What do you think Space Warfare will actually be like? Thread

Probably long range nuclear rocket fest. Which would be shot down by lasers. Fighters wouldn't be used because then you could self-destruct a rocket that has a nuke and all fighters are eliminated. Then fire more rockets again.
Or a EMP rocket battle which would have low casualties with high amount of enemy ships stolen. Although deck combat might be as bloody.

Then again Rockets might be covered with a special mirror surface which could withstand high amount of heat from non-reflected lasers. So it sounds like submarine battles. Whichever shoots first or with higher arsenal wins the battle.

[Edit]Unless Missile-Defence rockets are used to counter them. Then nuclear and EMP rockets have lasers attached to shoot down incoming Missile-Defence rockets. Then Missile-Defence rockets are layered with mirror surface. Then they both use small projectiles against each other... It's evolution in space! -> Conclusion computer or remote controled bombers.

[Non-Edit] Mass projectiles would probably miss ships at long distance and be hardly worth the effort.

Edited by: Pendrokar

Great... you could fight from 10 km to 600'000 km if computer can shoot precisely enough.

Capital ship vs Capital ship at 600'000 km
One shoots particle beams to the other ship and the other has 3 or less seconds to react.
If capital ship speed is fast enought they could actually evade if the computer has control, just by steering a little bit.

But how puny would a 1 km long ship be at 600'000 km range?

why are you assuming "One shot"? A particle beam can be fired constantly. Theres no way to evade something like that.

That's not the point, if you "misfire" or miscalculate the location of the ship you're shooting at, you are giving away your location and wasting resources by shooting at nothing. Ideally, you want every hit to be a direct hit so you aren't shooting for nothing.

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~Toyoka's Gaming Channel~

Ok ... here's the problem i see ... we're all thinking relatively small aren't we? ... i mean ... who needs a super accurate targeting system when you could send out "mirror drones" to relay the laser "signal" ... which would make the whole thing into a huge game of interstellar cat and mouse :o ... for example

(My ship) --------laser-beam-----------(mirror drone with targeting)------------------------(mirror drone with targeting)--------------(target)

Sorta like the light towers work in Red Alert 2, except there would be only one source (unless some sort of "shared grid" could be used by fleets) and (probably) hundreds of drones set up in a specific pattern

This eliminates issues such as line of sight and the sensitivity needed to target something 1000's of miles away ...

I think drones would have to be used in space combat simply because they would allow the main ship to watch a larger area and also attack a further distance ...

Everyone is thinking "Battleships" when they should be thinking "Carriers"! ... WWII was like this

Edited by: Assaultman67

The surface of the ship would have to have a perfect mirror ... plating an entire ship would be ... probably impossible

the targeting mirrors used for today's laser tests are like ... developed in static/dust free labs ... and even then they heat up when they reflect the light ...

The mirror itself would have to have some sort of shutter over the top to prevent debris from getting on it when not being used ...

so how would abit of dust damage a hull made to cope with iron rock 30,000km/s impacts, and you have take in solar storms and black holes, gravitational pulls and magnetic fields, light really isnt a constant, e=Mc2 is absolute nothing in the full quantum equation, you might have light particles blasting out from a star but not from a static source like a tv or a simple spark

Edited by: p0rt

Guys, we don't even know how spaceships will battle (if they even will) until we get the proper technology. But then I guess fair's fair since most of todays technology was based on Star Trek, which were based on fictional ideas

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~Toyoka's Gaming Channel~

Me neither, but the point is; how do we know we will be using "Battleships"? How do we even know we will be using mirrors to deflect lasers and projectiles? We don't even know what's out there and for all we know we might just be fighting something that is highly superior to anything we have knowledge about. Particle Beams? Bah.. we might as well run blindly into battle using plastic sporks because we don't know what we are fighting against. THat is unless, the human race splits up and decides to go rogue on itself. That is only one of many possibilities.

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~Toyoka's Gaming Channel~

Ok ...

1) i mean the laser as to be the weapon itself ... lasers are already used to cut through things, why not a ship? They already use lasers for cutting steel in industrial applications ... hell there are two laser cutters within a 17 mile radius of me and i live in a pretty rural area ... Relay may have been a bad choice of words, that suggests some sort of communication or amplification of a signal after a distance ... These "Relays" would just reduce the targeting precision needed by a guidance system to target another ship at an extreme distance ... instead they would hit a "relay" which targets another "relay" and so on untill they reach their target ...

2) using drones would give the large ship an advantage in defense as well as an advantage attacking because they can scout a larger area faster thus increasing the odds of locating the enemy ship first

3) The mirrors have to be perfect because when the laser hits the mirror all the energy has to be reflected ... dust is bad because instead of reflecting the energy it would absorb it ... causing the dust to heat the mirror up (has anybody seen "Real Genius"? There is a scene where one of the guys puts grease on a lens (i believe) to fuck up his laser)

Edited by: Assaultman67

Ok granted, you guys dont know how particle beams function. And i dont really know how to tell since "dust" might be bad wording. "Small projectiles" would fit more. Projectiles accelerated up to 300.000 km/s could weigh just a little bit over nothing and would smash through everthing.
And if your going on about quantum theorys, ok light is not a constant. Light speed, though, is absolute.

yay for stereotypes >_>

i think space warfare will be completely silent xP