Hard Light Productions Forums
General FreeSpace => FreeSpace Discussion => Topic started by: rscaper1070 on January 04, 2011, 10:13:52 pm
-
I've been trying to find out how much reverse engineering was done with the captured Dragon fighter. Other than the fact that Triton Dynamics developed the control interface for it I haven't been able to find anything. Has anybody made any Terran fighters based off the Dragon?
-
I think the most important tech to be reverse-engineered from the Dragon was fighter inter-system jump drives. Other than that, there probably hasn't been much major technological salvaging from it.
-
I think the most important tech to be reverse-engineered from the Dragon was fighter inter-system jump drives. Other than that, there probably hasn't been much major technological salvaging from it.
no, that tech was found elsewhere.
-
Most likely the reverse engineered the whole thing, main drives, power core, everything, there's a lot of difference between jerry-rigging something for a one off mission and the kind of research that would go into learning how the shivans build ships. Also, I don't see an enourmous amount of difference between technology levels on the battlefield. It's more a question of pure scale. The Shivans build ships bigger than ours and at a rate the dwarfs the alliance. It took the alliance 20 years to build ONE Collie. The Shivans built at least 80 ships that are bigger and more fearsome than the Collie and given how willing they were to throw them away with that supernova trick, it's entirely likely that they could afford to lose them because the objective was worth it or(more frighteningly) the Sathanai were disposable due to obsolescence.
-
The Shivans were indeed more advanced.
It isn't mentioned exactly what technology is gained from it, but the UD-8 Kayser was based on Shivan weaponry. Perhaps from the Dragon.
-
I don't think there was actually terribly much to be learned from the Dragon. The design is in a lot of ways a step backward from Terran or Vasudan fighters, and certainly not what's needed to compete with the Shivans. It lacks the time-on-station (because of munitions depletion) and damage resistance to be a good answer to the Shivan fighter hordes.
Doubtless you could glean some kind of improvements from the individual systems, probably shields and possibly power systems and weapons, but I doubt the basic hull structure or the ship as an integrated whole had much to offer to GTVA design.
-
The Shivans built at least 80 ships that are bigger and more fearsome than the Collie and given how willing they were to throw them away with that supernova trick, it's entirely likely that they could afford to lose them because the objective was worth it or(more frighteningly) the Sathanai were disposable due to obsolescence.
:shaking: I'm curious to know what :v: would have imagined as more powerful juggernaut for FreeSpace 3 ... Frightening is the word.
-
I've often toyed with the question "If we hadn't built the C, would the Sathanas have even existed?", which raises a whole heap of questions about what the Shivans actually are :)
-
Has anybody made any Terran fighters based off the Dragon?
The Loki? :p
-
I've often toyed with the question "If we hadn't built the C, would the Sathanas have even existed?", which raises a whole heap of questions about what the Shivans actually are :)
Dark mirror of humanity?
-
I've often toyed with the question "If we hadn't built the C, would the Sathanas have even existed?", which raises a whole heap of questions about what the Shivans actually are :)
Dark mirror of humanity?
That sort of idea, it gives more weight to the 'Revenge of an angry Cosmos' ideology that surrounds them ;)
-
Revenge of an angry cosmos perhaps, but dark mirror of humanity I'm not so sure of. If they are a mirror for us, then why did they kill the ancients?
-
Perhaps the same reason we would have killed Vasudans if Shivans didn't stopped us.
-
I find it hard to believe the GTA would have committed genocide against the Vasudans.
In all likelihood whichever side won would demand surrender and likely reparations, etc. I find it hard to believe that he Bastion would just jump into Vasuda and nuke it.
I mean let's face it, the Zods and Terrans are capable of communication.
-
The ability to communicate isn't enough to overcome the ability to hate.
-
But hate THAT much?
Genocide is a huge step man. While I'm sure some in GTA high command would be prepared for it, I severely doubt that all of command would be on board, and if humanity has truly lost that much moral fiber then we are up **** creek without a paddle.
Perhaps GTVA command circa Blue Planet would have been prepared for genocide, but that's the disconnect I always had with BP i guess. GTVA command was bat**** insane xD. I get that Ubuntu was a threat.. or well they perceived it to be (i felt bad playing WiH because once war started I was definitely cheering for the GTVA... i was pissed when I thought the Carthage was gonna be destroyed). But war never should have happened at all. Or at least not that quickly. Strategically, militarily I can see why the security council did what they did.. but still. War against earth, after the quest to return to earth just seems a stretch. Also, propaganda or no, Terran citizens GTVA wide would be up in arms.
Either way, GTVA command that decided to invade sol were a collection of megalomaniacs that I have a hard time believing would actually exist simultaneously in positions of authority, thus, i just cant see genocide against the zods.
-
The Harbinger was designed for planetary bombardment. I think it's pretty clear it was used for planetary bombardment. Casualties from that kinda event are definitely at the genocide level.
And no BP command was not insane. *sigh* FreeSpace 2 command allowed the NTF leadership to escape in the hope of capturing a piece of technology that was of use to them. They were perfectly happy sacrificing lives and ethics to achieve their goals. That proud tradition of putting exigencies first carries on.
All your questions are answered in the BP techroom. As far as the Security Council was concerned it was either invade Sol or face the extinction of humanity. What choice would you make?
-
I understand the reasoning, and I did read the BP tech room.
I'm not meaning to pick a fight Battuta, i thought BP ad WiH were EXCELLENT campaigns. The BP team did an excellent job, I enjoyed playing them.
I understand why, but I still think that GTVA command was insane. Sacrificing lives in order to acquire ETAK was also morally reprehensible, but so incredibly different on a psychological level from invading earth. Samuel Bei's reaction upon entering Sol at the end of BP was my reaction. I was flabbergasted, absolutely speechless that command could even consider it. I read the reasons, the reasons were good but were just... it seems to be a major step up from GTVA moral, lack in FS2.
Command sacrificing lives to take ETAK.. horrifying, but it didnt have that sam shock value. Here we are, lost our home world for 50 years. and now we're fighting them? It was horrifying.
I will admit though, gratz to the BP team for delivering one of the best shock value endings I have ever experienced.
-
Well that I can respect, there are doubtless people in the setting who feel the same way you do.
Poke around on these forums and you'll find ardent supporters of the war who will be happy to argue with you. JUST LIKE REAL LIFE
-
Yeah.. sorry if i came across like a douche haha. I guess that, while I know people are really prepared for evil deeds, I like to believe that everyone is essentially good.
-
I'm sure some people felt the same way about the change in the United States' military policy between World War II and Vietnam. Similar timespans, similar shifts in public opinion of their leaders.
-
Fair point that.
Living outside the US, I never did have that shift. Or well, I wasn't alive at the time, but I wasn't born into that shifted society I guess.
-
We're still hearing about it today.
I get the impression that the NTF rebellion caused perhaps more casualties than the Sol war - 100,000 per Orion, I think 5,000 for a Deimos, plus ethnic violence in Cygnus Prime. More people died whenever an Orion was destroyed than did in the the civilian bombings right before Post Meridian.
WiH actually seems closely modeled on the US civil war, coincidently. Much more so than the NTF rebellion was. That war was the bloodiest in American history.
Severanti = General George B. McClellan
Jump gate = Railroad
-
We're still hearing about it today.
I get the impression that the NTF rebellion caused perhaps more casualties than the Sol war - 100,000 per Orion, I think 5,000 for a Deimos, plus ethnic violence in Cygnus Prime. More people died whenever an Orion was destroyed than did in the the civilian bombings right before Post Meridian.
WiH actually seems closely modeled on the US civil war, coincidently. Much more so than the NTF rebellion was. That war was the bloodiest in American history.
Severanti = General George B. McClellan
Jump gate = Railroad
small correction the crew of an Orion in 10,000 in canon
-
100,000 per Orion
Damnit. Edged out by headdie.
But, one other thing to consider- the crew of those Destroyers are warriors. They are trained combatants, and far from defenseless, very much unlike those poor souls on Luna. Granted, there were valid military targets in the regions the GTVA bombed, but, like many air raids in WW2, the Tevs didn't seem to care much about collateral damage.
Man, we could look for historical parallels all day!
-
still 10,000 military casualties is horrific and compare to the Somme
-
Mankind has a history of eliminating each other in job lots, why would we have qualms about eliminating the Zods?
-
oops :eek2: lol, sorry guys. I guess I have decimal issues.
-
Casualties in the NTF rebellion aside, the cultural significance of Earth puts a war against Sol in a whole different category.
As for eliminating the Zods, I guess it's just my world view, but genocide is. It's such a radical move and I'd like to believe most of humanity wouldn't support wholesale genocide
-
Firstly, the conflict with the Vasudans had settled quite a bit by the time the Shivans show up. More akin to the level of conflict of Kilngons/Federation circa the Original Star Trek. Openly hostile, but not going out of the way to blow each other out of the stars. Besides, as I recall, there had only been a couple of destroyers lost during the whole war 14 years at the point where we come in.
Comparing to the NTF rebellion, as a military action, forgetting the behind the scenes politics, it felt like a mostly military matter. Bosch took those of his Command who were loyal and took 3 systems and kicked the GTVA out. We don't know how bad things were under his rule. We don't know if there were stormtroopers in the streets or if people got up every morning and went to work and lived normal lives with no change in their day to day activities. Also, background activities aside, the Alliance had painted the entire conflict with the NTF as a Liberation of those systems, there is no way they could have nuked the planets they were liberating and ever have expected to stay themselves or keep their flunkies, minions or co-conspirators anywhere near the positions of power they needed to enact they're plans.
Look, you guys have got me talking like Terran command is a bunch of 3rd class comic book villains now.
-
Revenge of an angry cosmos perhaps, but dark mirror of humanity I'm not so sure of. If they are a mirror for us, then why did they kill the ancients?
That's why it's not quite a 'mirror' as such, more like a 'parasite', the fleet encountered by the ancients was their own personal nightmare, no matter what they tried, the Shivans had a reply to it. In many ways, Freespace 1 involved fighting the Shivans the Ancients met, however, when we meet them again, the fleet starts to change, no shielded capital ships (maybe the ancients never developed Beam weapons), craft that seem almost designed to deal with GTVA assets appear almost at the same time as the assets themselves do, so I don't think they are an 'alternate version' of humanity, think more 'White blood cell', flooding to a wound opened by the Knossos ;)
-
Openly hostile, but not going out of the way to blow each other out of the stars.
GTI says hi.
-
That part of GTI was the freaking SS and you know it. It's like trying to say the KGB was a charity organization.
-
Perhaps the same reason we would have killed Vasudans if Shivans didn't stopped us.
There's no real evidence we would have managed that, and one can well interpret the war as winding down.