• Announcements

    • Robin

      Welcome!   03/05/2016

      Welcome, everyone, to the new 910CMX Community Forums. I'm still working on getting them running, so things may change.  If you're a 910 Comic creator and need your forum recreated, let me know and I'll get on it right away.  I'll do my best to make this new place as fun as the last one!
Sign in to follow this  
hkmaly

Story Wednesday Jan 25 2017

Recommended Posts

The battle in the Mutara Nebula was different because the nebula severely reduced visibility, which meant that hit-and-run tactics were more useful as opposed to the outright slugging match that would be favored in open space. Since both ships were being flown under manual helm control, it thus was sensible to approach from an angle from which the opposition was less prepared to quickly dodge or counterattack. Weapons firing arcs also do not cover all angles equally--with the saucer shape of the Reliant's hull, approaching from the ventral side meant that the dorsal-mounted weapons could not fire upon the Enterprise, whereas attacking along the equatorial plane would leave both dorsal and ventral weapons able to track it.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
2 hours ago, mlooney said:

Grunt, snap snarl etc.  Button push.

In space combat between two ships, there is only 1 (one) dimension to deal with.  "Any two points determine a line"  With 3, of course you have two dimension, it's not until you get to 4 or more ships that you get to 3 dimensions.  Space is not the ocean and star ships don't get to act like aircraft and/or submarines.  If the sensors on a space craft only work in the plain that the that the craft is in vs 360x360 or at least 360x180, they are freaking useless. 

There was this old space board game where a ship's sensors had a 3% chance of missing a planet the size of Jupiter while within 11.000 miles range of its surface. I always did wonder who designed those sensors and just how thick the ship's crew would have to be if they had not noticed the planet WITHOUT technical aids before then.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
1 hour ago, ijuin said:

The battle in the Mutara Nebula was different because the nebula severely reduced visibility, which meant that hit-and-run tactics were more useful as opposed to the outright slugging match that would be favored in open space. Since both ships were being flown under manual helm control, it thus was sensible to approach from an angle from which the opposition was less prepared to quickly dodge or counterattack. Weapons firing arcs also do not cover all angles equally--with the saucer shape of the Reliant's hull, approaching from the ventral side meant that the dorsal-mounted weapons could not fire upon the Enterprise, whereas attacking along the equatorial plane would leave both dorsal and ventral weapons able to track it.

It's still BS.  I'm not going to even talk about the fact that nebula don't work that way.   They were treating space craft as aircraft or submarines.  For starters space ships don't have to face the direction of travel, and they don't slow down when the engine cuts off.  "Quickly dodge" isn't something a space ship can do either.  Inertia is a cruel mistress. 

All that being said, if the sensor systems on Khan's ship were so poor as to not see the Enterprise at the exact same moment that the Enterprise saw him, the designer of the ship need to be fired out a photo torpedo tube.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
7 minutes ago, mlooney said:

All that being said, if the sensor systems on Khan's ship were so poor as to not see the Enterprise at the exact same moment that the Enterprise saw him, the designer of the ship need to be fired out a photo torpedo tube.

My late friend Jens said much the same about the weapons designers who worked on the classic Enterprise. In one episode -- Balance of Terror, I think -- they fire the main armament three times. Every time they fire, the phaser banks overload and burn out, and they need to resort to desperate measures to get them to work again. Jens stated that any company that tried to sell military hardware that bad should itself be made the target of properly functioning main ship guns.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
17 hours ago, Scotty said:
17 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Not sure why specifically basement, but yes, likely individually.

Because thats where Ellen was practicing when Sarah called after Elliot was kidnapped. And I'm pretty sure they have gym equipment down there, they at least have a punching bag, because I don't think Tedd's got one at his place.

Good point. Forgot about this.

9 hours ago, CritterKeeper said:
22 hours ago, hkmaly said:

I think that training flying in dojo wouldn't be good idea anyway. While learning to fly in tight space would be on list, they should start the training outside. Three people flying in one room, even big, sounds like advanced training in collision avoidance.

It's a lot easier to make sure you're unobserved indoors, but the ceiling would be a limiting factor.  They should do some training indoors and some outdoors, ideally, so they're ready for either situation.

Based on how long GRIFFINS manage to almost avoid being observed ...

Generally, there are plenty of places where you can be unobserved outdoors, but it's true that they would be rare in Illinois (because it's flat). And of course they should train both, but I think the outdoor training would be easier so it makes sense to start with it.

9 hours ago, mlooney said:

In space combat between two ships, there is only 1 (one) dimension to deal with.  "Any two points determine a line"  With 3, of course you have two dimension, it's not until you get to 4 or more ships that you get to 3 dimensions.

With two moving ships, you have four points: my ship now, my ship in next second, their ship now, their ship in next second. Four points, three dimensions.

9 hours ago, mlooney said:

Space is not the ocean and star ships don't get to act like aircraft and/or submarines. 

If they do, it's tactical mistake.

9 hours ago, mlooney said:

If the sensors on a space craft only work in the plain that the that the craft is in vs 360x360 or at least 360x180, they are freaking useless. 

360x360 and 360x180 are actually the same, aren't they?

 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
6 hours ago, The Old Hack said:
9 hours ago, mlooney said:

Grunt, snap snarl etc.  Button push.

In space combat between two ships, there is only 1 (one) dimension to deal with.  "Any two points determine a line"  With 3, of course you have two dimension, it's not until you get to 4 or more ships that you get to 3 dimensions.  Space is not the ocean and star ships don't get to act like aircraft and/or submarines.  If the sensors on a space craft only work in the plain that the that the craft is in vs 360x360 or at least 360x180, they are freaking useless. 

There was this old space board game where a ship's sensors had a 3% chance of missing a planet the size of Jupiter while within 11.000 miles range of its surface. I always did wonder who designed those sensors and just how thick the ship's crew would have to be if they had not noticed the planet WITHOUT technical aids before then.

Depends. Did they had windows? If they had artificial gravity and no windows, they can't notice ANYTHING without sensors.

5 hours ago, mlooney said:

It's still BS.  I'm not going to even talk about the fact that nebula don't work that way.   They were treating space craft as aircraft or submarines.  For starters space ships don't have to face the direction of travel, and they don't slow down when the engine cuts off.  "Quickly dodge" isn't something a space ship can do either.  Inertia is a cruel mistress. 

That's true, but doesn't change the fact that you DO need to take 3D into account.

5 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

My late friend Jens said much the same about the weapons designers who worked on the classic Enterprise. In one episode -- Balance of Terror, I think -- they fire the main armament three times. Every time they fire, the phaser banks overload and burn out, and they need to resort to desperate measures to get them to work again. Jens stated that any company that tried to sell military hardware that bad should itself be made the target of properly functioning main ship guns.

You know, they don't use money in 23th century's Federation. The company probably didn't SELL that hardware. Which might be the reason it worked so bad.

4 minutes ago, mlooney said:
6 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

360x360 and 360x180 are actually the same, aren't they?

 

360x360 is a sphere.  360x180 is a hemisphere

180x180 is hemisphere.

Try to imagine it. From -90 to 90 up and down, from -90 to +90 left and right. Hemisphere.

 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
22 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

Depends. Did they had windows? If they had artificial gravity and no windows, they can't notice ANYTHING without sensors.

That's true, but doesn't change the fact that you DO need to take 3D into account.

You know, they don't use money in 23th century's Federation. The company probably didn't SELL that hardware. Which might be the reason it worked so bad.

180x180 is hemisphere.

Try to imagine it. From -90 to 90 up and down, from -90 to +90 left and right. Hemisphere.

 

360 degree circle centered on the ship.  180 arc going forward.  Hemisphere.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
14 minutes ago, mlooney said:
38 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

180x180 is hemisphere.

Try to imagine it. From -90 to 90 up and down, from -90 to +90 left and right. Hemisphere.

 

360 degree circle centered on the ship.  180 arc going forward.  Hemisphere.

If you take circle and rotate it 180 you will get sphere, not hemisphere. Alternatively, get half circle and rotate 360. Or, think about geographics coordinates: longitude goes from -180 to 180, but latitude only from -90 to 90. 360x180. Still, it's whole Earth.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
19 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

If you take circle and rotate it 180 you will get sphere, not hemisphere. Alternatively, get half circle and rotate 360. Or, think about geographics coordinates: longitude goes from -180 to 180, but latitude only from -90 to 90. 360x180. Still, it's whole Earth.

OK, I think we are talking past each other. 

Assuming the "sensors" work like radars, you don't use negative degrees.   My tracking radars had a full 6400 mils azimuth (with 0 mils being due true north, 1600 being east, 3200 being due south and 4800 being west), but elevation went from 0 mils1 (pointing parallel to the ground) up to 1600 mils (pointing straight up) to 3200 mils (parallel to the ground again, but facing the other way)  3200 to 6400 elevation would be pointing into the earth, which, of course, a ground mounted radar isn't going to do.

Angular mils

Quote

There are other definitions used for land mapping and artillery, for instance a compass with 6400 NATO mils is used instead of a 360° compass, achieving higher resolution.

1Not quite true, for reasons we never did figure out, it stopped about 30 mils shy of 0 or 3200, but the idea is the same.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
3 hours ago, mlooney said:
3 hours ago, hkmaly said:

If you take circle and rotate it 180 you will get sphere, not hemisphere. Alternatively, get half circle and rotate 360. Or, think about geographics coordinates: longitude goes from -180 to 180, but latitude only from -90 to 90. 360x180. Still, it's whole Earth.

OK, I think we are talking past each other. 

Assuming the "sensors" work like radars, you don't use negative degrees.   My tracking radars had a full 6400 mils azimuth (with 0 mils being due true north, 1600 being east, 3200 being due south and 4800 being west), but elevation went from 0 mils1 (pointing parallel to the ground) up to 1600 mils (pointing straight up) to 3200 mils (parallel to the ground again, but facing the other way)  3200 to 6400 elevation would be pointing into the earth, which, of course, a ground mounted radar isn't going to do.

Angular mils

Thing is, target on elevation 0 azimuth 0 and target on elevation 3200 azimuth 3200 would be the same target. It obviously makes sense for tracking radar, because if you would rotate it 3200 mils every time the target goes over you you would lose it, but it doesn't make sense for "mapping" radar or how it's called, which has fixed "path" to scan. So, your radar only does one hemisphere, but twice ; it would be able to scan the same hemisphere even if it's elevation would stop on 1600 mils.

Obviously, no single sensor would be able to scan whole sphere (because the ship would be in way), but ship is supposed to be equipped with multiple sensors with overlapping fields of "vision".

(Except gravimetric sensor. Ship is likely hardly visible on those.)

3 hours ago, Aura Guardian said:

Unless Grace's claws are inherently magical, I'm a little worried. I'm not sure they're at Andrea's level in a fight, and she had to rely on stealth tactics to fight a vampire. 

Depends on what is average vampire. I think that the vampire Andrea and Tara fought is above average in fighting capabilities, the one Nanase and Susan fought in France was easier target.

Nevertheless, it's possible she can only hurt the vampire and not kill it ... unless she lend magic weapon somewhere.

(or ... Grace: "I'm holding him, kill him!" Diane: "Wait, I almost succeed in summoning the dagger!")

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
11 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

My late friend Jens said much the same about the weapons designers who worked on the classic Enterprise. In one episode -- Balance of Terror, I think -- they fire the main armament three times. Every time they fire, the phaser banks overload and burn out, and they need to resort to desperate measures to get them to work again. Jens stated that any company that tried to sell military hardware that bad should itself be made the target of properly functioning main ship guns.

I haven't seen the episode (I haven't seen much of Star Trek and most of what I've seen is TNG and Voyager), but reading through the episode detail on the Star Trek wiki, it seems the phaser banks started shorting out after the Enterprise took a hit from the Romulan ship using a weapon they'd never seen before and was strong enough to tear through most of their shields with ease. Which if that's the case, then it's not so much bad hardware as hardware that can't hold up to weaponry beyond expected parameters.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
17 hours ago, mlooney said:

Grunt, snap snarl etc.  Button push.

In space combat between two ships, there is only 1 (one) dimension to deal with.  "Any two points determine a line"  With 3, of course you have two dimension, it's not until you get to 4 or more ships that you get to 3 dimensions.  Space is not the ocean and star ships don't get to act like aircraft and/or submarines.  If the sensors on a space craft only work in the plain that the that the craft is in vs 360x360 or at least 360x180, they are freaking useless. 

That was kinda the point of the quote.  Khan had been a villain on Earth before contact with aliens led to space travel.  He was frozen for hundreds of years, and when he woke up he was almost immediately marooned on the surface of a planet.  He'd only been in space a very brief time, and he still tended to fall into the sort of combat tactics useful on the two-dimensional surface of a planet.  The very pattern of thinking that annoys you was what Spock was pointing out.

The battle in question was, if I recall correctly, being fought just outside a nebula, and Khan was moving as if the surface of the nebula were the surface of a planet.  But it's been a while so I'm not 100% on that.  The nebula gives multiple other points besides the two ships.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
45 minutes ago, CritterKeeper said:

The battle in question was, if I recall correctly, being fought just outside a nebula, and Khan was moving as if the surface of the nebula were the surface of a planet.  But it's been a while so I'm not 100% on that.  The nebula gives multiple other points besides the two ships.

Stuff like that is USUALLY on youtube, you only need to search.

Nevertheless, yes, Kirk battle as if those ships are submarines, while Khan battles like they were sea ships. Neither would be good, but Khan is worse.

Balance of Terror, meanwhile, is SO much inspired by submarines they are actually WHISPER to not alert enemy of their position.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I think the assumption was that starship sensors could pick up sound vibrations. Not so much as sound through water, since that's not possible in space, but more like sound inside a can?

But then the question would be how could they not detect the can?

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

The page I read on Balance of Terror stated that they poweted down thier ship to avoid detection. So maybe they were whispering to conserve oxygen?

I honestly doubt whispering would actually help conserve oxygen, but it sounds like to sort of handwavy excuse a lazy and/or overworked sci-fi writter might use.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I cut Balance of Terror some slack.  The 1960s were only 20 years removed from World War 2 where we played out the Destroyer vs. Submarine drama on both fronts.  We were the destroyers in the Atlantic and the submarines in the pacific.  The whispering on the Romulan ship would make perfect intuitive sense to 1960s viewers, though it doesn't survive any serious scientific scrutiny. 

It was also Classic Trek's first dive into starship combat of any kind and they made a ton of mistakes even as compared to later combat sequences in the same show.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
15 hours ago, Vorlonagent said:

I cut Balance of Terror some slack. 

Oh absolutely. It was a great episode. My friend mostly made his remarks because it annoyed him past endurance to think of any military unit equipped with weapons that unreliable. And unfortunately it is not even unrealistic -- for example, during WW1, the French managed to design an early submachinegun that functioned so badly that it would often jam after firing just a handful of rounds or less.

Mind you, it is also worth considering that the Enterprise was not a military vessel per se but also meant for science and exploration. It is not completely unreasonable to think of its main armament as a 'hopefully never needed precaution' rather than as an 'absolutely vital defence mechanism which the crew will be staking their lives on the functionality of'. It might be a prototype or an early generation model of the involved technology.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
11 hours ago, The Old Hack said:
On 01/27/2017 at 7:52 PM, Vorlonagent said:

I cut Balance of Terror some slack. 

Oh absolutely. It was a great episode. My friend mostly made his remarks because it annoyed him past endurance to think of any military unit equipped with weapons that unreliable. And unfortunately it is not even unrealistic -- for example, during WW1, the French managed to design an early submachinegun that functioned so badly that it would often jam after firing just a handful of rounds or less.

You know, if I don't like something, I rarely bother to get enough knowledge to nitpick it.

11 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

Mind you, it is also worth considering that the Enterprise was not a military vessel per se but also meant for science and exploration. It is not completely unreasonable to think of its main armament as a 'hopefully never needed precaution' rather than as an 'absolutely vital defence mechanism which the crew will be staking their lives on the functionality of'. It might be a prototype or an early generation model of the involved technology.

Yeah, it's not as if it would be on deep space exploration mission into uncharted space, possibly outside the range of federation repair facilities for whole five years oh wait. :)

(On the other hand, that deep space exploration mission didn't get so deep considering they ended up near Romulan neutral zone.)

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
4 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Yeah, it's not as if it would be on deep space exploration mission into uncharted space, possibly outside the range of federation repair facilities for whole five years oh wait. :)

Well, with the replicators (which I think TOS era had) and the engineering crew, they should be able to repair most of the ship themselves. The only things I think that would give them trouble would be the warp core (because it's dangerous and is what provides them with power), the structural skeleton (fixing the structural skeleton might require advanced facilities to not weaken the structure), and maybe the hull (similar concerns to the structural skeleton, also would require equipment that can function in vacuum, which the Enterprise should have, but I'm not sure that they do)

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
56 minutes ago, Drasvin said:

Well, with the replicators (which I think TOS era had)

No it didn't. TOS era used food synthesizers. Presumably, they were not usable for machinery, although they possibly had some sort of technology on similar base. Even later, there were things which can't be replicated, and while DS9 replicators were able to create automatic defense system including disruptors, it wouldn't surprise me if ship phasers wouldn't be replicable.

56 minutes ago, Drasvin said:

and the engineering crew

Did they actually had someone else doing repairs than Scotty? :)

56 minutes ago, Drasvin said:

The only things I think that would give them trouble would be the warp core (because it's dangerous and is what provides them with power)

Also, antimatter can't be replicated, logically.

56 minutes ago, Drasvin said:

the structural skeleton (fixing the structural skeleton might require advanced facilities to not weaken the structure), and maybe the hull (similar concerns to the structural skeleton, also would require equipment that can function in vacuum

While they were repairing hull damage and structural integrity damage all the time, I think it was sort of patch, not providing the same strength as proper full repair at dock.

Anyway, they certainly weren't able to just download upgrades and install them on fly. So, letting them go to five year mission with substandard equipment would be irresponsible, even if they didn't expected fight. Could still happened, of course.

Refitting Enterprise after the five year mission took two and half years and wasn't really finished when they send Enterprise to another mission ... definitely not the kind of upgrades possible on-route.

(Of course, Borg did had technology to do substantial upgrades without any dock facility. Which brings question why exactly Janeway dismantled it ... jealousy?)

 

 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
35 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

(Of course, Borg did had technology to do substantial upgrades without any dock facility. Which brings question why exactly Janeway dismantled it ... jealousy?)

At the time (I'm assuming you mean the upgrades done to fight species 8472, or the Undine as they're called in Star Trek Online) I think it was because of the risk of the borg having a backdoor to take over the ship if Voyager ran into them again.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
7 hours ago, hkmaly said:

You know, if I don't like something, I rarely bother to get enough knowledge to nitpick it.

And? I am not you. I am not particularly fond of war, genocide or dictatorships in general, and I nonetheless have spent a great deal of time studying European history from 1919 to 1945. My entire reason for learning German in the first place was so I could finally begin to unlearn my reflexive fear and hate of all things German. I do not like misogyny, racism or homo/trans/queerphobia either but I am still studying their mechanisms in an attempt to learn how to deal with them.

Your motivations are not mine. And that is absolutely fine, you have a right to them. But conversely, I have my own reasons for acting the way I do. It is that simple.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
19 hours ago, Scotty said:
19 hours ago, hkmaly said:

(Of course, Borg did had technology to do substantial upgrades without any dock facility. Which brings question why exactly Janeway dismantled it ... jealousy?)

At the time (I'm assuming you mean the upgrades done to fight species 8472, or the Undine as they're called in Star Trek Online) I think it was because of the risk of the borg having a backdoor to take over the ship if Voyager ran into them again.

Based on episodes 406 The Raven and 515 Dark Frontier, they have anyway.

17 hours ago, The Old Hack said:
On 01/28/2017 at 10:53 PM, hkmaly said:

You know, if I don't like something, I rarely bother to get enough knowledge to nitpick it.

And? I am not you.

Sorry, I should've quote just Vorlonagent, this was reacting to him.

17 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

I am not particularly fond of war, genocide or dictatorships in general, and I nonetheless have spent a great deal of time studying European history from 1919 to 1945.

My own motivation for studying second world war (probably not so thoroughly as you) includes that I like dictatorships being defeated, so I guess it could apply, but generally, I was speaking about fiction and other universes. In case of our real world, there is no option to just ignore what I don't like, unfortunately: even if I ignore Trump for example, I will still be affected by his decisions.

Even if Romulans would be in our universe, I'm pretty sure I can safely ignore them until 2063, possibly even until 2152. But I don't want to ignore them, I like Romulans. At least reasonable Romulans like commander Donatra.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
Sign in to follow this