[Jellyfish]

This is the attitude that will get humanity wiped out within a month.

We go as we came: with a bang!

[Shivan Hunter]

The best thing to use against the Shivans is Thermite, specifically Thermite-TH3, the military grade stuff. Just pour this **** all over the Dante in nice, big heaps. Standard Thermite exotic Thermite, whatever. For those of you who don't know, Thermite has its own oxidizer so it CAN burn in space, the this stuff is as hot as liquid plasma and also oxidizes metals (notice how i wasn't specific.). This **** would ruin them, and we have enough of it. BUT NO ONE BUT ME THINKS OF IT.

You have read the tech descriptions of, say, the Helios and Harbinger bombs, correct? These ships can withstand nuclear-scale explosions and come out without a scratch. Even a Lilith- a frakking CRUISER- can withstand several Helios hits. So tell me, how much thermite would you need to destroy a ship that it may or may not even affect and which may or may not reinforce its structure with energy shielding, in which case all bets are off as to how it would react to thermite?

FS weapons are orders of magnitude more powerful than anything we have today. Maybe NO ONE BUT YOU THINKS OF IT (like the cruise control there btw, really makes you seem classy. Not) because IT WOULDN'T WORK.

About the rest of your post; I'd like to see a solution that results in a minimum of Terran and Vasudan casualties, which would be reconciliation between the Tevs and the GTVA ASAP. I can only hope that the Fedayeen's secret project has something to do with that end.

As to the Shivans; we are not going to survive by engaging them in combat. The only chance we have starts with finding out what their true motives are.

[asyikarea51]

For some reason whenever I see the words "Solus Lacus" and "Enlightenment" I am more reminded of the act of brainwashing.

That said, since the writing is intentionally grey-on-grey and people like HT and GB can deliver lines upon lines of pro-UEF text (this is not an insult btw - just some of HLP's figures in action ), I'm just thankful the scenario is still nothing but a video game.

[-Sara-]

I see the GTVA as the produce of years of fear. The generation which experienced the Shivans firsthand in the second war on the frontlines now seem to form the flag admirality of the GTVA. With their first-hand experience they utterly fear the Shivans and are desperate to get themselves any tool they can, including the conscription of Sol's forces might a third invasion occur and making good ues of all the resources available in Sol. Having a war to unite the people again and playing it so subtle that the Vasudans may rejoin the effort are factors that seem to have contributed to the actions taken. As far as the GTVA knows the Shivans may return and they wish to prepare any way possible, not a stupid approach from their point of view and not really an evil move. Definately more so desperation, doing what they think is right in the long run. I doubt Admiral Steele enjoys what he does, he just finds it nescesary.

I simply lack knowledge on how much the Elders really do know about the Shivans. They may actually know enough about the Shivans through whatever means that their entire Ubuntu concept is introduced with more of a purpose than to simply bring peace and unification to the Sol system. It may be to prepare humankind for much bigger things.

I can't say I agree with the GTVA as a player, however if I were with the GTVA as an officer and knew no better I may have believed the same. The same as how a country which is repeatedly attacked by a much greater invader may find anyone who chooses not to fight naïve. Knowing of Vishans and Shivans by playing the BP series however, I must say my support goes to the UEF and Ubuntu.

[Infamus]

Uh... Shivan Hunter, you do realize that even the Harbinger is NOTHING compared to the nukes that the US has TODAY bo. We have nukes so powerful just ONE could level an entire, small country. Plus that is only using about 15% of the nuclear capacity inside one. In FS, we should be using about 50%, but the detonators work the same way and probably only use 20%. If the largest nuke that the US has or ever had available was used on a Lucy, it would probably blow it in half. You know the nuke-tests? those where only small payloads, about the same size used in the Davy Crockett Nuke Bazooka; those had only a mere 10 to 20 ton yield. The Fat Man, one of our nukes used on Japan in WWII had a 21 Kiloton warhead, and decimated a huge area. Nukes we have today are about 5 times as powerful, one, that is coming from the same size warhead, and two, that was in only about 50 years, that's a lot of progress when it comes to something as complicated as nuclear physics.

Oh, and Thermite? Dude, do you know what a large amount of Thermite does to things? The amount of Thermite I was talking about using on the Dante is enough to start a ****ing sun to form man. oh and I forgot to mention, because of the intensity of a Thermite reaction on such a large scale it will cause the reaction to repeat itself a few times. Seriously, it gets that hot, plus it has tons of atoms crashing into each other because of the massive amounts oxidization which could cause a good amount of fusion reactions in that amount of Thermite. Oh and shields? Bah, stuff. Thermite gets hotter than the surface of the sun; it would be like getting thrown into a star.

Also, Did you know that lightning is hotter than the surface of our sun, Sol? Tesla made a device that could produce a constant flow of this stuff with scrap parts. If a modern FS universe version could be made and fitted onto a ship, it would tear the Shivans apart, and they would go run screaming. Did you know that Tesla was able to create a particle cannon similar in effect to the UD-8 Kayser?

[General Battuta]

Actually, some of the lowest yield weapons in FreeSpace - Fury dumbfire rockets - have a 3kt payload, which is described as 'very small'. So even the lightest FS weapons are comparable to today's nukes, and a Harbinger, a 5000mt warhead, is 100 times more powerful than the largest nuclear detonation ever conducted on Earth.

Our weapons today are no match for FreeSpace yields.

[Infamus]

3kt? that's physically impossible, plus we don't know what kind of explosive it is toting

Furthermore, a true 5000mt explosion would have ripped the Lucifer to shreds. It may be the size of a large city, but a city can be easily crushed by a Davy Crockett Rocket, so imagine what a true 5000mt explosion would truly be capable of. I know it's more devastating in an atmosphere, but it still would have sploded everything.

[General Battuta]

3kt? that's physically impossible, plus we don't know what kind of explosive it is toting

Furthermore, a true 5000mt explosion would have ripped the Lucifer to shreds. It may be the size of a large city, but a city can be easily crushed by a Davy Crockett Rocket, so imagine what a true 5000mt explosion would truly be capable of. I know it's more devastating in an atmosphere, but it still would have sploded everything.

How is a three kiloton detonation physically impossible when our modern nuclear warheads easily achieve that yield?

A true 5000mt explosion would not have ripped the Lucifer to shreds if it were made of material that could withstand a 5000mt explosion, which it apparently was. Welcome to the future.

[Infamus]

How is a three kiloton detonation physically impossible when our modern nuclear warheads easily achieve that yield?

uh, because they aren't nuclear.

A true 5000mt explosion would not have ripped the Lucifer to shreds if it were made of material that could withstand a 5000mt explosion, which it apparently was. Welcome to the future.

I see your point. Still, if Tesla were around he would have single-handedly brought the Shivans to their knees.

[Shivan Hunter]

The Shivans are older and more powerful than we are. They are technologically superior in most aspects related to warfare. Whatever weapons we could devise, they could as well. Any weapon we could imagine, they probably have in field testing.

Some of your strategy seems built around having more ships/more badass ships than they do. Do not try to fight a production war against a race that can build 100 Sathanas juggernauts. You will lose.

How would we be able to dump more thermite on them than we could hope to produce when they could pulverize us with beam cannons before we can even get in range?

Food for thought.

[SomeGuyWithAName]

3kt? that's physically impossible, plus we don't know what kind of explosive it is toting

Well, it could be 3kt TNT equivalent with a Plotdeviceonium warhead for all we know...

Furthermore, a true 5000mt explosion would have ripped the Lucifer to shreds. It may be the size of a large city, but a city can be easily crushed by a Davy Crockett Rocket, so imagine what a true 5000mt explosion would truly be capable of. I know it's more devastating in an atmosphere, but it still would have sploded everything.

Nukes aren't that powerful in space. A lot of the devastation of a nuke comes from it's shockwave, which needs air to be carried. I guess with all the sounds and the way shockwaves are moving through space, one could argue FS has "space air", but I think we are still to believe that there is no air in space.

Still, a 5000mt explosion should probably shred a lucy, and about anything else. The fact that it doesn't seems to mean, that materials are used that are so much more sturdy that anything we have imagined so far. As the GTVA and UEF vessels can take that sort of punishment as well, I guess mankind and Vasudankind have developed something to that effect as well. Who knows if thermite would even do anything here, it burns really hot, but perhaps the material is indeed able to withstand temperatures like within a star. Maybe it isn't even metal, but some sort of plotdeviceonium-gameplayproofingum quantum crystal thingymajjiger alloy. Or perhaps electromatter... no, wait... the ships aren't pink...

I guess it could be used, however, as a sort of genocidal weapon. Dumped in sufficient numbers it would overheat the interior even if the hull could not be significantly compromised. That could kill the inhabitants, leaving the ship for the taking. The amount of thermite that would have to be used would be rather impractical, though. I could imagine that you'd need huge, thermite laden carrier ships to deploy it, which in turn would be a vulnerable and fragile target, easily baked and obliterated.

Speaking of "I thought of a weapon no one else did"... When you have AWACS in the combat zone, and you are able to coordinate such extremely precise jumps to allow SSM strikes, why not jump in a harbinger INSIDE the ship. 5000mt inside a ship would destroy the interior, or at least kill everyone inside, even with a plotonium-whatever alloy as a hull. Ah, I guess every ship has some sort of shielding against that, probably the "Gameplay > Everything" device, which is not targetable as a subsystem.

I still support the UEF a lot more than the GTVA.

And to make myself completely unlikeable: I think the Gefs have a sensible idea, which should be put into action if complete xenocide of our species seems absolutely unavoidable.

[Aardwolf]

Lol, Gefs. What will they do when they discover their "return to the comets" is yet further xenocide?

[Herra Tohtori]

FS2 warheads detonate when they contact their target. The damage is likely dealt mainly by internal shockwaves propagating through the ship's superstructure, or in case of shaped charges, piercing damage is done that can reach pretty deep into the ship.

I prefer to think of the shockwaves as formed by the vaporized material of the warhead (or ship) itself.

[SomeGuyWithAName]

FS2 warheads detonate when they contact their target. The damage is likely dealt mainly by internal shockwaves propagating through the ship's superstructure, or in case of shaped charges, piercing damage is done that can reach pretty deep into the ship.

I prefer to think of the shockwaves as formed by the vaporized material of the warhead (or ship) itself.

Makes quite some sense. The blast of nuclear explosions though, comes from rapidly overheating the air, which results in pressure changes. I'm really not sure how you would get that into a spaceship hull to the same effect. The shockwaves in-game are of course some sort of plasma from the remains or something to that effect. Basically the 50% energy of a nuclear explosion that normally goes into the blast would be added to the thermal radiation.

If a warhead like this penetrates the hull, though, it is bound to destroy that section of the ship, unless there are several layers of hull to prevent that.

Conventinal shaped charges are actually a lot easier to understand in that regard I think. They should work pretty much the same like the ones we already use. Many of them use not only heat but rapidly expanding Nitrogen or other gases, which are bound in the molecular structure of the explosive, so they should create a sufficient blast even in space.

And the Gef thing - well, if you got a huge fleet of juggernauts ready to chew up earth and every living human being, some sort of diaspora is needed. Thing is - it should always remain the last straw to grasp.

[Herra Tohtori]

The blast of nuclear explosions though, comes from rapidly overheating the air, which results in pressure changes. I'm really not sure how you would get that into a spaceship hull to the same effect.

A. The explosion of a contact triggered warhead at close proximity to ship's surface would cause radiation based heating of the surface of the hull, to the extent that parts of it would vaporize. Rapid heating would cause equally rapid thermal expansion, which would cause a shockwave propagating through the structures of the ship, and if the shockwave were srong enough it would cause structural damage as well as local damage.

B. Penetrators like Stiletto or Paveway would sink the warhead's payload into the target object before detonation.

C. Shaped charge basically become explosion-powered beam of molten metal that penetrates the ship's structure and causes damage that way. This could theoretically be accomplished by a nuclear charge as well as conventional explosives.

But, this tangent of the discussion is veering off topic quite fast, so let's leave damage mechanisms for another thread.

[The E]

3kt? that's physically impossible, plus we don't know what kind of explosive it is toting

Reality disagrees

Look closely. That's a man-portable, variable-yield nuclear weapon which can be dialed from 10t to 1kt. It was designed in the 60s.

For further education, take a look at this, which is a 181kg bomb with a yield of up to 45kt. Developed in 1965.

[General Battuta]

How is a three kiloton detonation physically impossible when our modern nuclear warheads easily achieve that yield?

uh, because they aren't nuclear.

Yes they are.

[Herra Tohtori]

Reality disagrees

Look closely. That's a man-portable, variable-yield nuclear weapon which can be dialed from 10t to 1kt. It was designed in the 60s.

For further education, take a look at this, which is a 181kg bomb with a yield of up to 45kt. Developed in 1965.

For further further education, AIR-2 Genie was a 1.5 kt air-to-air rocket designed to have an area effect and destroy hostile aircraft.

Strategic dimensions for it are 2.95 m (9 ft 8 in) length and 0.44 m (17.5 in) in diameter, weighing in 373 kg (822 lb) at launch. Warhead itself was W25, which by itself was 17.4 inches in diameter and 26.6 inches long, weighing estimated 218-221 pounds.

From this context, the dumbfire rockets used in FreeSpace actually sound almost plausible - if not for their rather lackluster visible results...

[OsirisFLFan]

Firstly General Steele is a downright, dispecable son of a *****, with no morals BUT I got to admit he's one hell of a strategist and a General (i'd rather be fighting for him than against him LOL)

Playing through WIH and seeing the capabilities (nuclear weapon and artillery) of the UEF warships i've noticed that the only advantage the GTA has is the beam technology and probably the war/fighting experience they got from fighting the shivans. Remove that and the UEF trounces them everytime (big up to the 2nd fleet; jovian/martians rock and kick butt)

Even though General Steele is a maniacal but absolutely intelligent strategist i think he has a match when it comes to some of the Jovian militiary head honchos.

One thing i still can't get is why the GTA wants to remove the ubuntu goverment. With the experience the GTA has had fighting the shivans plus the experience of the survivors from the alternate timeline (AOA)wouldn't the diplomatic route of informing the Ubuntu of the risk the shivans pose be easier than fighting? Cuz this war is just going to end up as a war of attrition with the best of the UEF fleet being destroyed (which strategically is a big no no cuz training newbies is going to suck and getting that fighting experience will take time.) Leaving the GTA having to rebuild a viable fighting fleet whilst dealing with controlling  a probably disgruntled populace.

[SpardaSon21]

Diplomacy isn't an option.  The GTVA fears Ubuntu will spread throughout GTVA space, turning its citizens into pacifists.  Projections also had a massive emigration from the outer colonies into Sol, leaving them useless in case of Shivan incursion.  Essentially, the GTVA feels that if it and humanity are to survive, the UEF must be crushed and Ubuntu consigned to the dustbin of failed philosophies.  There's also the fact the GTVA needs Sol's industry to get its economy running again and to start building more warships.

In other words, the GTVA has been wanting a short, victorious war in order to restore public morale and give the economy a shot in the arm.