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Thread: Projectile Weapons

  1. #61
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    Deflector shields usually aren't oriented in such a way as to deflect away from the direction of travel However they are steerable, and (thinking back to TNG and the 'laser incident') they do appear to give protection in none front vectors, since of course a fast moving space object could come from anywhere in a 3D space!

    I'd probably give the operator a bonus, with respects to the 'automatic' aspect, but to 'steer' the navigational deflectors so as to deflect something heavy, from a non front facing attack. - bottom line is you're using them for something they are not *quite* intended for!

    Beyond this I'd use the rules with respects to ramming and using the tractor to push away objects the size of a shuttle or larger.

    The other main problem is how to scale speed. Full impulse is .25 C or 74,948,114.5 m / s - a bullet (optimistically) will travel at about 1,219.2 m/s - so basically compared to something traveling at 'super science speeds, it's gonna be kind of feeble!

    In contrast a Rail gun style weapon, will accelerate objects to appreciable fractions of C, so it's fair they'd do decent damage, but then we've discussed this Re: deflector shields!

    The other major hurdle I can forsee in the rules is the accuracy - with respects to the technology level you are talking about. Other than 'chaff' (large volume of spray in roughly the right area) how are you going to deal with range: For example, using 21st level analogy technology, you're trying to hit an object which might be travelling hundreds of times faster than a bullet with a... bullet! Again, then scale that up to rail gun style technology, you still have the computational and sensor accuracy issues. As we've discussed, some of the technology with respects to Trek era shields is 'countermeasure' aka fooling the sensors, and frankly Trek era ships could run rings around 21st century level of technology in that regard, which means that they can only fire guns within point blank 'visual' range (using the Icon/Coda meaning of that) - trek ships can fire their phaser beams from ***40,000*** Km away! That said, assuming you're using comparable technologies you also still have the general problems of accuracy: phaser beams are energy beams controlled to the nano-ark by sophisticated computers, and photon torpedoes are well... self guided. How would the equivalent of a mortar shell compare with either: How would you make your launch mechanism accurate enough?! Gah it's a problem when you try to mix infeasible superscience with real-world technology
    Ta Muchly

  2. #62
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    Well in regards to the speed of a ballistic projectile from a rail gun or any other gun from an object that can also reach the same speeds as Star Trek like aircraft it would be = the speed of the firing mechanism + the speed of the craft which is carrying the firing mechanism - a % of the speed of the craft if fired at an angle not at 0 (where 0 is forward movement)

    Therefore a bullet could still travel in sufficient trek like speeds, whether from a rail gun or not, if the vessel that is firing the bullet is moving at trek like speeds when it is firing, and it is aimed in the direction of travel. Because the void of space will not slow down the projectile in question.

    Therefore it is a feasible weapon when fired properly . . . and when coupled with sensors which function at the same speed of calculation . . . as you would still have to lead the target, something that may be a lost skill to instant hit 24th century types.
    (much like how the butcher arts are said to be being lost today)

    As for the navigational deflector you are accurate to say that when firing towards the forward arc of the object say 330 to 30 degress (0 being directly forward) . . . then there should be an automatic degree of success . . . however . . . I imagine there is a less powerful rear navigational deflector for those rearward movements (and a very loud but unaudiable beeping noise to occumpany going into reverse) . . . so there should be a less but automatic degree of success there . . . but you are right any other direction of attack would be relatively unprotected by the navigational deflectors, causing the personnel of the targetted craft to use the tractor beem (given that there is one that functions at that arc (as they have arcs of use as well, dependent on where the tractor beam projector is located)).

    Therefore it would be feasible to use ballistic projectiles as weapons if used in mass, with sifficiant targeting capability, with a craft that travels at like speeds of the target, and only given certain angles of attack relative to the target and the attacker.

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  3. #63
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    Right so you're flying up to the enterprise, from the rear, with your handgun, with the window rolled down, popping a cap, and hoping the bullet gets there sometime this century

    The issue is not of slowing down, it's of not very fast in the first place.... Ok - think of it like this... you're sitting 100 yards away, firing at a fast moving train. Chances are you'll hit it. Now try and hit that at 1000 km.... 10,000 km !! 40,000 km... Even if you are not factoring in air resistance/friction and gravity - there's the basic problem it'll be gone by the time the bullet reaches it!

    As I said yes the non forward deflectors wouldn't be AS good as the forward facing one's but there, by necessity have to be navigational deflectors 720 degrees round the ship!
    Ta Muchly

  4. #64
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    As stated before, the angle of attack which one attacks the target vessel is a major factor in the weapons effectiveness . . . and even with inertial dampers, large mass objects still take a certain amount of time and distance to come to a stop or complete a turn.
    So to wholey rule out the effectiveness of ballistic weapons I thinkis underestimating their abilities.

    I could surely see flak being thrown in up an incoming planetary blockade/invasion force.

    Or fighters firing explosively tipped, armored piercing bullets.

    Or my design of the mini-photon torpedo with extended range.

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  5. #65
    Quote Originally Posted by JALU3
    I could surely see flak being thrown in up an incoming planetary blockade/invasion force.
    Isn't that exactly what the shields are?

    Or fighters firing explosively tipped, armored piercing bullets.
    Again... plasma thingies?

    All the treknology is basically stuff we're familiar with. It just happens to glow.
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  6. #66
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    No, actually, it's specified in the TNG technical manual, objects are deflected, i.e they change direction, and imparted with a new vector, it's an exotic subspace effect. The larger the object, the more effort this takes for the shields, and respectively, the faster the projectile the more effort it will take to deflect it. In the case of the navigational deflectors the field extends thousands of kilomiters in front of the ship at a very low threshold, and so they only deflect the particles a tiny angle, so they don't hit the ship. In the case of the tactical shields, then yes, they can actually cause a particle/object to change it's course 180 degrees, from the observers perspective. From the point of view of the object being deflected, it hasn't lost momentum or energy, the shield basically rerouted it's path in a way conventional physics couldn't!

    The issue comes because if you think about it, the amount of energy an atom has, impacting the shields at warp speeds, in the case of an impact is massive, compared to someone throwing a boulder at more usual speeds... I.e. the faster the 'bullet' the more energy it has. This is why the hull of Voyager began eroding when it jumped to warp without navigational deflectors. That's tiny, invisible particles, with (effectivelly) hundreds of times the energy of a bullet, and as a NORMAL function of the ship, the ship shrugs these off!
    Ta Muchly

  7. #67
    Who actually read the manual? It was there for the cool diagrams, dammit.

    What I'm saying is that there's Trek equivalents of flak, and bullets, and heavy projectiles and whatever. If you ask "Where's the bullets?" you get pointed to the phasers, and disrupters, and plasma charges, and photon torpedos, et cetera. They're things you shoot at other things. They just happen to glow.
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  8. #68
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    Navigational deflectors would need to be able to work to some extend against non front impacts. Otherwise the ship would stand a very good chance of being destroyed at any high velocity. Sooner or later it would cross the flight path of another object at just the right time to result in a collision.

    What I think makes the most sense is to assume that the ship can deflect a certain number/size worth of Space Debris at any given time, with, say twice or three times that amount against the front arc. After that amount it is no longer automatic defense and counts as an impact against the shields.

    SInce this is ICON, perhaps the limits could be based on the ship's Shield Threshold rating (SPACEDOCK would give us more options). How about THreshold in SIZE worth of objects, and 2xSIZE for the forward arc?



    As for hitting an object travelling at high speed witrh another object travelling at high speed, well that has been done in TREK, especially with TOS phasers, so it would be possible. From a technical standpoint, TREK computers could work out the math and adjust the tradectory of the projectile for an intercept course. Realsiticaly this would be very difficult, especially at relativistic speeds, as after about .70c, the time dilation effects would result in slower objects reach a spot in less time than faster objects, but TREK rarely bothers with that stuff, so we can ignore it, too.

    THe big problem would be that EFFECTIVE range would be limited, since if the target has time, it could change course to avoid the impact. For what it'S worth, this sort of explains why Photorps don't get used beyond phaser range on TV. Basically if it is going to take more that a few seconds for the torp to reach the target, the target could go to warp and outrun the missile.

    Since ICON has phasers travelling at 1xC, and a raqnge of 300,000 km, then limiting the range of a mass thrower to it7s velocity(in C) X 300,000 km seems about right. SUre, against a stationary target the range is really unlimited, but obviously, if the target is far enough away to take any sort of evasive maneuvers, the "slug" will miss.

    Now, if a culkture did use some sort of mass thrower weapon, then they would probably consider giving it some sort of way to get by a navigational deflector.


    One possiblity for a really effective bullet idea would be something like a impulse powered drone. SOmething around SIZE 1 or so with a .5c impulse engine and perhaps some form og guidance. Stuff from a grojet round to a missle. If I remember correctly, the formula for collison damage in ICON, is 20XSpeedxSize, even a Size 1 slug travelling at .5c would be effective. If it has some sort of guaidance system, it would be able to make slight course sorrections in reponse to the target, increasing the range.

  9. #69
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    Yeah actually that's one thing I always thought was missing from Photorp rules, in all the systems.. their speed. They move fast, but they also have an obscene range, so at anything beyond medium should carry over to the next action or something. I just don't know how it would be done, but yes the option to 'raise shields' or 'jump to warp' would then be an option. Evading them is already covered in your manoeuvres but not reaction time...

    It does have to be said that if you looked at Coda, for example, then a nuke does something like a 1 damage If you look a normal shuttle might still have a threshold of 1 - so other than the fact you might damage the shields, regular projectile weapons are likely to cause any damage at all to a ship

    Yeah, the speed issue is a problem. It has to be said too of 'slugs' something that slow moving could be targetted with a phaser, and destroyed on route too. That again is something we don't have a maneouver for, but we've seen the D and the E and the Voyager shoot out dozens of rays in rapid succession on a low power, testing their sensors (such as in Nemisis) Those rays would hardly do anything to comparable era technology but would probably be powerful enough to destroy small 'slugs'.
    Ta Muchly

  10. #70
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    So then, the question is how fast a photon torpedo is . . . and other projectile weapons. And depending on their spead, even if self guided, they would given the proper manuevers be avoidable . . . and targetable by the phasers or other beam weapons, to be destroyed en route.

    I guess I am just repeating other people here.

    But why haven't the created Goalkeeper, Phalanx, CIWS, RIM-166, and other systems based on these systems concepts in the future. Was it under a false belief, like when they removed the machine gun from fighter aircraft in the 60s? Is it something about the design of vessels around a certain doctorine? If so what doctorines do each powers navies teach, and how does that effect their ship design, technological advancement, and capabilities?

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  11. #71
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    I think SPACEDOCK did have something for Photoprs taking a few turns to hit.

    A few years ago (before CODA) I did up a combat system for ICON to handle mutplie ship engagewments. It worked pretty decent too, allow me to run some Domionion War stuff.

    I did make the Photorps seeking, putting counters on the battleboard, and allowing them to move right when they were fired in the intitiative procedure, and at what was effectively Warp 1 during sublight battles. What happened was that the players started to hold the things until they got in close enough to hit the same round they were fired (phaser range).


    As far as why Starfleet doesn't have an equivalent to the Aegis system, well I think they do. If you watch STII:TWOK during the first space battle the Reliant fires a (record holding slowest even seen on screen) photorp at the Enterprise. Kirk screams for phasers and Spock riplies "Too late!" right before the torp hits.

    THe impression I got from that was that you CAN shoot a photorp with a phaser, BUT you need enough time to lock the phasers onto the torp. It probably isn't easy to do either. Now if we consider that the phortopr is only going to be within phaser range for a fraction o a second before it hits the ship, then shooting down torps seems pretty impractical as a standard tactic. Of course if the torps are fired at range you could fire a torp at another torp and intercept it at a distance. All reinfoceing the "fire at phaser range" idea.

    If we look at the TV series, only TNG ever fires the torps at extreme range, and then I think only against the Borg, who ignored them (back in the Badass Borg days).



    In ICON if you put torps on the map at Size1, Speed 10 and let them move right wne they are fired, and allow them to be shot at as Size 1 ships, they end up being used a lot like they are on TV.

  12. #72
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    Quote Originally Posted by tonyg
    As far as why Starfleet doesn't have an equivalent to the Aegis system, well I think they do. If you watch STII:TWOK during the first space battle the Reliant fires a (record holding slowest even seen on screen) photorp at the Enterprise. Kirk screams for phasers and Spock riplies "Too late!" right before the torp hits.
    You think a major galactic power, that professes to be a mainly defensive yet absorbing power would choose to seek technology that would counter known offensive technologies, allowing them to be more defensive and less hostile . . . but then again what the posters say and actual doctorine maybe different.

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  13. #73
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    Quote Originally Posted by JALU3
    You think a major galactic power, that professes to be a mainly defensive yet absorbing power would choose to seek technology that would counter known offensive technologies, allowing them to be more defensive and less hostile . . . but then again what the posters say and actual doctorine maybe different.
    THey probably would, but...

    ...then the production staff would have to deal with the escalation of weapons technology. In the real world there is always a constant competition between offensive and defensive technology.

    I think to avoid this Trek just sort of upgrades the deflector systems every couple of years.

    But personally, I think the reason why photorps are primarily used at phaser range is that they can be shot down/tractored/outrun or otherwise countered if the targeted ship has the time.

    On a side note, one thing that I liked about the BOTF Trek computer game is that the designers took that kind of approach to the ship designs of the various cultures in Trek. The Federation isn't agressive and forces on defense, and so Fed ships have better shields (something like 20% better than another ship of tyhe same type). Likewise Klingon ships has better firepower, and Cardassian ships had stronger hulls.

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