[mikhael]

 

From Setekh:
And yet, we know that it got toasted by the Lucifer- errr, by some Shivans. I wonder what kind of damage would be detectable after so very long (8k years?) that distinguished it as Shivan battle scars.

I dunno. You do enough damage to raze an entire planetary surface from orbit, I think that's going to leave a lasting mark.

Heck, look at the chunk of debris that hit Mars and created Tythonus Chasma (the largest canyon in the solar system). Its age is estimated, conservatively, at over 500 million years. And that was just a rock hitting once. The Shivans steamrolled an entire planetary surface.

On sheerest speculation, let's say the Shivans used high energy weaponry to crack the mantle in several places. That would create distinct scarring that would outlast the resulting cataclysm.

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--Mik

[This message has been edited by mikhael (edited 12-14-2001).]

[Nico]

I'd rather look at what would happen with our nukes. The radiation left by nukes would stay for about a dozen of milleniums, I've read, but they would remain only in zones where they couldn't have been cleaned by weather, erosion and stuff like that (caves, deep forests). The shivan weapon most likeky generates very particular radiations, easily recognizable by the GTVA

[karajorma]

t's been a while since I played FS1 what exactly did the shivans do to Vasuda Prime?

[Su-tehp]

 

Originally posted by karajorma:
t's been a while since I played FS1 what exactly did the shivans do to Vasuda Prime?

See big Lucifer superdestroyer. See big Lucifer superdestroyer with big beams.
See big Lucifer superdestroyer with big beams fire on Vasudan homeworld. See Vasudan homeworld become big radioactive ball of sand and glass.

Don't be a Vasudan homeworld.  


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FRED Zone's Grammar editor/ FS history moderator
Former member of TCA
Member in good standing of 99th Skulls
Honorary member of TCS and UGC

"I created your civilization...now I will destroy it!"
--Ra, the Sun God

[aldo_14]

Well, the destruction of a planet could be put down to 2 things - accident/disater or an attack.  

If the planet was not destroyed by a cataclysm, the natural assumption would be the Lucifer was repsonsible - as it was the only known class of ship able to destroy a planet at a time.  When you take into account the Sathanas fleet, it's just as possible that they razed Altair - or another similar craft type did.

[karajorma]

 

Originally posted by Su-tehp:
See big Lucifer superdestroyer. See big Lucifer superdestroyer with big beams.
See big Lucifer superdestroyer with big beams fire on Vasudan homeworld. See Vasudan homeworld become big radioactive ball of sand and glass.

Don't be a Vasudan homeworld.  

Somehow I just don't buy it. Unless the lucifer has a higher setting to its beams. It would have taken months or even years to "paint" the entire surface of a planet with beams. Those beams don`t have much width to them and considering the amount of damage they do to capships they wouldn`t have a huge amount of power by the time they got through the planets atmosphere.  
 Seems much more likely that they'd just open a hatch and rain down nukes (or even just asteroids).

[mikhael]

 

Originally posted by karajorma:
Somehow I just don't buy it. Unless the lucifer has a higher setting to its beams. It would have taken months or even years to "paint" the entire surface of a planet with beams. Those beams don`t have much width to them and considering the amount of damage they do to capships they wouldn`t have a huge amount of power by the time they got through the planets atmosphere.  
 Seems much more likely that they'd just open a hatch and rain down nukes (or even just asteroids).

Unless, of course, the Shivans sent more than one. Or if they just boiled it's atmosphere. Or they just punched a needle thin beam through the mantle into the core and then widened the aperture. It could have been a combination of all these things.

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--Mik
http://www.404error.com

[Nico]

 

Originally posted by karajorma:
Somehow I just don't buy it. Unless the lucifer has a higher setting to its beams. It would have taken months or even years to "paint" the entire surface of a planet with beams. Those beams don`t have much width to them and considering the amount of damage they do to capships they wouldn`t have a huge amount of power by the time they got through the planets atmosphere.  
 Seems much more likely that they'd just open a hatch and rain down nukes (or even just asteroids).

they used alternate shots, it seems: the beam that destroyes the city in the CB anim is blue/white, not yellow.
Btw, i think the Luci just destroyed cities, the planet is rendered unhabitable because of the resulting radiations, not because it has been completly leveled.

[jonskowitz]

Might I remind you that it only took TWO hits from the Lucy's main beams to eviscerate the Galatea.  That SOB is several kilometers long and made of stuff that (quite literally) laughs hysterically at nuclear weapons!?!

  Also, you're forgetting that the passage of the particle beam would cause firestorms created by the surrounding superheated atmoshpere that would cause massive collateral damage to a wide area, not just the point of beam impact (likely, what we're seeing in the 'Bombardment of Vasuda Prime' video is this superhot atmosphere and not the beam at all).

[This message has been edited by jonskowitz (edited 12-15-2001).]

[Setekh]

 

Originally posted by mikhael:
I dunno. You do enough damage to raze an entire planetary surface from orbit, I think that's going to leave a lasting mark.

Heck, look at the chunk of debris that hit Mars and created Tythonus Chasma (the largest canyon in the solar system). Its age is estimated, conservatively, at over 500 million years. And that was just a rock hitting once. The Shivans steamrolled an entire planetary surface.

On sheerest speculation, let's say the Shivans used high energy weaponry to crack the mantle in several places. That would create distinct scarring that would outlast the resulting cataclysm.

What I meant was in reference to Venom's recollection of Altair (well, the razed planet) being 'pretty blue and green planet, just like ours'. If everything was looking rosy, how could we tell it had been nuked by the Shivans? Planets tend to heal themselves - Earth isn't marked by meteorite craters as much as Mercury or the Moon - but if Altair had healed itself up as far as looking similar to Earth in terms of ocean and greenery, how could we tell what damage had been caused? Indeed, what damage would be visible?

[mikhael]

 

Originally posted by Setekh:
What I meant was in reference to Venom's recollection of Altair (well, the razed planet) being 'pretty blue and green planet, just like ours'. If everything was looking rosy, how could we tell it had been nuked by the Shivans? Planets tend to heal themselves - Earth isn't marked by meteorite craters as much as Mercury or the Moon - but if Altair had healed itself up as far as looking similar to Earth in terms of ocean and greenery, how could we tell what damage had been caused? Indeed, what damage would be visible?

You should come to the US and visit Meteor Crater (a mile across and several hundred feet deep). The Earth is marked by such things, but our atmosphere handles most of the biggest debris. Altair might be a pretty, blue-green world now, somewhere on the surface, there's going to be something like Tythonus Chasma or Meteor Crater.

If, as I speculated, they pierced the mantle, the resulting geological upheaval would produce a distinct, easily recognizable set of geological features: anamolous, enormous slabs of basaltic rock, lava beds and the like. Those tend to last a good long time. Think of the tectonic shearing along the new superfault created by a slasher beam designed to punch a hole like that. At the very least, you're going to have extremely suspicious looking wall-like mountain ranges, I think.


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--Mik
http://www.404error.com

[Setekh]

Okay, never mind me, I'm an idiot.  

Hey, wait there.   (I'm a sucker for punishment.) Who says it couldn't have been another type of weapon? An Ancients one, for example. The scientists that crash-landed made a positive ID that it was Shivan battle-damage. Gee, this roaming band of Vasudans must've know their Shivan weaponry pretty well, or else someone in Intelligence (GTI? PVI? There was no GTVA back then...) did some serious research.  

[mikhael]

Oh it could have been an Ancients weapon. I just think those crazy Vasudan scientists were looked at the remains of a planetary *****slap and immediately associated it with the Shivans. After all, who else would have slapped down an entire planet?


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--Mik
http://www.404error.com

[Setekh]

Lol! A planetary *****slap... well said. Mmm, good point there. Gee, the Ancients could have had a mighty big civil war. Except the artifact the scientists found - the one with the Ancients monologues in it, which we showed how to track Shivans into subspace - doesn't have any clues towards that, but instead supports the Shivan planetary *****slap possibility. Oh well.  

[joek]

About this talk about Altair... so I smell a render coming on? (Not by me but by someone with render talent). A planet the looks like the moon Miranda (all fractured and beat up), but is now covered with green forests and rivers cascading off miles-high creavases and canyons.  

Joe.

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[aldo_14]

 

Originally posted by Setekh:
What I meant was in reference to Venom's recollection of Altair (well, the razed planet) being 'pretty blue and green planet, just like ours'. If everything was looking rosy, how could we tell it had been nuked by the Shivans? Planets tend to heal themselves - Earth isn't marked by meteorite craters as much as Mercury or the Moon - but if Altair had healed itself up as far as looking similar to Earth in terms of ocean and greenery, how could we tell what damage had been caused? Indeed, what damage would be visible?

Radiations signatures I guess.... wasn't there some mention of that in the briefing after Ross 128 was destroyed?

[mikhael]

 

Originally posted by joek:
About this talk about Altair... so I smell a render coming on? (Not by me but by someone with render talent). A planet the looks like the moon Miranda (all fractured and beat up), but is now covered with green forests and rivers cascading off miles-high creavases and canyons.  

Joe.

Setekh: pay attention to this guy (p-p-p-please, Eddie!).   I would LOVE to see something like that. *heh* Heck that would make a great world in which to base an RPG.  

Did I just quote Roger Rabbit? Eviscerate me now.



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--Mik
http://www.404error.com

[Alikchi]

*charges the Eviscerator* Any last words?

[mikhael]

Please don't kill me! I'll give you the pods! No cargo is worth my life!

[Setekh]

 

Originally posted by mikhael:
Setekh: pay attention to this guy (p-p-p-please, Eddie!).   I would LOVE to see something like that. *heh* Heck that would make a great world in which to base an RPG.  

Heheh, I'll add it to the list of about 20 render ideas I have sitting next to me.   Sounds like a challenge... good.