Group of fictional armies vs modern day NAVY Seals

[Guest TheJ0ke]

Yeah, but a .30-06 rifle round actually has more kinetic energy than a heavy spear. It's different physics. Modern rounds still knock people over often, even if their armor takes the impact completely. Additionally, a person wearing a Kevlar vest can take a shotgun slug without penetration. But that slug still has sufficient momentum, mass, etc. to break bones and cause internal bleeding.

 

And I don't necessarily interpret that quote as him actually traveling backwards through the air to hit a bulkhead. For all we know, he could have staggered backwards, his head recoiling to hit the bulkhead. Something a modern round can do.

Certainly modern round are able to knock armored people over, perhaps even causing them to stumble backwards into a wall. However, I would hardly say that reeling backwards from said impact could be accurately described as being "slammed into the wall". Ruinus may have exaggerated when he said that the spear's impact bodily flung the man into the wall, but he has a point when he says that no modern rounds could cause the same effect.

 

Dude, I LOVE Supreme Commander, maybe its just me, but I get the satisfaction of completing a mission once I see the enemy commander erupt in a nuclear fashion.

 

I heard the second game was a bit of a let down? Tell me its not true!

Heh, leave it to JP to come up with such a post in the middle of a heated debate.

[Guest sirmethos]

Certainly modern round are able to knock armored people over, perhaps even causing them to stumble backwards into a wall. However, I would hardly say that reeling backwards from said impact could be accurately described as being "slammed into the wall". Ruinus may have exaggerated when he said that the spear's impact bodily flung the man into the wall, but he has a point when he says that no modern rounds could cause the same effect.

 

no, he wasn't exaggerating, he was quoting directly from one of the novels. the 2nd or 3rd in the Young Jedi's series if i'm not completely mistaken.

[Guest TheJ0ke]

no, he wasn't exaggerating, he was quoting directly from one of the novels. the 2nd or 3rd in the Young Jedi's series if i'm not completely mistaken.

Wai, wah?

I'm aware he was quoting... I never said that the quote was skewed. I wasn't questioning the reliability of the information from the book, I was questioning the interpretation. I thought that it was fairly obvious, but apparently it wasn't obvious enough. So here, I'll put it as plainly as I possibly can with all edits clearly marked:

 

Ruinus may have exaggerated [to some extent] when he said [in his interpretation of the quote from the Young Jedi Knights book] that the [heavy metal] spear's[, whose shaft had been dented by Qorl's robotic hand, had enough force that when thrown by Qorl, its] impact [completely picked Norys up, off his feet and] bodily flung the man [Norys] into the wall, but he [Ruinus] has a point when he says that no modern rounds [bullets commonly used in modern military guns] could cause the same effect [a man to hit a wall so forcefully that it could accurately be described as a "slam"].

[Skirmisher]

And everyone seems to have forgotten The Battle of Maridun... where a Force of Tribal Spear Chuckers went up against a Company (Typically 80 to 225 Soldiers) of Stormtroopers, and two Juggarnauts and inflicted 90% Casualties on them...

 

With Spears...

 

Wooden Spears...

 

That Penetrated Through their Armour...

 

Not the Soft Black parts, or the gaps...

 

But Through the Hard White Parts.

 

 

They killed 72 to 202 Stormtroopers by Shafting them.

[Guest TheJ0ke]

In an attempt to reconcile the obviously conflicting canon, I shall now devise an incredibly improbable, yet still possible, explanation...

 

You see, what happened on Maridun was that the Stormtroopers were being attacked by 2-3 meter tall hulking giants while running around in chaos and fear due to terrible COs. Said fear could have caused minor fluctuations in the molecular structure of some of the plastoid armor as a result of various quantum principles. The foremost of which is the uncertainty principle. Since the Amani would not have been able to directly observe where each spear landed and what it did and the Stormtroopers were too busy panicking (for the most part), the moment in which some spears made contact with soldiers may have gone completely unobserved. Thus meaning that, much like Schodinger's cat, each of these troopers was both alive and dead until observed by another and had a 50/50 chance for each. Over time, this resulted in the gradual build up of Stormtrooper casualties, despite the normally superior armor. Additionally, the Amani were using spears constructed from an unknown wood, which could possibly highly durable and tough as stone due to a variety of molecular properties and possible treatments used by the Amani. It is therefore possible that these factors all compounded to reduce the overall strength of the plastoid armor used by the Stormtroopers.

This stands in sharp contrast to the relative neutrality of Norys. His certainty is not great enough to affect the outcome, and his fear is not great enough to make him not pay attention to the spear's trajectory. As a result, the armor acts according to normal probabilities and easily deflects the heavy blow.

 

Note: Please do not refute my psuedo-science. In the Land of TheJ0ke, it all makes perfect sense and in fact is how that universe works in some areas. Besides which, it took me all of 2 minutes of hard thinking to come up with this explanation.

[Guest force_echo]

Well, The Fact that Greedo was sizzling after he was killed only speaks to the fact that Blasters are Thermal Weapons. Of course it would burn him, it's concentrated superheated plasma, besides, a Normal pistol could do that too...

Wrong, Han's DL-44 isn't a plasma based weapon its the more common particle beam version that delivers high speed electrons as well as a laser blast.

 

"The more common type was the blaster that fired a high energy particle beam that was more deadly to humanoids and other biological targets than superheated plasma (which was quite deadly anyway), but it was still effective enough against droids to put a B1 battle droid down and keep it down. Particle-beam types were also more efficient because they used less blaster gas to produce the beam than is necessary to form a plasma bolt, as plasma, as a state of matter, requires a far greater amount of energy to produce."

 

Plus, you just refuted your own point. You said a large rifle with Incen. or HE ammo can do the same thing as a regular blaster, that means a regular blaster can punch through modern armor, or atleast cause, as Redfield said, cause internal bleeding and internal damage from the concussive force.

[Skirmisher]

Particle Beams Are Plasma you idiot.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_weapon_%28fiction%29

 

"When discussing weapons in science fiction, a plasma weapon is a type of raygun that fires a stream, pulse or toroid of plasma...

 

[At present] The technology to create plasma toroids and particle beams is presently far too bulky for anything man-portable..."

 

Basically Particle Beams are compressed Plasma Bolts. I'm not sure why they try and differentiate them on the Wiki quote you gave, but I think that it is based on Fanon Speculation on how someone thinks they should act, or once again the Writers getting their Physics Wrong. I also like how the ENTIRE Article Section on Mechanics is unsourced, it leads Greatly to it's credibility.

 

Presumably some fan got upset that Blasters are described as shooting Plasma and wanted to differentiate them from Standard Plasma Weapons seen in other universes. But since they don't even fully operate as a Particle Beam Gun said fan had to compromise.

[Guest Jason Redfield]

Certainly modern round are able to knock armored people over, perhaps even causing them to stumble backwards into a wall. However, I would hardly say that reeling backwards from said impact could be accurately described as being "slammed into the wall". Ruinus may have exaggerated when he said that the spear's impact bodily flung the man into the wall, but he has a point when he says that no modern rounds could cause the same effect.

 

I see what you mean, but I still think it's open to interpretation. A guy wearing a bulletproof vest standing in front of a wall could get shot. He stumbles back, his head recoiling to hit the wall. Later on, he could say "Yeah, but the bullet slammed me into a wall."

 

I'd just like to know how far the wall was behind him. Besides, this is all moot point, as even the ability to knock a Stormie over with a round would be good. And I still believe many rounds would be able to penetrate, and even if they can't, the sheer volumes of fire modern firepower can put out will eventually find the visor or body glove, particularly with SEAL marksmanship.

[Guest TheJ0ke]

Bah! But you all seem to be forgetting the Stormtrooper Effect!

 

The deadliness of Stormtroopers is directly proportionate to the amount of main characters present in the opposing force subtracted by the amount of of main antagonists multiplied by 2.23 over the quotient of the amount of time elapsed since the beginning of the movie (or number of pages into the book) divided by the total possible.

 

Or: D_s = (P - A) (2.23/(T_c/T_o))

 

So since there are no plot crucial, named, protagonists present, the potential deadliness of the Stormtroopers is infinite! Hah! Pseudoscience wins again!

 

Anywho, now back to the real debate:

 

I see what you mean, but I still think it's open to interpretation. A guy wearing a bulletproof vest standing in front of a wall could get shot. He stumbles back, his head recoiling to hit the wall. Later on, he could say "Yeah, but bullet slammed me into the wall."

Well, I see what you mean as well. However, the thing is that the book isn't told through a first person narrator (not that there could really be any other types of narrator), its told in your typical 3rd person omniscient prose. So there is no potential for bias. If it's described that way, it's probably because it happened that way.

[Guest Ruinus]

And everyone seems to have forgotten The Battle of Maridun... where a Force of Tribal Spear Chuckers went up against a Company (Typically 80 to 225 Soldiers) of Stormtroopers, and two Juggarnauts and inflicted 90% Casualties on them...

 

With Spears...

 

Wooden Spears...

 

That Penetrated Through their Armour...

 

Not the Soft Black parts, or the gaps...

 

But Through the Hard White Parts.

 

 

They killed 72 to 202 Stormtroopers by Shafting them.

 

And as I said, it's outright contradicted by the book. Either the Amanin killed Stormtroopers in another way (for instance, the spears hit necks and snapped them, or hit the black body glove) thus removing the contradiction, or the comic is overshowing the extent of the casualties due to spears and not showing the ones due to stolen blasters. Etc.

 

I mean, it's not like it hasn't happened before. The cartoon Clone Wars series has a bunch of things in the Battle of Coruscant that simply could not have happened, and there are several conflicting statements about the lenght of the battle (hour, day and one week).

[Guest Ruinus]

Dude, I LOVE Supreme Commander, maybe its just me, but I get the satisfaction of completing a mission once I see the enemy commander erupt in a nuclear fashion.

 

Oh yeah, I love that too. I love how it's a game that's almost completely different than other RTSs. In those, static defenses are just there to annoy the enemy, the real strenght is in the units. In SupCom, it's the otherway around, the units are there to annoy you while you build defenses that can shoot all the way across the map. It's like EXTREME turtle-ing (sp?)!

 

I heard the second game was a bit of a let down? Tell me its not true!

 

I dunno, I haven't played it. Where did you hear this? Just look up some reviews or something.

[Guest force_echo]

Particle Beams Are Plasma you idiot.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_weapon_%28fiction%29

 

"When discussing weapons in science fiction, a plasma weapon is a type of raygun that fires a stream, pulse or toroid of plasma...

 

[At present] The technology to create plasma toroids and particle beams is presently far too bulky for anything man-portable..."

 

Basically Particle Beams are compressed Plasma Bolts. I'm not sure why they try and differentiate them on the Wiki quote you gave, but I think that it is based on Fanon Speculation on how someone thinks they should act, or once again the Writers getting their Physics Wrong. I also like how the ENTIRE Article Section on Mechanics is unsourced, it leads Greatly to it's credibility.

 

Presumably some fan got upset that Blasters are described as shooting Plasma and wanted to differentiate them from Standard Plasma Weapons seen in other universes. But since they don't even fully operate as a Particle Beam Gun said fan had to compromise.

You're a freaking retard. Plasma is an energized gas containing some charged particles in the mix, its an electrically conductive gas. Thats all. The atoms don't even free up until its heated, heated more and the electrons fly away and it becomes all charged particles, but its still a gas. All particle beams are purely charged subatomic particles, if you were to shoot a particle beam you would shoot pure electrons at someone, not superheated charged particles like plasma. Ignorant asses these days.

[Indolent]

Oh yeah, I love that too. I love how it's a game that's almost completely different than other RTSs. In those, static defenses are just there to annoy the enemy, the real strenght is in the units. In SupCom, it's the otherway around, the units are there to annoy you while you build defenses that can shoot all the way across the map. It's like EXTREME turtle-ing (sp?)!

 

 

 

I dunno, I haven't played it. Where did you hear this? Just look up some reviews or something.

Exactly, that's why its my favorite RTS game out of all the others I've played.

 

I read game reviews in my Playstation and Gamestop magazines. They said it deviated from the unique style of the original Supreme Commander and brought it down. But other than that, it was somewhat okay...

[Guest Jason Redfield]

Well, I see what you mean as well. However, the thing is that the book isn't told through a first person narrator (not that there could really be any other types of narrator), its told in your typical 3rd person omniscient prose. So there is no potential for bias. If it's described that way, it's probably because it happened that way.

 

True, but it could just be poor word choice by the author. It all comes down to interpretation and semantics, IMO. But I accept your point.

[Guest Ruinus]

Basically Particle Beams are compressed Plasma Bolts. I'm not sure why they try and differentiate them on the Wiki quote you gave, but I think that it is based on Fanon Speculation on how someone thinks they should act, or once again the Writers getting their Physics Wrong. I also like how the ENTIRE Article Section on Mechanics is unsourced, it leads Greatly to it's credibility.

 

Presumably some fan got upset that Blasters are described as shooting Plasma and wanted to differentiate them from Standard Plasma Weapons seen in other universes. But since they don't even fully operate as a Particle Beam Gun said fan had to compromise.

 

Actually, I'm pretty sure my Star Wars: Visual Dictionary says exactly the same thing. It really doesn't matter though, becuase blasters are funky, and don't have any characteristics shared by other weapons in sci-fi anyways. Whenever I read tech discussions on how a blaster weapon works I always assume that's what's going on inside the blaster, but none of that laser or gas actually comes out as the bolt.

 

For instance, they have recoil, sothe bolts must have mass, yet they never arc in atmosphere, they go faster the further out they must travel, etc etc. They are wierd.

[Guest force_echo]

Actually, I'm pretty sure my Star Wars: Visual Dictionary says exactly the same thing. It really doesn't matter though, becuase blasters are funky, and don't have any characteristics shared by other weapons in sci-fi anyways. Whenever I read tech discussions on how a blaster weapon works I always assume that's what's going on inside the blaster, but none of that laser or gas actually comes out as the bolt.

 

For instance, they have recoil, sothe bolts must have mass, yet they never arc in atmosphere, they go faster the further out they must travel, etc etc. They are wierd.

Have you seen a blaster bolt that just goes on and on and on?

[Guest Ruinus]

Have you seen a blaster bolt that just goes on and on and on?

 

Battle of Geonosis, shots are fired out into the sky and they don't have an arc. Also:

 

The guerrillas have pretty good luck with them, even though they take a lot of practice—slugs are ballistic, y'know? You have to plot the trajectory in your head. Shee, gimme a blaster anytime." ―Phloremirlla Tenk

[Guest force_echo]

Battle of Geonosis, shots are fired out into the sky and they don't have an arc. Also:

 

The guerrillas have pretty good luck with them, even though they take a lot of practice—slugs are ballistic, y'know? You have to plot the trajectory in your head. Shee, gimme a blaster anytime." ―Phloremirlla Tenk

So?, it could dissipate in like 30 miles, beyond combat range.

[Guest TheJ0ke]

You're a freaking retard. Plasma is an energized gas containing some charged particles in the mix, its an electrically conductive gas. Thats all. The atoms don't even free up until its heated, heated more and the electrons fly away and it becomes all charged particles, but its still a gas. All particle beams are purely charged subatomic particles, if you were to shoot a particle beam you would shoot pure electrons at someone, not superheated charged particles like plasma. Ignorant asses these days.

1. Plasma can be considered superheated gas, but it's actually a states of matter. So saying it's nothing more or less than "energized gas" is really like saying that air is a mix of superheated solids. What you're saying could provide a fairly accurate description, but it's not actually saying what plasma is.

2. I'm not sure what you mean by "Plasma is an energized gas containing some charged particles in the mix", but it's basically just a incredibly high energy state of matter where most of the atoms are highly ionized due to all the energy. So there would probably be plenty of electrons floating around.

3. If you got a gun that fired alpha particles (helium atoms without electrons) you'd still call that a particle beam weapon. So I don't see your point in making such distinctions.

4. Cool it.

 

True, but it could just be poor word choice by the author. It all comes down to interpretation and semantics, IMO. But I accept your point.

Welp, that's also true, but that's why I only put "probably" rather than a definite statement. At any rate, well argued. It's so nice when people don't devolve into name calling and handle these things in a civilized manner.

[Guest Ruinus]

So?, it could dissipate in like 30 miles, beyond combat range.

 

He's poiting out the differences in blasters and slugthrowers, he points out how slugthrowers are ballistic. Therefore, blasters aren't. If he mean "only in combat ranges" he'd say that.

[Guest ricrery]

I'm curious about CQC as well. The Stormies carry vibroblades, the Guard also carry monomolecular weapons, and the rest seem to carry normal knives and such.

[Skirmisher]

I'm curious about CQC as well. The Stormies carry vibroblades, the Guard also carry monomolecular weapons, and the rest seem to carry normal knives and such.

AFAIK, Stormtroopers do not carry Vibro weapons. They have some sort of powered attachment to one or both of their gauntlets that allows them to hit a little harder, but Stormtroopers =/= Republic Commandos.

[Guest force_echo]

1. Plasma can be considered superheated gas, but it's actually a states of matter. So saying it's nothing more or less than "energized gas" is really like saying that air is a mix of superheated solids. What you're saying could provide a fairly accurate description, but it's not actually saying what plasma is.

2. I'm not sure what you mean by "Plasma is an energized gas containing some charged particles in the mix", but it's basically just a incredibly high energy state of matter where most of the atoms are highly ionized due to all the energy. So there would probably be plenty of electrons floating around.

3. If you got a gun that fired alpha particles (helium atoms without electrons) you'd still call that a particle beam weapon. So I don't see your point in making such distinctions.

4. Cool it.

 

 

Welp, that's also true, but that's why I only put "probably" rather than a definite statement. At any rate, well argued. It's so nice when people don't devolve into name calling and handle these things in a civilized manner.

For Plasma to actually have high levels of free electrons it would require more heat than a blaster could muster. I never said plasma is a superheated gas, it dosen't even have to be hot at all, its just that when it comes out of a blaster, it is superheated. Plasma weapons don't fire alpha particles, because then it would be a particle beam weapon. If a plasma weapon did fire alpha particles than yes, it would be a particle beam weapon, but there's no proof that it does so, as most plasma is not made up of alpha particles. Also, I'm pretty sure alpha particles are HYDROGEN (the one with 1 valence electron) atoms without electrons, not helium ones, you could make them out of helium but if would be alot harder than Hydrogen.

[Guest TheJ0ke]

For Plasma to actually have high levels of free electrons it would require more heat than a blaster could muster. I never said plasma is a superheated gas, it dosen't even have to be hot at all, its just that when it comes out of a blaster, it is superheated. Plasma weapons don't fire alpha particles, because then it would be a particle beam weapon. If a plasma weapon did fire alpha particles than yes, it would be a particle beam weapon, but there's no proof that it does so, as most plasma is not made up of alpha particles. Also, I'm pretty sure alpha particles are HYDROGEN (the one with 1 valence electron) atoms without electrons, not helium ones, you could make them out of helium but if would be alot harder than Hydrogen.

You clearly missed all of my points entirely.

 

1. You clearly said in the post I quoted earlier that "Plasma is an energized gas containing some charged particles in the mix, its an electrically conductive gas. Thats all." Well, after you called Skirm a "freaking retard" that is.

2. While, plasma technically does not have to be hot, the fact is that the amount of energy it takes to turn any known substance into plasma is so great that it becomes extremely hot by our standards. Oh and when I said "superheated gas", I was referring to the above quoted statement in which you clearly define plasma as being "an energized gas... an electrically conductive gas. Thats all." I don't know about you, but to me, my statement sounds like a pretty accurate summation of what you said there. Besides which, you did say this later on in that statement: "superheated charged particles like plasma".

3. I never said that plasma weapons fire alpha particles. Nor did I ever say that plasma was made up of alpha particles. I was using the hypothetical to show how (forgive me for this, but there really is no better adjective I can think of) anal you are being by making distinctions between plasma weapons and particle weapons like "All particle beams are purely charged subatomic particles, if you were to shoot a particle beam you would shoot pure electrons at someone, not superheated charged particles like plasma."

4. The whole purpose of having my hypothetical use alpha particles was to show that your definition of a particle beam not only poor, it is incorrect. After all, I hardly think that alpha particles are "pure electrons". Yet, bafflingly enough, you seem to have agreed with me in saying that an alpha particle firing weapon would be a particle beam weapon.

5. We must have radically different methods of determining what element an atom is. I mean I don't know about you, but I determine what element it is by tallying up all the protons and seeing what element it matches up with. So since alpha particles are by definition nothing more or less than two protons and two neutrons bound together, I determine them to be helium nuclei. I don't know what you think, but that's my result. Regardless, if I am incorrect, I think it rather odd that scientists would use ⁴₂He²⁺ as the nuclear notation...

[Guest force_echo]

You clearly missed all of my points entirely.

 

1. You clearly said in the post I quoted earlier that "Plasma is an energized gas containing some charged particles in the mix, its an electrically conductive gas. Thats all." Well, after you called Skirm a "freaking retard" that is.

2. While, plasma technically does not have to be hot, the fact is that the amount of energy it takes to turn any known substance into plasma is so great that it becomes extremely hot by our standards. Oh and when I said "superheated gas", I was referring to the above quoted statement in which you clearly define plasma as being "an energized gas... an electrically conductive gas. Thats all." I don't know about you, but to me, my statement sounds like a pretty accurate summation of what you said there. Besides which, you did say this later on in that statement: "superheated charged particles like plasma".

3. I never said that plasma weapons fire alpha particles. Nor did I ever say that plasma was made up of alpha particles. I was using the hypothetical to show how (forgive me for this, but there really is no better adjective I can think of) anal you are being by making distinctions between plasma weapons and particle weapons like "All particle beams are purely charged subatomic particles, if you were to shoot a particle beam you would shoot pure electrons at someone, not superheated charged particles like plasma."

4. The whole purpose of having my hypothetical use alpha particles was to show that your definition of a particle beam not only poor, it is incorrect. After all, I hardly think that alpha particles are "pure electrons". Yet, bafflingly enough, you seem to have agreed with me in saying that an alpha particle firing weapon would be a particle beam weapon.

5. We must have radically different methods of determining what element an atom is. I mean I don't know about you, but I determine what element it is by tallying up all the protons and seeing what element it matches up with. So since alpha particles are by definition nothing more or less than two protons and two neutrons bound together, I determine them to be helium nuclei. I don't know what you think, but that's my result. Regardless, if I am incorrect, I think it rather odd that scientists would use ⁴₂He²⁺ as the nuclear notation...

I was using electrons as an example, I know it could fire any subatomic particle, but electrons are the most common on account of they have almost no mass in relation to protons and neutrons so I chose that one to use. Usually I don't say things with the intention of someone breaking down every word for no good reason. In my book, that qualifies as being "anal".

 

I was confused to the meaning of apha particle for a moment, I thought you meant free protons. Well no, shooting an alpha particle would not be considered a particle beam, it has to be purely subatomic particles for it to be considered such. A particle beam firing an alpha particle would be extremly inefficient as nothing more than a sheet of metal would block it and the alpha particle would be too heavy. "Subatomic particles such as electrons, positrons, and protons can be accelerated to high velocities and energies, usually expressed in terms of center-of-mass energy, by machines that impart energy to the particles in small stages, ultimately achieving very high energy particle beams, measured in terms of billions and even trillions of electron volts."