Two things: 1. Flak burst Vs. Shield glare; 2. Weak shields

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Mr. Oragahn
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Two things: 1. Flak burst Vs. Shield glare; 2. Weak shields

Post by Mr. Oragahn » Fri Dec 29, 2006 11:28 pm

I was reading that lenghty versus at SB.com. A very nice read, really, with plenty of stuff about Stargate.

There's that claim on page 21.
JC, Interrupted wrote:LAATs are definitely shielded; you see plenty of shield flashes when Dooku's escorts are shooting at the LAAT in Episode 2.
Ladies and gentlemen. Let's breathe and assimilate those words.

Ok.
I'm just plain tired of that BS, of people pointing at flak bursts and claiming - with a straight face - that those are shield glares.
Of course, supported by another expected resident warsie, and probably silently approved by the whole classical wagon you certainly know.

Aren't they realizing that those explosions occur at non constant distances from the hull, sometimes very close, sometimes meters away from the ship?

We've seen similar explosions occuring tens of meters away from LAAT formations when the CIS droids were firing from the ground. Same explosions sometimes occuring deadly close to the troop nacelles, sometimes so far that you wondered what happened to the bolt in question. I mean, they actually poped everywhere, rather randomly, with a great magnitude of variance in the distances between said explosions and the closest republican ships.

There was that same issue with the case of the Trade Federation warship firing at Padmé's ship, years earlier.

I suppose that these droids in TMP were blown away by shield flares, because you know, the ship's shield just happened to be hugging the droids when they were hit. I mean, sure, it's not like there's been bolts literally missing the hull by a few millimeters, while others happily exploding around a damn bus away from the yatch! Back and forth.
Oh, btw, those droids were obviously vaporized (?) by kiloton level shots. Huh, I don't know, I'm just looking at the size of the TF cannons firing at the nubian ship after all. They're quite big, and the Neimoidians clearly wanted to destroy that ship.
Ah, wait, those droids had kiloton level shields. Stupid me. Not strong enough though. Too bad.
Or, better, now they'll quickly modify their favorite theory so a bolt can hit a shield, but not be totally absorbed. Like a varying small fraction of the bolt will still pass through. Of course! A modification that they will probably forget as soon as necessary when facing evidence of bolts stopped dead, or when dealing with ships which pack some nasty firepower.

Well, that's not very new in fact, we probably heard that one like a million times before. But you got to wonder how it can fit with their sink tank model. They'll gladly remind you that unless you've completely filled a shield's "tank", it will still function perfectly. That's part of the uber nature of their shields. Which doesn't scheme well with all that shit above.

So what? those shields have a non defined volume that constantly changes rather randomly multiple times within a second, so one bolt can brush against the hull and continue on its trajectory, unhampered, and be lost in the confines of space until it dissipates, when another one can fly meters away from the hull and suddenly explode for no apparent reason (and let's not get started on what creates those explosions in space).

Needless to say that this is arguing for such a poor shield design, that stops much more fire than necessary, but that is not even constant at it, as shield range jumps from largely overgenerous to murderously close, say totally absent, within a microsecond. :rolleyes:

Ah, maybe that's the fabulous *** volumetric shields ***.

Isn't it easier to say that it's just a timed explosion and that the weapon can deal damage via concussion? Like, flak?

It's just the most simple explanation over that hazardous shapeshifting vibrating shield after all, and Occam would be happy at it.

The answer is probably simple. Those flak bursts are just too damn weak for their kiloton level cannons I suppose. So it's better to brush the whole thing away with magical shields that absorb unseen energy and ditch it once more with a fancy invisible trick of the same vein. Nevermind evidence and logic, of course. Be they damned.


Besides - the second point - the LAAT's supposedly "strong" shields (not disputing the existence of shields, just their power) have been downed by the geonosian fighter's water cannons (look at the damage done at the sand dunes or the rocky cliffs to see what I mean).

Since this already discounts even 1-ton-of-TNT level weaponry, this can only leave the superb following theory:

The LAAT's shields were already left at 0.00000001% when the firing started.

Oh, wait, considering that they work on the sink tank model, and since they were visibly not hit since several seconds, if not minutes, and considering the rates at which they supposedly bleed off energy (I mean, like hundreds of kilotons per second, if not megatons per second), what's the excuse that says that the shields were so weak when *cough* hit *cough* by those geonosian firecrackers?

It should be time one of them actually accepts to honestly defend those funny claims, by providing logical arguments.

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Post by AnonymousRedShirtEnsign » Sat Dec 30, 2006 12:36 am

Some people aren't capable of objective analysis, it's just that simple. As for shielded gunboats, GT TLs, and kT fighters they exist, just not in George Lucas's Star Wars. I'm wondering if the people who make these claims have actually seen a Star Wars film recently.

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Post by GStone » Sat Dec 30, 2006 12:47 am

[dusts off warsie, sycophant hat and puts it on]

You want a logical argument? Read Wong's page on frequency. Matter is just made up of energy and ships in Star Wars have energy shields. That's why the shields change shape.

And, it's not a varying small amount that gets through. The shields were clearly down, as per the dialogue that says the generator was hit.

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Post by Mr. Oragahn » Sat Dec 30, 2006 1:45 am

GStone wrote:[dusts off warsie, sycophant hat and puts it on]

You want a logical argument? Read Wong's page on frequency. Matter is just made up of energy and ships in Star Wars have energy shields. That's why the shields change shape.
Is there a link by any chance?
And, it's not a varying small amount that gets through. The shields were clearly down, as per the dialogue that says the generator was hit.
Hey you! What are you talking about?!
What case is that?

Ah, there's also that whole pursuit in AOTC between Obi-Wan and Jango.
What's your opinion? A rain of bolts hitting a kind of bubble shield of unfixed range, or a rain of flak flooding the fighter's close perimeter and progressively wearing its shields off?

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Post by GStone » Sat Dec 30, 2006 3:24 am

Mr. Oragahn wrote:Is there a link by any chance?
http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/Tec ... ience.html
Hey you! What are you talking about?!
What case is that?
The yachte v TF ships scene, of course.
Ah, there's also that whole pursuit in AOTC between Obi-Wan and Jango.
What's your opinion? A rain of bolts hitting a kind of bubble shield of unfixed range, or a rain of flak flooding the fighter's close perimeter and progressively wearing its shields off?
I'll need to rewatch the scene and get back to you. It's been a long time since I saw it. The PT sucks. Long live the OT! For it is the only real story of Star Wars! All hail ESB!!!!!!!!! The PT suffered from crappy writting blah blah blah Saxton should have been more involved with the films; he's basically writing SW tech now blah blah blah the ewoks got switched with gungans and they still suck blah blah blah the underground outtakes of the gungan/ewok orgy are gonna make Lucas much more money than he's made to date with SW blah blah blah I think I'll make fun of KT and KJA now blah blah blah...

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Post by AnonymousRedShirtEnsign » Sat Dec 30, 2006 6:07 am

I thought a Warsie (fake or not) wouldn't ever bring up TESB, since it gives us crappy Imperial sensors, shields, firepower, etc.

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Post by Nonamer » Sat Dec 30, 2006 6:26 am

I'm not surprised at all by the stupidity. If you've been deluded enough to believe in the ICS for the last 3 or 4 years, why not be deluded enough to believe any random made-up garbage relating to anything? Both SB.com and SDN are in the gutter at these debates. At least we have this site to debate reasonably.

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Post by Jedi Master Spock » Sat Dec 30, 2006 7:47 am

Easy up on the sarcasm and vitriol please.

In all seriousness, it's very easy to forget what the scripts and novelizations say (i.e., describing flak bursts). However, it's not unusual to have pretty invisible shields present in Star Wars, so there's not too much point most of the time in arguing about which ships do and do not actually have shields available.

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Post by Trinoya » Sat Dec 30, 2006 8:04 am

I've always thought that these flak bursts were kinda of a good thing for starwars, the idea that all these gunners need to be super good shots is terribly, but if you give them a flak capability with their shots, suddenly these near hits can do some damage to shields.

But hey, if they want to take away a good thing for starwars, let them... it just means that all these 'random' sheild impacts are horrible misses because the guy isn't aiming at the hull of the ship since the shield bubble is so big and random he can simply aim anywhere and hit it lol. STORMTROOPER AIM REVEALED!

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Post by GStone » Sat Dec 30, 2006 1:33 pm

Mr. Oragahn wrote:Ah, there's also that whole pursuit in AOTC between Obi-Wan and Jango.
What's your opinion? A rain of bolts hitting a kind of bubble shield of unfixed range, or a rain of flak flooding the fighter's close perimeter and progressively wearing its shields off?
It's just asteroids getting the crap blown out of them.
AnonymousRedShirtEnsign wrote:I thought a Warsie (fake or not) wouldn't ever bring up TESB, since it gives us crappy Imperial sensors, shields, firepower, etc.
It has the best story of all of Star Wars. SDN is already full of why any apparent low level stuff is the way it is and shows what's really going on.

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Post by 2046 » Sat Dec 30, 2006 5:07 pm

To get a sense of the complexity of explanation for ICS-style shields (and thus the myriad flip-floppings available and employed by adherents), take a look at this SDN post on EU torpedoes.

In brief, some unspecified magic superconducting volumetric cloud of whatzit somehow disrupts turbolasers, absorbing the energy and instantly redirecting it around the rest of the cloud, instantly emitting it toward space.

Now, one would think that a superconducting magic cloud might inadvertently let some energy conduct toward the entire hull as the "temperature" of the magic cloud increases due to its superconductivity and absorption of hundreds of gigatons of energy, but in fact you would be mistaken in this belief.

You see, along the hull are shield projectors which disperse the magic cloud like a garden hose and yet also somehow contain it where it is desired. But in addition to emitting magic clouds and also outputting the containment system, these shield projectors take in energy from the cloud. Indeed, they suck it in like a six year old going to town on a Slurpee.

Of course, if the shield projector is simply an ultra-cold spot on the hull we could understand that a superconducting magic cloud (here for our purposes thought of as a superfluid perhaps) might lose heat both to it and to space. But then the problem becomes that if the whole ship is surrounded by a superconducting cloud of goo then it will naturally also absorb heat coming from the rest of the hull before it's ever struck by a weapon. Engines would run cold, and that really cold spot on the hull that the shield projector is supposed to be simply becomes a way to cool the rest of the hull via the superconductivity. And outbound weapons? Oh snap! Maybe the guns have to initially shoot out a little expanding cylinder of containment field ahead of them to allow bolts to escape. What's a little extra complexity between friends?

So anyway, energy is sucked into the ship by the shield generators, which have magic heat sinks nearby that instantly and with 100% efficiency draw heat away from the projector innards, and instantly and with something like 99.99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999% efficiency convert the heat into neutrinos that are then released into the void of space.

So, let's ponder the fate of a turbolaser bolt . . . we'll call him Bob . . . fired against an ISD:

1. Bob flies through space
2. Bob effortlessly penetrates the containment field keeping the superconducting magic whatzit cloud inside.
3. Bob, surrounded by the whatzit, chooses to end his own life as a suicide bomber.
4. Bob's hard radiation and raw heat are sucked into the cloud.
5. The remains of Bob are spread amongst the cloud.
6. Bob is then eaten by the shield projectors like some sort of Energy Jonah.
7. Bob attempts to attack the innards of the shield projectors, but before he can do anything he's sucked straight through them into magic heat sinks.
8. Bob, now in the magic heat sinks, finds himself being converted instantaneously into neutrinos.
9. Bob goes to the great turbolaser afterlife as a swarm of neutrinos in the sky.

Of course, according to them the same system is employed on the hull itself, which logically leads one to wonder why they have shields at all. I mean, if your hull is superconducting and energy striking it gets sucked into heat sinks and re-radiated, there's really no purpose to having shields is there? The heat sinks and neutrino radiators you've just installed to protect a complex superconducting cloud system could've just as easily been used to bolster your superconducting armor's heat dissipation ability, and without all the trouble and increased aspect.

Maybe if you just really, really hate turbolasers and want a fat cloud of extra Bob-killing around your ship then that makes sense, but otherwise why not just let the hull do it? The only explanation would be that the re-radiation of energy into space from the magic cloud itself is so significant that it's worth all the trouble, though this is dismissed by the poster linked to.

Of course, if you've got a superconducting cloud that is attempting to radiate some energy, it basically has two options . . . inward and outward. So some of the radiated energy will hit the hull and some will go into space, and what's left over will be eaten like Bob. Let's say 20% is to be radiated. That means about 10% will hit the hull, 10% will radiate outward, and 80% will be eaten. (Of course, a superconducting cloud around a superconducting hull means that more like 20% will head for the hull as the two have hot superconduction together.)

So in short, you've added fake heat capacity to the armor by drawing heat into a separate bank of heat sinks via an incredibly complicated system. You could've done this just as easily by having a really big switch between primary and secondary heat sink systems, but instead you've gone with a complicated system that makes no sense and increases how big a target you are, so that you end up grabbing extra heat that wasn't even going to do anything to you anyway.

Does that make sense to you?

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Post by GStone » Sat Dec 30, 2006 7:23 pm

Okay, calling it Bob makes me think an actual person is being flung at the ship.
2046 wrote:I mean, if your hull is superconducting and energy striking it gets sucked into heat sinks and re-radiated, there's really no purpose to having shields is there?
Ships, like many other things in life, rely on complex mechanisms to function properly...complex being system after system being used. It's like it is today with many things. It's about the level of protection and how many layers there are.
The heat sinks and neutrino radiators you've just installed to protect a complex superconducting cloud system could've just as easily been used to bolster your superconducting armor's heat dissipation ability, and without all the trouble and increased aspect.
Turbolaser/blaster technology fires plasma blasts. Plasma is a combo matter state of matter and energy. When you slow it down, you can see smoke/gas emitted from Han's blaster in the canteena when he shoots Greedo and when he blows up the comms console on the DS with the Imp blaster.
Maybe if you just really, really hate turbolasers and want a fat cloud of extra Bob-killing around your ship then that makes sense, but otherwise why not just let the hull do it?
Again, it's about layered defenses.
So in short, you've added fake heat capacity to the armor by drawing heat into a separate bank of heat sinks via an incredibly complicated system. You could've done this just as easily by having a really big switch between primary and secondary heat sink systems, but instead you've gone with a complicated system that makes no sense and increases how big a target you are, so that you end up grabbing extra heat that wasn't even going to do anything to you anyway.

Does that make sense to you?
You really can't see it, can you? By grabbing in the extra heat, it energizes the ambient electromagnetic fields floating through space (particularly those close to the hull) and makes them act like a pseudoforce field projection of heated, electromagnetic energy, which helps guide the energy of the enemy fire to the heat sinks. It's an ingenious design.

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Post by Mr. Oragahn » Sat Dec 30, 2006 10:03 pm

Bob aside, the system isn't that bad, with all that technobabble (once you replace the mocking nicknames with more serious terms). Of course, it's very complex, uses plenty of different systems which are not really explained, or could not.

But seriously, all those shields probably work on such exotic principles anyway.

The real problem, is that it's extremely complex, and yet completely fails to bring a convincing solution to cases such as the yatch attack in TPM.

You don't know where to start from, when you think about what we should actually see, frame by frame, if a bolt was to actually penetrate that volume and be absorbed. I actually would NOT expect to see any explosion, and even less explosion occuring near the hull looking like the ones occuring maters away from the same hull.

I'll come back on that cloud of fuzzy matter later on after I have checked a thing in AOTC.
Or, wait, if someone can do it for me.
Can someone check for the Jedi standing up in the passenger section of the troop transport, the one that's open on both sides?
Anakin, Obi-Wan, Mace, Yoda, Ki-Adi, etc.

Are their hairs and robes actually blown by the wind?

Can a bolt be absorbed by this cloud and yet let air pass through?
Somehow, that would fit with that duality about KE/radiation shields.

But, well, those energy absorbing shields are defined by being bubbles of matter. So if air passes through those shields, because LAATs have shields, then we're talking about funky matter that... doesn't react with other matter, such as all the gasous elements present in atmosphere, plus the dust... but reacts with matter that can explode... ah, wait, it's the matter that composes the cloud that explodes, since the bolts are in fact lasers, according to Saxton. So anyway, it's extremely reactive to photons.
Stop, this bolt = laser theory is non sense.

So we're back to funky plasma bolt that can be stopped and triggered - at a random distance, of course - to explode inside that cloud... but atmosphere particles and other gasous elements can freely move through.

So, what is that matter? Quantic matter that is... based on frequency, out of phase? What?

.../\-/\-/\-/\-

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Post by Mr. Oragahn » Sat Dec 30, 2006 10:09 pm

GStone wrote:You really can't see it, can you? By grabbing in the extra heat, it energizes the ambient electromagnetic fields floating through space (particularly those close to the hull) and makes them act like a pseudoforce field projection of heated, electromagnetic energy, which helps guide the energy of the enemy fire to the heat sinks. It's an ingenious design.
The problem doesn't lie with the intent of explaining why a bubble shield exists. Otherwise we could also mock Star Trek and so many other universes.

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Post by GStone » Sat Dec 30, 2006 10:45 pm

Mr. Oragahn wrote:Or, wait, if someone can do it for me.
Can someone check for the Jedi standing up in the passenger section of the troop transport, the one that's open on both sides?
Anakin, Obi-Wan, Mace, Yoda, Ki-Adi, etc.

Are their hairs and robes actually blown by the wind?

Can a bolt be absorbed by this cloud and yet let air pass through?
Somehow, that would fit with that duality about KE/radiation shields.
Clothing and hair does blow around when on it.
So, what is that matter? Quantic matter that is... based on frequency, out of phase? What?
Who knows. Maybe out of phase in a certain way.

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