How many Pegasus-Style Battlestars can take out...

[Ado Mortumee 500]

It doesn't say anything about the shields being down. ISDs have deflector shields for dealing with asteroids and micrometeorites.

 

If shields were up the book would have said the asteroids impacted the shields instead of referring directly to the hull of the Star Destroyer which makes no sense if shields are up during the impacts.

[Tyralak 12,068]

According to the Essential Guide, Particle Shields (read: Deflector Shields) are always on, as they provide protections from asteroids, debris and other kinetic impacts.

[Ado Mortumee 500]

Contradicted by the movie when the captain of the ISD the MF hid on ordered shields raised - after all, if particle shields are on all the time why order shields raised when the Falcon comes about? - and ANH novel:

 

 

 

Page 102 A New Hope

 

 

 

“What the--?†a thoroughly startled Solo muttered. Next to

 

him, Chewbacca offered no comment of his own as he flipped

 

off several controls and activated others. Only the fact that the

 

cautious Solo always emerged from the supralight travel with his

 

deflectors up--just in case any of many unfriendly folks might

 

be waiting for him--had saved the freighter from instant destruc-

 

tion.

 

 

 

And finally having found my copy of the New essential Guide: “Particle shields are usually kept powered at all times to protect against micrometers and other small particles. Combat-grade radiant shielding consumes a great deal of energy and is only activated when combat is imminent.â€

 

 

 

So from this we know that they are usually kept powered at all times and that they only use combat grade shields when battle is imminent (or are getting hit with enough asteroids unless Vader gets pissed at them about wasting fuel).

[Gonzo 0]

First of all, I mock your signature's delusions of adequacy and wittiness.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

SHRIEK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

So from this we know that they are usually kept powered at all times and that they only use combat grade shields when battle is imminent (or are getting hit with enough asteroids unless Vader gets pissed at them about wasting fuel).

 

 

 

The above on the other hand is a very good point. Only an idiot such as Jason would leave an obviously energy intensive system online all the time. Most likely, there are combat particle shields that cover a spherical area, as well as standard particle shields that don't cover areas such as docking bays and airlocks. Who knows? Maybe there is even a reason why the command tower isn't covered by navigational shields - perhaps they introduce a sensor distortion or some other result that would be undesirable in combat? This would also provide a reason for the command tower to have separate shields, come to think of it.

[Tyralak 12,068]

Prophet, that was exactly my point. They have the equivalent of navigational deflectors which are always on and There are separate shields for battle, just like Trek ships. And as for you, bird, the command tower probably was shielded but the asteroid was enough to overpower the deflectors.

[Gonzo 0]

And as for you, bird, the command tower probably was shielded but the asteroid was enough to overpower the deflectors.

 

 

 

Be careful, or I'll have you stuffed and use you as a perch!

 

 

 

That is a perfectly valid explanation, mine works, too though.

 

 

 

Also, attrition has not been accounted for. Depending on how shields work - and both ST and SW shields seem to function as energy absorption capacitors (whatever the mechanism), we have no idea what the total energy that had hit the shields in that scene was. Given the observed ridiculous density of the asteroid field, it is logical to assume that other collisions had occured. If the damage was occuring even slightly faster than the deflector's ability to dissapate it even shields that could shrug off a superlaser blast would eventually collapse.

 

 

 

And before you bring up dodging, doing a detailed survey of an asteroid belt that large and dense would almost certainly require highly precise formations to search efficiently.

 

 

 

It's not as if Vader seemed like he cared all that much about the cost of finding the Falcon (or more accurately, Luke.)

[Praeothmin 532]

Please keep in mind that the ISDs were firing at incoming asteroids, even the small ones the size of the Falcon.

 

Had these asteroids truly been harmless, why fire on them?

 

Why not simply fire on the bigger ones?

 

And again, hulls and shields that can supposedly resist GT-level damage should not, in any way, be afraid of low KT impactors...

[Questor 501]

Please keep in mind that the ISDs were firing at incoming asteroids, even the small ones the size of the Falcon.

 

Had these asteroids truly been harmless, why fire on them?

 

 

 

Without taking a position either way, because I am away from high res copies of tesb at the moment, how are you doing the scaling?

 

 

 

 

Why not simply fire on the bigger ones?

 

 

 

 

When an opportunity to exercise with real targets presents itself, why not have your gunners run some drills?

 

 

 

 

And again, hulls and shields that can supposedly resist GT-level damage should not, in any way, be afraid of low KT impactors...

 

 

 

 

because shields are progressive, because the combat shields might not have been up, because the captain doesn

 

T like debris on his ship?

[Praeothmin 532]

Without taking a position either way, because I am away from high res copies of tesb at the moment, how are you doing the scaling?

 

 

 

The good old Eyeball Mk1...

 

I estimated them roughly wayching TESB on my HD DVDs and my HD 42" screen, and comparing them with the MF's ralative position to the ISD in the pursuit scene...

 

Also, guys at SFJ scaled them at between 8 to 30 meters.

 

Even if they were a bit bigger, they were not the "Bridge-smasher" size, and were not faster, and so could not have been more dangerous to the ISD if the GTs Firepower figures were right...

 

 

 

When an opportunity to exercise with real targets presents itself, why not have your gunners run some drills?

 

 

 

 

It is true that they need it...

 

 

 

because shields are progressive,

 

 

 

What do you mean by "progressive shields"?

 

They protect less farther away instead of having a delimited boundary?

 

How does that change the fact that low Kinetic Impactors were considered a threat to ships that can supposedly take GTs to PTs of damage?

 

 

 

because the combat shields might not have been up,

 

 

 

See point above...

 

 

 

because the combat shields might not have been up, because the captain doesn

 

T like debris on his ship?

 

 

 

 

I imagine, since all SW Captains seem to be Brits, that they would indeed frown upon dirty hulls...

[enigma 521]

Prophet, that was exactly my point. They have the equivalent of navigational deflectors which are always on and There are separate shields for battle, just like Trek ships. And as for you, bird, the command tower probably was shielded but the asteroid was enough to overpower the deflectors.

 

 

 

Or simply as far as I could tell and it'll be a bitch to hunt it down again but that particular ISD was the same one that got owned by the Ion cannon on Hoth. One could say that the ship was not in top shape when it got hit by the asteroid. I can't find the source at the moment.

[InvaderSkooj 1]

Because a non-nuclear low KT asteroid destroyed the bridge of an ISD in TESB?

A nice localized kinetic impactor, compared to an omnidirectional weapon, on what was most likely an unshielded ISD

[Praeothmin 532]

A nice localized kinetic impactor, compared to an omnidirectional weapon, on what was most likely an unshielded ISD

 

 

 

Yes, it was most likely unshielded, but it was still hit by a low kinetic impactor in the low KT.

 

So we're to believe that a ship that can fire TTs with it's biggest guns cannot withstand a low kinetic impactor equivalent to 1 millionth of it's most powerful guns?

 

And how did it become unshielded?

 

These low Kinetic impactors were hitting shields that can dissipate TTons to PTons of Firepower, yet you want us to believe these same shields were brought down by low KT impactors?

 

Even when we consider the fact the gunners were firing at incoming asteroids to clear the way, meaning most likely that not many asteroids got through?

 

You are a funny guy, Skooj, a very funny guy...

 

 

 

 

 

And TLs are omnidirectional now?

 

I thought most Warsies compared them to HEAT rounds?

[InvaderSkooj 1]

Yes, it was most likely unshielded, but it was still hit by a low kinetic impactor in the low KT.

 

So we're to believe that a ship that can fire TTs with it's biggest guns cannot withstand a low kinetic impactor equivalent to 1 millionth of it's most powerful guns?

 

And how did it become unshielded?

 

These low Kinetic impactors were hitting shields that can dissipate TTons to PTons of Firepower, yet you want us to believe these same shields were brought down by low KT impactors?

 

Even when we consider the fact the gunners were firing at incoming asteroids to clear the way, meaning most likely that not many asteroids got through?

 

You are a funny guy, Skooj, a very funny guy...

And just where did I mention TEH TERATONZ? Your OCD obsession with the ICS is really sad

 

 

 

 

 

And TLs are omnidirectional now?

 

I thought most Warsies compared them to HEAT rounds?

 

No the nukes they use in nBSG. Is it even possible for you to respond a SW related post without a strawman or red herring?

[Praeothmin 532]

And just where did I mention TEH TERATONZ? Your OCD obsession with the ICS is really sad

 

 

 

Oh, I'm sorry, but since you are usually the first one here to defend the idiotic ICS numbers, and usually the first one saying the numbers even before the ICS stated TTons for HTLs, I thought you were still referring to these numbers...

 

 

 

No the nukes they use in nBSG. Is it even possible for you to respond a SW related post without a strawman or red herring?

 

 

 

 

No, impossible...

 

 

 

Buuuttt, since we are talking about nBSG nukes, I don't agree with Oragahn, an ISD, I believe, and for the reason you mentioned, Skooj, is capable, when fully shielded, to take multiple nBSG nukes before needing to worry, just like a ST ship...

 

Unshielded?

 

Again, and as you said, Skooj, the kinetic impactor will be more efficient on the ISD because it is a localized impact, and affects the tower's sturctural iintegrity fully, while an omnidirectional nuke will have only half it's energy hit the ship, some of which can affect the ship physically, but most will be in heat and radiation...

[Mr. Oragahn 0]

Buuuttt, since we are talking about nBSG nukes, I don't agree with Oragahn, an ISD, I believe, and for the reason you mentioned, Skooj, is capable, when fully shielded, to take multiple nBSG nukes before needing to worry, just like a ST ship...

 

Unshielded?

 

 

 

I never said an ISD couldn't take multiple nukes. But multiple nukes, in a nuclear ready scenario, is going to be brought to the table rather easily, and the Colonials have enough means to deliver them.

 

And since the scenario is just a question of how many Mercuries to get an ISD down, if one massive BSG and all its ammo, crews and Viper and Raptor wings isn't enough, then two. I already covered that part.

 

The ISD has the advantage is better weaponry, and more advanced defenses to some degree, but it's certainly not safe.

 

I already pointed out that if we go with the terajoule figures for the ISD, then its shields can be taken down by even the basic colonial nukes. And from ROTS and TCWS, I'm just sorry to say that, but it's abundantly clear that the hull strength is far from being remarkable. To me, Battlestars have shown far superior resilience in this department than Star Destroyers. I'd love to see a shieldless Venator or a shieldless Invisible Hand cope with the kind of fire the Galactica had to deal with twice, first in orbit of the Algae planet, secondly after ramming the Cylon Colony.

 

I'd also like to see those same ships take nuclear detonations to their hulls like Battlestars did and continue to remain operative. What we saw in TCWS is not impressing me. A Venator is just as screwed when ramming a Lucrehulk battleship than Pegasus was after ramming a Basestar, and that was after taking a punishment quite different than the puny crashes from Vulture Droids.

 

 

 

Heck, even the basic missiles carried by Vipers have been seen to be able to crack open asteroids much bigger than Vipers, and make their core glow, and that's far more damage than the kamikaze Vultures were dealing, explosives within them or not.

 

 

 

SW capital ships move like beached whales, just like nBSG ships, so that makes both universes candidates for a rather even battle, even if one universe's ships are technically outclassed, but not overwhelmingly either.

 

 

 

Again, and as you said, Skooj, the kinetic impactor will be more efficient on the ISD because it is a localized impact, and affects the tower's sturctural iintegrity fully, while an omnidirectional nuke will have only half it's energy hit the ship, some of which can affect the ship physically, but most will be in heat and radiation...

 

 

 

 

The Pegasus' forward projectile batteries seem good enough to deal massive destruction to structures. You can see how they rape Basestars in a very few shots. I suppose that the non nuclear warheads would obviously be built to be armour piercing btw. And that would apply to both Colonials AND Cylons. It would be immensely stupid not to do so when it's a rather basic idea.

[Picard578 0]

Battlestar Wiki puts Galactica's warheads at 150 kilotons, max. Probably enough to destroy unshielded ISD, but against fully shielded ISD, and assuming each warhead hits (there seems to be 20 of tubes for Galactica; I'm not sure, thought) we would need 1000 warheads, or 50 battlestars, minimum, according to my ISD shield calculations. That is not counting fact that some nukes will get shot down by ISD's point defences, no matter how sloppy these could be.

[InvaderSkooj 1]

Pegasus burns down in space after TIE fighters kamikaze the landing bays

[Mr. Oragahn 0]

Battlestar Wiki puts Galactica's warheads at 150 kilotons, max. Probably enough to destroy unshielded ISD, but against fully shielded ISD, and assuming each warhead hits (there seems to be 20 of tubes for Galactica; I'm not sure, thought) we would need 1000 warheads, or 50 battlestars, minimum, according to my ISD shield calculations. That is not counting fact that some nukes will get shot down by ISD's point defences, no matter how sloppy these could be.

 

 

 

If we go with the high ends from the higher canon of both franchises, Pegasus can take several 50 MT nukes to her hull and keep going. ISDs, on the other hand... if they're close cousins to Venators, which they are since the first Imperial SDs were rolled out like one or two years after the Venators apparently, then they don't even approach that. When I mean high ends, I mean viable ones, that is, the higher end of calculations that make sense, not the higher end of total bullshit like that claim of vaporized asteroids in TESB. It's more like calc from the vaporized small town in the ROTS novelization, which I think RSA had put at 6~8 MT per HTL, with of course no proof that such bolts can be fired in rapid fashion - and shouldn't, since they were the shiny hairlines seen from Corsucanti rooftops : you could only see the SPHA-Ts( beams, and those are pre-charged one shot wonders.

 

 

 

In nBSG, we have Cylon Raiders using multi-KT nukes against civilian ships, in the novelization we have Cylon Raiders partaking in the destruction of the colonies which, at that time, were said to be blasted by 50 megaton nukes : we see smaller clouds in The Plan, just like we see big megaton-like ones, we see cluster nukes, but the distant shots from space show

in the gigaton range (Scorpia was hit hard anyway), and in the initial miniseries, we also saw high multi-gigaton bangs on Caprica, so I suppose the megaton level nukes is the proper middle ground. Oh and Basestars are quite robust enough to fly into a planet's atmosphere at a high speed like the Raiders, and the Basestars have only one type of launching ramp-turrets from which they fire all their type of missiles, so saying the MT nukes were much larger than those fired against Battlestars - or something similar - is particularly wrong.

 

 

 

With SW's EU (no ICS), the story is different.

[Praeothmin 532]

Pegasus burns down in space after TIE fighters kamikaze the landing bays

 

 

 

Yeah, right, like their shitty flying will even get them near any of the bays with all the flack defense going on...

[Mr. Oragahn 0]

Not to say that I don't see what's going to happen once the TIEs get inside Pegasus' landing bays. They're a lot of mass of metal for the puny TIE guns to take on, and both nacelles are hold away from the ship's main body by huge metal "arms".

[Praeothmin 532]

And the fact that Tie fighters blow up with the effects of a hand grenade means that aside from killing someone it rams, it won't do much damage to the Battlestar...

[Mr. Oragahn 0]

And the fact that an old Raider model did crash inside Pegasus, albeit at a slow speed, and it was nothing tragic.

[InvaderSkooj 1]

If we go with the high ends from the higher canon of both franchises, Pegasus can take several 50 MT nukes to her hull and keep going. ISDs, on the other hand... if they're close cousins to Venators, which they are since the first Imperial SDs were rolled out like one or two years after the Venators apparently, then they don't even approach that. When I mean high ends, I mean viable ones, that is, the higher end of calculations that make sense, not the higher end of total bullshit like that claim of vaporized asteroids in TESB. It's more like calc from the vaporized small town in the ROTS novelization, which I think RSA had put at 6~8 MT per HTL, with of course no proof that such bolts can be fired in rapid fashion - and shouldn't, since they were the shiny hairlines seen from Corsucanti rooftops : you could only see the SPHA-Ts( beams, and those are pre-charged one shot wonders.

 

 

 

In nBSG, we have Cylon Raiders using multi-KT nukes against civilian ships, in the novelization we have Cylon Raiders partaking in the destruction of the colonies which, at that time, were said to be blasted by 50 megaton nukes : we see smaller clouds in The Plan, just like we see big megaton-like ones, we see cluster nukes, but the distant shots from space show

in the gigaton range (Scorpia was hit hard anyway), and in the initial miniseries, we also saw high multi-gigaton bangs on Caprica, so I suppose the megaton level nukes is the proper middle ground. Oh and Basestars are quite robust enough to fly into a planet's atmosphere at a high speed like the Raiders, and the Basestars have only one type of launching ramp-turrets from which they fire all their type of missiles, so saying the MT nukes were much larger than those fired against Battlestars - or something similar - is particularly wrong.

 

 

 

With SW's EU (no ICS), the story is different.

 

All of which is subject to interpretation, as you yourself are fond of crying.

 

 

 

Funnily the standard weapons used during the series use explosive warheads, which were quite capable of hurting battlestars

[Praeothmin 532]

All of which is subject to interpretation, as you yourself are fond of crying.

 

 

 

Funnily the standard weapons used during the series use explosive warheads, which were quite capable of hurting battlestars

 

 

 

Yup, the series saw "standard", non-nuclear missiles used against the Battlestars and Cylon Basestars wich great efficiency.

 

These blasts were comparable to the ones seen in RotS in the battle over Coruscant.

 

In fact, in nBSG's 3rd or 4th season, Admiral Adama threatens to use Nukes on a planet's surface to destroy a temple, but the nukes are never used against ships...

[Mr. Oragahn 0]

All of which is subject to interpretation, as you yourself are fond of crying.

 

 

 

Crying? Don't be silly. There's not much "interpretation" you can go with what we saw in the CGI crap show.

 

As for the numbers for BSG, I listed the high ends (nukes) and the lower end stuff. It's as honest as it can get. Now if it's the canon that annoys you, perhaps you could write Lucas a letter about your gripes.

 

 

 

Funnily the standard weapons used during the series use explosive warheads, which were quite capable of hurting battlestars

 

 

 

 

With the difference that they can take a pounding of the "chemical" variety and survive.

 

Galactica did when three or four Basestars were molesting her after her free fall through the atmosphere of New Caprica.

 

Then at the Cylon Colony, tanking shots that made the whole structure jerk, up and down (the elasticity was a plus form the Cylon magic toothpaste).

 

Notice that tylium is never defined as nuclear at all, yet comes with a mad energy density (500 TJ/kg) once pressured, which can easily be done even with mere chemicals, as per the oldest nuclear bomb designs. Tylium is also funky in that it can be rendered inert under nuclear radiation. Don't ask.

 

Now, we're speaking of two space faring factions which would now that just using nukes as you'd do in an atmosphere wouldn't be as effective if you wouldn't try to get some momentum of out their sudden expansion. Simply put, nuclear weapons in space would logically be about heavy casings. A heavy casing vs a light weight one makes a great deal of difference, in that one can produce huge craters in the ground and the other, small ones, for the same yield.

 

So logically nukes would be designed as heavy, at least when fired by warships.

 

Besides nothing says that chemical warheads wouldn't be focused. Actually, any current military would go for that: they'd try every possible technique to focus the blast forward, which would be more effective than having an omnidirectional nuclear blast for the same yield.

 

Essentially, the nukes would "burn" the hull's upper layer and eventually suffer some kind of blunt damage if the nuke's casing is heavy enough, while the chemical round could have everything of a HEAT round. A high tech HEAT round may reach a depth in contemporary alloys at more than 7 times the warhead diameter. When you look at the size of the cannons on Galactica for example, there's nothing to scoff at. Especially when we've seen in Daybreak that they could launch projectiles at several kilometers per second (several times the speed of the projectiles fired by the Cylon Colony, which I pegged at 1.7 km/s). The cannons on Pegasus are just huge. That said, the two forward cannons on Berserk-class Battlestars are not small either. You can easily get a projectile about one meter wide. Which would mean a theoretical penetration of 7 meters.

 

Since tylium can be used for chemical explosives, it clearly remains in the realm of the possible that tylium be used for the chemical rounds, in a HEAT manner (it would be stupid not to).

 

 

 

As for the nukes, there's a problem between what we've seen of Galactica's crew needing to greenlight their way through a long series of validations - the normal procedure inherited from the war against the Cylons, as stated in the bible, there's practically a guy to push every single button - and the fact that Vipers and Raptors have effortlessly carried powerful nukes. Even the nukes used by Gina to destroy Cloud Nine or the nuke deposited inside the Basestar by Sharon weren't particularly huge.

 

And then we know that Valkirie-class Battlestars have missile launchers. Valkiries are of the newer lots, so as the Berserks, which by looking at their structure, seem to be literally filled with launch tubes and other turrets. Berserk-class Battlestars are actually meant to be escort ships, contrary to the more carrier orientated Galactica.

 

Aside from taking a long time to achieve because of her age and complete colonial reluctance on used automated systems, Galactica types also had no other weapons than the turrets, which I haven't seen used to fire missiles. So firing missiles from Galactica-class Battlestars is pretty much something exceptional in itself. But nowhere it's something technically burdening and complex. It's long because the humans made it to be long.