91 replies to this topic

[LordNothing]

MechaBattler, on 17 April 2019 - 10:24 AM, said:

There's such a thing as too much technobabble handwaving Bombast. Frankly it's more interesting to see ships fighting quasi realistic battles.

case in point: star trek voyager.

also space battles in tng felt like an episode of dragonball z, where they would stand still and insult each other for 40 minutes and then have a quick fight. they fixed that up towards the end of deep space nine, which upgraded to star wars style ww2 naval combat.

[Bombast]

LordNothing, on 17 April 2019 - 08:04 PM, said:

their main weapons are pretty much point defence cannons (think phalanx system that the navy uses) to take out missiles and for cqb, railguns to be used directly against other ships in cqb, and missiles for long range. the missiles can be either plasma or nuclear (both are used).

improvised kinetic weapons are sometimes used by the belters. they also did use a laser in the last season but that was a retrofitted comms laser that was never meant for combat. in the latter books they get antimatter weapons (that's at least 3 seasons out if the show stays on that long).

I guess that's a no. I suppose X-Ray bombs would be a bit OP, if the combat is as I recall.

Edited by Bombast, 22 April 2019 - 05:50 PM.

[Khobai]

space above and beyond handled space combat fairly realistically too.

its a lesser known series, but I highly recommend it, it was basically WW2 in space.

[Y E O N N E]

If it has fighters, it's not at all realistic space combat.

[LordNothing]

Bombast, on 22 April 2019 - 04:03 PM, said:

I guess that's a no. I suppose X-Ray bombs would be a bit OP, if the combat is as I recall.

you mean like bomb pumped lasers? that would be cool.
honestly though lasers are really inefficient no matter how they are pumped.

Khobai, on 22 April 2019 - 04:44 PM, said:

space above and beyond handled space combat fairly realistically too.

its a lesser known series, but I highly recommend it, it was basically WW2 in space.

i remember that. mostly because they had r. lee ermay on the pilot. i really dont remember anything else from the show.

Y E O N N E, on 22 April 2019 - 05:27 PM, said:

If it has fighters, it's not at all realistic space combat.

starfuries!

[Khobai]

Y E O N N E, on 22 April 2019 - 05:27 PM, said:

If it has fighters, it's not at all realistic space combat.

yeah but if they made movies about invisible xray lasers that dont make sounds it would be boring as !@#$

so its as realistic as youre going to get in a tv show

[Mystere]

LordNothing, on 22 April 2019 - 06:01 PM, said:

starfuries!

Hell yeah!

Khobai, on 22 April 2019 - 04:44 PM, said:

space above and beyond handled space combat fairly realistically too.

its a lesser known series, but I highly recommend it, it was basically WW2 in space.

My problem with that show was that pilots also served as ground-based grunts. What a waste of expensive resources.

[Bombast]

LordNothing, on 22 April 2019 - 06:01 PM, said:

you mean like bomb pumped lasers? that would be cool.
honestly though lasers are really inefficient no matter how they are pumped.

The idea is kind of laser like, but way more primitive.

Basically, nuclear reactions in the absence of an atmosphere don't 'explode,' they emit tremendous amounts of energy in the form of X-Rays. So you take a big nuke and you shove it in a dense tube with one end plugged, then cram that into a rudimentary rocket that's sole purpose is to get the damn thing off your weapons platform before you fire it. You aim the open bit at the enemy ship and set the bomb off. The dense shell fails, of course, but in the short time it exists it will focus quite a bit of the energy in a singular direction, making a crude, one use X-Ray beam.

I can't find the source at the moment, but they estimated such a device would be pretty stupidly effective, basically coring out any ship it would be fired at, frying any electronics that may have survived the actual X-Ray hit (Which could potentially punch through several feet of steel), and potentially roasting the crew alive if they somehow maintained atmosphere.

All theoretical math work, of course, since nukes function differently in space than they do in an atmosphere and it's not like the US has been regularly testing fusion devices in stellar space.

Khobai, on 22 April 2019 - 06:12 PM, said:

yeah but if they made movies about invisible xray lasers that dont make sounds it would be boring as !@#$

There are things so much more satisfying than realistic lasers, like hosing enemy ships down with rapid fire rail guns or trading literal broadside cannons from the safety of your flying cathedral.

Edited by Bombast, 22 April 2019 - 06:54 PM.

[LordNothing]

Bombast, on 22 April 2019 - 06:51 PM, said:

The idea is kind of laser like, but way more primitive.

Basically, nuclear reactions in the absence of an atmosphere don't 'explode,' they emit tremendous amounts of energy in the form of X-Rays. So you take a big nuke and you shove it in a dense tube with one end plugged, then cram that into a rudimentary rocket that's sole purpose is to get the damn thing off your weapons platform before you fire it. You aim the open bit at the enemy ship and set the bomb off. The dense shell fails, of course, but in the short time it exists it will focus quite a bit of the energy in a singular direction, making a crude, one use X-Ray beam.

I can't find the source at the moment, but they estimated such a device would be pretty stupidly effective, basically coring out any ship it would be fired at, frying any electronics that may have survived the actual X-Ray hit (Which could potentially punch through several feet of steel), and potentially roasting the crew alive if they somehow maintained atmosphere.

All theoretical math work, of course, since nukes function differently in space than they do in an atmosphere and it's not like the US has been regularly testing fusion devices in stellar space.



There are things so much more satisfying than realistic lasers, like hosing enemy ships down with rapid fire rail guns or trading literal broadside cannons from the safety of your flying cathedral.

i believe it was part of sdi back in the 80s. they had a lot of cool ideas.

Edited by LordNothing, 22 April 2019 - 07:00 PM.

[Y E O N N E]

Khobai, on 22 April 2019 - 06:12 PM, said:

yeah but if they made movies about invisible xray lasers that dont make sounds it would be boring as !@#$

so its as realistic as youre going to get in a tv show

I can think of many ways it wouldn't be boring using visuals alone, but there are also low-key ways to bend or break the rules without going full-on "physics and logistics don't apply at all, ess my deeeeeeeeeee!" with space fighters, e.g. muffling the sounds or restricting them to only what you would hear from the inside.

Picture: launching a missile, target enacts countermeasures, but instead of going for kinetic kill the missile detonates in a nuclear fireball to pump an X-ray laser blast which then shatters the target's stern section into a million tiny, glittering fragments in a flash of light as the beam tears through it faster than the speed of sound through the hull.

Or, if you want to be more crude, that nuclear blast is driving a shaped charge so you get a bright lance of slag moving at relativistic speeds, an effective particle beam.

That, sir, is some extraordinarily cool stuff. Cooler than "pew pew laser beam!"

[YueFei]

Bombast, on 17 April 2019 - 12:07 PM, said:

Do they ever use X-Ray bombs in Expanse? I can't get past episode 3 myself, don't know if they allow the use of nukes in space in universe.

?? They used a nuke in the very first episode, the Canterbury gets nuked.

Not that the Expanse is necessarily going for hard sci-fi, but being able to feature zero-G situations in-universe leads to some pretty cool sequences and VFX shots.

Babylon 5 flirted occasionally with zero-G, but their much more limited budget prevented them from using it as often.

Starfuries do behave as they should in zero-G, but it's not as if Starfuries make sense as a practical space combat platform. The slow-firing, low-velocity bolts seem rather implausible... it's hard to imagine them actually being able to reliably hit other targets maneuvering at 20+ g's or more. Then again, sci-fi VFX typically vastly under-represents the actual speeds and distances you'd expect from space-faring vehicles.

[slide]

If any of you want some real hard sci-fi story telling, check out the "Lost Fleet" series by Jack Campbell. Great story but I don't recall any "hand waving" of physics in the entire 11 books (2 series, 6 and 5 books). And we are talking large fleet actions which take place across whole solar systems at relativistic speeds, including holding communications down to the speed of light and the problems that entails. There is of course the usually sci-fi trope of jump points near stars and later jump gates as well but they are not instantaneous either, but the fleet actions use as real physics as any thing I have ever seen or read.

For example a primary weapon used is actually the equivalent of 19th century canons and grape shot. "Whats a bunch of ball bearings going to do?", you say. Well imagine the impact of a small lump of steel travelling at 0.2c hitting a target travelling at 0.2c in the opposite direction. Well these books explain it well.

[Y E O N N E]

YueFei, on 22 April 2019 - 08:28 PM, said:

?? They used a nuke in the very first episode, the Canterbury gets nuked.

Not that the Expanse is necessarily going for hard sci-fi, but being able to feature zero-G situations in-universe leads to some pretty cool sequences and VFX shots.

Babylon 5 flirted occasionally with zero-G, but their much more limited budget prevented them from using it as often.

Starfuries do behave as they should in zero-G, but it's not as if Starfuries make sense as a practical space combat platform. The slow-firing, low-velocity bolts seem rather implausible... it's hard to imagine them actually being able to reliably hit other targets maneuvering at 20+ g's or more. Then again, sci-fi VFX typically vastly under-represents the actual speeds and distances you'd expect from space-faring vehicles.

The problem with fighters is that you are wasting resources to support a pilot and the necessary ability to said pilot and his vehicle. More missiles is always the better choice, fighters are simple rule-of-cool.

[dwwolf]

Y E O N N E, on 22 April 2019 - 08:03 PM, said:

I can think of many ways it wouldn't be boring using visuals alone, but there are also low-key ways to bend or break the rules without going full-on "physics and logistics don't apply at all, ess my deeeeeeeeeee!" with space fighters, e.g. muffling the sounds or restricting them to only what you would hear from the inside.

Picture: launching a missile, target enacts countermeasures, but instead of going for kinetic kill the missile detonates in a nuclear fireball to pump an X-ray laser blast which then shatters the target's stern section into a million tiny, glittering fragments in a flash of light as the beam tears through it faster than the speed of sound through the hull.

Or, if you want to be more crude, that nuclear blast is driving a shaped charge so you get a bright lance of slag moving at relativistic speeds, an effective particle beam.

That, sir, is some extraordinarily cool stuff. Cooler than "pew pew laser beam!"

The nuclear EFP has been referred to as a Casaba Howitzer. Speeds are calculated to be in the 1000 km/s.

[Y E O N N E]

dwwolf, on 22 April 2019 - 09:07 PM, said:

The nuclear EFP has been referred to as a Casaba Howitzer. Speeds are calculated to be in the 1000 km/s.

Yup.

The US toyed with the idea of using them against fixed installations and large naval vessels; certain details are still classified from what I've been able to gather.

Everybody always says realism is boring, but they don't have any idea man. They just don't know how mind-bendingly amazing some of the stuff we can actually do really is.

[Khobai]

Y E O N N E, on 22 April 2019 - 08:03 PM, said:

I can think of many ways it wouldn't be boring using visuals alone, but there are also low-key ways to bend or break the rules without going full-on "physics and logistics don't apply at all, ess my deeeeeeeeeee!" with space fighters, e.g. muffling the sounds or restricting them to only what you would hear from the inside.

Picture: launching a missile, target enacts countermeasures, but instead of going for kinetic kill the missile detonates in a nuclear fireball to pump an X-ray laser blast which then shatters the target's stern section into a million tiny, glittering fragments in a flash of light as the beam tears through it faster than the speed of sound through the hull.

Or, if you want to be more crude, that nuclear blast is driving a shaped charge so you get a bright lance of slag moving at relativistic speeds, an effective particle beam.

That, sir, is some extraordinarily cool stuff. Cooler than "pew pew laser beam!"

no thats really boring. just a bunch of ships that cant even see eachother exploding for no apparent reason. with no sound or anything. realistic space battles are incredibly boring thats exactly why movies dont make them 100% realistic.

thats why anyone doing a decent space battle scene in a show or movie always has both fleets in CQC firing tons of weapons at eachother. with huge visible lasers and loud explosions. because its what the people want.

Y E O N N E, on 22 April 2019 - 08:03 PM, said:

The problem with fighters is that you are wasting resources to support a pilot and the necessary ability to said pilot and his vehicle. More missiles is always the better choice, fighters are simple rule-of-cool.

youre falsely assuming you need a pilot. humans are feeble, especially in space since the human body cant handle acceleration very well as well as needing life support, getting rid of the human element is kindve an obvious thing.

drone fighters actually make a ton of sense IMO. especially if they can enter atmospheres and attack ground targets as well. you also dont have to worry about getting them back home theyre expendable.

Edited by Khobai, 22 April 2019 - 11:32 PM.

[Bombast]

Y E O N N E, on 22 April 2019 - 09:14 PM, said:

Everybody always says realism is boring, but they don't have any idea man. They just don't know how mind-bendingly amazing some of the stuff we can actually do really is.

It's not necessarily that real stuff is boring, it's that there's a hard limit on what is real, and expecting everything to play to that would result in a lot of sammy boring stuff.

But when you allow for movies to do unrealistic stuff, you allow for a lot more variety.

Khobai, on 22 April 2019 - 11:20 PM, said:

youre falsely assuming you need a pilot. humans are feeble, especially in space since the human body cant handle acceleration very well as well as needing life support, getting rid of the human element is kindve an obvious thing.

drone fighters actually make a ton of sense IMO. especially if they can enter atmospheres and attack ground targets as well. you also dont have to worry about getting them back home theyre expendable.

We've seen in recent years that drones have problems. A proper drone can be pretty easily jammed by a foe of equivalent technical skill, and even hijacked. An autonomous robot is a philosophical and practical nightmare.

[Weeny Machine]

Anyone "in The Know" Heard Anything Regarding Pgi's License Renewal?

[YueFei]

Y E O N N E, on 22 April 2019 - 08:57 PM, said:

The problem with fighters is that you are wasting resources to support a pilot and the necessary ability to said pilot and his vehicle. More missiles is always the better choice, fighters are simple rule-of-cool.

I agree that fighters in space are not practical, but what you just said is not exactly the reason. Otherwise you could say the same about fighters in real life. It's not about wasting resources on supporting a pilot and his plane. There's a reason we don't just spam missiles despite us having plenty of long-ranged missiles. Differences in propulsion technology between fighters and missiles (jet engines vs rocket motors), difference in environment, planes being able to loft missiles longer distances by launching them up at higher altitudes with thinner atmosphere, AI still not being up-to-snuff, etc... these make it worthwhile to support a pilot and his plane, rather than being a waste.

The problem with space fighters is really that they're operating in totally the same environment, with the same propulsion systems, so there's no advantage conferred. Instead, you can just spam missiles, and even without VLS cells to simultaneously launch them all, you can just have the earlier missiles cruise and allow later missiles to catch up, and get them all to time-on-target to overwhelm the opponent's point-defense.

[Phyrce]

Anjian, on 15 April 2019 - 07:29 PM, said:

Microsoft 2020 is a very different company from Microsoft in 2002. FASA digital licenses are just dead weight and no longer has any bearing in their corporate mission and objectives. I won't be surprised if they sell it to someone else, and its not likely to be worth much either now.

I won't be surprised either if PGI tries to buy the entire digital rights to Mechwarrior.

Microsoft is not one company but several. They have own several game studios and developers that they publish for. You speak of corporate mission and objectives with literally no concept of the company structure.

I wouldn't be surprised if they are trying to get PGI to put MW5 on the new iteration of the xbox via their streaming service to fluff content. I can make up random statements with no basis in reality too.