Sci-fi Military Tactics and Strategy

Matt; That is nice you have that in your setting but that is the catch now isn't it. It is determined by the setting of the writer in question. If the setting allows hover craft to have power shields and sticks to that pattern it maintains consistency fairly easily. The logic is again dictated by the setting. Being a soft sci fi approach does not indicate a lack of creativity or consistency. Just because a work doesn't follow your personal preference of hard vs soft is not an indicator that it lacks those particular qualities to begin with.

Case and point John Carter of Mars series uses "The Lift Rays". They are completely soft sci fi hand wavium silliness yet they are consistent but are also a simple creative solution to something like alien flying machines on Mars.

Doesn't matter if it is hard or soft sci-fi. Just as long as it is consistent in what it portrays. And nothing else.

The problem is, you look at the difference between soft and hard sci-fi is whether the writer is actually consistent with his portrayal of what is actually possible.

Okay let's say the better written stuff in Star Trek. That's entirely soft sci-fi as we all know that stealth in space by physically disappearing from view is impossible. But the best written stuff is always consistent with what it has established.

And isn't Hard Sci-Fi where it gets closer and closer to real world science?

edited 18th Jul '16 11:53:01 AM by EchoingSilence

Matt: That isn't the difference between soft and hard sci-fi at all. Soft sci-fi can and has exhibited consistency and creativity in general and specific.

Echo; Yes.

edited 18th Jul '16 12:32:16 PM by TuefelHundenIV

Yes, although the divide between soft and hard is sometimes arbitrary, as it may have real science taken to the Nth degree. For example, it's possible to make something physically invisible through the use of certain meta-materials that bend light around themselves. I'd imagine you'd be able to mass-produce such materials (and others) by the time you move to Star Trek level technology.

edited 18th Jul '16 11:13:34 PM by TerminusEst

Yes. Keep in mind that scientific breakthroughs are called breakthroughs because they end up demonstrating that something previously thought impossible is actually perfectly doable, like radios. Or penicillin. So who knows, maybe sometime in the future we'll discover a way to coat our vehicles in a glowy bubble of protective energy that won't cause ol' Albert to roll in his grave.

So anyway, I'm here with a question about shields as well! Two, even. Firstly, can there be any feasible explanation as to why nothing smaller than space ships and planets can use shields of a certain type and secondly, am I correct in thinking that if there existed man-portable shields, they would make for brutal close combat weapons?

The first one is easy. Power requirements are so high only something with a potent power plant can run them.

The second one really depends on shields work in the setting.

Shouldn't smaller devices have exponentially lower energy requirements than their larger counterparts, which makes it hard to imagine that a tank-sized shield cannot be powered with an on-board generator?

As for the second, what I'm talking about are the old-school "super strong invisible wall" forcefields, which will probably hurt a lot if you punch someone with them.

That is really reliant on the fiction in question. If you are using some sort of uber shield or highly capable shield the usual answer is it is a power hog or also the emitter system is larger and heavy.

Which sort of personal force-field do you mean? I have seen some that are basically little more then a physical presence so a shield bash makes sense others give violent jolts if touched, and some others can only stop certain things.

The literal repulsor shield. Basically, everything that touches it gets a massive amount of force applied to it in a direction opposite from the emitter, so a shield bash with that would pulverize human bone.

edited 19th Jul '16 3:25:26 AM by KnitTie

Ah, yeah. "Shield is defensive" trick.

I imagine someone tossing a heavy metal ball in a formation of shielded soldiers and then watch the ball ricochet as each hit adds more energy to the ball and the ball keeps bouncing on the shielded soldiers, causing a sort of mayhem.

Or like Dune's shields that can set of nuclear explosions if someone shoots a laser at them.

I guess you could classify shields in three types: Deflectors, reflectors and absorbers.

Knit for the reason why shields work better for planets and space crafts could be explained by having the shields only working on the void, as in handwaving something like the atmosphere can disrupt the shields because there is too many particles and molecules in the atmosphere preventing the shield to be fully formed or the shield ionizes the molecules in the atmosphere posing a huge risk for the user.

edited 19th Jul '16 11:31:14 AM by AngelusNox

Knit: So you are talking a shield that pushes back against a mass with a certain amount of force. It takes a decent bit of force to pulverize human bones. If you can make a protective shield do that why not make a melee weapon that can do that. Warhammer 40k the Arbites have a "power maul" or stun mace basically that has a diable effect stick that can be set to stun with a mild concussion or deliver force enough to breach light masonry wall.

Knit: So how do the users of such a shield breathe?

For you fans of AI driven cyber warfare as a tool in the tactical and strategic tool chest.

DARPA is hosting a contest for AI hacking and patching sans human input. The goal is this. Design an AI that will hunt for and exploit holes in a programs security or design and can also turn around and develop, distribute, and apply a patch all on it's own.

Nanomachines, son! Miniature globules in their bloodstream that can carry enough oxygen for seven hours of non-strenuous activity. And also it's not like the shield isn't hooked up to a computer system that turns it on only in response to incoming objects moving at certain velocities.

Melee weapons - Hell, I can even imagine somebody creating a sword that projects two of these repulsor fields at a sharp angle to form a forcefield wedge that you could probably use to chop people into confetti.

edited 20th Jul '16 12:24:10 AM by KnitTie

One consideration is that the shield presumably doesn't void the laws of physics. If a 160 pound guy tries to shield bash a 300 pound body builder, it's entirely possible that the outcome might be a broken arm for the basher. Similarly, I just amused myself with the idea of a large heavy object being flung at a mass of shield users, and the resulting kickback sending the shield users flying like pool balls.

This does imply you could breach a shield with a sledgehammer no matter what system it used. The impact would transfer right to the user.

Good point! This means that in order to be practical, the shield needs to be emitted by a myriad of small emitters located all over the user's frame, so that when it gets shot at with something powerful the kinetic energy is evenly distributed along the shielded person's entire body and he merely gets knocked back instead of having the emitter violently rip itself free from him. That even might explain why this technology is used almost exclusively by the cyborgs I mentioned earlier in this thread - because for organic squishy humans it's only marginally better than good ol' ballistic vests, but a biomechanical chassis can take the force of a machinegun shell and be no worse for wear. Or would shields like that still be useful even for mere mortals? Maybe with some sort of an ablative emitter set up, where a guy has an array of them on his back and when he gets hit in the front, an emitter projects a shield, absorbs all the force and gets jettisoned in the other direction?

Edit - And this ablative emitter system might also be used to explain how spaceships get to survive hits at proper Newtonian velocities. After all, it doesn't matter how many ultragigamegatons of force a missile in space has behind it if all of it gets transferred to a small, loosely attached device on the other side of the target.

edited 20th Jul '16 10:16:25 AM by KnitTie

It also ought to work in a sort of 'powered armour' style suit.

So, been watching a lot of Infinite Warfare vids on YT which got me thinking.

Would there be ANY point to having a Special Operations Force capable of being an Ace Pilot and Special Ops on the ground?

Because as cool as it is in the game, I think there are only a handful of people who have the necessary skills who can do both. Just way too much training for it to be effective in my opinion.

If we will ever transition into space combat, it would be mandatory for even a "normal" space marine unit. Also the better technology gets, the less a human needs to actually do in regards to the mechanics of it. Then there's also neural and muscle enhancements etc.

"A handful" is also a huge amount considering the population of the Earth at that point.

COD has gotten a bit weird though, I prefer Star Wars in this. You just have to know how to pilot.

edited 22nd Jul '16 3:08:26 AM by TerminusEst

Mandatory? Why?

How are you planing to move around in space?

It would be less comparibale to modern aircraft training, and more comparable to jeep training.

edited 22nd Jul '16 8:45:49 AM by Imca