[headdie]

even without support from space a predator would cream us at our current tech level.

on a tech aspect
Predator plus side
the predators cloak, now its been a while since i have had anything to do with the predator story arc but if it is em based then we have no way of penatrating it as all of out detection tech except sonar is based on the em spectrum.

the edges on most of the bladed items in predators have been shown to slice pretymuch any material we can produce to some degree or another

their visual enhancment tech is at least equal to and most likely superior to ours.

Preaditor tech negative
that plasma cannon is a good show stopper and would prove usefull against armoured vehicles but its use would negate many of the predators tech and skill advantages.



Human tech Advantage
we have yet to see predators use vehicles for planetside combat so a few light vehicles with ap weaponry might prove handy in open terrain.

Human tech Dissadvantage
loud inaccuret weapons

inability to penatrate predators cloak



predator training
raised as young to be hunters operating primeraly solo but also in small team in hostile enviroments against many hostile opponents

human training
trained from young adults to fight in groups against other groups of similar size with little knowlage of combat against solo higly trrained combattants

we would probably win against a hunting party but at a heavy casutly rate, if they chose to invade we would have our arses handed to us

[Liberator]

Preds don't invade.  We are useful because we are incredibly dangerous game, nothing more.  In AVP2, the one with the blue acid was a game warden, I don't think we've seen Pred military yet.

[SpardaSon21]

Yes we have; what do you think all those hunters would be doing if war broke out?

[Qent]

Don't predator cloaks make a "blur" when they move? With the right optics and computers I'm sure we could spot that. And what EM band does the cloak work on? It might not be able to mask heat emissions.

And machine guns are very accurate. They just shoot what you're pointing at, so you'd better be able to see the target.

[headdie]

Don't predator cloaks make a "blur" when they move? With the right optics and computers I'm sure we could spot that. And what EM band does the cloak work on? It might not be able to mask heat emissions.

And machine guns are very accurate. They just shoot what you're pointing at, so you'd better be able to see the target.

the optics would take time to develop, produce and then there is the usability, could you condense thew system down to man portable in time? or would it rely on a field commander + technicians looking at monitors trying to spot the pred and guide the soldier aim?

on weapons fire single shot is pretty accurate and has been for decades but unless your weapon is bolted to something solid it will still jump throwing the following shots off the mark unless you take time to correct your aim.

[Qent]

In time? I thought this was a hypothetical predator vs. earth military discussion. *Re-reads*

I was thinking you strap a (very expensive and somehow shock-resistant ) camera to the gun, plug it in to the iPhone or whatever processing power the marines have on them, and the computer compares the actual image to the expected image (based on previous footage), searching for that specific blurry effect. Then it draws (either on a screen on the gun, or better yet on a Halo-marine-style helmet HUD) an orange silhouette where it thinks there's a cloaked predator. Yes, I'll bet we can do that if not right now, at least in a few years.

Machine guns are either bolted down or on some kind of bipod. Infantry fire assault rifles in very short bursts.

[headdie]

i say in time because we dont know what that effect would look like so cant pre develop the concept into a workable technology, it would be necessary to take recordings of the effect.  from that a mathematical model of the distortion would need to be developed that could be converted into computer code. i say a mathematical model because we are not talking about a solid shape such as an aircraft or tank as has previously been done but a form that changes shape dramatically depending on perspective of the viewer and the stance/moment of the target, so identifying the "blur" would probably prove more reliable.  to be honest i dont think an iPhone or similar device would have the processing ability to complete the task quickly.

Finally whatever system is implemented how do you get it to the guys on the front line

I do agree a soldier mounted camera would be a necessity i would suggest a helmet mounted system would be more workable as you firstly don't have the same shock issues you mentioned and it is already done in some forms.

[Qent]

Maybe you could set a trap with some kind of poison gas, retrieve the cloak, then analyze it at your leisure. And I'm sure all that weird alien technology must have some kind of heat signature.

Getting it to the front lines, I'm not sure. Equip a battalion with them, deploy them, and pull back the ones currently on the front line? IDK how that works.

Or you could spray smoke everywhere because for some reason predators always use that laser thingy. Then whenever they take aim they'll have three red arrows pointed right at them.

[Colonol Dekker]

Wait just a second. . . . .
 
 
In Predator 2, in the warehouse full of meat. Didn't the government bods use thermal vision on the Pred to track it?

[mxlm]

All I remember from that scene is that the SWAT guys got massacred, I thought because thermal vision didn't actually work.

I mean, if thermal vision worked then surely preds would show up in the human vision mode in the AvP games? No?

Here's wiki's summary of the scene. Maybe someone with a better memory and/or who hates themselves and has seen the movie recently can help:

Keyes finally reveals to Harrigan what he's dealing with, and that he and his team have been following encounter sites with the "other world life form" ever since Alan "Dutch" Schaeffer (the protagonist of the first film, played by Arnold Schwarzenegger) and his special forces team were attacked in the jungle ten years earlier. Keyes and his men are determined to capture this creature for study, realizing its value as a potential means for immense technological advance. Armed with cryogenic weaponry intended to immobilize the creature, they have set a trap for it in a vacant slaughterhouse which the Predator has been raiding for food. The team wear thermally insulated suits to prevent the Predator from detecting them via infrared. However, the Predator simply switches its mask's scanner through a number of different ranges of electromagnetic wavelengths that are available to it, before settling on the ultraviolet  spectrum where it is able to see their black lights. The Predator attacks the government team, killing everyone except Keyes. Harrigan, who foresaw trouble, is able to escape custody and heads to confront the Predator.

[Kosh]

All I remember from that scene is that the SWAT guys got massacred, I thought  because thermal vision didn't actually work.

It didn't work, but it had other vision modes that allowed it to see the lights they had on.

[Qent]

So humans never tried using thermal vision on predators?

[Kosh]

Nope. How they defeated its cloaking device was filling the warehouse with radioactive dust. To get around the predators thermal vision mode they wore suits to conceal their thermal signature. It did work, but they thought it could only see in one mode when it had others, which allowed it to see the light beams from the shoulder lamps. Ultimately that's why the trap didn't work.

[Qent]

Seems to me they should have tried thermal before radioactive dust. Ah, Hollywood is a strange place....

[TopAce]

It wouldn't have helped them. Rewatch the scene.

[Qent]

I never watched it in the first place. That's why I asked about it.

[TopAce]

You may find it on YouTube.

[Qent]

Okay got it. They can't spot him even with the cloak disabled. XD