Hard Light Productions Forums
General FreeSpace => FreeSpace Discussion => Topic started by: LoneKnight on October 05, 2011, 02:11:37 pm
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I was milling through hallfight and was wondering if anyone ever figured out what the weapon is that the Shivan charges(?) and fires from it's face(?). IIRC I recall seeing some debate as to whether this was a subspace gun or something. Now, look at the FS2 Intro cinematic - as the Manticore fires a missile at the Herc, it does a similar particle "charge" before firing. Is this supposed to indicate that it was the same mechanism for firing?
Considering Shivan technology and their familiarity with subspace, is it conceivable that they had subspace based weaponry? This could be related or unrelated to the event that triggered the Capella supernova, but on a much smaller scale.
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It doesn't fire from it's face, it fires from it's shoulder.
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YES! Someone else agrees with me :wakka:
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I never before noticed, but when I re-watched the video just now, you can see that it really is the left shoulder that opens up. You can see part of the face with the many eyes behind it, or beside it in the very last shot, were the weapon starts to fire.
And the FS2 Techroom describtion very clearly stated that the Shivans have an integrated plasma-weapon... or at least the german one does and I doubt they made that up from thin air for a translation. So no, no subspace involved.
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It's not that I agree or disagree... It's that I have proof.
Debate ended.
[attachment deleted by ninja]
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Debate ended.
Right, but I'm trying to discern between the shoulder gun, the way the Manticore fires, and subspace-based weaponry. Are they all different systems? Can Shivans only manipulate subspace on a much larger scale?
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Right, but I'm trying to discern between the shoulder gun, the way the Manticore fires, and subspace-based weaponry. Are they all different systems? Can Shivans only manipulate subspace on a much larger scale?
Can't say. We can only speculate.. and speculate we have done.. for 10 years. I assume this question is in relation to a campaign or mission. I'd say just do whatever you like or think works best.
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All different i'd wager.
In the same way the marines mini-ml16 appeared to be a machine gun :/
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I can't say anything about the Manticor charging up the missile, but as I already wrote in my earlier post, the FS2 techroom entry on Shivans clearly states it is a plasma weapon. And usually there is no subspace involved in plasma weapons technobabble, unless subspace is used instead of a magnetic bottle.
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Yeah, I don't see any reason to drag subspace into this. It's quite clearly a plasma based beam cannon same as on their ships.
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As in many sci-fi games/movies/whatever, I think the term "plasma weapon" can apply to most, if not all, lasery weapons. Terran Huge Turrets, Shivan Megafunks, beam cannons, Lucifer cannons, and all other energy-based weapons can simply be called "plasma weapons".
The OP is wondering whether the Shivans use subspace weapon mechanisms all the time because apparently, he says that the same firing effects were seen in both the Shivan firing that "integrated plasma weapon" and when the Manticore fired a missile at a Herc in the FS2 cutscene.
But really, I think there's no need to be suspicious of this mysteriously frequent charge-up effect. It's just a flashy...charge-up, to make things more dramatic. Also, notice that if that charge-up were indeed some kind of subspace manipulation mechanism, then the Sathanases should have used it too. But no. Clearly, the Sath fleet in the FS2 ending cutscene didn't charge up their subspace weapons with that flashy effect again.
Finally, as karajorma said, I really think that the weapon the Shivan used in the Taranis cutscene is a beam weapon. Both capital ship beam weapons and the Shivan had a multi-second, expanding ball of light before releasing a vaporizing beam of energy. So yeah, it's most probably a beam weapon.
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Yeah, I don't see any reason to drag subspace into this. It's quite clearly a plasma based beam cannon same as on their ships.
It doesn't really look or act the same as a beam, no base glow for example. This is possibly because of the atmosphere in the ship but I doubt it. It may be a less-advanced version.
To be honest I'm not even sure why they have the shoulder gun, it's slow to charge, terminal effect isn't that great for the apparent investment of energy, it probably requires exposing vulnerable bodyparts or components.
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Yeah, from what I can tell, a Shivan can walk up taking a good amount of fire before going down, and rip you to shreds with its bare... claws?
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Yeah, from what I can tell, a Shivan can walk up taking a good amount of fire before going down, and rip you to shreds with its bare... claws?
Claws imply that they could be used for climbing or moving, yet they clearly only were "extended" when the Shivans got really close to the boarding Marines. I'm assuming that these are instead blades used specifically for CQC.
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Maybe the beam was originally intended to melt through walls, bulkheard or battlemachines (like tanks) and the Shivan was just showing off, or had a dislike for dismembering and thus decided to toast the marine instead (or didn't want to have to clean the blades afterwards).
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They actually have claw-like hands, but they havce these funny looking swords/bigass knives in them, that retract into the hand when not in use.
I'm also talking about their "legs", not the arms they have on top of their body.
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Shivan Megafunks
Unce unce unce unce unce unce unce unce unce unce
As for the beam, Volition did it for dramatic effect. Stop reading too much into it
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As for the beam, Volition did it for dramatic effect. Stop reading too much into it
But it is now forever part of canon. If they can integrate beam canons into their bodies, I'll be wondering why they can't have beams on their fighters every single time I encounter them ingame.
Just the same way I wonder why they don't use the three shot disintegrate function on the Zat gun to disintegrate capital ships in SG-1.
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IIRC, the Zat Gun "three shot disintegration" was retconned out.[/offtopic]
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Considering the Shivan shot the marine point blank we can assume that beam has very short range.
Combine that with the long heatup time and you got yourself a very ineffective weapon for dogfights.
And the disintegration thing wasn't retconned. They used that trick twice in later seasons.
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Well, if the beam cannon was effective in dogfights, wouldn't it have penetrated the hull of the vessel he was in? It was never shown, so the assumption in this case would be that the beams they have on their bodies is more anti-person than anti-ship.
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Well, if the beam cannon was effective in dogfights, wouldn't it have penetrated the hull of the vessel he was in? It was never shown, so the assumption in this case would be that the beams they have on their bodies is more anti-person than anti-ship.
I think he means if you can make a beam cannon small enough for your shoulder why can't you put one on a fighter or bomber? It's a good question, Inferno will probably answer it.
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We also don't really know if it was a true "beam" weapon, or just something like a finite blast of plasma, similar to a primary weapon on a fighter. The screen fades to white pretty quickly as it fires.
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Most FS2 ships can survive ridiculous amounts of damage.
The simple answer is probably just that while the Shivan beam is good against fleshy humans it would simply be laughed at if you hit a ship with it.