1189 replies to this topic

[GDL Rahsan]

Love it when friends reunite at VS threads.

On a more related note I never knew you are a part of the STO community, I started playing the game 2-4 months ago when it went F2P, but in my defense I never knew that there was a Star Trek MMO I only discovered it recently with the hype about going F2P, I was totally surprised by it and hey a free game is a free game and a Star Trek based game to add to the fun.

Anyway, back to the discussion.

EDIT: Vaughn we already established that WH40K runs on the "Rule of Cool" . Saying that the universe is based on "ludicrous assumptions" is a huge understatement.

Edited by GDL Rahsan, 26 February 2012 - 08:44 AM.

[Catamount]

Commander Elias Vaughn, on 26 February 2012 - 08:34 AM, said:

60 feet, 200 feet, and 300 feet which are powered by fusion-based plasma reactors which also double as their warhead. The measure isn't what's consistent with the real world, though, but what's consistent with the universe it exists in. Not to mention the actual, printed figures given in books which're still canon. If we measured everything against what would be possible in real life, then half the things that happen in Star Trek would be impossible.

If anything in Trek is absolutely not possible or able to be rationalized, then sure, and we WOULD discount certain Trek technological displays, like the Warp 10 shuttle in Voy Threshold.

There has been plenty of discussion here about discounting or adjusting things that just simply wouldn't work, because, as I've said before, if you don't assume real-world rules to apply, then you assume all analysis is meaningless anyways.

Why does 40k get to be immune to that when we're willing to apply that to other franchises? If I and others are willing to scale-up EVE power figures on the grounds that they seem impossible with observation (an argument eventually retracted), why does 40k get to be immune to the same consistency checks?

Can you rationalize away the fact that this source book is claiming a nuclear warhead vastly bigger than the actual torpedo is inside the torpedo?

If you can't, and your argument is "it doesn't matter, and nothing in the real world matters", well then why assume a "gigaton" in 40k is equal to one in Trek? Why assume 40k weapons would have any effect? Why assume Trek ships wouldn't instantly break 40k physics and turn every ship in the 40k universe into a banana split?

If the real world is no longer a constraint, then suddenly nothing is true anymore with any degree of certainty, and therefore, there is no analysis, ergo, we can't have this discussion.



Look, I get the canon argument, and in any other situation, I'd agree, but in a VS debate, it's multiple canons of many franchises, and you have to have some way to translate one universe to the next, and without real-world rules, I don't see how that can be done.

Edited by Catamount, 26 February 2012 - 08:43 AM.

[Catamount]

Actually, I retract one of the previous statements. As a Trekky, I'm a nitpicker (and Trek usually gets it worst of all from me, especially Voyager), so if I see something in any franchise's canon that I absolutely cannot rationalize, I usually do assume it to be a mistake by the writers.

Like when Halo gets the density of tungsten and iron wrong for their MAC rounds (was it this thread we discussed that, or the other?). I just say "nope, they were wrong; they made a mistake"

[Commander Elias Vaughn]

Yes you can, because you can judge something based on the effects it produces. If the Death Star blows up a planet then it needs to produce a certain amount of force to accomplish that feat. Whatever the minimum amount of force it needs to accomplish that feat is the bare minimum firepower that it possesses. How it accomplishes that feat doesn't matter, only that it can.

So does it matter how Starfleet, the Imperium, the Galactic Empire, etc can do certain things? No. All that matters is that they can do something, and we can measure and compare those effects. If we're not comparing these organizations based on their observed capabilities, as well as what we're specifically told about what they can do in the established canon for each universe, then we're not comparing them at all but alternate fan fiction versions.

So how can the Imperium make a 610 gigaton 300 foot torpedo? I don't have a clue. But they can, and they can also apparently make ships which can take those impacts directly to their hull and keep on going (Hey, their hulls are supposedly made out of a material called adamantium, after all. I find it hard to believe that they just made that word up out of nothing. They obviously lifted the name from somewhere else, and they picked that particular word for a reason).

[Commander Elias Vaughn]

As for Threshold, it was declared noncanonical. They even made a point of making sure the audience knew it when Tom Paris outright said in a later episode that he's never flown at Warp 10.

[Commander Elias Vaughn]

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Look, I get the canon argument, and in any other situation, I'd agree, but in a VS debate, it's multiple canons of many franchises, and you have to have some way to translate one universe to the next, and without real-world rules, I don't see how that can be done.

And that can be done without disregarding what's canonical for each universe. Otherwise what's the point of comparing them in a vs thread if you're not going to actually take the canon versions? If you're not discussing the canon versions, then you may as well not even bother to have the discussion to begin with, because you're certainly not talking about the actual universes which are supposed to be the subject of discussion. For instance...

The Descent, Part 2: The Enterprise-D flew into a star's corona to escape a rogue Borg ship. The sun's corona is so dangerous that the rogue Borg ship didn't fly in after the Enterprise, which was only able to survive there because of the metaphasic shielding developed by Dr. Reyga. Shielding which only protects against a star's corona and nothing else. And even then, they were only able to survive for a short time before their shields were depleted and they had to exit the corona. But neither the regular shields of the Enterprise-D nor the shields of the Borg ship were able to withstand the corona and, under normal circumstances, it's impossible for either ship to survive in the corona of a star.

Now contrast that to an Imperial ship which flew into a star's corona to avoid detection by a Chaos ship and happily stayed there for over 60 hours without any hint that they ever had any problem. The Chaos ship they were avoiding had actually left after about 40 hours, but they stayed hidden in the stars corona an extra 20 hours just to be on the safe side. And we're not even talking about a warship, but a merchant freighter here. If the shields on a merchant freighter are that tough, how much more powerful are those on a destroyer, a cruiser, or a battleship? How much more damage can a battleship, which'll have four void shields to the freighters one, be able to take?

That's a feat you can hang your hat on, which maintains canon for both universes, and on which you can measure differences. The Star Trek ships couldn't survive a stars corona while the Imperial freighter handled it just fine. That indicates that Imperial shield strengths are several magnitudes greater than those of Star Trek ships. And that's just one example.

Edited by Commander Elias Vaughn, 26 February 2012 - 09:02 AM.

[Catamount]

Vaughn, you're making my point for me. No one with any amount of brains and sanity assumes the Death Star to be a DET weapon, anymore than we assume the majority of the firepower in the DS9 TDiC fleet to be DET, because that's impossible.

It may not matter how a franchise does something, as long as what they do isn't completely impossible.


You claim we should just go by canonically stated effects? Well you just threw the laws of physics out the window, so you've just invalided the very meaning of the word "effect". So now I no longer have any basis to judge what a 40k torpedo would do to a Trek ship. What? It's 610 gigatons? Well that might mean something in the sense of physics, but since we've just thrown that out the window, such a stated yield now has no meaning, whatsoever.

Maybe it would obliterate the ship; maybe it would turn it into a chocolate chip cookie with Ford sedans for chocolate chips. Maybe it would make the ship grow stronger. I don't know. Do you?

Edited by Catamount, 26 February 2012 - 09:08 AM.

[Catamount]

It also means we have to accept silly things like the constant size-shifting of the USS Defiant.

Okay, so if we assume that, that means Trek ships can spontaneously grow and become bigger, ergo, Starfleet would just develop that tech, whatever it is, make 1m long ships, and have them spontaneously grow to be the size of solar systems. 40k gets wiped out.


You see what happens when we don't have useful constraints anymore?


Also, when was Threshold retconned? I know Braga stated it to be a bad episode, but I don't believe it was ever retracted.

Edited by Catamount, 26 February 2012 - 09:02 AM.

[Commander Elias Vaughn]

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You see what happens when we don't have useful constraints anymore?

That's only an issue when someone's completely lacking in common sense. Obviously the Defiant doesn't shift in size and that's an issue with the special effects. That you use that as an example, though, proves just how silly this whole notion is.

Quote

You claim we should just go by canonically stated effects? Well you just threw the laws of physics out the window, so you've just invalided the very meaning of the word "effect". So now I no longer have any basis to judge what a 40k torpedo would do to a Trek ship. What? It's 610 gigatons? Well that might mean something in the sense of physics, but since we've just thrown that out the window, such a stated yield now has no meaning, whatsoever.

So you're claiming, then, that the Death Star didn't in fact blow up Alderaan? Because I've watched Star Wars and I'm pretty sure it did. Just like I'm sure the Essene hid out in the corona of a star in one of the Eisenhorn books.

You claim you have no basis to judge what effect a 40k torpedo would have on a Star Trek ship? Let's see: photon torpedoes are approximately 64 megatons. We've seen Star Trek ships blown up very spectacularly after being struck by half-a-dozen photon torpedoes. 40k torpedoes are 610 gigatons. 610,000 > 64 x 6, therefore the effect is that the Star Trek ship blows up a bit more spectacularly.

Seems simple enough to me.

[GDL Rahsan]

I know that you too are caught up in your discussion here but remember folks there is an edit button for us to not double or triple post so start using it.

[Catamount]

Commander Elias Vaughn, on 26 February 2012 - 09:13 AM, said:

That's only an issue when someone's completely lacking in common sense. Obviously the Defiant doesn't shift in size and that's an issue with the special effects. That you use that as an example, though, proves just how silly this whole notion is.

"Common sense" isn't an argument, nor is it a standard for judgement, because the term doesn't actually mean anything.

By what logical standard do you claim Warhammer 40k can fit a warhead into their torpedo that's vastly larger than the torpedo itself, but that the Defiant can't magically change size?

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So you're claiming, then, that the Death Star didn't in fact blow up Alderaan? Because I've watched Star Wars and I'm pretty sure it did.

Nope; I'm not claiming any such thing, anymore than I'm claiming the TDiC fleet didn't obliterate a third of the crust of a planet in a single volley.

Quote

You claim you have no basis to judge what effect a 40k torpedo would have on a Star Trek ship? Let's see: photon torpedoes are approximately 64 megatons. We've seen Star Trek ships blown up very spectacularly after being struck by half-a-dozen photon torpedoes. 40k torpedoes are 610 gigatons. 610,000 > 64 x 6, therefore the effect is that the Star Trek ship blows up a bit more spectacularly.

That means a lot to a physicist, but you just claimed the laws of physics have no meaning, so therefore those statements have no meaning.



Edit: Doesn't the fact that twenty ships averaging heavy-cruiser range for capability in Trek entirely made a third of the crust of a planet go away in one two-second volley mean they match or outstrip 40k for firepower anyways?

I usually discount that for ship engagements for all sorts of reasons, but Vaughn, according to your own standard here, that has to be included absolutely, therefore, Trek ships still have at least as much firepower, and still have better weapon range and sensor capabilities by far.


You can't have it both ways here If we include everything, no matter how ridiculous, as being absolute, with no caveats or room for adjustment based on consistency or reasonability, then that means Trek still wins, because Trek has claimed silly overpowered things too.

Edited by Catamount, 26 February 2012 - 09:31 AM.

[guardiandashi]

Commander Elias Vaughn, on 26 February 2012 - 09:13 AM, said:

That's only an issue when someone's completely lacking in common sense. Obviously the Defiant doesn't shift in size and that's an issue with the special effects. That you use that as an example, though, proves just how silly this whole notion is.



So you're claiming, then, that the Death Star didn't in fact blow up Alderaan? Because I've watched Star Wars and I'm pretty sure it did. Just like I'm sure the Essene hid out in the corona of a star in one of the Eisenhorn books.

You claim you have no basis to judge what effect a 40k torpedo would have on a Star Trek ship? Let's see: photon torpedoes are approximately 64 megatons. We've seen Star Trek ships blown up very spectacularly after being struck by half-a-dozen photon torpedoes. 40k torpedoes are 610 gigatons. 610,000 > 64 x 6, therefore the effect is that the Star Trek ship blows up a bit more spectacularly.

Seems simple enough to me.

if you don't want to be civil we can always go with answer B to warhammer 40k.

Q gets irritated with the empire, and snaps his fingers "poof" the empire of man never existed and never will exist. discussion over, (and yes Q level entities have done this in star trek)

[Catamount]

I think Vaughn is being civil, just a bit silly with his double standard for reasonability

I certainly haven't taken anything he's said as a slight.


Besides, even if he was implying that I personally don't have "common sense", I'd take that as a compliment, since it's "neither common nor sense"

Edited by Catamount, 26 February 2012 - 09:42 AM.

[GDL Rahsan]

I have to agree with Catamount here, I didn't sense any type of hostility in Vaughn posts, but then again sensing emotions in a post on an online forums is kinda hard you know

[Catamount]

Yeah, the whole "intent doesn't always translate across text" has started more than a few bitter fights on forums I've been on

I've discussed with Vaughn before however, and he's never had a habit of being uncivil.


Edit: As long as someone doesn't make a Galaxy vs Sovereign thread on these forums, I think we'll be okay there

Seriously, I've seen everything short of riots erupt over that topic!

Edited by Catamount, 26 February 2012 - 09:49 AM.

[Strum Wealh]

guardiandashi, on 26 February 2012 - 09:30 AM, said:

if you don't want to be civil we can always go with answer B to warhammer 40k.

Q gets irritated with the empire, and snaps his fingers "poof" the empire of man never existed and never will exist. discussion over, (and yes Q level entities have done this in star trek)

IMO, both Cmdr. Vaughn and Catamount have been rather civil.

Also, as far as "Answer B" goes, I thought anything above a Kardashev Type III civilization (anyone god-like and/or time-active, for example) and certain special examples (Chuck Norris, Goku, etc) were generally to be excluded from the versus matches?

[guardiandashi]

mabie I overreacted but I was picking up on an impression.

1 warhammer is the wins and nothing anyone can say to the contrary matters
2 even if the physics says this doesn't work, this old information that says BLAH that on one else can find ...

oh never mind

I will say that the way he phrased the arguements irritated me, it read as excessively fanboy and condencending to me, re a IP I have never cared that much for.

edit spelling

I will say that as has been mentioned warhammer IP irritates me because they routinely claim "magical, contridictory performance out of "tech" with no justification. its IMO the ultimate expression of "the rule of cool"

wheras other ip's that I like more:
robotech, honorverse, star trek, star wars, etc at least TRY to be internally consistant, warhammer 40k doesn't even seem to do that IMO

Edited by guardiandashi, 26 February 2012 - 09:56 AM.

[Catamount]

Strum Wealh, on 26 February 2012 - 09:50 AM, said:

IMO, both Cmdr. Vaughn and Catamount have been rather civil.

Also, as far as "Answer B" goes, I thought anything above a Kardashev Type III civilization (anyone god-like and/or time-active, for example) and certain special examples (Chuck Norris, Goku, etc) were generally to be excluded from the versus matches?

That was the impression I get, but then, how far does that go?

That mean MacGyver has to be excluded too?! D:

[GDL Rahsan]

Well Guardian you did say yourself that you didn't care much about the WH40K IP so you can't exclude that his opinion might have been right if you havn't already known about the info. Oh and I am pretty sure you can find those old information, the Space Hulk board game have created a hardcore cult of their own and I am pretty sure fi you go to any of their websites they can supply you with the info you need to know and how canon are they to the main universe.


EDIT: So I guess we will exclude Sly Marbo too since he is the WH40K answer to Rambo.

Edited by GDL Rahsan, 26 February 2012 - 09:59 AM.

[Strum Wealh]

Catamount, on 26 February 2012 - 09:52 AM, said:

That was the impression I get, but then, how far does that go?

That mean MacGyver has to be excluded too?! D:

Quote

In 1964, Kardashev defined three levels of civilizations, based on the order of magnitude of the amount of power available to them:

Type I: "technological level close to the level presently [1964] attained on earth, with energy consumption at ≈4×10^19 erg/sec. Guillermo A. Lemarchand stated this as "a level 'near' contemporary terrestrial civilization with an energy capability equivalent to the solar insolation on Earth, between 10 to the 16 power and 10 to the 17 power Watts."

Type II: "a civilization capable of harnessing the energy radiated by its own star (for example, the stage of successful construction of a "Dyson sphere"); energy consumption at ≈4×10^33 erg/sec. Lemarchand stated this as "a civilization capable of utilizing and channeling the entire radiation output of its star. The energy utilization would then be comparable to the luminosity of our Sun, about 4 x 10 to the 26 power Watts."

Type III: "a civilization in possession of energy on the scale of its own galaxy, with energy consumption at ≈4×10^44 erg/sec." Lemarchand stated this as "a civilization with access to the power comparable to the luminosity of the entire Milky Way galaxy, about 4 x 10 to the 37 power Watts."

Has MacGyver himself, any other individual member of his civilization, or any organized group (from rag-tag team to nation-state) of said civilization exhibited qualities or characteristics that would be indicative or characteristic of a civilization with capabilities in excess of a Type III?