Best/Worst military forces in Science Fiction

[Blayne]

Again, I can logically surmise that we never see artillery simply because at no point has ever any view point character in a reasonable and logical place to *see* any. Our POV characters are the following:

Senior Officers at a desk.
Commandos, doing commando things.
StateSec Spooks doing Spooky Things.

Also Glasslands clearly describes that world there whose name I forget that fired a AA missile at the UNSC (Verona? Venetian? I forget) was described as a massive weapons market and described artillery parked around there.

It's clear that the weapons logically exist, simply stating that they *cannot* exist simply because they aren't mentioned when the book has no logical reason to mention them is pure silliness.

Also dude, spare me that "Cold War weapons are BETTAH" just because you say so, you have no way to prove this, has an AK ever taken down a Brute? No? Huh, that's funny.

I know the Longsword fighters they have in the Haloverse are capable of both flight in the vacuum of outerspace and in the atmosphere and can move between them, I don't see any cold war era gear that has done that.

Or force field armor, where's the Soviet Superscience team that made the "Molotov" battlesuit?

The Scorpion follows every requirement of a MBT, which is an emphasis on mobility and firepower; and they give me no reason to doubt they are better than modern tanks for the roles they are designed for.

I don't see the Armata outperforming against plasma blasts, do you?

[Daefaron]

And, Halo Wars actually shows UNSC artillery. .

[weemadando]

I'm not disputing the existence of material. I'm criticising ridiculous doctrinal failures.

[khursed]

Destructionator XIII, so when the story isn't to your liking in Star Trek it's bad writing and when it happens in Star Wars it's because the Empire sucks? Right?

Come on, I've watched all the Star Trek shows and movies, they have more then their fair share of incompetence and plot driven stupidity. So, when you think about it, on a scale of a million world, a couple thousand Rebels isn't that bad, when you think the "Empire" managed to crush a real rebellion in the AOTC, and ROTS, which was orders of magnitude bigger and more threatening then in the last 3 movies.

As for Star Fleet's vaunted peace and harmony, Dominion war ring any bells? What about the Cardassian war?

Didn't Sisko trick the Romulean into a war, using "GASP" un-Star Fleet methods? Of lying and deceit with the help of Mr.Garrack, and didn't he simply ignore the moral repercussions?

You can find dozens of such instances, doesn't mean Star Fleet is filled with incompetence, it means the same on one show or movie as the other, basically plot driven device must not be taken to heart, because you'll quickly realize how useless they are.

To think we were discussing the best military force in Science fiction and we fell again into a ST VS SW debate again.

I still think overall, the 40k Space marines are pretty awesome. Heck at time the fluff makes them seem so powerful it's ridiculous, but god do I love it

[Daefaron]

I'm not disputing the existence of material. I'm criticising ridiculous doctrinal failures.

And those are?

Also, same thing as I said to the other guy. Do tell what you'd do in that case.


Edit: The republic techincally only truly beat the CIS because Palp was using both sides.

As for Sisko luring the Romulans into the war, he was very much torn, and didn't know Garack was going to bomb the shuttle. However, at the end he said he could live with it because it'd save far more lives.

[weemadando]

I listed some. Given the available resources (assuming they only have what we see) then rushing in so tightly grouped across open terrain is suicidal. I mean a single modern cluster bomb would have the capacity to utterly devastate that force given their lack of spacing.

Just because an army is technically capable didn't mean their leadership isn't incompetent.

[Daefaron]

And you'd get bomber runs and heavy air support past their AA guns how?

Also the fact the areas where the Covenant groups were coming out of where shielded, and the entire area was a sensor blackout?

Seriously, the actions taken were the best. A quick attack to cut off the enemy reinforcements and landing zone, before more can arrive. The Covenant have wraiths, but they wouldn't be able to do more damage then hit a single warthog. Oh look, they did hit a single warthog of that first formation, and the warthog was still going after it landed. Only major damage was the gunner being killed.

UNSC Artillery strikes would've just been hitting the area blind, as past that first AA gun they didn't really have eyes before the attack. And that area was pretty large to waste ammo bombarding. The structures there were also involved in mining, so pointlessly destroying those harms the UNSC more then the Covenant.

So, let's look at this.

No combat air patrol/air superiority = let's roll in with slow, vulnerable tilt rotors with zero capacity to defend themselves or ground forces against enemy air cover.

Massive open plain to cross to engage = let's use unarmoured patrol vehicles to get there.

You know the location of the enemy LZ that you are sending your main force against, but you haven't tried to smash their beachhead with artillery/bombing/EVERYTHING why?

That's pretty fucking bad.

As I've pointed out before and I will again.

A: Those falcons are excellent against banshees, the primary air support of the Covenant. They are also versatile and great against ground targets.
B: Those Warthogs have light armor, and also, versatile and great for combat. Following groups of hogs could very well had rockets or gauss cannons equipped. Likewise, the passenger could hold a grenade launcher or rocket launcher/spartan laser for heavy anti-vehicle.
C: Both of above vehicles are fast when at top speed. How else would you cross that terrain? Had the entire force dropped in by air and get gutted during offload?
D: See above, that area was in a sensor blocking net, their scouts had found the Covenant camp, but really only saw the outermost AA line. They knew a rough location, but not an exact location. Given mining buildings and such in the area that would be bad to hit, a blind bombardment would be utterly foolish. And again, their scout parties saw the AA turrets. Those things would rip apart bombers, and even put a hurting on frigates acting as air support.
If you played the game, the more they pushed into the Covenant held area, the more they scouted. Such as "We need a crew to get in that shield so we know what's up underneath it." and I'm fairly sure they tell you about the second AA gun AFTER it was spotted during the attack.

So yeah, I'd love to see what your full battle plan would be, given the details of "Scouting groups reached the first AA turret, spotted where the enemy camp was at, then withdrew. Entire area was in a sensor blocking field."

Edit: If anything doesn't make sense, it's cause I'm tired. I'll read whatever battle plan you'd use that makes the UNSC look utterly retarded and see if it'd actually work given the situation.

[weemadando]

A) OK, so they're effective against Banshees and ground targets. How effective? Why isn't there fighter cover if this is a major push to secure a key location? Forcing a utility chopper to act as troop transport, close air support and combat air patrol all at once is going to destroy their effectiveness by removing them from the two roles which they aren't acting in at the time. This is doctrinal stuff, if we want to talk about "why are there no dedicated fighters or strike aircraft" that's a whole other thing.

B) It doesn't matter how much armour you put all over the thing, the fact that EVERYONE in the vehicle has significant, VITAL portions of their body exposed at all times and the gunner is required to stand up with no cover other than a tiny gunshield? We solved this issue quite a while ago. It's call remote weapon systems. And we have them on nearly every vehicle now. http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ ... -crows.htm There's just one modern example.

If you've got a location for an AA emplacement that's ripping your ships apart and can get ground forces that fucking close, then it should have been collapsed by artillery by now.

C) Or you could not cross that terrain? Yes, that's their beachhead, but was there no other approach option? I'm not that well versed in the fluff around this, so who knows why an attack on the beachhead was seen as critical rather than going for containment or why that approach was chosen.

D) All you need is someone with line of sight in a nice bit of cover/concealment and one of these:

And you can ignore the fact that it's sensor shielded because you can visually correct fire.

As for the collateral damage issue - if you're ceding the space to the enemy them you might as well just fucking flatten it in the meantime. It's ridiculous to think you shouldn't try to destroy an enemy just because it risks damaging infrastructure you've already lost.

[RogueIce]

We know that in the Battle, only Darth Vader personal squadron/fighters were launched. There has been differences between how many fighters exactly and how he got the pilots, but the TIEs launched were outnumbered by the Rebel starfighters.

You know I've always wondered where this came from. Is it pure fanon? Fanon that the later EU eventually included? EU to begin with? Or was it actually somewhere in the script/novelization/radio play that they held back TIE Fighters?

I mean, there's nothing in the movie itself to really suggest this. Vader says, "Get the men into their fighters" or something close to that, with no real sign or hint that he's somehow just talking to his personal crew.

Personally, if you're just going by the movies (which this discussion seems to be) what you brought up later makes the most sense:

Now, to this day, I mention that based on Qorl statement of we launched all available fighters in Young Jedi Academy series, the Death Star was not fully manned. It made sense afterall. It blew up Despraye, picked up its extant security forces and transited to Alderaan shortly on its shake down cruise. There is no reason to actually believe that the Death Star contained the thousands of TIE that should had been its official complement.

Which makes a certain amount of sense and is kinda supported by the movie. Because in that first conference scene when Tagge or Motti or whoever it was got himself choked out like a bitch by Vader, he said, "Once this battlestation is operational" which means it clearly wasn't. So maybe they just hadn't loaded up their TIE Fighter complement yet or something.

Or they just had minimal fighters to begin with for some reason. Can't imagine why when you've got a small moon to stick 'em in, but hey.

[AMT]

Babylon 5 dumbness again:

S1E02

Sinclair delays critical action (stopping a disabled ship from hitting the station) while he goes to the hangars, suits up and launches to go and do it personally AND SOLO.

That's less military incompetence and more Commander death wish.
Per J Michael Straczynski stuff like this was supposed to showcase Sinclair's personal demons. As such using it as an example of bad military in general isn't valid.

There were other examples during the 1st season as well which show this, which eventually points to a character moment between Sinclair and Garibaldi where the latter points this out.

As such I'd say this points to actual competence since instead of these actions being promoted as "heroic" and "right" they're rightly shown to be mistaken.

[the atom]

Again, Contact Harvest. Describes the Assault Rifle as having Hidden iron sights. Fail on your end.

My mistake.

I constantly hear about how their weapons are outperformed, and don't see anybody noticing "Oh wait, this is a video game developer, NOT military masterminds!"

Exactly. This is what happens when you get Art Majors designing weapons, but that still doesn't change the fact that they're terribly designed and thought out. How the fuck do you even make a rifle that can only shoot 300m anyways?

And also, you know, peacetime mentioned below. And you know, I'm pretty sure that the AR is more reliable then an AK-47, and their body armor is better.

The Scorpion tank really is the 'weakest' link. But that's because compared to others, it's more of a light tank instead of a MBT. Try putting modern tanks against the Grizzly.

Wrong and wrong. The Scorpion is their designated MBT, and...'light tank'? Did you actually just cal the Scorpion a 'light tank'? Links below.

http://www.halopedian.com/images/thumb/ ... ibrary.jpg

http://www.supercheats.com/xbox360/guid ... ontank.jpg

http://anzacsteel.hobbyvista.com/Armour ... s/NZ17.jpg

The Scorpion could literally use RL Scorpion 2s as tracks:

http://i.imgur.com/iT21M.png

I don't know much about the Grizzly, but I know it is fairly uncommon and I understand that putting more then one barrel on a tank is apparently a pretty awful way of doing things.

So, what would you have done in Tip of the Spear? Just curious.

Just a thought, but maybe send the Scorpions in ahead of the Warthogs and keep the offensive more spread out so that they aren't getting massacred by slow moving plasma weapons. Oh, and I wouldn't have driven off a cliff either.

And Yes, they were at peace, or a near-perfect peace for a very long time. The whole colonization phase where they did little to no weapons development or Research. The only time they started doing it again heavily was when the rebels appeared, a long time after the colonization happened.

They maintained standing armies and fleets during that period, and even when the first Rebellions started they had over 30 years before the events of the first game to advance in tech.

I'd call it a MASSIVE stretch to say the Federation could beat them on the ground. The Federation's biggest gun is a rifle, they have no air support or real vehicle support. They have zero personal armor. Their tactics are even worse then whatever you say the Halo tactics fail at.

They have atomic artillery the size of a small mortar, well as direct fire phaser artillery weapons. They may not be the most brilliant at tactics, but I'd say stuff like Tip of the Spear makes the battles at AR-558 look like something from the Art of War.

[Daefaron]

Replying just to the "Federation can beat UNSC on the ground." part right now.

Starfleet also has ZERO body armor. You'd need just one spray of the warthog turret, or one frag grenade to utterly destroy the Federation lines. Bullets and shrapnel tend to rip into people wearing just cloth.

[Stofsk]

Ando's doubled post was deleted.

[Stofsk]

Replying just to the "Federation can beat UNSC on the ground." part right now.

Starfleet also has ZERO body armor. You'd need just one spray of the warthog turret, or one frag grenade to utterly destroy the Federation lines. Bullets and shrapnel tend to rip into people wearing just cloth.

You're wrong, Starfleet has used body armour in the past. Starfleet also has phasers that vapourise people. And teleporters. And artillery. And mortars/grenade launchers.

[Daefaron]

Where was the body armor in DS9(Last I checked, it was merely THICKER uniform, and not true armor). Likewise, where was that artillery or mortars/grenade launchers?

For "Phasers that can vaporize people, or even buildings if set right!", they sure lost a damn lot of people in the siege of AR-558 when they could have just set their phasers to that setting and filled that tiny chokepoint.

In the AR-558 situation, imagine it was UNSC instead of Jem'hadar attacking. They just have to get 1, maybe 2 or three frag grenades tossed past the barricades and bye bye defenders. Shrapnel would tear the Starfleet forces up so easily it's not funny.

A) OK, so they're effective against Banshees and ground targets. How effective? Why isn't there fighter cover if this is a major push to secure a key location? Forcing a utility chopper to act as troop transport, close air support and combat air patrol all at once is going to destroy their effectiveness by removing them from the two roles which they aren't acting in at the time. This is doctrinal stuff, if we want to talk about "why are there no dedicated fighters or strike aircraft" that's a whole other thing.

B) It doesn't matter how much armour you put all over the thing, the fact that EVERYONE in the vehicle has significant, VITAL portions of their body exposed at all times and the gunner is required to stand up with no cover other than a tiny gunshield? We solved this issue quite a while ago. It's call remote weapon systems. And we have them on nearly every vehicle now. http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ ... -crows.htm There's just one modern example.

If you've got a location for an AA emplacement that's ripping your ships apart and can get ground forces that fucking close, then it should have been collapsed by artillery by now.

C) Or you could not cross that terrain? Yes, that's their beachhead, but was there no other approach option? I'm not that well versed in the fluff around this, so who knows why an attack on the beachhead was seen as critical rather than going for containment or why that approach was chosen.

D) All you need is someone with line of sight in a nice bit of cover/concealment and one of these:

And you can ignore the fact that it's sensor shielded because you can visually correct fire.

As for the collateral damage issue - if you're ceding the space to the enemy them you might as well just fucking flatten it in the meantime. It's ridiculous to think you shouldn't try to destroy an enemy just because it risks damaging infrastructure you've already lost.

A: Pretty dang effective. If we use ingame as a source, a well piloted Falcon with nose gun and side turrets manned can clear out banshees. Likewise, if equipped with grenade launchers they can disable enemy vehicles. Fighter cover isn't there because, again, that AA gun. It'd take out longswords (one of the main fighter/bombers of the UNSC) Main troop transport actions would be done by the Pelicans in the rear of the formation. The Falcons were there mostly as close air support as I can tell.
B: Body armor covers that. And the warthog doors are mostly glass anyway. The reason they got removed was so the people in the vehicle can QUICKLY bail out if needed. Back when the warthog was first created, I believe the Humvee turret gunners had to deal with the same thing. Again, in the past few years they might've made the humvee gunner protected heavily by new armor plates, but what's happening today doesn't effect what happens in the halo universe.
C: They attacked the beachhead because they had just found it, and were pretty sure the Covenant would use it to get more forces in. Seeing as there had already been a few other strikes by the Covenant, and Reach was a key defensive world, it was decided that a fast strike would be best. All other approaches were likewise, either wide open plains or mountains.
D: I'll grant you that. But typically the FPS ones haven't featured the UNSC artillery. Once the AA turret got downed (which, this model is either a grenade in power source or a good amount of hits from the rocket hog you have, that's 6 missiles per shot), the two heavy frigates came in. That's artillery in itself.

Maybe they cared about the buildings, maybe not. But really the whole situation is "Oh shit, we just found out they have this area of operations on our planet we had no idea was there!" Likewise, remembering correctly I hope, the Battle wasn't just in the Tip of the Spear cutscene. It was all over that provence featuring ODSTs, Marines, and other vehicle groups. I can however look up and see about finding that information though. Tip of the Spear related to the strike against their beachhead.

[Stofsk]

Where was the body armor in DS9(Last I checked, it was merely THICKER uniform, and not true armor). Likewise, where was that artillery or mortars/grenade launchers?

DS9 didn't have body armour for Starfleet, TOS did. Likewise the artillery and mortars.

However, your point was that Starfleet had no body armour, which is disproven by the TOS movies. We don't see body armour used in DS9, but that doesn't mean it wasn't ever used.

For "Phasers that can vaporize people, or even buildings if set right!", they sure lost a damn lot of people in the siege of AR-558 when they could have just set their phasers to that setting and filled that tiny chokepoint.

So what is your claim? That phasers don't have a disrupt or disintegrate setting, despite there being a huge number of instances where we see phasers used to vape people? Your point was 'zomg no body armour bullets will chew up those starfleey pussies'. My reply was phasers vape people, so this whole question of firepower vs armour is fucking IRRELEVANT. And yeah, the vape setting wasn't used in that episode, but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Furthermore, I personally think the fact that phasers are so powerful is a good in-universe reason why we don't actually see any Star Trek race employ body armour. The only people that devise a defence is the borg, who use personal force fields, and this completely negates the phaser's effectiveness. Others like the jem'hadar, have the ability to cloak themselves like the fucking Predator, which isn't a defence against ray gun pewpews but it's a sign that they use alternatives. Incidentally, 'personal forcefields' were mentioned in DS9 as being some kind of deployable Starfleet troop gear. It's more than likely some kind of fortification thing though, rather than borg style 'personal' shielding.

[Blayne]

I'm generally willing to give Star Trek a pass on that as war has never been the point of Star Trek and never envisioned to have to deal with wars or the issues surrounding wars. That and It's supposed to be revolving around "Starfleet" the navy; so why would they think of needing to flesh out ground forces?

However if we include Star Trek Online, which Paramount has declared canon, there's a *lot* more variety for the whole ground pounder thing, and some more depth to Starfleet itself if you roleplay it right and ignore that its an Momerpurger.

How the fuck do you even make a rifle that can only shoot 300m anyways?

*blink* This *is* how [assault] rifles are designed, the Soviets did a study and determined that 90% of combat occurs within 350m and designed the AK for that and AR's more or less followed the trend.

Tip of the Sphere

http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/Tip_of_the_Spear

Here's a link if it will help clarify what happens for anyone, but my impression is you can't space out a convoy too much if you want them to still be mutually supporting.

Re: Scorpion: We have to remember that these are designed to be transported by pelican, that also implies some things about its design.

[lord Martiya]

I'm generally willing to give Star Trek a pass on that as war has never been the point of Star Trek and never envisioned to have to deal with wars or the issues surrounding wars. That and It's supposed to be revolving around "Starfleet" the navy; so why would they think of needing to flesh out ground forces?

Because they showed that Starfleet provided ground forces in the Dominion War.

However if we include Star Trek Online, which Paramount has declared canon, there's a *lot* more variety for the whole ground pounder thing, and some more depth to Starfleet itself if you roleplay it right and ignore that its an Momerpurger.

I suppose that the debacle at AR.-558 taught them something. Where we can see it?

[Daefaron]

No, I simply claim Starfleet is the bigger tactical blunders then UNSC. They had a method to hold the area, and didn't use it at all If they used that wide beam vaporize setting they could've maybe held it no problem.

My point was, Marines close in, guys in back prime and throw frag grenades. Even if Starfleet kills the entire group the frags are thrown, and the shrapnel WILL ruin Federation day. Starfleet seems VERY uneager to use the vaporize setting in general combat, so that points muted. Likewise, UNSC body armor is built to offer protection at least somewhat against energy weapons/plasma. Likewise, as we rarely see Phasers penetrate cover, UNSC forces using warthogs or scorpions as cover would be fine.

My reply was phasers vape people, so this whole question of firepower vs armour is fucking IRRELEVANT.

It is not. As I just pointed out above, Starfleet forces would still be destroyed by a hail of gunfire or a few frag grenades being tossed. Sure, you COULD vaporize enemy troops, but that doesn't mean you've stopped them from firing or throwing their grenades. And frankly, that tactic harms Starfleet more then the UNSC. Cause the UNSC doesn't have to worry about wounded, while Starfleet's wounded numbers are going to rise with each attack.

Now, as Blayne said, if we include STO era gear... The Starfleet has a chance because they start being tactically smart. Using grenades, turrets, personal shields, AND BODY ARMOR. As well as variable weapons such as hand held cannons and miniguns.

[Blayne]

I don't think the vaporize setting *works* the way we think it does, otherwise maybe they would be using it more often? I never see anyone else vaporizing anyone and the Cardies and Romnies have less ethical compulsions.

[Batman]

What would be the way we think it does?

[Stofsk]

No, I simply claim Starfleet is the bigger tactical blunders then UNSC. They had a method to hold the area, and didn't use it at all If they used that wide beam vaporize setting they could've maybe held it no problem.

I'm not going to argue that the tactics employed were optimal, but you seem to be implying that Starfleet somehow lost that battle, when they didn't - they actually held it and defeated the jem'hadar.

My point was, Marines close in, guys in back prime and throw frag grenades. Even if Starfleet kills the entire group the frags are thrown, and the shrapnel WILL ruin Federation day. Starfleet seems VERY uneager to use the vaporize setting in general combat, so that points muted.

No? The point is not muted, Starfleet uses the vapourise seeting when they need to. Most times they use phasers set to stun, but if they need to kill they will. They've done it plenty of times.

Likewise, UNSC body armor is built to offer protection at least somewhat against energy weapons/plasma. Likewise, as we rarely see Phasers penetrate cover, UNSC forces using warthogs or scorpions as cover would be fine.

Depends entirely on the cover. Sometimes phasers go through cover and equipment without a problem, sometimes they do not. When there are 16 different settings you cannot conclude that phaser beams are always ineffective vs cover, especially when unknown data is present (i.e. like on what setting the phaser was fired on).

It is not. As I just pointed out above, Starfleet forces would still be destroyed by a hail of gunfire or a few frag grenades being tossed. Sure, you COULD vaporize enemy troops, but that doesn't mean you've stopped them from firing or throwing their grenades.

How does any of what you just wrote make sense? 'Sure you COULD vapourise enemy troops, but that doesn't mean you've stopped them from firing or throwing their grenades' Really? After being vapourised they're going to keep firing or throwing their grenades?

And saying Starfleet forces will be destroyed in a hail of gunfire leads me back to my first post to you: why is automatic rifles scarier than rayguns that vapourise people? Why are you assuming one will effortlessly trump the other?

Also I note you didn't bother replying to anything else in my reply to you, where I pointed out that Starfleet has demonstrated things like body armour, artillery, mortars, grenades, have mentioned things like 'personal forcefields', and have teleporters. Yet you still maintain that they'll be destroyed in a hail of gunfire.

And frankly, that tactic harms Starfleet more then the UNSC. Cause the UNSC doesn't have to worry about wounded, while Starfleet's wounded numbers are going to rise with each attack.

This makes even less sense than what you wrote above. Why are Starfleet going to have a rising wounded problem, but the UNSC won't? Does the UNSC have unlimited troops?

I don't think the vaporize setting *works* the way we think it does, otherwise maybe they would be using it more often? I never see anyone else vaporizing anyone and the Cardies and Romnies have less ethical compulsions.

Starfleet phasers have 16 settings, the highest of which gives them anti-materiel capability. We don't often see them vapourise anything because there is never any call for it, and they generally use stun settings first and foremost because they don't usually want to kill anyone. For most scenarios the lower settings often suffice. But we DO see people get vapourised.

Hell in TOS, there were only two settings: stun, and 'kill' - kill meaning to vape someone. TNG added the 16 different levels, the first three IIRC were varieties of stun, the rest were kill up to disrupt.

[Batman]

Technically, that's incorrect-TOS had heat a rock in a way completely incompatible with DET, stun, and kill via vape.

[weemadando]

UNSC body armor is built to offer protection at least somewhat against energy weapons/plasma.

Really?

Where is this fact from?

Because I had thought that aside from the Spartan laser (which costs more than 4 warthogs per unit apparently) there were no energy weapons in the human inventory for non-aerospace/capital ship combat.

So why would you have body armour that was built to offer protection against weapons that aren't in use?

And don't say to protect from the Spartan Laser, because that's fucking stupid. You might as well say "why don't infantry today have body armour to protect them from TOW missiles?"

[Daefaron]

My point was, Marines close in, guys in back prime and throw frag grenades. Even if Starfleet kills the entire group the frags are thrown, and the shrapnel WILL ruin Federation day. Starfleet seems VERY uneager to use the vaporize setting in general combat, so that points muted.

No? The point is not muted, Starfleet uses the vapourise seeting when they need to. Most times they use phasers set to stun, but if they need to kill they will. They've done it plenty of times.

Yeah, kill. not Vaporize. How many times in general combat do they do that? Point is muted. You quote them as if they go "Okay boys, Jem'hadar are charging us, set to max setting." when they don't. They Might go "set to kill." but I don't remember them ever using Vaporize setting in general combat TNG era. Kill setting? yes. Vaporize? nope.

Likewise, UNSC body armor is built to offer protection at least somewhat against energy weapons/plasma. Likewise, as we rarely see Phasers penetrate cover, UNSC forces using warthogs or scorpions as cover would be fine.

Depends entirely on the cover. Sometimes phasers go through cover and equipment without a problem, sometimes they do not. When there are 16 different settings you cannot conclude that phaser beams are always ineffective vs cover, especially when unknown data is present (i.e. like on what setting the phaser was fired on).

Titanium armor. I'd wager that's something it'd take the Phasers a bit to cut through.

It is not. As I just pointed out above, Starfleet forces would still be destroyed by a hail of gunfire or a few frag grenades being tossed. Sure, you COULD vaporize enemy troops, but that doesn't mean you've stopped them from firing or throwing their grenades.

How does any of what you just wrote make sense? 'Sure you COULD vapourise enemy troops, but that doesn't mean you've stopped them from firing or throwing their grenades' Really? After being vapourised they're going to keep firing or throwing their grenades?

Um, you clearly didn't read it right. You were acting like them having their phasers set to vaporize means they instantly negate any chance of the UNSC marines pulling their triggers or tossing a grenade. Sure, you can vaporize them but bullets or grenades in the air STAY in the air. They don't magically shut off/drop dead as if it's a phaser.

And saying Starfleet forces will be destroyed in a hail of gunfire leads me back to my first post to you: why is automatic rifles scarier than rayguns that vapourise people? Why are you assuming one will effortlessly trump the other?

Also I note you didn't bother replying to anything else in my reply to you, where I pointed out that Starfleet has demonstrated things like body armour, artillery, mortars, grenades, have mentioned things like 'personal forcefields', and have teleporters. Yet you still maintain that they'll be destroyed in a hail of gunfire.

Yes, one will effortlessly trump the other, especially when the side using Rayguns thinks "body armor" is just more padded cloth uniforms. and you must've missed where I went "Sure, they have artillery and actual body armor. IN TOS. In TNG/DS9 It's nowhere to be seen. Likely having been phased out entirely. they've mentioned personal forcefields, and we've only seen such a device ONCE. in the holodeck with Worf. in actual combat it's never been shown. So yeah, a group of guys in nothing more then simple cloth uniforms vs a hail of gunfire. I'd wager they'd go down damn quick. Just like when you see a machine gun fired into a crowd of civilians. You see freaking corpses.

And frankly, that tactic harms Starfleet more then the UNSC. Cause the UNSC doesn't have to worry about wounded, while Starfleet's wounded numbers are going to rise with each attack.

This makes even less sense than what you wrote above. Why are Starfleet going to have a rising wounded problem, but the UNSC won't? Does the UNSC have unlimited troops?

No, your tactics mean if the UNSC pulls back to regroup, they don't have to drag any wounded with them. Or go "Damn, call the medivac, this guy is dying!" However, the Federation with each bullet, each grenade, are going to have people in stages of wounds. From "Just a flesh wound." to "This man needs surgery INSTANTLY if he's going to survive."

So yeah, the UNSC wouldn't have a wounded problem because your tactics are "use vaporize setting purely." So they've have losses, but not wounded.

I don't think the vaporize setting *works* the way we think it does, otherwise maybe they would be using it more often? I never see anyone else vaporizing anyone and the Cardies and Romnies have less ethical compulsions.

Starfleet phasers have 16 settings, the highest of which gives them anti-materiel capability. We don't often see them vapourise anything because there is never any call for it, and they generally use stun settings first and foremost because they don't usually want to kill anyone. For most scenarios the lower settings often suffice. But we DO see people get vapourised.

Hell in TOS, there were only two settings: stun, and 'kill' - kill meaning to vape someone. TNG added the 16 different levels, the first three IIRC were varieties of stun, the rest were kill up to disrupt.

Again, as above. You make it sound like the Federation frequently uses the vaporize setting in combat. Which is untrue.

To Weemadando: Um, body armor constructed after the covenant attacked. Who, GASP, use energy weapons/plasma weapons! Are you saying factions only should build armor to protect against what they can deploy themselves? That's a retarded idea.
Quote about marine body armor

The armor consists of several layers, some of which include a ballistic shock-absorbing gel layer and a heat reduction gel layer to help reduce velocity and felt shock from ballistics, shrapnel, and explosives as well as reducing the burn caused by plasma once it reaches flesh. This heat reduction layer also reduces the chance of the plasma penetrating by counter-acting and dissipating the heat, effectively disarming the blast.

Note, Has a layer that helps dissipate heat from plasma strike. Sure, I'll take back the "built specifically to protect against those weapons." but still, the fact they have an aspect that ends up protecting against them anyway remains.

I know the Spartan MJOLNIR armor specifically has aspects geared toward protecting against plasma/energy weapons.