Starwars Lasers BS?

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doggtag RE:Starwars Lasers BS? 7/27/2004 1:02:46 AM

Even having mile-long ships (the standard Star Destroyers were supposedly 1600m long, while the Super Star Destroyers reached up to almost 18,000m long), you'll have difficulty visually seeing ships out beyond even 50,000 miles (even with the best binoculars, how easily can you spot geo-sync satellites?). Naturally, some kind of future radar/lidar/scanners would be needed, operating perhaps faster than speed-of-light (which could cause problems at shorter ranges...could you detect a ship with faster-than-light sensors before the ship even arrives there then to detect it? And if you already deteceted it and could engage it, would you try detecting it again or avoid sending out the first FTL pulses that found it in the first place? Most likely, even such future space battles are going to be limited (visual) range engagements, or perhaps just into a space BVR range. The Death Stars were 120km and 160km in diameter (DS1 and DS2 under contruction). Effectively, about 100miles overall, a small moon. A 10-mile Star Destroyer would not be easily seen at a lunar distance from Earth, only BVR (radar-ish) sensors will "see" it. A truly fascinating site is Jeff Russell's STARSHIP DIMENSIONS link It gives a very nicely done rendition of ship scales. As for "million mile missiles", even the photon torps from Star Trek tech aren't good for much beyond 250,000miles. By then, the torps have consumed a considerable amount of their antimatter (except the quantums) as fuel to the point their yield becomes minimal at the greatest ranges... so Trek ships are always facing off WVR, perhaps within 50-75km at most. Most likely, Star Wars ships aren't engaging each other beyond the relatively same ranges (the only weapons capable of exceeding that are the superlasers of the Death Stars, as was winessed at the Battle of Endor. As for the actual practicality of the lasers... I'll assume that they most likely were particle effect weapons, and not true "light guns" like the USAF is attempting with the YAL-1A Airborne Laser. As for the colors we see around all beam-type weapons, it was once compared to (by Arthur C Clarke, I think) the event horizons of black holes: the actual core (or the beam center that has the actual particles that do the damage) is invisible to the naked eye, and the actual "light" we see is the interaction of particles at the outside edge of the beam. So an actual stream of proton bolts or phaser energy is invisible, but the reaction with the beam's outer edges with the surrounding particle suspended in space generates the visible flash we see. Depending on the particle frequencies in the beam, and what exact type of particles they are and how they react with other various elements of matter, technically could determine the color of the beam we see (just as gas chromatography works. And how differing elements introduced into flame burns different colors. So a true particle beam weapon could "phase" through various colors throughout its "flight", depending on what elements it interacts with in space as it "flies" to its target. And serious advances in particle emission, beam generation and coherence, and power generation will be needed to achieve any truly effective long range ray or beam weapons. In space, a true laser like the ABL mounts may well work, so long as there is power/laser fuel. It could well have considerably greater range than in an atmosphere, but eventually beam propagation will "dilute" the kill abilities at longer ranges. True space warfare may well take the form of various-ranged Thrust Vector Control missiles. But the problem there being, all that exploded debris will be hazardous to your own vessels: ships will not entirely vaporize like we see in the movies. Until effective EM shield technologies are created, true space battles may well rely on total stealth: almost zero RCS and thermal signature, just to avoid detection, because you will still be vulnerable to physical objects and space debris until you got those shields..

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Warhammer RE:Starwars Lasers BS? 7/27/2004 10:44:05 AM

Ever read those books by David Drake where aliens abducted a Roman Legion and dropped them on various planets to do their dirty, low tech fighting? One book in the series was called Foreign Legions, but that was a different line in the series where an english boat crew was abducted... Eventually, a book or two into the series, the Romans overthrow their captors and are able to return home thousands of years after they left. Earth, in its infancy of space travel, something like 2100, recieves word of an alien trade/slaver empire which could pose a threat to earth. They have an alien warship with an alien or 2 on board who are willing to help earth gain a level of technology to be able to join the empire as an equal, only they have to make it look like it is earth original tech. Somehow the aliens learn of earth, so dispatch a fleet to cover up the problem. By this time earth has retrofitted some old sea battleships with fusion powerplants, shields, and anti-gravity drives. In the turrets of the battleships, they modify the 16' guns to be huge lasers. They make fusion bottles(similar to the EM field that would be needed to conatin a fusion reaction) with the bottleneck being the barrel of the 16' guns. They loaded thermonuclear devices into the bottles and detonated them forcing an entire nukes worth of energy into a single stream of destruction. Needless to say, this made short work of the enemy fleet, and won the day. I thought this to be rather original, and would theoretically be an extremely powerful beam weapon.

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Ehran RE:Starwars Lasers BS? 7/27/2004 12:04:41 PM

sounds like the hellbore wpns of the bolos. space warfare is likely to most closely resemble sub warfare today. first guy to get a lock on the foe and fire probably won the fight. it's gonna be all about sensors, stealth and ew.

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blacksmith RE:Starwars Lasers BS? 7/27/2004 7:26:21 PM

In the same way that AchtungLagg described how Hollywood presents space battles like futuristic Battles of Midway, Hollywood also tends to completely miss the dynamics of orbital mechanics. Spacecraft running at each other from opposing planets would in all likelihood never get within millions of miles of each other with closing velocities of ten or hundreds of thousands of miles per hour. An interplanetary war would be fought by attacking the opposing bases of operation. Limited war would be on the surface or within inhabited spaces (space marine kinds of stuff). Unlimited wars would see nukes and/or guided asteroids being tossed about.

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wkwillis RE:Starwars Lasers BS? 7/29/2004 4:18:37 AM

Glen Cook did the excellant 'Passage At Arms', a sub war book set in space. The POV is a newspaper reporter who was space navy (destroyer equivalent, I think) and not submariner interviewing his former classmates and friends. They were all very stressed. More like the German WWII navy than the US one.

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andyf RE:Starwars Lasers BS? 8/1/2004 7:58:34 PM

most realistic space combat i've seen is in Peter f hamiltons nights dawn trilogy.. laser ciws and combat wasps.. combat wasp = fusion powered missile with a hundred or so independant smart sub-munitions , ranging from tacnuke to single shot laser to KE and EW

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eon RE:Starwars Lasers & David Drake- eon to Warhammer 8/2/2004 10:02:53 AM

It sounds like Drake was developing a rationale for japanimation-style space warships (Space Cruiser Yamato, anyone?). BTAIM, I suspect the idea of space-going capital ships armed with a combination of long-range near-lightsped weapons (energy weapons and/or EM or gravity-accelerator mass-drivers) plus very big PGMs (i.e., the "capital missiles" in David Weber's novels) are far more likely than "spacegoing aircraft carriers", out of simple physics. Or in other words, the starship Enterprise is more probable than the Battlestar Galactica..

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rylan76 RE:Starwars Lasers BS? 8/3/2004 7:47:52 AM

Hey guys! I think space combat as depicted in Ian M. Banks' Culture novels is more likely, i. e. superfast computers conducting combat against each other at speeds far beyond what human brains can comprehend, using weapons that harness superluminal drives (missiles) and energy weapons (gridfire). What do you think?

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eon RE:Starwars Lasers BS?-eon to rylan76 8/3/2004 10:03:13 AM

I've never read the Banks series, but I agree with you. Forget everything in any movie, except maybe some of the Star Trek ones (Wrath of Khan, First Contact, and maybe Nemesis- which overall s**ked on so many levels). Real space combat will be fast, short, and deadly- the best DC in the world won't help much if you get bullseye'd by a dozen or so heavy missiles with laser heads (ala' David Weber), antimatter packages (ala' Starfleet), or just a really big nuke up front (Weber again). Not to mention heavy-cycle energy weapons or mass-driver rounds arriving at about .96C. (Math people- can you figure the yield in ergs, etc., of a one MT nickel-iron projectile travelling at that velocity? My math isn't up to it, but I'm pretty sure I wouldn't want to be on the receiving end.) As for novels, if you can find it, check out the classic Eric Frank Russell Sf novel "Next of Kin", aka "The Space Willies"- early in it, he gives a portrait of a space engagement that is chilling in its impartiality while being ludicrous in its tactics. Short take; one task group detects another, and tries to get between it and its base (one of those time-honored naval tactics that don't reaaly work in space). In the process, one ship continues for a few minutes too long on one course, delivering itself into the engegment envelope of the other side's weapons. Their "predictors" (computers) notice this, and fire, without human intervention at any point. Hapless ship goes "boom", and everyone else finally notices that something actually happened....

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joe6pack RE:Starwars Lasers BS? 8/3/2004 11:07:01 AM

Well, maybe a simple answer.. Say you have a "space fighter" that was capable of traveling nearly the speed of light (without using some sci-fi FTL technology). A missile might not ever catch up. Thus relatively close range fights with energy based weaopons is your next best option. You could also go with the idea that in space - getting a missile reload might be costly, tough to do, and you can run out of missiles. As long as the power source for your ship is working, you have virtually unlimited ammuntion with energy weapons. (OK, its pretty silly.. buts it's sci-fi.. so why not)

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Ehran RE:Starwars Lasers BS?-eon to rylan76 8/3/2004 3:19:31 PM

a 120 ton projectile travelling at .9 C delivers enough energy to burn off an entire hemisphere of a typical terrestrial planet. this assumes the projectile was vapourized by a nuke just before impacting the planet. the energy dispersion pattern is different if it arrives as a solid mass but the end result isn't very different. one of those essentially destroys the biosphere of a planet. looking at the bright side it's very doubtful that a mass driver than can push a one tonne object to .96 C is going to be any sort of portable.

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Warhammer Mass drivers 8/5/2004 10:11:40 AM

Relativistic warheads are rather hard to dodge as well. Not because you can't move out of the way, but because by the time you see it, it is already 90%+ the distance to you. If you detect a warhead moving at .9c 100 billion miles out, the time it took the light to make that 100 billion miles, has given the projectile time to move 90 billion miles closer to you. At this distance, you still have a chance to evade. Anything closer, and you will probably get blindsided. The projectile will seem to have near infinite acceleration, it is only 10% behind the light it is following. Everytime you view it, it will be 90% closer than it looks. If you see it at 100 billion miles away, it is actually 10 billion miles away and it will hit you in about 14 hours. If you first see it at 10 billion miles 1.5 hours. 1 billion miles you only have about 9 minutes. If you see it at 100 million miles, you have about 53 seconds before you need to move or die. That is looking at .9c, .95c cuts all those prior times in half. .999c and it is another half. If we ever get .9c velocities or higher in our weapons, they will be a formidable weapon, close up and relatively far away. Smaller missiles used for shorter ranges, larger ones for longer distances on bigger, slower targets. We don't even have to be able to project the missiles at that speed, just get the ship moving at .9c and the bomb will do the rest of the work. The ship gets to .9c, moves towards target, lets bomb go, alters course, and goes home. The bomb continues on to target, and if it is a planet, there isn't much that will stop it from destroying its target. Relativistic dive bombing could be tomorrows weapon of mass destruction. Energy weapons will play their part in close up encounters, but an alien race doesn't even have to be in our solar system to destroy our planet if need be.

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doggtag RE:Mass drivers 8/5/2004 11:21:39 AM

"...but an alien race doesn't even have to be in our solar system to destroy our planet if need be." Excellent, Warhammer. And a true point. If we consider the capabilities any race would have who achieved the abilities to move space rocks up to such high velocities, then they also will have developed very effective orbital science principles and formulae. They could, effectively, launch a hunk of asteroid several decades ago at whatever speed, timing its arrival to impact a planet anywhere along its solar orbit. And even near-miss asteroids of sufficient size and velocity can rape a planet of a good portion of its atmosphere. For all we know (or don't know), the "planetkiller"-type asteroids that at several-million-year intervals have impacted our planet and wiped out scores of lifeforms could well have been intentional, or the remnants from some greater calamity taking place well beyond our comprehension. A very interesting storyline about such technologies is a two-parter called, "The Forge of God" and "The Anvil of Stars", about an ancient race who saw a threat from almost everywhere, and developed neutronium and anti-neutronium "meteors" they launched eons ago, a pair of which "intercepted" the Earth. Coupled to the devices following along ocean fault lines which broke water down into nuclear fuel for strings of bombs, when the two meteors met up at the Earth's core, our planet was ripped apart. Can't really give you a decent book report on it here, but they are definitely an interesting "what if" like a thousand other series. But it does make sense: what better way to eliminate a threat species to your cosmic plan than bombard their world with massive space rocks and antimatter asteroids? Even though we got all inspired by movies like Deep Impact and Armageddon, we still do not have anywhere near the technology or capability to stop some far-advanced species from "chunking us" with 10-to-100 mile asteroids. We only comfort ourselves in the hope that any civilization who has evolved far enough to explore space without wiping themselves out will somehow cling to a Trekkian- Prime Directive-type mentality and not go through the cosmos eliminating any other species it sees may become a potential threat to its existence. Here's hoping humanity never follows that path (but considering how we have treated our own kind in the name of the gods we worship, we most likely will commit planetary genocides somewhere in our distant future)..

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eon RE:Mass drivers 8/6/2004 2:58:54 PM

As for shipboard weaponry, based on Ehran's comment I'd have to conclude you wouldn't need a very big projectile to kill a typical space vehicle (I'd assumed otherwise, proving once more the old adage about "assume"). Forget the 120-ton round; what about a mass-driver firing the equivalent of an old-time cannonball, as per the 12-pounder Napoleon of the Civil War era? A sphere would be just about the ideal form for space combat, minimizing irregularities in CG (and of course you don't have to worry about air resistance, because there isn't any air to resist), could easily be handled by autoloading sysytems (there's no "wrong way" to put it in the loader, sort of like the automatic return at the bowling alley), and could easily be mass produced in any reasonable material (nickel-iron, etc.), and possibly even in an unreasonable one or two (H. Beam Piper's "collapsium", for instance). In effect, you'd have a very big, very long-ranged, and very, very nasty....BB gun..

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realpolitik The problem with .9C projectiles, and otherwise fast moving objects 8/6/2004 3:55:58 PM

I'm not sure I buy the arguement that combat is difficult "BVR" (Beyond Visual Range) - given the "VR" of such low tech achievements as our own Hubble Space Telescope. Of course, ships don't emit energy like stars, nebulae, etc., but we seem to be able to spot asteroids and the like. Definitely though, stealth in space becomes a very strong factor with increasing ranges - as well as decoy tactics. Dogtagg said Star Trek styled Photon Torpedoes lose effectiveness with range (by consuming their fuel) but based purely on my wargaming experience, it is my understanding that Photon Torpedoes are one trek weapon that do not lose effective warhead yield with range (however they do lose accuracy.) Plasma torps, on the otherhand, do run out of energy (buy they are guided weapons that can make course corrections, in addition to being a big ball of loosely managed energy.) Eon predicts Capital Ships over Space Carriers. That makes sense if you think the carrier based weapon systems are small manned fighters with short range weapons. But space is vast, and your Capital ship is small. I think something like carriers or motherships that carry andyf's wasps are not unlikely. In otherwords, a large ship might tend to many frigate sized UAV (USV?) missile like vehicles that would carry submunitions, one shot massive lasers, or just be kinetic kill vehicles. (Maybe a combination of all.) These would allow a ship to cover a large area and engage enemy forces at extreme range. (What happens when both sides USVs nullify each other is another question.) Finally, one argument to get space combat to resemble Star Wars might be the problem of inertial velocity. Warhammer pointed out the peril of responding to a projectile approaching at .9c speed, but it seems to me that unless the target is fixed (which means in space, it is moving on a fixed path, I guess) how could one ever hope to correctly aim such a projectile, or to make course corrections to keep on target when shooting at a something making unpredictable (evasive) movements. Given two fleets attempting to engage each other from long distances at high speeds, it would seem targetting is difficult. If those two fleets close distance, they would be making rapid flybys followed by a long period of turning around for another pass. Perhaps this would lead to a more practical slower engagement speed, and use of shorter ranged weapons??

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