Your own ship...

posted on January 8th, 2010, 9:43 pm

whole race of people, and they only had one base?   really?

They did actually find another city, but it was over grown and crumbling; the central tower being used as a castle for a feudal society where the rulers were those who had the ATA gene. They could use the chair to fire drones and terrorize the surrounding villages  and could make limited use of the Ancient's hand held scanner, but beyond that they had no knowledge of Ancient technology, the city, or how to use it. As for the problem of ZPM availability, when the Ancients were around they could probably whip up a ZMP no problem. For all we know the instructions could be buried in the database and McKay was too dense to think to look for them.

the holodeck is on tier 3

There was the holoprojector room which they came across in the first episode which provides a more personal interface to the database. They just never made much use of it because it used too much power. I don't think there was a full holodeck as Star Trek envisioned it.

Atlantis vs. Death Star is a hard one. The Death Star's only real advantage is sheer size and it only gets a few more points for its massive beam weapon because it is fixed. As soon as you get out of it's firing arc (assuming it has one) you're pretty much golden. If I recall the original Death Star had no shields while the second one was using a planet side shield generator. So assuming that there are no shields, and that Atlantis is at full power with a full and competent crew, it would be fairly easy for Atlantis to zip in and bombard the surface with drones to quickly take out the turbo lasers and then direct them towards the surface tearing it apart. The drones would quickly find their way to the core which would result in a large explosion. I suppose that even if the Death Star had some kind of shields that they would be pretty useless since we have seen drones punch right through even Ori shields.

For the record that there are two types of drone, the explosive type carried by Jumpers and the non-explosive, penetrating type used on the Antarctic Defense Platform and Atlantis. It's possible that drones penetrate shields by retuning their energy layer to match that of the target's shields.

I would definitely want an Ancient ship for myself, maybe and Aurora class ship, it certainly has a nice shape to it, but I might like to have one of the still bigger battle ships. My impression was that the Aurora class was a midsized ship, but we never really see anything larger, so it's hard to say. I have to say, I don't think I would want an city ship, it strikes me as being too sluggish, bulky, and of limited use. I get the impression that the Ancients didn't actually fly cities around the galaxy, but rather used them as planetary bases which had the added bonus of being capable of interstellar and even intergalactic travel.

posted on January 8th, 2010, 9:50 pm

I suppose that even if the Death Star had some kind of shields that they would be pretty useless since we have seen drones punch right through even Ori shields.

The tiny hole apparently was protected by shield that are not very good with physical objects (still not entirely useless because Drones are only part physical) and we have no idea which of the shield types the Empire uses for other things (like complete battlestations).

You can't just make up things with no basis, it has already been proven that the drones are not capable of going through all shields, some can stop them. We also don't know the power or tech-level difference between the Empire and the Ori.

posted on January 8th, 2010, 9:56 pm

it has already been proven that the drones are not capable of going through all shields, some can stop them.

Where it is that, did I miss that show?

posted on January 8th, 2010, 10:00 pm

Stargate Wiki.

three races possess shields that have proven capable of resisting drone weapons: Ancient, Asgard and Traveler, although they are still placed under heavy strain upon impact.

If shields can resist, it is obviously possible.

posted on January 8th, 2010, 10:00 pm

several eps, to list a few:

1) season 4 opener, daedalus takes fire from asurans.

2) the episode where they wipe out the replicators, both earth ships took fire.

3) the one where replicators take over atlantis, the puddle jumpers modified shields deflects a drone.

there's probably others. we can presume that atlantis city shield could stop them as the replicators used a beam weapon rather than firing drones

posted on January 8th, 2010, 10:06 pm

whole race of people, and they only had one base?   really?

if we are getting into silly ships, eveyone seems to be in for a Asguard Jack O'Niell ship,  but as that was the PROTOtype, and prototypes usually are glitchy, i'd hold out for the Daniel Jackson. 

sorry to double post and i'm replying to a post on page 2

as someone else explained there was another city ship in the episode called: The tower.
there was another base (not a city) featured in the one where rodney blows up 5/6 parts of a solar system. the one with the new power source, there was a base there amongst the locals.

the ship you mention is the Asgard (no u) O'neill (no jack) type ship, there was a prototype, that got used by carter as a makeshift bomb. they then put it into production, it didnt end the war, but it was more powerful than the beliskner (thor's chariot) type ship. when anubis modified his hataks to use ancient like shields they resisted fire from a beliskner type but didnt want to risk a fight with several O'neill types.

the daniel jackson was a ship featured as well, it was a primarily science ship, thor used it to monitor the black hole sucking in the replicators (it didnt work out as planned). it was smaller and less powerful than the O'neill type. the valhalla was another named O'neill type, it was part of a group of O'neills that ambushed replicators over orilla.

[Atlantisbase]

posted on January 8th, 2010, 11:13 pm

Last edited by Atlantisbase on January 8th, 2010, 11:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Stargate Wiki.

three races possess shields that have proven capable of resisting drone weapons: Ancient, Asgard and Traveler, although they are still placed under heavy strain upon impact.

If shields can resist, it is obviously possible.

Saying that Ancient shields are resistant to drones is, well, DUH. It is only logical that they would design their shields to be resistant to their own shield breaking weapon, or at least design it to not react to Ancient shields. As for the Asgard and the Travelers, the article goes on

The Asgard have had the ability to study the technology behind drones for thousands of years after they found an Ancient repository of knowledge and downloaded a portion of its contents to their computers, and it is likely the Travelers obtained the ability to resist drone weapons by reverse-engineering the shield system of the Aurora-class warship in their possession.

It is also possible that since the Ancients and Asgard were long standing allies that the drones were originally developed to not react to Asgard shields or that the Asgarad modified their shields to be resistant at the time of development. The Travelers just copied the Ancient's technology.

The point is, all the races with high resistance have had direct access to either Ancient plans or the technology itself, and presumably it would be extremely difficult for anyone with out such access to develop the kind of shields capable of resisting drones. So yes, it's possible, but 80-90% of the species that you might encounter will be helpless against drones.

posted on January 8th, 2010, 11:19 pm

While the fact that they could still proves it is possible for shields to resist. Regardless of why they could, what is important is the fact that it is obviously possible for shields to resist.

Theh there is the chance factor, their particular type of shield may naturally work against it, similar to Dominion weapons and Federation shields before the Dominion having a chance to gain any type of technical specs.

posted on January 8th, 2010, 11:27 pm

what species do we know that dont use ancient shields though. nearly all shields are derived from them. the asgard shields you mention are an exception, but you have found a plausible reason why they would stop drones (asgard were allies of ancients), and earth simply copied them. so apparently all shields can stop drones thats what follows from your reasoning.

goa'uld shields: rip off of ancients, were seen to stop NO drones. puddle jumper destroyed a hatak with 2.

anubis' advanced ancient design shields: even closer to ancient design, were seen to stop NO drones when he attacked earth and the platform destroyed his fleet.

Puddle jumper cloak to shield conversion: based on ancient shields presumably, deflected a drone once.

Asgard shields on asgard vessels: not seen attacked by drones.

Asgard shields on earth vessels: directly seen to stop drones, taking damage to shields and not hull. drones not very damaging, as earth ships can take multiple direct hits.

ori shields: similar to ancient shields, possibly more powerful, never seen drones attacking it, it took ALL the remaining drones at the earth platform to defeat an ori ship. not known if the ship was destroyed or just forced into retreat.

ancient shields on asuran replicator aurora type: in Be all my sins remebered an aurora type replicator ship was destroyed by a medium size group of drones fired from sheppard on the traveller aurora type. not known if the drones had penetrated as it might have had its shields collapsed by other fire.

the shields in that episode were crazy, no replicator ships were observed with good shields. to begin, the blue asgard plasma beams seemed to instantly destroy the ships that were ambushed at the beginning, this could be explained by the fact that they had just exited hyperspace and may have been caught with their shields down.
later though, a group of F-302s and wraith darts penetrated an aurora type's shields with their limited weapons, destroying the hyperdrives of the ships to prevent escape. Also the rail guns on the earth ships dealt direct hull damage. so we cant use the replicator shields as indication of anything.

it seems most shields can stop drones when good enough. i prefer to believe that drones are powerful enough to penetrate only weaker shields instead of all shields.

posted on January 9th, 2010, 12:15 am

Since when were Goa'uld shields Ancient rip offs, I never heard that. Granted it is plausible, but unlikely since the Ancients had long abandoned the Milky Way when the Goa'uld came to power and as far as we know there were no conflicts between them. Following from that logic, where would they have found the technology to rip them off from. No Ancient ships have been found in the Milky Way, only Knowledge Repositories and various outposts in ruins, and to the best of our knowledge, the Goa'uld never found out how to use these devices, with the exception of Ba'al who probably somehow gained access to Anubis' records (or is just that good  ). Anubis only got the shields because he was ascended and probably managed to figure a few things out while he was there.

As the Stargate wiki article on the Asurans points out, they are less concerned with technological advancement and are probably using earlier versions of Ancient technology which would account for weaker shields.

We obviously can't compare Asgard shields on an Earth vessel to those on an Asgard vessel. Presumably, Earth vessels can't supply as much power as an Asgard vessel could, and thus have weaker shields but thicker hulls to make up for it. Since the Asgard beam weapons could cut through an Ori vessel in no time, it follows that they could easily take out a less powerful Asuran vessel, with or without shields. In the cases in that same battle where weak, conventional weapons penetrated Asuran shields, it's possible their shields were close to collapse and that was the straw that broke the camel's back.

Theh there is the chance factor, their particular type of shield may naturally work against it, similar to Dominion weapons and Federation shields before the Dominion having a chance to gain any type of technical specs.

Note however, that in Star Trek, most beam weapons and even torpedoes work along the same lines, so it's like you're encountering your own weapons. And are you saying that Federation shields were or were not highly effective against Dominion weapons (or vise versa) when first encountered?

posted on January 9th, 2010, 12:21 am

Note however, that in Star Trek, most beam weapons and even torpedoes work along the same lines, so it's like you're encountering your own weapons. And are you saying that Federation shields were or were not highly effective against Dominion weapons (or vise versa) when first encountered?

Dominion weapons Vs Federation shields, Dominion shields always seemed to work properly.

That still doesn't negate the chance factor. Remember the Klingon Bird of Prey and the Breen energy dampner? Shield modifications can be just as unpredictable for things you've never encountered before.

posted on January 9th, 2010, 12:27 am

it was hinted that the goa'uld stole all their tech, they stole the stargates, the ring transporters, their shields were probably stolen as well, who else other than the ancients could they steal from. granted their shields are far less sophisticated.

you're right we can't compare asgard shields on asgard ships vs on earth ships, thats why i put them in two different sections we saw the asgard shields on daedalus take drone fire, so if the asgard shields on asgard ships are more powerful, they could probably stop drones as well.

all in all, it seems your assertion that drones ignore most shields is incorrect, and that they only ignore weak shields, like the goa'uld shields, and anubis's upgrade shields. anubis was limited by the ascended ancients to what he could do, which explains why his shields would not be as good as real ancient shields.

posted on January 9th, 2010, 12:41 am

The Goa'uld didn't really "steal" the stargates, they just claimed to have built them out of a combination of arrogance and propaganda; it's easy to conquer less developed species when you claim (and appear) to be the builders of something as mystical as the stargate. They did steal the ring transporters though. They probably developed their own shields though or stole them from some other species.

all in all, it seems your assertion that drones ignore most shields is incorrect, and that they only ignore weak shields, like the goa'uld shields, and anubis's upgrade shields. anubis was limited by the ascended ancients to what he could do, which explains why his shields would not be as good as real ancient shields.

I never said that they "ignore" shields. I postulated that they adapt to the shield frequency on when they impact it and re-tune their emitted energy to match, allowing them to pass right through. The Stargate wiki postulates that drones have energy equivalent to a nuclear explosion and that they overload the shields with that high energy. It goes on to postulate that this high energy is what allows drones to drill their way through anything.

[Myles]

posted on January 9th, 2010, 12:47 am

Last edited by Myles on January 9th, 2010, 12:49 am, edited 1 time in total.

thats pure speculation

theres a lot of conflicting evidence, sometimes they are able to pass through shields, sometimes not. it seems though, that they only pass through less advanced shields, like goa'uld shields. while are stopped by the advanced asgard shields given to earth ships.

i doubt they can drill through anything, although i admit that when used as intended (in large swarms) they are probably the most powerful weapon we've seen in stargate. the zpm superhive could stop asgard blue plasma beams but not a drone spam.

EDIT: i doubt the goa'uld invented their own shields, they steal malps from SGC they usurp. their tech is crystal based, like ancient tech. and sometime we see asgard crystals alongside stones.

posted on January 9th, 2010, 1:42 am

thats pure speculation

I did say postulate. 

i doubt they can drill through anything

It's not so much that they drill, but their high energy output literally burns away anything in the drone's path. In the Atlantis episode "The Tower" (which I refered to earlier, feudal society, overgrown Ancient city ship, etc) a single drone was able to drill a hole from deep within one of the city's arms clear to the surface.