protecting the earth (government vs)

[The Yosemite Bear]

So who would you rather have protecting you from all your supernatural, and alien threats?

MIB (movie version)
Scully & Mulder
X-Com
Stargate SG1
Primeveal Team
Torchwood
UNIT
Godzilla Force
others

[Stark]

MIB and the Godzilla-verse guys are the only guys who are at all competent who have any idea what's going on. Flying drill submarines may be of limited utility.

[adam_grif]

Is the SGC like, post season 10, where we have a fleet of superships?

Also, does picking one group (MIB for example) make us have to face those badguys, or do we have to take all badguys from all verses, but only have one group to defend us?

[The Yosemite Bear]

yes, everything and the kitchen sink.

and by the kitchen sink, that includes Anubis Possesed Krychek with a scorpius clone inside their head. For added villian shields.

[Broken]

It may be a larger group then your looking for but to defend humanity against alien threats there is little better then Gunbuster universe military/government. I'm not sure how well they would do against supernatural threats, but give them a bit of time get their research going and they will quickly become unstoppable. After all, in less then a century (IIRC the timeline correctly) they went from pre-spaceflight to a 5th generation battleship 70km long whose sublight propulsion is provided by ESPer's and modified dolphins that rewrite the local laws of physics. Their research base is XCOMish fast and that is without the benefit of any technology to reverse-engineer. They are also ruthless enough to detonate a blackhole weapon inside our own solar system and later take out a massive chuck of the Milky Way to finally end an alien threat.

[lordofchange13]

Torchwood, I truly believe the WHO universe tech more then makes up for there incompetence and tiny numbers(can some one enplane to me how the canary wolf thing had many dozens of armed soldiers, while Cardiff with it's big trans-temperial rift thing...only has at most six torchwood members at a time?). Plus if you got Torchwood then you get the chance the doctor might help you with your problems.

[Artemas]

lol, XCOM?

Scully and Mulder would not protect anyone.

[Skylon]

Not Mulder and Scully.

Mulder is downright dangerous I'd say. I've been re-watching the early X-Files stuff. In one episode Scully uses a woman who has the spirit of her dead boss to help them solve an actual crime (the dead boss's company selling weapons to terrorists) and Mulder spouts some BS about how Scully may have just cost them a chance to study "psykokenesis" or some crap. In other words, studying the paranormal is more important to Mulder than doing what the FBI is supposed to, preventing crime. He also must have some record for the FBI for losing his gun.

Scully may not believe what she is seeing until it is too late. However, she doesn't lose her gun nearly as often as Mulder.

[Simon_Jester]

If the threat is already 'mature,' my money's on the Men in Black, because they have a large organization, contacts and allies of their own among various alien civilizations, and experience dealing with threats on that level.

If we have a few years for the crisis to ramp up to its full magnitude, my money's on X-COM, because given a few years' head-start (and a budget that doesn't require them to sell alien corpses on the black market to make payroll), they'd be capable of pretty much anything.

[Stark]

Are you serious? Without a common techbase to exploit they're totally useless. If Apophis shows up week one and the Cybermen show up week two, they're FUCKED.

[Gunhead]

Well, SGC gets shit from season 10 so in all fairness XCOM should be getting all of their best toys also, which wouldn't make them half bad at defending the earth from an alien menace.
I don't know about others, but as I understand there's not a lot season 1 SGC can do if someone parks a ship into earth's orbit and starts blasting shit.

-Gunhead

[Stark]

I think Bear was sayign the threats they need to face are from all the universes; it's pretty stupid if Torchwood has a giant space laser, transdimensional teleportation, electro laser guns, etc.

[Gunhead]

This is too vague anyhow, MiBs would be good at rooting out infiltration by aliens, where later era SG-1 and XCOM can go toe to toe with big pewpews. I'd still pick XCOM, they can both root out infiltrators and given time reverse engineer a lot of technology.

-Gunhead

[Simon_Jester]

Are you serious? Without a common techbase to exploit they're totally useless. If Apophis shows up week one and the Cybermen show up week two, they're FUCKED.

If we have a few years for the crisis to ramp up to its full magnitude, my money's on X-COM, because given a few years' head-start (and a budget that doesn't require them to sell alien corpses on the black market to make payroll), they'd be capable of pretty much anything.

If we have a few years for the crisis to ramp up to its full magnitude, my money's on X-COM, because given a few years' head-start (and a budget that doesn't require them to sell alien corpses on the black market to make payroll), they'd be capable of pretty much anything.

If we have a few years for the crisis to ramp up to its full magnitude, my money's on X-COM, because given a few years' head-start (and a budget that doesn't require them to sell alien corpses on the black market to make payroll), they'd be capable of pretty much anything.

Stark, read the goddamn posts before replying, or don't bother replying at all. It's not a hard choice to make.

What X-COM excels at is reverse-engineering alien technology, even technology ludicrously far beyond anything in the world today (like ray guns that can blow up tanks and yet be conveniently portable for little gray men). If the threat takes a few years to ramp up, as it does in the games they feature in, they are very capable of meeting aliens on their own terms and demolishing them.

If you start them out with machine guns and kevlar, within one fucking year they can be up to power armor and the aforementioned ray guns and interplanetary spacecraft. It's a routine feature of the setting. If they start out at that tier, I shudder to think how far they could advance given another year or two.

Now, if X-COM is handed machine guns and tasers to go take on the Space Gods with no buildup time, they're fucked. Which I pretty much came right out and said. At which point you want a larger, better-equipped organization, such as the MIB; they already have experience with dealing with world-ending threats on a regular basis. Which I did come right out and say.

As much to the point, they have allies and relationships with various alien races: favors they can call in, reference libraries that will help them figure out what they're dealing with. That's another asset that gives them a potential advantage.

[Stark]

Fuck off, dickhead. XCOM progresses through linking technologies; if they're facing a variety of unrelated threats they're useless and significantly worse than MIB, UNIT, Torchwood, SG1, etc. They literally cannot do anything that SG1 or UNIT hasn't been shown doing themselves, except they're structurally stupid and their high-end stuff isn't really.

XCOM is hamstrung by almost every element of its organisation and starts with nothing. They are perhaps better than Mulder and Scully, maybe. If you give XCOM a year and SG1 a year, guess who'll do better?

Oh sorry you SHUDDER TO THINK. I'd noticed that already.

[Batman]

I'd actually go with XCOM over the MiB period. The MiB have had what, half a century of routine access to alien technology, and when they're faced with actual alien spaceships, they're reduced to having Agents shooting them down (and appear to be able to do jack all about ships in orbit). XCOM went from essentially modern day technology to being able to go toe to toe with alien warships inside a year. Repeatedly.

[Stark]

'Alien warships'. You're assuming alien battleships in XCOM are the same as world-ending alien ships in MIB, which is frankly retarded. In TFTD we see what XCOM can do against a large and powerful alien ship capable of threatening the planet - ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. Ooops.

You can kill a battleship with modern-day missiles. So dangerous!

[Batman]

Fuck off, dickhead. XCOM progresses through linking technologies; if they're facing a variety of unrelated threats they're useless and significantly worse than MIB, UNIT, Torchwood, SG1, etc. They literally cannot do anything that SG1 or UNIT hasn't been shown doing themselves, except they're structurally stupid and their high-end stuff isn't really.

SGC developed laser weapons even WITH access to alien technology when XCOM did so WITHOUT? I must've missed that part. Curious how SG-1 was still wearing ordinary military gear all throughout the series when XCOM went from camos to body armour to power armour to flying body armour inside a year. Did I mention plasma weapons? Curiously enough, by the end of the series, SGC is still using slugthrowers.

XCOM is hamstrung by almost every element of its organisation and starts with nothing. They are perhaps better than Mulder and Scully, maybe. If you give XCOM a year and SG1 a year, guess who'll do better?

XCOM by a landslide. By the end of season 1, the SGC still had exactly zero spacegoing capacity and was still using modern day military gear mostly. XCOM has power armour, plasma weapons and warships by that time, and that's just using UFO Defense.

[Batman]

'Alien warships'. You're assuming alien battleships in XCOM are the same as world-ending alien ships in MIB, which is frankly retarded.

It would be, if I ever actually said that. The fact remains that apparently, there's jack all the MiB can do about ANY starship once it gets out of infantry weapon range (if the MiB had ANY space force, what was the big deal about the roach getting away in the first movie?)

In TFTD we see what XCOM can do against a large and powerful alien ship capable of threatening the planet - ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. Ooops.
You can kill a battleship with modern-day missiles. So dangerous!

At least XCOM can actually get around to shooting at it. How many MiB spaceships were there again?

[Stark]

Oh I see, we're talking about game mechanics now. Hilarious.

SG1 doesn't need armour when its useless in their universe. They use everyone else's power generation as its available. I mean, are you really so stupid you think that comparing XCOM learning how to shoot a gun is impressive when they capture shiploads of the stuff all the time? I'm glad you've cut back from anything important to hand weapons, though; I mean Torchwood invented death lasers by themselves during an ecological catastrophe, but XCOM taking a few weeks to learn where the trigger is is impressive now.

Indeed, if you give XCOM its pathetic requirement for 'build up time', what's to say they'd even get anything? Why would they even be formed, BEFORE the threat exists? They'd lose months while everyone gets assraped independently before they even bother to form XCOM, and then they'd be bleeding members for months until they can actually do anything.

Or do we assume that the huge array of threats are doing some kind of Bruce Lee one-at-a-time method?

[Stark]

It would be, if I ever actually said that. The fact remains that apparently, there's jack all the MiB can do about ANY starship once it gets out of infantry weapon range (if the MiB had ANY space force, what was the big deal about the roach getting away in the first movie?)

You're a fucking moron. A giant spaceship capable of destroying life on Earth is comparable to a box with engines that can be killed by an F15? The comparison is TOTALLY BOGUS, and XCOM is never, ever shown intercepting shit in space. OH DEAR!

At least XCOM can actually get around to shooting at it. How many MiB spaceships were there again?

Yeah, all those times you do orbital interceptions... in... XCOM... wait a second.

[Simon_Jester]

If X-COM starts with nothing, everyone else starts with nothing. Everyone starts with Day One "Oh my god aliens are real what do we do?" SG1 takes several years to ramp up, which it doesn't have, and gets crushed. UNIT takes time to ramp up, which it doesn't have, and gets crushed. Indeed, pretty much everyone takes years to ramp up, which it doesn't have, and gets crushed.

Given a year, SG1's capabilities improve as much as they did in one year- not very much, given that it took several years for them to get from their starting point to "credible interstellar combat abilities."

And I don't know what you're thinking with the "progresses through linking technologies" thing; do they suddenly lose all the stuff they already had that allows them to pick fights with things that sneer at a magazine of assault rifle bullets and survive hits from rocket launchers? Do they suddenly lose the spaceships and telepaths and stuff they already have, plus all the shit they reverse engineered from last week's monster of the week?

If we're going to fling the biggest villains of every series in the known universe at anyone with no prep time, they're fucked. That's a given. Half-assing insults about X-COM because, well, you like making up half-assed insults because it gives you an excuse to tell people they're stupid without actually understanding what they said... that's not going to change anything.

If there's prep time, or a reasonable spacing between villains so that people have time to learn and adapt the lessons of the previous battles to fight their new ones more effectively, then X-COM is a contender. So are the MIB or SG-1, to be fair, and they'd be a lot better at diplomacy... assuming the universe isn't just a uniform sea of assholes trying to screw us.

[Stark]

What? XCOM starting at the start of the game is nothing like resetting everyone else; but even otherwise (say if you take XCOM during Apocalypse) they still have very few attributes to recommend them, especially over professionals like MiB, the Godzilla guys, UNIT, Torchwood, or SG1. If I wanted to be as lame as you guys I'd say that we obviously have to take Torchwood from the future where they send a shit across the universe to dig up Satan, but I'm not fat enough. Bear is clearly asking who people think has the best combination of capability and competence, and XCOM is pretty low on both (outside amusing game mechanic wanking they're almost totally useless).

That you didn't notice how the XCOM tech tree worked is fucking hilarious. I love how pointing out XCOM sucks is 'half-assing insults' because... I guess you're a fanboy?

EDIT - since you repeat the broken logic WRT to SG1, I'm going to use small words. In SG1, they seriously take as much action as they can to PREVENT acquiring technology as possible while exploring. Expecting this to occur in a far higher-threat situation (hell even with a single Kaiju running around SG1 would have a much stronger need for pew pews) with even MORE access to technology is stupid. SG1 has shown that when required they can adopt or be shown how to adopt frankly ridiculous technology, and simpleminded shit like 'lol the first year of being attacked by everyone they'll do exactly what they did in S1 on TV' should embarrass you just saying it.

[Simon_Jester]

How is it a sign of organizational competence when, knowing that much of the galaxy is populated by hostile aliens, the Stargate group tries to avoid disseminating technology that might be used to bolster Earth's defenses? Or engaging in activities that would enhance Earth's defenses but require them to explain the problem to the general population?

If they're confronted with a large number of threats in a short span of time, larger than what they confronted 'historically,' then that "we must preserve the masquerade!" mindset is going to hurt them.

The same, to be fair, can be said of the MIB and probably a number of other organizations on the list.

[Samuel]

It would be, if I ever actually said that. The fact remains that apparently, there's jack all the MiB can do about ANY starship once it gets out of infantry weapon range (if the MiB had ANY space force, what was the big deal about the roach getting away in the first movie?)

The MiB are police, not soldiers. Their job is to keep order, keep up the facade, assist refugees and repair damages. Their technology is entirely provided by alien- they are the equivalent of the INS. Earth is also supposed to be a neutral zone (hence the aliens coming in) so having a fleet would probably violate that rule.