Federation versus Empire (with the worst showings)

[Generalissimo]

How would a battle play out between the Galactic Empire and United Federation of Planets using only the very lowest yields seen for each side?

That’s right. . . *everything* is assumed to match its worst showing.

In 2373 the United Federation of Planets is engaged at war the Galactic Empire instead of the Dominion.
Instead of attacking Hoth (3 years after Yavin) the Galactic Empire is battling the United Federation of Planets instead.

Facilitating the fighting there are improbability convenient hyperlane/warp corridors facilitating two-week travel between galaxies for both sides.

Standard battlefield technologies (super weapons and technology-of-the-week are specifically forbidden)
Surprisingly the Alliance to Restore the Republic is going to sit this one out, equally surprising the Galactic Empire isn’t going to bother looking for them.


This comes from a fun scenario I’ve come across at another versus site. . .

[Generalissimo]

I’ll start with the Star Destroyer from Force Unleashed.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKU3PxM1Ajs
Firepower that compares unfavorably to vintage battleships!

To be fair. . .
Federation’s 4.3 kilojoule photon torpedoes. . .
A mindblowingly low amount of energy!

[Generalissimo]

If we accept Stormtrooper armor can be penetrated by small spears. . .
We’re also accepting random crates can stop phasers!
It’s race to the bottom.

[Luke Skywalker]

Gameplay footage like that is N-canon.

Using low end showings...

So for Star Wars, firepower is on par with WW2 battleships, and large fleets consist of a single star destroyer and a few frigates. Average combat range is a few dozen feet. Commanders are mentally deficient and stormtroopers are killed by wooden sticks.

But for Trek, firepower is 4.3 kilojoules, the Enterprise is the only ship in range in the middle of the Sol system, and average combat range is also a few feet. Phasers cannot make any dent in redshirts' pajamas and people can survive point blank shots to the chest. Commanders are still mentally deficient.

Star Wars still wins.

[darth_timon]

Empire still wins owing to enormous industry, hyperdrive and fleet size.

[Captain Seafort]

Empire still wins owing to enormous industry, hyperdrive and fleet size.

Based on the OP, it's only got a few thousand planets, and hyperdrive takes several days to cover the few hundred ly from Sullust to Endor.

[Batman]

Not that I doubt the EU coming up with something this stupid but where, exactly, is that from?

Also, by that token, Warp drive is no faster than 1000c thanks to VOY so Wars is still considerably ahead as stardrive speeds go

[Metahive]

Not that I doubt the EU coming up with something this stupid but where, exactly, is that from?

Also, by that token, Warp drive is no faster than 1000c thanks to VOY so Wars is still considerably ahead as stardrive speeds go

Not if we go by the spirit of this thread and take Han's bragging from ANH literally which means 1.5c is considered fast in the SW universe. Yeah, super slow ships or super condensed galaxy, choose your poison.

HAN: She'll make point five beyond the speed of light. She may not
look like much, but she's got it where it counts, kid. I've added some
special modifications myself.

[Batman]

.5 past lightspeed does not equal 1.5c. One and a half times lightspeed (like in the german version. Thanks, translators) means 1.5c. 'Point five past lightspeed' doesn't mean - anything, really.

[Metahive]

They don't talk English anyway, so the German "translation" counts even if we accept this handwave.

[Batman]

Um no it doesn't as that's not what they say in the original english version of the movie? Why is the german translation to be preferred over the english one?

[Captain Seafort]

Not that I doubt the EU coming up with something this stupid but where, exactly, is that from?

RotJ, plus a bit of creative interpretation from a certain individual currently going by the moniker of DSG2k.

Why is the german translation to be preferred over the english one?

Because it produces a lower number, as per the OP.

[Batman]

Sorry. I was working on the assumption that we were going by the actual worst showing in the canon material, not one being the result of incompetent translation. If we're going to include every dubbing mistake made in both franchises this is going to be a mess in short order.

[Luke Skywalker]

Not that I doubt the EU coming up with something this stupid but where, exactly, is that from?

The Prequel novelizations tend to give the Republic "only" one hundred thousand member worlds. But, going by low end Trek showings, 99% of the Vulcan population is actually on Vulcan, so Wars still has the advantage here.

TPM - "ten thousand Jedi knights active on a hundred thousand worlds,"

AotC - "[The Republic was] a vast network of tens of thousands of systems, and even more species, each with a distinct perspective."

EU sources (Clone Wars 3: Last Stand on Jabiim):

"You must remember that there are over a hundred thousand inhabited worlds in the Republic, and there are now only a few thousand of us. Billions of beings have never seen a Jedi. Millions have never even heard of our Order. Or of the Force. When we do appear, we can be killers, but also healers. Thank the Force for that."


Wars low end showings are weaker than WW2 battleships. Trek low end firepower showings are weaker than handguns.

[seanrobertson]

In all fairness, guys, you're not comparing apples to apples. As silly as measuring each side's prick at its most flaccid strikes me, at least in the Star Wars side of the equation ("TUF"), we're measuring observed effects when we talk about WWII-era battleship broadsides.

Those of you quoting "Conundrum" are overlooking the fact that the huge Lysian station the Enterprise was about to attack did, yes, have a "shield output of 4.3 kilojoules." And, sure enough, Riker remarked, "One photon torpedo ought to do it."

Among other things:

Shield output /= shield strength. Does anyone have a whit of evidence to suggest otherwise? For all we know, a kilojoule shield could withstand 100 MW attacks for brief periods.

Also, one torpedo ought to do ... what, exactly? IIRC, Riker or someone else later commented that a single photon torpedo could have ended the Satarran-Lysian War.

Ah, here it is:

PICARD -- Satarran weapons technology is no more advanced than the Lysians'. One photon torpedo would have ended their war.

That suggests to me that the Lysian post's shield is designed as a proximity shield at best; i.e., a torpedo-like weapon strikes the starbase's relatively weak shield (which may or may not withstand something significantly greater than a few kilojoules*), but that weapon still explodes with some stand-off distance between it and the station itself. It could very well be that a photorp is powerful enough to destroy that giant-assed space station even if it detonates well short of the hull. After all, hit it in just the right place -- say, near a reactor or weapons magazine -- and you can imagine the rest.

*Let's be real here for a minute Operating an energy shield to handle incoming attacks suggests it has some advantage, at least as a stand-off measure as I suggested, over a little extra armor ... and what kind of armor would be vulnerable to single strikes from 4 kJ? Not a modern FLAK JACKET, for Christ's sake. I suggest you underestimate these space-faring fuckers.

If y'all want to do this right, compare something like the cruise-missile level BANG we see when the refit Enterprise shoots torpedoes at the Reliant. Reducing Trek to kilojoules is outright dishonest when we have onscreen evidence of hand-phasers putting out over a megawatt ("The Mind's Eye"). I'm sure I could scour SW EU and find references to ridiculously low firepowers, like the "kilojoules of energy" per every shot of an X-Wing's cannons.

Observed effects under similar circumstances!

That reduces things to roughly comparable firepower, at which point the Empire's vast size and speed advantage would still equal a swift victory.

[Luke Skywalker]

seanrobertson, there's a reason why we are going by "the worst showings". And it's not just Wars in which idiot writers give turbolasers stupidly low yields (that makes you wonder why they don't just stack hellfire missiles on the ISD's); remember First Contact's photon torpedos?

And as for phasers having megawatt outputs, that's a high end showing. Low end, they cannot even visibly dent natural rock formations or even redshirt pajamas, and a man can be shot in the chest by one and still survive.

[seanrobertson]

seanrobertson, there's a reason why we are going by "the worst showings".

I understand the premise of the thread: "everything is assumed to match its worst SHOWING," emphasis mine.

What I'm trying to tell you is the "Conundrum" quote is meaningless bullshit. Assuming a shield with an output of 4.3 kilojoules can only withstand 4.3 kJ is unwarranted. It flies in the face of what we're told earlier in the episode (Lysian destroyer, 2.1 MJ disruptors anyone?), and as I pointed out, Picard not only expected the torpedo's yield sufficient to overwhelm Lysian HQ's shield, he also expected a single torpedo would DESTROY the thing.

How did he put it?

PICARD -- Satarran weapons technology is no more advanced than the Lysians'. One photon torpedo would have ended their war.



Even with a direct hit to a critical system, if a torpedo's detonated prematurely by even a low-level shield, well ... *shrugs* How much distance is between this lucky hit on a critical system and where the torpedo exploded?

No one expects this 4.3 kJ-powered shield to withstand thousands of terawatts. At least, not me. I also don't pretend that any observed photon torpedo would have the yield to rip apart something that massive without the target itself contributing to its own destruction. (I mean, LOOK at the fucking thing! It's HUGE!)

Just the same, I'm telling you, fellas, pretending the quote represents a "low-end" is no different than taking Han's "point-five past lightspeed" statement to mean the Falcon is only capable of 1.5c. Somewhat like the 4.3 kJ quote, it is highly unlikely that interpretation's relevant, but like any hard-core skeptic, can you rule out it beyond any doubt whatsoever? No. It's absurd, of course, but philosophers could imagine all manner of reasons why that .0000000000000000000000000000000001% probability is somewhat significant

Again, I'm implore you: either go with observed effects on both sides or dialogue/written word for both sides. In "Who Mourns for Adonais?" we see the Enterprise fire phasers at "Apollo's" temple, which appeared to be a loose collection of Roman-style columns. It took over 10 seconds of firing to reduce those columns to debris IIRC. Or Trek V or VI, in which a photorp directed at "god" impacted with, at best, a modestly-sized chemical bomb and photorps rocking Chang's ship about seemed more like high-velocity cannonballs than actual M/AM devices. (Given the close proximity involved, it might be that the torpedoes didn't fully arm when they hit the BoP; after all, even much later on in TNG, we learn that, if the E-D's shields are very weak or non-functional, proximity blasts from her photorps threaten her survival ("Q Who?", "The Nth Degree"). Still, if you're looking for legit, basement bottom "low-end" stuff, well -- there you go.)

And it's not just Wars in which idiot writers give turbolasers stupidly low yields (that makes you wonder why they don't just stack hellfire missiles on the ISD's); remember First Contact's photon torpedos?

Which ones? The salvo that blew up a Borg cube? Yeah, I remember that.

And as for phasers having megawatt outputs, that's a high end showing. Low end, they cannot even visibly dent natural rock formations or even redshirt pajamas, and a man can be shot in the chest by one and still survive.

Variable yields.

I'm willing to entertain this "low/high-end" stuff to a degree, but the bunch of you do realize that is, at best, the stuff of purely hypothetical questions, right? Proper sci-fi analysis doesn't even recognize those terms.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Which ones? The salvo that blew up a Borg cube? Yeah, I remember that.

I believe he is referring tot he torpedoes the Bog fired at the Montana missile complex that have very low yields (certainly not megatonne, kilotonne or even tonne yields). The same Borg torpedoes seen totalling (possibly unshielded) Steamrunner and Sabre class starships only a few minutes earlier.

[seanrobertson]

Which ones? The salvo that blew up a Borg cube? Yeah, I remember that.

I believe he is referring tot he torpedoes the Bog fired at the Montana missile complex that have very low yields (certainly not megatonne, kilotonne or even tonne yields). The same Borg torpedoes seen totalling (possibly unshielded) Steamrunner and Sabre class starships only a few minutes earlier.

Curious. When was it established that those Borg weapons were photon torpedoes?

[Captain Seafort]

Curious. When was it established that those Borg weapons were photon torpedoes?

It wasn't. For that matter there's a good chance they weren't even the same weapons - the sphere only fired on Cochrane's complex, not the Fed fleet.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Curious. When was it established that those Borg weapons were photon torpedoes?

It wasn't. For that matter there's a good chance they weren't even the same weapons - the sphere only fired on Cochrane's complex, not the Fed fleet.

That's true. These may not have been the torpedoes Luke Skywalker wwas thinking of, it's what sprung to mind from STFC "low yield torpedoes."

[Captain Seafort]

That's true. These may not have been the torpedoes Luke Skywalker wwas thinking of, it's what sprung to mind from STFC "low yield torpedoes."

They're the only weapons we can get any idea of yield from. The others' firepower could be anywhere from a blowpipe to a supernova given that they're only used against ships.

[Eternal_Freedom]

True. And apparently they have a yield roughly the same as a film pyrotechnics blast. Funny that

[Luke Skywalker]

seanrobertson, there's a reason why we are going by "the worst showings".

I understand the premise of the thread: "everything is assumed to match its worst SHOWING," emphasis mine.

What I'm trying to tell you is the "Conundrum" quote is meaningless bullshit. Assuming a shield with an output of 4.3 kilojoules can only withstand 4.3 kJ is unwarranted. It flies in the face of what we're told earlier in the episode (Lysian destroyer, 2.1 MJ disruptors anyone?), and as I pointed out, Picard not only expected the torpedo's yield sufficient to overwhelm Lysian HQ's shield, he also expected a single torpedo would DESTROY the thing.

Picard's reaction is hardly indicative of the shields being several orders of magnitude weaker than the norm. He did not do what he should have done, which is to laugh his ass off at the idea of a shield that is weaker than the human body, implying that a 4.3 kilojoule/second shield is weak, but not by orders of magnitude.

Of course, it is pathetically easy to contradict this with other examples in Trek, but I think that the entire point is to only count the most pathetic showings as canon.

[Connor MacLeod]

Rogue Squadron novel: An X-wing puts out 'kilojoules' of laser power which can destroy TIE fighters. Also an X-wing's shields can be taken down by a truck running at around 30 kph IIRC.