Why not just collapse the wormhole?

IDMR · Post by **IDMR** » 2002-07-09 08:16am

DarkStar wrote:
IDMR wrote: The Federation controls a portion of a galaxy's quadrant, whereas the Empire control at least 60%. Even class III hyperdrive outpaces maximum warp by a factor of a hundred.
ANH novel says the million systems of the Empire is a tiny fraction of a section of a modest-sized galaxy.

Inhabited systems.

SCVN 2812 · Post by **SCVN 2812** » 2002-07-09 11:35pm

It seems that with the million more worlds statement it's implied that all of these worlds are actually useful in some manner. Some of them, like Tatooine, would be so backward and utterly useless that Imperial pressence in the system would be minimal. However, having more than a million systems under your control does give you more resources since not all of these million systems would be completely useless. Although, I fail to see really, why the Empire needs material resources, population and support resources yes, but IF one considers the novels canon then most of the production of warships is done by corporations. It's the corporations who need the resources.

As for the Federation never being able to collapse the wormhole if the Empire finds it first, I beg to differ. It only takes 1 ship or even shuttle, with collapsing capabilty to make it through Imperial defenses, just 1. After that the Imperial forces are cut off from their supplies in an unexplored galaxy, for them at least, which means that they would have to find the Federation first and get to them second. Which is no small task. Imperial warships are warships, not science or exploration ships. The reason hyperdrive works at all in the SW galaxy is because the galaxy has been completely charted. The position of any major stellar body at any given time is known in order to make hyperspace travel safe. Imperial ships would be forced to progressively jump to the edge of their sensor range and even using this method the likelihood of actually finding the Federation is very slim unless the fleet happens to stumble upon a world with knowledge of the Federation. Considering that in the Star Trek universe only 1 in 30,000 (according to Enterprise) planets support life or intelligent life (I can't recall which). Then they would have to find a post-warp society that knew about the Federation which would be even more difficult. Say the Imperial fleet does find the Federation, and smashes it into itty bitty pieces, the Federation wins anyways because the Imperial Fleet will still eventually exhaust it's supplies and have no way to replenish them without building up the infrastructure to do so practically from the ground up, IF they could even do so. How likely is Imperial warships having even some of the neccessary information or the skilled personell to accomplish this? They would know OF what they need but would they know exactly how to build what they need or to build what they need to build so they can build what they need to build? Gee, a replicator would really come in handy if you need advanced materials fairly quickly.....

Shadow · Post by **Shadow** » 2002-07-10 12:28am

GrandAdmiralPrawn wrote: Probe droids.

They can't get anywhere without hyperspace routes.

Robert Treder · Post by **Robert Treder** » 2002-07-10 12:29am

Shadow wrote:
GrandAdmiralPrawn wrote: Probe droids.
They can't get anywhere without hyperspace routes.

wtf?

Shadow · Post by **Shadow** » 2002-07-10 12:42am

Robert Treder wrote: wtf?

Though the Arkanis sector is exceedingly remote, it is permeated by a number of high-traffic hyperspace routes. Several of these join in a point in space close to Tatooine. Thus, the planet -- which would probably have gone unvisited otherwise -- became a busy stop-off point for travelers heading elsewhere.-starwars.com

Robert Treder · Post by **Robert Treder** » 2002-07-10 12:45am

That doesn't have anything to do with why probe droids would need hyperspace routes.

Shadow · Post by **Shadow** » 2002-07-10 12:48am

Robert Treder wrote:That doesn't have anything to do with why probe droids would need hyperspace routes.

It says that sector is remote, but is has hyperspace routes. If hyperdrive had such great speed without these routes, why would they have to stop at Tattooine?

Post by **Dalton** » 2002-07-11 03:29pm

Bastard wrote:
Howedar wrote:Once the Empire knows the location of the wormhole, it will be quite inaccesable to any and all Federation forces.
And you will of course provide examples of the countermeasures that the Empire has prepared for phase-cloaking?

What? They don't have any?

Too bad.

Oh wow! The Phase Cloak argument. Like we've never seen that before. Alright, sparky, show me one Starfleet ship that has a phase cloak as standard equipment.

Come on, sparky, I'm waiting.

Howedar · Post by **Howedar** » 2002-07-11 04:06pm

Or one surviving Starfleet ship that has ever mounted a cloak of any type, for that matter.

TheDarkling · Post by **TheDarkling** » 2002-07-11 04:09pm

Get within 3 LY and beam the torps to the enterance of the wormhole - and its done (Can Imps cloak detecting reach that far?)

Grand Admiral Thrawn · Post by **Grand Admiral Thrawn** » 2002-07-11 04:09pm

Howedar wrote:Or one surviving Starfleet ship that has ever mounted a cloak of any type, for that matter.

Oh yeah, that pesky treaty. Let's use a cloak to fight the Empire! Wait, the Romulans just declared war on us. A war on 2 fronts. Damn...

TheDarkling · Post by **TheDarkling** » 2002-07-11 04:13pm

To hell with the Romulans were fighting for our lives - will they even know?

Plus once the wormhole is gone the war with the Imps becomes easier.

If that would be your choice to simply let the imps own the wormhole im afraid thats rather..... shortsighted.

Grand Admiral Thrawn · Post by **Grand Admiral Thrawn** » 2002-07-11 04:15pm

TheDarkling wrote:To hell with the Romulans were fighting for our lives - will they even know?

What an idiotic battleplan. A battle on two fronts is a REALLY stupid idea.

TheDarkling · Post by **TheDarkling** » 2002-07-11 04:19pm

Wouldnt you have us believe the Feds cant beat a full powered Imp - therefore the Imps are a greater threat than the Romulans - IF they find out, which is doubtful since they have used it in the Alpha Quad before when they shouldnt have.

Grand Admiral Thrawn · Post by **Grand Admiral Thrawn** » 2002-07-11 04:23pm

TheDarkling wrote:Wouldnt you have us believe the Feds cant beat a full powered Imp - therefore the Imps are a greater threat than the Romulans - IF they find out, which is doubtful since they have used it in the Alpha Quad before when they shouldnt have.

So? Greater threat doesn't mean the Romulans are unimportant.

And the Imperials oh I don't know, would TELL the Romulans?!

TheDarkling · Post by **TheDarkling** » 2002-07-11 04:25pm

If he imps knew what happened - they have no proof and why would the Romulans believe them - or care?

Attacking the Feds makes no sense since the Imps are the greater threat to all the alpha quad.

BenRG · Post by **BenRG** » 2002-07-11 04:50pm

Shadow wrote:It says that sector is remote, but is has hyperspace routes. If hyperdrive had such great speed without these routes, why would they have to stop at Tattooine?

Maybe I'm looking at this wrong, but these aren't the semi-fixed 'Transwarp Tunnels' of Star Trek. These are simply the gravitationally 'safe' hyperspace paths through that sector of space. There is nothing stopping a ship from travelling at Light Speed away from those routes. It is just much more dangerous and only a brave or foolhardy pilot (or both, cf Gen. Han Solo) would do so.

Some areas (like the Kessel Sector) have few routes. Other, open sectors allow any hyperspace course that stays away from any large gravitational field.

About the Probe Droids: I am sure that there are private (and governmental) surveying organisations who regularly update the navigational conditions in any sector. Guild of Galactic Cartographers? Or mabye even Guild of Gravitational Meteorologists?

With hyperspace travel apparently so dependant on local gravitational conditions, an accurate map of the local continuum must be critical to stellar navigation. Their ships would drop out of Light Speed, drop off a few dozen probots and then jump out. Then the droids would survey the entire area and holocom the data back.

BrianDavion · Post by **BrianDavion** » 2002-07-12 05:11pm

As for cloaking or not, I dunno. to equip the definat with a cloaking device for scouting in the dominion war didn't they effectivly have to walk up to the romulans and say "mother mother may I?"

Hell you bet if they did this the MINUTE the war ended the romulans would be demanding concessions due to the treaty being broken

Grand Admiral Thrawn · Post by **Grand Admiral Thrawn** » 2002-07-12 05:33pm

Wouldn't the Romulans demand the phase-cloak oh I don't know, be destroyed?

TheDarkling · Post by **TheDarkling** » 2002-07-12 05:50pm

these sensory devices use a synthetic crystal grid to detect fluctuations in
the gravimetric plane. They are very effective, but can be inconclusive if used
near a large spacial body, such as a planet. They can also be rigged to reflect
sensor scans, and are operable from thousands of kilometers away

That tells me that the Imps cloak detector arent very useful near planets and dont have that great a range either so a starship under cloak and going full speed would probably go past an Imp ship and into the wormhole before it had chance to respond.

The quotes from WEG's 'The Last Command Sourcebook'.
Posted by Sir Nitram to ASVS - my thanks

Darth Yoshi · Post by **Darth Yoshi** » 2002-07-12 06:25pm

CGTs are reliable enough that New Republic High Command was willing to risk two sector fleets to get one, even though Coruscants gravity would interfere with the readings. Besides, Imperial sensors don't need CGTs to detect cloaked ships, not if they're moving under power.

TheDarkling · Post by **TheDarkling** » 2002-07-12 06:29pm

What exactly do you mean moving under power (What speed etc)? - what is it about a ship moving that gives it away?

Darth Yoshi · Post by **Darth Yoshi** » 2002-07-12 06:47pm

Under power means shields, active sensors, weapons, engines, etc. Impulse and warp drives do give off exhaust, don't they? In Dark Force Rising Ackabar comments that cloaked ships that are under power can still be detected by their exhaust, making them vulnerable.

TheDarkling · Post by **TheDarkling** » 2002-07-12 06:54pm

I dont think ships at warp give off exhaust.
Shields would be down, active sensors could be deactivated (In fact cloaking stopped active sensors in early models at least).
Weapons would also be offline.

The power output of SW ships is much higher than Fed ships (according to most figures at least) so I think Fed ships would be hard to detect uncloaked let alone cloaked.

Darth Yoshi · Post by **Darth Yoshi** » 2002-07-12 07:03pm

No exhaust? I remember that plenty of the antimatter is thrown out of the engine without reacting with the matter during warp. That counts as exhaust. Besides, how do they move without exhaust. They're operating in vacuum, remember? In vacuum there has to be exhaust to propel you in the direction you want to go.