Fatal Flaws in Sci-Fi Films: which ones drive you mad? I'll start it off...

You know what's another fatal flaw?

Those lightsabre thingys. I mean really? The only thing that comes close is something that would disperse a stream of plasma... and even that wouldn't have a defined length! :rolleyes

Sheesh! Swords that are made of lasers and really small spaceships that can fly faster than light! :rolleyes

[/joking-sarcasm]


But if we want to argue "in universe"...

I always imagined the Empire as having that "quantity over quality" mentality (like the former Soviet Union having outnumbered the NATO forces with what would be considered lower grade equipment- MIG-21s etc). TIE fighters have no shields or hyperdrive, but they have thousands of them (kinda begs the questions as to why they didn't overwhelm the Alliance attack in ANH- guess it boils down to overconfidence).

So what I'm saying is that a TIE fighter "probably" could have a hyperdrive, but the Empire chooses not to add one because they feel it is unnecessary (read as- they don't care).

In other words a small ship like an X-Wing can have a hyperdrive, and the Alliance makes sure to have them because it provides an advantage over the enemy ships. And the Alliance needs every advantage they can use, as they are greatly outnumbered.

Kevin
 
Regarding the Star Was Fighters, Ties can be equiped with a hyperdrive. Vader's Tie had one. That's how he was aboe to leave the Yavin system before the rest of the rebellion hunted down the ship and destroyed him.

Also the EU has referenced Ties with Hyperdrives. It makes the ships heavier and slower, but they do function.

The basic reasoning is this. Ties will never be called to fight without a ship as escort, unless they are planetary based. Why wast the time and the money on hyperdrives. Plus you can't defect if you can't get away fromy our command ship.
 
Also the EU has referenced Ties with Hyperdrives. It makes the ships heavier and slower, but they do function.

Weight has no meaning in space. A 400 ton rock weighs the same as a 4 lb rock, in space. And in SW, weight on any given planet plays no bearing as they all operate on anti-grav drives. If not, all the ships would fall straight out of the sky, as none of them exhibit any known aerodynamical design.

Now maybe this is a fatal flaw in sci-fi. Weight and size have no bearing in space. Zero gravity equals zero weight. W(eight) = M(ass) X G(ravity). No atmosphere, means no air. No air means, no air resistance.

So theoretically, a star destroyer should be as fast and maneuverable as a TIE fighter - no? I'd actually like to see a discussion on this.

-Fred
 
So theoretically, a star destroyer should be as fast and maneuverable as a TIE fighter - no? I'd actually like to see a discussion on this.

No gravity, but mass still has an effect. It takes much more power to turn a star destroyer than it does to turn a tie fighter. Not installing a (call it 300 pound) hyperdrive into a tie fighter will make it much more able to change it course rapidly than one that had it installed. Force = Mass X Acceleration so greater mass meens more force is required for equvalent acceleration.
 
Yeah, mass and weight are two different things. Waaaay different.

Getting away from SW for a moment, in First Contact, the entire plot is based on a "fatal flaw". The Borg attack Earth, calling attention to themselves, and THEN go back in time, giving our heroes an opportunity to defeat them. Had they gone back in time in some backwater, THEN traveled to Earth, they could have assimilated the planet with zero resistance. The plot depended on the protagonist – the Borg who are supposed to be this super-advanced and relentless force of nature – to be stupid. Give us one line of dialogue that tells us why it HAD to be that way, and there's no flaw.

Most "fatal flaws" can be addressed simply with a line of dialogue, but most of the time they are ignored, assuming the audience won't see it or care.

I HATED it when the 3 Kryptonians spoke aloud on the Moon is Superman 2!! Super powers or not, no air = no sound.
 
Is that still applicable in a vacuum? With no gravity, resistance or friction to overcome, the slightest nudge should be enough to knock it off course.

In a conventional airplane, you adjust the angle of the vertical stabilizer/rudder to turn the plane. The rudder is now acting as a deflector, turning the nose of the craft in the direction of the rudder angle.

Boats turn by pushing against the water in the same way. And on a car, is the friction between the road and the tire.

In all these cases, it's a matter of A pushing against B, so you need more force to move heavier objects.

In space, you're relying on newton's first law - for every action, there is an opposite and equal reaction. You use a thruster to expel air in the opposite direction you wish to travel. Without an opposing force to overcome (gravity, friction or resistance), the slightest poof of air should be enough to move you. Unless there's something I'm not seeing.

-Fred
 
But if we want to argue "in universe"...

I always imagined the Empire as having that "quantity over quality" mentality (like the former Soviet Union having outnumbered the NATO forces with what would be considered lower grade equipment- MIG-21s etc). TIE fighters have no shields or hyperdrive, but they have thousands of them (kinda begs the questions as to why they didn't overwhelm the Alliance attack in ANH- guess it boils down to overconfidence).

So what I'm saying is that a TIE fighter "probably" could have a hyperdrive, but the Empire chooses not to add one because they feel it is unnecessary (read as- they don't care).

In other words a small ship like an X-Wing can have a hyperdrive, and the Alliance makes sure to have them because it provides an advantage over the enemy ships. And the Alliance needs every advantage they can use, as they are greatly outnumbered.

Kevin

Yeah, in-universe, that's the explanation given. Rebel ships are made for durability and with a specific strategy in mind. The primary Rebel tactic prior to the Battle of Yavin was to do hit-and-run (or "hit-and-fade") tactics. Basically, they hyper in, destroy/capture/disable the target, and hyper out. All hopefully before a distress call can get out.

One-on-one, the Rebel starfighters USUALLY can kick the snot out of a TIE, assuming equal experienced pilots. That's less applicable to the TIE Interceptor, or TIE Advanced (like Vader's TIE), but against a TIE Bomber or TIE Fighter, they'll smack them down. Rebel starfighters are more heavily armed and armored, and by the time the X-wing shows up, they're ALMOST as fast on a straightaway. TIEs are still a lot more maneuverable, but they can only take one or two hits before they blow.

Rebel ships have shields, armor, heavy lasers, missile/torpedo capacity, hyperdrives, ejection systems and atmosphere in the cockpit, etc. TIEs are fast and maneuverable, and rely on swarming tactics to beat Rebel fighters. They're supposed to be dirt cheap to make, but hard-hitting enough that if you throw a huge squadron of them at a wing of Rebel ships, the Rebels will be overwhelmed.

Plus, bear in mind that, at least before the Rebellion really got underway, the idea was to have an inexpensive but MASSIVE military that could be everywhere at once (or close to it). Cheap and fast-to-produce, therefore, is the order of the day.

Regarding the Star Was Fighters, Ties can be equiped with a hyperdrive. Vader's Tie had one. That's how he was aboe to leave the Yavin system before the rest of the rebellion hunted down the ship and destroyed him.

Also the EU has referenced Ties with Hyperdrives. It makes the ships heavier and slower, but they do function.

The basic reasoning is this. Ties will never be called to fight without a ship as escort, unless they are planetary based. Why wast the time and the money on hyperdrives. Plus you can't defect if you can't get away fromy our command ship.

This too.



As for those with questions about which craft do and don't have hyperdrives, competing design philosophies, and relative durability, I highly recommend you go play the old X-wing games. :)
 
Is that still applicable in a vacuum? With no gravity, resistance or friction to overcome, the slightest nudge should be enough to knock it off course.

In a conventional airplane, you adjust the angle of the vertical stabilizer/rudder to turn the plane. The rudder is now acting as a deflector, turning the nose of the craft in the direction of the rudder angle.

Boats turn by pushing against the water in the same way. And on a car, is the friction between the road and the tire.

In all these cases, it's a matter of A pushing against B, so you need more force to move heavier objects.

In space, you're relying on newton's first law - for every action, there is an opposite and equal reaction. You use a thruster to expel air in the opposite direction you wish to travel. Without an opposing force to overcome (gravity, friction or resistance), the slightest poof of air should be enough to move you. Unless there's something I'm not seeing.

-Fred
The new BS:G seemed to handle this well.
 
Unless there's something I'm not seeing.

You're still not seeing the "equal and opposite" part of the equation. Yes if you expel two pounds of O2 out of a spaceship it will push the space ship forwards but it won't move the same distance as the O2 does unless the spaceship also weighs two pounds.
 
I was just gonna say your post sounded like a player. :)


Haha, yeah, I started playing on 3.5" floppies and still play to this day (from time to time). Some of the best games ever made (although XvT was pretty weak -- too much reliance on missiles unless you played BoP).
 
I HATED it when the 3 Kryptonians spoke aloud on the Moon is Superman 2!! Super powers or not, no air = no sound.
You worry about that? I worry about the fact that since there's no air... how the **** do they breathe? Superpowers or not... they should be gasping for air and die when escaping the Phantom Zone.
 
In the 3rd Planet of the Apes movie, apes are "normal". 20 years later (in the 4th movie) they're walking around, wearing our clothes, performing basic human functions and understand some english.

In 20 years??? What the hell, man?!
 
Unfortunately, this happens here in our own Army.....

And it pisses me off to no end. I rode out of Iraq on a gunship UH60...the crew chief was completely done up and then one of the women attached to my unit was wearing her normal eyeliner mascara and lip stick.

I'm sitting here with a freakin full combat load of ammunition, topped of water, 3 MREs and everything I need, that I spent about 3 hours checking and rechecking, and shes sitting there with 2 magazines a canteen and a compact....

No offense to women in the military, but when you are in a combat zone, your makeup should NOT be something you worry about...at all....EVER


:lol:lol:lol:lol Omgwtfbbq. I can't even be bothered to put makeup on for work, that's just.... obscene.


The X-Wing hyperdrive thing....I think it makes perfect sense, and I think SSgt Burton stated it well. The Empire always had a disposable mentality with their troops. Hyperdrives are a major expense for a fighter that had no need to be sent long-range and was probably just going to be anihilated in short range combat, and they needed thousands, maybe even tens or hundreds of thousands of these disposable fighters. Only specialty TIE's would be financially smart to equip with hyperdrives.

Having a hyperdrive in the smaller fighters presented a major tactical advantage for the alliance though, seeing as they had a tiny fraction of the funds and fighters to work with. Rendezvous at a safe distance, and make a collective short jump straight into battle, ala Battle of Endor.


However, I would like to know how they dealt with stuff like bodily functions on hyperspace trips that would take multiple days to make, on a craft like an X-Wing.
...yknow, on second thought...maybe I don't. :sick
 
:lol:lol:lol:lol Omgwtfbbq. I can't even be bothered to put makeup on for work, that's just.... obscene.


The X-Wing hyperdrive thing....I think it makes perfect sense, and I think SSgt Burton stated it well. The Empire always had a disposable mentality with their troops. Hyperdrives are a major expense for a fighter that had no need to be sent long-range and was probably just going to be anihilated in short range combat, and they needed thousands, maybe even tens or hundreds of thousands of these disposable fighters. Only specialty TIE's would be financially smart to equip with hyperdrives.

Having a hyperdrive in the smaller fighters presented a major tactical advantage for the alliance though, seeing as they had a tiny fraction of the funds and fighters to work with. Rendezvous at a safe distance, and make a collective short jump straight into battle, ala Battle of Endor.


However, I would like to know how they dealt with stuff like bodily functions on hyperspace trips that would take multiple days to make, on a craft like an X-Wing.
...yknow, on second thought...maybe I don't. :sick


Remember the crazy astronaut lady that drove half way across the US? :lol
 
In the 3rd Planet of the Apes movie, apes are "normal". 20 years later (in the 4th movie) they're walking around, wearing our clothes, performing basic human functions and understand some english.

In 20 years??? What the hell, man?!

was it not something about a "Space virus" that killed all pets so they had to use monkeys.
 
was it not something about a "Space virus" that killed all pets so they had to use monkeys.

First off, apes, not monkeys (monkeys have tails :p).
But that still doesn't explain how they evolved to that level in ONLY 20 years. :wacko
 
First off, apes, not monkeys (monkeys have tails :p).
But that still doesn't explain how they evolved to that level in ONLY 20 years. :wacko

I'd love to see the genetic experiments and growth accelerators there. It would be like fruit flies, make so many generations in a given time that in the end and given enough change they will be a completely different being genetically right?
 
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