I just finish my Dominion War mod (which I'm proud to announce is finished except for the civilopedia entries of the Dominion tech tree).

I respectfully bow in humility to the great science minds of the forum and will argue history which my college degree says I'm qualified for and only for.

Beisdes, my brain hurts with all this scientific formulas. No wonder the Star Trek producers could not keep it straight.

 

[volbound1700]

Wow you guys sure know your stuff. I am into Law so I work on totally different topics. BTW I want to thank everyone's attitude, you have been all class listening to my comments that probably blasphemy Star Trek since I am not a real Trekky but I love some parts of Star Trek.

The Borg question was brought up because I was wondering why don't the Federation arm themselve with projectile guns in gun fights with the borg such as in First Contact.

Also was I right about Gorn, they are the episode when Kirk collects materials to make gunpowder to kill one?

Explain to me again who Tholians are.

Also some of my advice was to add flavor to the scenario. Even if it took that long to travel, you want the ships to move faster to make wars on it seem more realistic. At the current movement points, a Dominion War would be impossible to re-create. I am trying out my first "Enterprise" episode tonight. They had a meeting at the beginning to form an Alliance of planets (I think it is the Federation) on Earth.