Yes, there are so many things we don't understand, but to form a comparison between two forms of fiction you have to take into account that when one is basing itself more in the realm of reality and a very real possibility as compared to the other which... isn't, then there really isn't any comparison at all. It's like saying who would win in a fight, you in the here and now or Superman in a reality that could never exist?

Lasers are what they are described as in the movies. Fan explanations for the lack of science in sci fi does not make it the fiction that was created in the original art. Unlike Star Trek which has tried very hard to explain itself throughout it's series in a logical and scientific way, unlike Star Wars which just wants to make things go bang in a fun way!

Again, logic is unfortunately not on your side as with the gravity plating damaged (and as I said before) you would start floating around as there is zero gravity that surrounds the ship. They would NOT start to run sideways down an elevator shaft or fall down to the back end of a room. Remember, reality is the marker when comparing the two franchises and that is why there could never be a true ST vs SW mod as they just couldn't make it fair as one (like I said all along) is based on an ideology from one man (Gene Roddenberry) to show what OUR future could be and therefore base it in our reality and scientific knowledge to date. The other just settled on a fun romp in a far away galaxy with little basis in science but rather what would look good on the big screen.

All the Star Trek series took some time to try and explain itself in some logical manner. Most of the time it's in a techno-babble that isn't in our scientific knowledge but that is part of the 'it's a TV show' thing. But they have tried to explain how the warp theory works and transporters, replicators, weapons systems, etc. They have also employed a real physicist for the show to help with the science portion to base it in reality.

So if you watch the series again, mainly Next Gen through Enterprise, you will pick up the science that they use and how it can be possible at times to be accomplished as opposed to Star Wars which... isn't!

Really people. IT'S A GAME 

Since this is actually directed at me, and I was out of town the past few days, and lazy for a couple more on top of that, I'll reply now.

*facepalm*

Since when have I claimed that Star Wars is scientifically consistent with reality as we understand it? The answer would be NEVER. Following that up, is the fact that analyzing each series empirically requires only Suspension of Disbelief and using basic scientific principles to quantify things. They have FTL, so we conveniently ignore Einstein for analysis of it. Obviously they have it, obviously it works, and obviously the universe doesn't explode from the fact that, as far as modern science is concerned, FTL=time travel.

*facepalm*

I'm going to simply point out that you obviously didn't read Einstein's theory very well, as what little I understand of it indicates that it is impossible to travel at the speed of light, but says nothing about superluminal travel. Conventional wisdom is that FTL is impossible due to the fact that, according to relativity, it would be equivalent to time travel and it might be possible to form universe-breaking paradoxes, which either requires some method to not break the universe or no FTL.

OTOH, a theorized particle, the tachyon, which would be a superluminal-velocity-only particle, is possible under Einstein's relativity.

I'll also point out that in the context of science fiction, it's oftentimes better to let the explanation be tantamount to "a wizard did it" when dealing with such handwavium devices as FTL drives and shields. This is what I rather like about SW; they have no science consultants because they simply don't bother with explaining how stuff works; it works because it does and that's that.

Incidentally, the inverse is true for me as well; I rather dislike Star Trek's incessant, pretentious need to explain how all of their tech works, when it's pretty obvious that it's all tantamount to "a wizard did it". That they hired an actual physicist to devise plausible (IE: not possible but believable) explanations is relatively unimportant.

It's also irrelevant to the purposes of a versus debate.

*facepalm*

I'm going to start by saying you simply have no idea what you're talking about when you talk of laser weaponry, and return to this particular point in a moment. I'll further second Zeta's comment that SW lasers aren't RL-lasers. A tank's main gun is called a cannon, except for the fact that a cannon historically fired a cannon-ball, usually with a bursting charge to create lots of shrapnel.

A tank's main gun does not fire such munitions.

Before I get back to your misconceptions of laser devices, I'll point out that phasers != lasers, and that phasers are completely fictional weapons. Oh, yeah, and the USS Defiant would like to have a word with you, as it had "tracer-style" phaser cannons.

Now to disabuse you of your silly notions of laser devices. First of, a laser is not invariably a single, continuous-beam device. Such items do exist, and are termed "continuous-beam lasers", or more colloquially, "heat rays". These devices are intended to function somewhat similar to what you describe; they heat up the surface of whatever you're aiming at, whether it's a deuterium/tritium fuel pellet in a fusion chamber or an ICBM.

But that's really a poor laser design for most applications, especially for a weapon. A pulse laser, colloquially termed a "blaster", works much differently in that instead of a single, continuous beam, it delivers multiple, nanosecond-to-microsecond pulses that "drill" through whatever you shoot at. This also means you get messy, ragged, wounds that are somewhat similar to gunshots, as the damage is by mechanical effects rather than thermal. Pulse lasers also benefit from superior material penetration, like armor. Further, if you pulse the laser fast enough, then you get a functionally continuous beam.....just not an actually continuous one.

And, for the coup de grace to your misconceptions on lasers, and laser weapons in particular, I refer you to these pages here. Savvy?

*facepalm*

You're ignoring the fact that the Invisible Hand is still trapped in Coruscant's gravity well. There's also the fact that the gravity tech in SW is equivalent to "a wizard did it"; we have no idea how it works, what happens when it gets broken, that sort of thing. All we know is that it works, except for a few situations.....like when the Invisible Hand began to plummet towards Coruscant before leveling out.

That he is a "raging idiot WRT actual science" is similarly irrelevant to a versus debate or a versus mod for that matter. In an empirically-driven vs debate, you consider the sources to be factual documentation, and ignore authorial intent unless you actually need to consider it.

*facepalm*

I want to say I'm surprised by this bit, but that'd be a lie. See, the argument you present here WRT canon for each setting ignores the SW canon structure......which, while it occasionally includes some pants-on-head-stupid things, so does Star Trek (99% of ST:VOY anyone?).

What you ignore, however, is the fact that there are multiple sourcebooks included in the SW canon structure, like the Incredible Cross Sections books (of which I have one, and I enjoy pouring over it), which, while subservient to the films in the "continuity hierarchy" (as the SW writers don't consider it "canon" so much as "continuity", but that's an internal matter), also do not contradict the films in any way/shape/form. So you can't discount them.

You also seem to have a problem with propping up Gene Rodenberry as the greatest man alive......which is was not, and is not. Especially since he's, you know, dead.

*facepalm*

This is just rude. For one thing, SW has never tried to be "realistic". It's tried to be a story about people, set against the backdrop of massive, galaxy-shattering wars. For another, Star Trek is far from realistic; no matter how you dress it up, replicators and transporters work because if they don't, the setting inexplicably falls apart.......except in some cases regarding transporters, but that's more a failure of lacking the foresight to consider the logical implications of said device.

To tell truth, the ending seasons of ST:DS9 had a pretty good amount of fairies/dragons/ridiculousness.......probably more than Star Wars, as the DS9 demons/angels/whatever-things weren't particularly consistent and the blatant mysticism was a completely schizo direction for the show to head in as Star Trek has rather consistently been more about "it's scientifically explainable" than "it's magic".

I also consider Star Trek to be somewhat pretentious because of the incessant need to explain how their magitech works.

*facepalm*

For one thing, Superman would win the fight. I don't think anyone would dispute that. The fact that said fight can never happen has no bearing on the answer to the question. In a comparison between ST and SW, the fact that ST is supposedly more scientifically accurate than SW has no bearing on the questions asked when making the comparison.

*faceplam*

As I pointed out above, just because they're called lasers doesn't make them lasers. Or are you arguing that ST warp drives are identical to the speculative, and impossible-to-function Alcubierre Drive?

*facepalm*

Reality is not the marker. Suspension of Disbelief, is the marker. You keep this up I'm going to start calling you an idiot, because that's what you look like.

Incidentally, one of the reasons I dislike Star Trek is because of Rodenberry's ideologies permeating part of it. Because I disagree with Rodenberry on about a dozen or more different things. Like a utopian-type future. IMO, ain't gonna happen.

I'll also point out that an ST vs SW mod is more-or-less unrelated to the actual versus debate; the mod's purpose is to give people a fun time playing a game in a new way. Not to present an actual, unbiased conflict-simulation between the Empire and the Federation.

*facepalm*

I'm going to second Kitkun here. What Star Trek were you watching, as there's literally dozens of things that they concocted to fix the Problem of the Week that never saw the light of day again, even if they would have been immensely useful.

It also doesn't help that even the logical applications of their own technology fail rather hard in light of the explanations given; case in point- the TR-116 rifle. Has a transporter device to transport the bullet, and is intended to work in environments that phasers don't.......like electromagnetic-interference-heavy areas.....which transporters tend to have trouble with....I think you can see where this is going.

And, once again, I will reiterate the point that it was probably not a Good Idea for the ST writers to hire a physicist (or anyone, for that matter) to write up plausible (i.e. NOT POSSIBLE, BUT probably BELIEVABLE) explanations for them. While that's my personal opinion, I stand by it on the basis that leaving a device's workings unknown, but the effects and implications of the device very well known, is a much better way to run things.

*facepalm*

So Star Wars has little-to-no basis in reality. BIG DEAL. Star Trek arguably has even less basis in reality, despite trying to be plausible. I'll also note that the most popular ST tech isn't possible.....we won't be making matter transporters or replicators any time in the foreseeable future. Not without going into the realm of Clarke-tech, AKA "sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic".

For those who were counting, yes, that is indeed a grand total of ELEVEN facepalms. If he'd written more, there would probably have been an even greater amount.

You're kind of correct. Special relativity states that any object with mass cannot be accelerated to or travel at the speed of light, as doing either would require that object to have infinite energy, which is obviously impossible.

Tachyons are theoretically possible, but they are special in that they have zero mass, and cannot be slowed down to something less than the speed of light. Assuming they exist (and there is no evidence that they do yet) they would be useless in the normal sense, in that they cannot carry information.

What's most astounding about this entire dialogue though is the  inability to transfer a fictional movie and a fictional TV series into a fictional game without trying to "prove" which is more "real" first.

P.S.  Tachyons may actually have [imaginary]  negative mass and it's pretty much a certainty tachyons can exist as far as current physics theory is able to establish.  What "imaginary negative mass" actually "is" in our real world remains an unanswered question.

We can't test for them in any way presently known so they are purely speculative and their actual properties and nature may be more varied and different than we can theorize--but the universe does have a place for them.

What's fascinating to me about tachyons is they pre-date "dark matter" and "dark energy" theories we hold today yet seem very similar in many ways.  Science is cool.

Tachyons would actually have a negative squared mass and an imaginary mass. They actually can be tested for (kind of). A tachyon with an electrical charge would emit radiation (Cherenkov Radiation) that would be detectable. A neutrally charged tachyon would also release radiation as it travels. So far, this has never been detected.

In any case, just because something can exist doesn't mean that it does. General Relativity also states that white holes can exist. White holes are essentially the reverse of black holes. If they existed, they would be pretty easy to find, much more so than black holes. We have discovered (indirectly) a number of black holes, but no white holes.

Dark matter was first proposed in the 1930s, while tachyons were the 60s. Dark energy is much more recent though.

@Whiskey

Sorry--that wasn't meant to be personal at you.  I'm really amazed at the plethora of zealousness by so many in this issue.

My apologies sir.  It's all fun reading.  Besides, I already know Star Trek is real and Star Wars is pure fantasy.  I saw Galaxy Quest ya know.

P.S.S.

(there have been tests for tachyons but the tests are as theoretical as the particles and have produced no results)

DISCLAIMER: I'm going to make a detailed response about star trek vs star wars, then i'm going to say what a star trek vs star wars mod should be in my opinion. If you want to avoid all the argument between star trek and star wars, skip to the bottom of this post.

In the TNG technical manual, a figure of 1.5kg of antimatter is given as the maximum warhead material of a photon torpedo. (pg. 129) Using standard physics calculations a direct 1:1 explosion would equal to about 64.4 megatons. Warhead materials are however premixed to achieve the level of destructive force of an antimatter pod rupture containing 100 cubic meters of antideuterium. (pg. 69) Antimatter is stored as liquid or slush on starships. (pg. 68) The density of liquid antideuterium is around 160 kg per cubic meter. According to this comparison the high annihilation rate energy release would be comparable to about 690 gigatons. When you calculate it based off how we measure modern megatons (1 megaton=4,184 terajoules) gives us a total of 2,886,960,000 terajoules. The TNG photon torpedo has a yield of only 18.5 isotons. That's 156,051,891.892 terajoules per isoton. A modern yield photon torpedo does 25 isotons, resulting in 3,901,297,297.3 terajoules on target per torpedo. A quantum torpedo does 50+ isotons in damage, which is 7,802,594,594.6+ terajoules on target. A class 6 high yield torpedo does 200 isotons, which is 31,210,378,378.4 terajoules. A Borg multi-kinetic neutronic mine has a yield of 5 million isotons. That is 780,259,459,460,000 terajoules.

A TNG phaser puts out 100,000 terawatts of energy. So a single phaser shot way outdoes turbolasers, which are estimated to deal 3,750 terawatts. It would take 26.67 turbolasers firing at once to equal one phaser shot. Phasers can also sustain their fire for longer than a turbolaser, dealing more damage upon the target. Furthermore, a Galaxy class ship has 9 phaser banks. It would take 240 turbolasers firing at once to equal the firepower put out by a Galaxy class starship. An Imperial Star Destroyer only has 6.

Phasers travel at near the speed of light as well, so with computerized targeting, they are able to target both fighters and capital ships accurately. This explains why there isn't a massive number of fighters in Star Trek. Star Wars, on the other hand, has relied entirely on visual targeting for thousands of years. This is why fighters play such an important role.

In short, Star Trek far outmatches Star Wars.

Now  on to the most important part of this post. Here's how I think the mod should play:

Any mod created should be balanced. Weapons, abilities, speeds, and armor should all be dumbed down or buffed up, as the need may be, in order to make an interesting and fun mod that stays true to the core of the game. Fanboy hysterics on both sides should be kept OUT of the mod.

Begin? The numbers for the yield of the torpedo is in the actual technical manual, the conversion between megaton and terajoule is a real world known. I just went from there. Or do you think that Star Wars trumps real world scientific numbers?

It can't???  WTF!  =,(

Epic thread Wish i checked on this forum more often before, its quite alive here!

Now I really wish there was a star wars/star trek mod.

Tried merging the relevant mods myself, but being the noob that I am, can't get it to work as it seems to require more actual skill then merely copy pasting files.

Lol this is just soo stupid. I agree with the early posts that fanboys can never see the sun for their own mind. Star Trek! no Star Wars!

The fact is we dont know enough to say anything for sure.

What we do know is that the federation has more advanced technology, transporters, replicators, cloaking, cloaked replicating mines anyone, also there are alot more super powerful beeings in star trek.

What we do know abouth the empire is that they are alot bigger, more ships, bigger ships, more guns, more worlds, more troops, so yeah they might be able to overpower or break down the federation in a war of attrition. But then the federation might be able to defeat them by their to-me obviously more advanced technology OR by the use of say the prophets, Q or any other of star treks super powerful beeings that could think the empire out of existence, would they do it? Maybe-maybe not. In the end these two universes are fundamentally different and comparing them is pretty much doomed to failure, what any rational beeing should be able to agree on are a few points on their respective strenghts and weaknesses and leave it at that. Even if you had been supercomputers with access to all the matertial abouth the respective factions you would have a hard time coming up with a prognosis, because even then we do not know all and the science is still magic to us, we do not understand it and we cannot see clearly what others achievments beeing on that level would enable. That aside none here are supercomputers so kindly do not overestimate your own intellect and processing capacity.

I just had to say that.