[General Battuta]

So the Shivans are type III - they use 10^20, or 10000000000000000000 H bombs per second?

1.27. (anyone here think 3.6.9?)

That's pretty reasonable, actually.

[Androgeos Exeunt]

* Androgeos Exeunt has voted.

I'd say II. If they were all-powerful (i.e. III), they would be invincible, but they are not. The fact that the Lucifer was destroyed shows that even the Shivans cannot control subspace.

[Droid803]

II seems about right.
To field a fleet of Saths, you have to be able to at least harness a star's worth of energy.
Not a goddamn galaxy though.

[Mars]

You wouldn't remotely need a stars "energy" and we're talking about power here, not energy. Each Sathanas is tiny compared to a planetoid, and even most asteroids. Why the hell would you need a stars worth of power to produce them?

This whole scale makes no sense to me, because in the end, we could be talking about power in a matter antimatter reaction, power in the chemical reactions that could occur, power that the object is receiving...

[Androgeos Exeunt]

This might be worth a look.

[Aardwolf]

Aw, I was hoping for a funny image when I saw the filename.

[General Battuta]

You wouldn't remotely need a stars "energy" and we're talking about power here, not energy. Each Sathanas is tiny compared to a planetoid, and even most asteroids. Why the hell would you need a stars worth of power to produce them?

This whole scale makes no sense to me, because in the end, we could be talking about power in a matter antimatter reaction, power in the chemical reactions that could occur, power that the object is receiving...

No matter what's producing it, power is measured in the same units.

The Kardashev scale specifically refers to the ability to harness the entire energy output of a star: i.e. build a Dyson shell around it.

[NGTM-1R]

Which I doubt even the Shivans can do. Mars' point remains valid. Nowhere near that level is necessary even for the Shivan fleet we saw in FS2...particularly since for all we know they've been assembling it over a period of more than four millenia!

[Mars]

Since Earth isn't really producing any energy at all, unless you count geothermal, it would be difficult to harness all of it. What is meant by "harnessing" and "all of the power" and "produced"? As I said, a lot of power could be produced if you took the Earth and combined it with an anti-matter Earth. That is not, I think, what is meant by "power produced"

[Ghostavo]

I've got to say over Type II and perhaps Type III or beyond. Would any of us be "surprised" if they saw a Shivan Dyson Shell of sorts in an hypothetical FS3?

[terran_emperor]

No, i wouldnt. I supect that have in their core space...If it can be defined as such, thousands if not millions of structures like the Star Forge from KOTOR

[KappaWing]

Unknown

Not enough information

This thread is a place where you can take canon knowledge and add your imagination.

Canon indicates II, but leaves the possibility for III and above, depending on how your imagination takes you.

[TrashMan]

It's a stupid scale.

I agree. The scale is rubbish.

I believe no race will EVER be able to harness the power of a star, and especially a galaxy. It stinks of handvawium extraordinare.

[redsniper]

Guys, seriously. Shivan ships aren't that much better than Terran/Vasudan ships, and you kill A LOT of Shivans in both games. Yeah, we're outnumbered and outgunned, but I think it's by a comprehensible amount. If they were II or higher they'd just steamroll over us without a second thought. Type III and they could instantaneously vaporize all of our solar systems just as easily as we would swat a fly.

That said, I have had visions of venturing into Shivan space with some kind of amazingly advanced fleet, then watching Shivan ships in the distance a thousand times bigger than your fleet, duking it out with equally colossal ships of some other race ("symptom of a bigger problem" and all that). It would be great to just sit in awe of some massive conflict so destructive you couldn't begin to approach it without being destroyed.

Also, where does the GTVA fit on that scale? 1.01? 1.1?

[Androgeos Exeunt]

I for the GTVA. If you count Terrans and Vasudans separately before the Great War, I estimate 0.5.

[Droid803]

I for the GTVA. If you count Terrans and Vasudans separately before the Great War, I estimate 0.5.

Impossible. Our current civilization is rated at 0.72 already.

[Shade]

It isn't a linear scale though, but a very steep logarithmic scale (difference between 1 and 2 being the difference between a planet and a sun). Even though we're at .72 now we're a lot further from 1.0 than we are from 0.

[Droid803]

Yeah, but its still impossible for the GTA/PVN to be any less than 0.72 like Exeunt said...

[KappaWing]

It isn't a linear scale though, but a very steep logarithmic scale (difference between 1 and 2 being the difference between a planet and a sun). Even though we're at .72 now we're a lot further from 1.0 than we are from 0.

Really? I was under the impression it was supposed to be linear after you take in the effects of the so-called technological singularity.

[General Battuta]

I don't think Kardashev and Vingean singularities are related.