Suggested by Sauroposeidon
The Arachnid Empire from Starship Troopers finds itself suddenly in an alien universe. That of Halo.
Are they able to survive?
Do they conquer?
Can anyone stop them or are they but a nuisance?
What happens?
What If…The Arachnid Empire Appeared in Halo
SHARE THIS POST
Author: admin View all posts by admin
96 Comments on "What If…The Arachnid Empire Appeared in Halo"
Starship Troopers, one of the first Sci-Fi series to ever come out.
-
Everyone is Halo will surrender to nostalgia, resulting in complete victory for the Arachnid.
Film, TV or novels?
all i know is i have a deep hatred for those damn things. loved the movies, but any creature that kills a woman nice enough to show me her breasts in a shower scene needs to have their race exterminated.
-
-
-that said, they are stuck to one planet with no space travel, only offensive interplanetary capabilities with those fart bomb things they do that wipe out cities. any of the halo forces could take them out with relative ease either by orbital bombardment or on the ground easily. although some blurred testing must be done on the brain bugs.
………forgot to hit the “notify me” button……..
Notify me.
They would easily hold their own, they would conquer several planets. I dunno about defeating all of Halo’s forces, but they have the chops to probably beat the UNSC.
Covenant would hunt them for fun. Elites for the trophies. Brutes for fun, Hunters to experience new things. Roflstomp on a massive scale.
“Covenant would hunt them for fun. Elites for the trophies. Brutes for fun, Hunters to experience new things. Roflstomp on a massive scale.”
-
You sir are underestimating the Arachnids I think. The Tanker, and Scorpion Bugs would wreck all kinds of shit for the Covies.
Let the debate begin.
I understand that orbital glassing would wreck the bugs. They could contain them easily especially since their firepower’s not that great.
” understand that orbital glassing would wreck the bugs. They could contain them easily especially since their firepower’s not that great.”
-
They shoot bigass balls of plasma out of their asses, Not to mention, this is What If…The Arachnid Empire Appeared in Halo, not Arachnids vs Covenant. Whose to say the Covies even find out about it before it’s too late?
@ZomB
Good point, we need more stipulations before moving on with this thread. Lizard God, you here?!
Assuming movi Arachnids, well the scenario doesn’t end favorably for them.
—
They only way they can really pose a threat is to make themselves known on a massive, quantifiable scale through colonization. And with no means of defending their worlds (plasma ejections are not that fast or energetic given we’ve seen a dropship explode on contact without the energies needed to kill Covenant orbital assets) they fall victim to orbital bombardment rather quickly.
—
The only hope they have is to find a world with a considerable amount of Forerunner infrastructure and hunker down into it – thus drawing Covenant infantry into a prolonged firefight. Although even in this arena the Covenant make out fairly well given their propensity towards vehicle use.
They shit plasma… What did I just say.
I’m just learning now that book bugs are spacefaring and have pretty powerful beam weapons… Wow the movie went off on tangents…
.
Movie bugs are wrecked. The plasma torpedoes looked no different than bug plasma, even in firepower (but any UNSC warship would put the Roger Young to shame). The Covenant could just glass the planet from orbit – each ship could take one to three of the bug plasma shots – and the Covenant wouldn’t be sitting like ducks either.
Again, we see the bug plasma shots detonate in atmosphere when several of the ejector species are taken out by a mini nuke – and barring their low velocity (certainly not enough to threaten the Covenant given their minimum 100G acceleration) the region isn’t saturated with an ionized cloud large enough to engulf Manhattan.
—
I’m willing to attribute it to some other effect such as a thermobaric corrosive gel that reacts explosively with solid metals, but against shields that means zip all.
Unless the bugs has feats not included in the movie… This ends with Halo stamping on the bugs.(pun)
This is a nice change.
-
I’ve been on this sie long enough to know that Halo is hated here.
-
Well, more specifically, Halo fanboys who exaggerate Halo power levels to insane degrees.
I love Halo. Freaking love it. But the PS3 thrashes XBOX360(lol).
-
Retards who wank Halo to unimaginable levels should kill themselves, I hate them. I love arguing against their stupidity in other forums, their responses make me laugh.
Bug variants from all three movies and the show are allowed.
-
Remember the bugs live underground, even a BDZ of typical star wars fanboy proportions wouldn’t be able to kill these guys.
-
Bugs can and do colonize other planets, although their methods strike me as being sub light speed, they somehow accomplish it quickly enough to imply that there is FTL involved in this somehow. No explanation is ever given but in the show they manage to get to Earth, actually, if I recall. Although in the show their mechs weren’t complete over kill and they weren’t throwing planet destroying bombs either like in the third movie.
Is this the bookverse or the movieverse version of the Arachnids? As the movieverse would get stomped badly.
-
Bookverse is a whole different story though, considering they actually have proper space travelling technology at their disposal and the fact they can go toe to toe with the Mobile Infantry on the ground, and those guys would make the Adeptus Astartes collectively crap their armoured pants.
Would a glassing do it? Since it just glasses everything so the heat would kill them? Or just throw nukes inside the tunnels.
Yeah… Covies would wipe their collective asses still. Worst somes to worst, just activate Halo for teh lulz.
The movies BARELY touch on how the Arachnids travel in space at all, if I recall, like it’s only a throw away line or two, but it strongly suggests that they do it exactly the same way as the bookverse do.
-
If the covies have a bomb like that tunnel cleansing one they used in GoW, it would definitely get some of the bugs. Although I doubt it’d get the entire planet’s population. I don’t know how many times the covies would have to lose or take massive losses to realize that this tactic is required en masse to begin working.
-
“Yeah… Covies would wipe their collective asses still. Worst somes to worst, just activate Halo for teh lulz. ”
-
Master Chief wouldn’t bitch smack their collective asses for trying why, exactly? This isn’t Halo vs Star Ship Troopers. This is “A new faction has appeared in the Halo verse.”
@Lizard god
Just kidding… Are we going by current incarnation though, just to be sure?
@ Sauro
The way this thread is going, it might as well be Halo vs Arachnids, with a different scenario for every one of the Halo’s races.
All three movies, and show variants, along with the “Described as being sub light but somehow operates as FTL” colonization method which they employ in the bookverse, showverse, and movieverse, I’m pretty sure they use it in ALL three instances. Like in the show and book they do have the ability to speak/reason with and manipulate other races, but they don’t seem to have any real interest with no insectoid races (the skinnies only just barely qualified, and were more like slave labor after all). Like in the movies they do have mind control bugs, as well as the ability to eventually grow God Brain Bugs… although I don’t really know what purpose those bugs serve at all outside of them being cool because they’re planet sized.
“The movies BARELY touch on how the Arachnids travel in space at all, if I recall, like it’s only a throw away line or two, but it strongly suggests that they do it exactly the same way as the bookverse do.”
-
No. In the movies they are said to “launch spores into space” in order to colonise planets. In the show they use so-called “Carrier Bugs”, ship-sized monstrosities that somehow perform FTL travel. In the bookverse they’re a hive minded technological civilisation with actual spacecraft. They’re practically two different races.
-
Not a big surprise, considering Verhoeven hated the book and didn’t read past the first two chapters.
-
And glassing would fuck the movie bugs ten times over. Hiding underground won’t miraculously protect you from having the atmosphere boiled off.
“In the show they use so-called “Carrier Bugs”, ship-sized monstrosities that somehow perform FTL travel.”
-
I don’t remember these at all, actually. I’ll have to rewatch the show it seems.
-
“miraculously protect you from having the atmosphere boiled off.”
-
It’s impossible to boil off, burn off, or blast off an atmosphere. The best you can do is reduce a celestial body’s mass to the point it lacks the gravity to hold atmosphere any longer. The concept of vaping the atmosphere through some bizarre means of extraordinary power is just a sign of a bad writer.
1. What do the bugs breath?
-
The “glassing” will muck up the atmosphere and destroy plants/trees needed for oxygen, unless they require something completely different.
-
2. Do they have spacecrafts? How strong?
-
I doubt the UNSC or Covenant would fight on the ground.
-
3. Individual defense, power, etc?
-
Could they survive atomic bombs?
“And glassing would fuck the movie bugs ten times over. Hiding underground won’t miraculously protect you from having the atmosphere boiled off.”
-
What the fuck? How is that even possible!?
“The “glassing” will muck up the atmosphere and destroy plants/trees needed for oxygen, unless they require something completely different.”
-
I don’t think they do breathe, they survive on Pluto.
It depends were they are in the universe.
If the bugs are in or near human colonies the UNSC would most likely attempt to exterminate them. The bugs are defiantly tuff enough to take care of them selves but UNSC armaments are very advanced.The war would last hundreds of years. I believe the UNSC could take them out but the problem would be eliminating all the bugs so they don’t make a come back. Taking them all out would involve a lot of digging into planets to find the hibernators. That would take a while.
Now with the Covenant I think the bugs would be done for. Covenant have shown time and time again that they are willing to glass and destroy any planet/race that gets in the way of there goals. The Covenant once finding out what the bug is would likely glass the planet. You might think “well the bugs live under ground.” The blast of energy from the covenant’s canons crack continents in peaces. The only way the bugs would be able to live is if they Transfer to another planet. Running away doesn’t last forever eventually they will get stuck.
Against the flood its hard to say. I don’t think the flood could control the bugs so they would have to have a battle to the death. I think it could go either way.
I didn’t read the books, only the movies.But I always wondered where the tanks and other armor was?All I remember was hordes of screaming human infantry charging the bugs.And a airstrike that proved to be pretty effective, but they didn’t use that oftenly fro what I remember…
I’ve only seen the Starship Troopers movies (freakin’ hilarious). However, those bigass bugs are pretty tough from what I saw.
-
Would you like to know more?
Why are we using the crappy movie version and not the book version?
“I don’t think the flood could control the bugs so they would have to have a battle to the death. I think it could go either way.”
-
Looks like more food for the flood. I do not see any reason why the flood cannot infect them.
If they try to fight any faction in halo they get exterminated :1 the only hope they have is if they make peace and join a faction
If we use the movie version, the bugs get roflstomped by pretty much anything. If we use the book version, we are dealing with a race that can fight Humanity. Humanity’s ENTIRE infantry had armor, weapons, and capabilities far superior to Master Chief. Every soldier carried nukes, flamethrowers, and bombs and could leap-frog around cities like it was ain’t no thing. The bugs fielded such numbers that the loss of a thousand soldiers for them was still a victory if they killed one infantryman. Each soldier also carried a gun that could cut through the Infantryman’s armor like butter. Humanity eventually won, but mostly because of the Nova Bomb, which could blow up a planet.
Don’t forget, book version bugs could only be killed by hitting their nerve case, and even then they’ll still blindly charge forward firing at nothing.
@itcheyness
Sauro said “Bug variants from all three movies and the show are allowed.” IIRC the movie/show bugs were moronic insects compared to the Arachnids in the books. Considering the marines in the movie were taking them down pretty easily with 7.62mm assault rifles. I think the Battle Rifle (9.5x40mm) should be pretty effective against them, although the UNSC marines will probably run out of ammo sooner.
Actually you can boil off the atmosphere. It requires altering the albedo of the planetary surface to the point that surface emissions exceed the external limits of the biome (sunlights, stellar winds etc.), or close enough without becoming a true black body, but the Coriolis effect would eventually guarantee that a planet with a 1G gravity would be left with the faintest wisp of an atmosphere. But how do the Covenant alter the atmosphere?
—
images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20110315195131/halo/images/0/0c/Fall_of_Reach_1.jpg
—
Shit. Keep that up for a few more weeks and the only atmosphere left would be gaseous silicon! Wait till fucker cools off and watch the fireworks.
“But how do the Covenant alter the atmosphere?
—
images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20110315195131/halo/images/0/0c/Fall_of_Reach_1.jpg
—
Shit. Keep that up for a few more weeks and the only atmosphere left would be gaseous silicon! Wait till fucker cools off and watch the fireworks.”
-
-
Ironically, the example you show is of a planet that kept it’s atmosphere after being glassed…
Ironically the planet isn’t *entirely* glassed to start with, in fact even going by the novel it maintained some sustainable surface atmosphere despite the sheer alteration in the albedo over a portion of the habitable surface.
—
Mhmm, I wonder why I said “Keep that up for a few more weeks”, could it be I was implying that whilst the present power is sufficient, it would require an addition of time to successfully glass the entire planet from pole to pole and thus render the surface totally uninhabitable?
—
Reading comprehension, what’s that?
Doesn’t change the fact that it was ironic bro… Irony, what’s that?
How is it ironic? My point with the image is that the Covenant can adversely effect the atmosphere, are you implying that gouts of plasma from hydrodynamic separation being ejected through the corona of the atmosphere isn’t a severe alteration of the state of the atmosphere? Or that the surface albedo changing so that EM transmissions glow bright orange on a continental scale (in a fashion that dwarfs the KT scale detonation) isn’t severely altering the atmosphere in any fashion?
—
You *should* indeed be asking the meaning of irony, because you clearly don’t know it.
I was stating it is ironic, out of all the planet glassings, the one that you can show as an example of what could eventually burn off an atmosphere is notably one of the exceptions to that happening. Thus ironic… You’re putting way too much thought into something incredibly simple, relax, and just look at it as a normal man would, not a vs debater.
@Lightning
“Retards who wank Halo to unimaginable levels should kill themselves, I hate them. I love arguing against their stupidity in other forums, their responses make me laugh.”
The Irony in that statement was palpable.
On a note pertaining more to the topic presented:
The ones from the film would in all likely hood prove very little a threat to the Halo-Universe as a whole (especially assuming the “natives” do what the Federation should have done more of and use Orbital Bombardments with impunity). On the ground, the Bugs would fair a better chance, but any victory would be either phyric, short-lived, largely inconsequental to the native offensive, or some combination of the three considering the limited Space Travel capabilities of the Movie Bugs and the shear numbers and military industrial complex of the natives and their technus levels and other, similiar factors.
Original Book Bugs, I’m am less comfortable and certain of saying. Though from what I’ve seen, they would seem to pose a far greater threat than the movie bugs given their access to interstellar travel, their (what I presume to be) larger population base, starship or starship equivalent units, and greater unit variation (which, I am again, presuming). Whether that greater threat is enough to floor the natives, I cannot say for certain.
it’s not ironic because his point was not the video, it was the video + his statement of prolonged bombardment and how the video itself showed how that prolongment would alter the atmosphere. you are only taking part of what is there to get your irony.
I get it, but it’s an entirely a misrepresentation of what was being said. Not on some intrinsic or sub-textual level, it was the exact choice of terminology in the text itself with no indication of the effects of atmospheric evacuation. Explicit as all and ideally difficult to confuse with the very language that we’ve all agreed upon.
—
“I was stating it is ironic, out of all the planet glassings, the one that you can show as an example of what could eventually burn off an atmosphere is notably one of the exceptions to that happening.”
—
Actually it’s the most accurate visual representation of atmospheric alteration in the series, not a burn off. Again, the choice of words is explicit in this regard, as is the intent. There’s no way you can confuse this as being ironic or containing any mote of irony unless English was a second language.
mmm……wel…..arachnids are quite a nuisance, but i really have to ask, what time in the halo universe does this take place in? before or after the human-covenant war? pre or post reach? cuz if it is post reach…..humans have the nova bomb…..(planet busters), pre reach……the UNSC has the Trafalgar, the pride of the UNSC….pre human-covenant war….spartans at full strenght, post human-covenant war….UNSC tech combined with covenant tech plus forerrunner tech….
-
-
this is what i think will happen….
-
-
the arachnids will emerge in some human colony….they will create havock and the UNSC will deploy a battle group to see whatt happened….the ground team is probably gonna get wiped out since they have absoluteley no experience whit these bugs, and probably the ships are gonna get some damage from the plasma shooting bugs…..
-
anyways….the UNSC is gonna retaliate sending a fleet to contain the situation, they are gonna go inathmosphere and shoot the bugs with their autocannons and longswords archer missiles…this is gonna proove effective against the bugs in the surface but when they realize its useless against the underground ones…..they are gona do their equivalent to covanant glassing…..but instead of plasma……MAC rounds……
-
-
probably even shoot a shiva or two…..in the end….the bugs are gonna be so resistant like roaches that the unsc is gonna give authorization to drop a nova bomb…and goodbye bugs…….
-
-
the bugs dont stand a chance….
Are they able to survive?
-
Depends. They very well could survive. It all depends on how aggressive they want to be. Make enough noise and the factions of Halo will come swooping in. Spread from uninhabited planets to other uninhabited planets? They would probably get noticed, but not to the level of any severe military action.
-
Do they conquer?
-
No. Trying to contest any faction in Halo short of the “innies” will end in their extinction.
-
Can anyone stop them or are they but a nuisance?
-
Strictly nuisance. Sure, if they got to an Outer Colony, they would be scary and dangerous as hell, at least until the cavalry arrives.
-
What happens?
-
Well, all races/factions short of the “innies” would crush them. God help them if the Flood every gets to them.
@manMarch 2, 2012 at 9:26 am -
I quote”I’ve been on this sie long enough to know that Halo is hated here.
-
Well, more specifically, Halo fanboys who exaggerate Halo power levels to insane degrees.”
1.Notice that the many people on this website who have Halo characters as thier pictures would dissagree.
2.Let me put this simpily for you.WE DO NOT EXAGGRATE.Hey I havent even heard of you stpid =arachnid empire.They fart plasma Now who is exaggerating
PWN!!
if the movie arachnids were to show up in the haloverse i dont think they would fare to well against most factions out there but if they were to somehow run into the flood that would be freaking scary, the flood threatened the existence of two factions in the halo story line if the arachnids were to become infected by the flood now you would have a super flood species, i mean the flood elites were bad enough but imagine an arachnid flood, and now that it is in control by the flood they would be intelligent, the flood arnt mindless zombies they pick up weapons and hijack starships, now imagine that but there all arachnid flood, scary right? but to conclude i dont think that the arachnids themselves would do to well but the arachnids infected by the flood would be terrifying
@threehobos
As a side note, the standard Morita assault rifle used by the troopers in the first movie was able to punch through two inches of steel, supposedly. The Morita III that they eventually end up with uses 10mm explosive rounds, giving them really nasty fire power if I’m not mistaken. By themselves the warriors are difficult to kill, and the movie versions of the arachnids are fairly smart. Once the Mobile Infantry invents proper methods of fighting them, they change their tactics, since standard rifles will probably be unable to do much do them with out sustained fire, in a ground battle the Arachnids would definitely be frightening. Flood or no Flood. These transport bugs which I’d also forgotten about are amazingly fast as well, able to travel vast interstellar distances fairly quickly. Finally the plasma bugs are able to one shot ships they hit in orbit. Orbital Bombardment may be difficult when there’s hundreds of Plasma Bugs shooting at their ships. That is all.
-
@ Shurikan
You’ve never heard of the Arachnids? You’ve never heard of Starship Troopers? Master Chief wouldn’t even be around if not for that book.
@Sauropesidon now those plasma bugs may appear powerful in the movie but thats only because those ships are incredibly weak and slow, they have no shields and if i recall their trajectory was affected by a nearby passing asteroid, the bugs cant aim very well either the only way they managed to hit the ships in the first place was because there was so many bugs all firing in the general direction of the ships thousands of bolts flying through space all at once, i think the covenant ships would fare much better in that scenario, heck even the pillar of autumn would do better, and even if the standard UNSC assault rifle was not capable of killing the bugs they could always up the anti with their sniper rifle or spartan laser and im sure the warthog would do just fine in that scenario but regardless i dont think the UNSC would be dumb enough to put in ground troops in this kind of scenario i think if they could not do an orbital bombardment they would send in longswords and pelicans and do a airal bombardment, and when exactly would the arachnids arrive before or after the covenant, if they arrived before the covenant there would be a large force of spartans out there all capable of punching right through them without their armor suits
You know they use the plasma bugs to shoot down atmospheric aircraft as well, and it’s a damn lot harder to shoot air craft down than it is a shit sitting in orbit, right? You’ve gone pretty heavily out of your way to make the Haloverse people sound pretty unstoppable even when there’s a force coming at them on the ground where they would consider it a victory even if they lost a thousand of their warriors and only killed one of us. A force which soaks up enormous amounts of fire power and chews through armor like its paper. I am seriously hard pressed to believe a spartan, with out armor or weapons, could defeat a warrior bug in hand to hand. This seems out right laughable. So what you have going here is you think their AA abilities are awful, when they aren’t at all, and you think they’re terrible in ground battles, which they aren’t at all, and you think they would only ever be defending and not taking territory. You also think the warthog of all things would be fine, when it’s just asking to be Hopper bait. I really believe you’re trolling and trying to make Halo look bad at this point.
HAWK bomb anyone?
In the fall of reach just one bomb can give out like 30 or 80 mega tons.
The only problem with that being that the bugs are subterranean. You could punch a big assed dent in the ground and have not even hit where the bugs are. The surface would show no signs that the bugs are there, only where they’ve fought.
okay how about the covenant destroying the atmosphere d of the planets they’re in?
Bugs don’t breath. *points at their holding Pluto*
Also, it was asked earlier about mobile infantry vehicles. They have something that appears to function as both a MBT and a Troop Transport, but it’s rarely seen. I suspect this is because it’s so completely and totally vulnerable to the way the bugs wage war that it simply has no place outside of human-to-human engagements. Fast action is needed to deal with the bugs on the ground, and anything that can’t get over mountains, or defend itself against sudden under ground ambush just isn’t going to survive. The heaviest vehicles they use are their walkers, which appear to function as something like a cross between a gunship and a IFV sans any transport abilities. They are mobile enough to keep themselves from getting swarmed or caught by the larger bugs in the show. In the movies they’re durable enough to survive being swarmed and still mobile enough to not be caught by the bigger, nastier bugs. Heavy vehicles simply lack a role in the Bug Wars outside of maybe garrison duty.
@Doppelganger
You do realize that to fully glass a planet (and I mean to boil away the atmosphere and all) The covenant would take 30 years with as much ships as the UNSC had (about 2,000) to fully glass a planet the size of Earth?
It is mentioned in the Reach datapads, actually, I will just give you a quote:
(2526) “A single Covenant capital ship (CCS-class) is capable of ‘glassing’ approximately one acre of a planet’s surface after an average of fifteen seconds of sustained fire.”
“Earth, one of the smaller planets inhabited by our creators, has one hundred and thirty billion acres of surface area. Thus, assuming the Covenant possesses a number of ships equal to that of the UNSC, and assuming that all of those ships are capable of generating and discharging the required power non-stop for the duration of the process, it would necessitate the combined efforts of their ships in toto for a minimum of 30.3801 years to ‘glass’ the entire surface of Earth. Myriad other variables which were not applied to this equation suggest this number would be far greater.”
-
Reach wasn’t completely glassed either, seeing how Covenant kept excavating some weeks after the planet fell. Hell, even Harvest, after 5 years of continuous fighting still had a breathable atmosphere, although it was rendered in a nuclear winter on its poles due to the glassing.
-
I honestly don’t know how powerful the bugs from Starship Troopers are but if they can withstand 5,000 degrees of plasma then they should be fine against ground forces.
They can’t survive 5000 degree plasma. They simply remain underground to avoid being wiped out en masse by nuclear strikes and the like.
ok what the hell…. Starship troopers is futuristic but Halo is 500 years in the future…. and well if the StarShip troopers survived enough to win…. well the Halo universe would rape….
Halo Wins!!!
and i agree with that Lightning person
@carmine
you dont have to render the athmosphere unbreathable, like poseidon said bugs dont breathe but you can blast them back to wherever they came from with a few well placed MAC rounds, for example a ship-mounted MAC fires a 600 ton slug at 30,000m/s which would create a very nice and deep crater should it impact in the surface, but if it hit a bug hive, all that evergy would obliterate the bugs in there…and if that doesnt work, shoot a shiva warhead into the hive you just exposed with the MAC round and bye bye bugs…….
“ok what the hell…. Starship troopers is futuristic but Halo is 500 years in the future…. and well if the StarShip troopers survived enough to win…. well the Halo universe would rape….
Halo Wins!!!”
-
The troopers use something akin to Spartan-II armor and mechs to take on the bugs.. so your logic there fails, you realize. When we see their light infantry face off against the bugs in the movies they universally get slaughtered.
-
“you dont have to render the athmosphere unbreathable, like poseidon said bugs dont breathe but you can blast them back to wherever they came from with a few well placed MAC rounds, for example a ship-mounted MAC fires a 600 ton slug at 30,000m/s which would create a very nice and deep crater should it impact in the surface, but if it hit a bug hive, all that evergy would obliterate the bugs in there…and if that doesnt work, shoot a shiva warhead into the hive you just exposed with the MAC round and bye bye bugs…….”
-
You’re detecting where the bug hive is how? And your ships aren’t being shot down.. how? With Brain Bugs stealing intel, they’ll be more difficult to bring down than some lucky, well placed MAC round. I would also like to know where the figures on that slug came from.
@Sauro
The MAC numbers are from Fall of Reach, and it comes down to the universally accepted 64.5 kilotons.
I get the distinct impression that 600 tons at 30,000 m/s would come down to a lot more than 64.5kt although I could be wrong… I think he was trying to use super mac numbers in place of standard mac numbers. Although not being a Halo fan I don’t know if we’ve ever even seen one of those hit the ground before.
@Sauro
600 tons moving at 30000m/s (or 30km/s) is roughly 60 kilotons (give or take a few tons).
-
Here: 600 tons comes out to roughly 545,000 kilograms (www.metric-conversions.org/weight/pounds-to-kilograms.htm)
-
Being lazy, I’ll just use this kinetic energy calculator to get the amount of kinetic energy in joules.
www.csgnetwork.com/kineticenergycalc.html
-
545,000 kilogram slug moving at 30000 meters per second is 245 tera-joules (or 2.4525 × 10^9)
-
Converted to ton (1 ton = roughly 4.1 gigajoules) its around 60 kilotons.
-
*I know I did it a bit differently, but I’ve seen everyone else get roughly same results around 60-64 kilotons*
*Forgot to add*
-
I’ve seen, played, read through pretty much all of the Halo fiction, but the only instances where MAC rounds are used in atmosphere and their effects are seen is in the games Halo 3, Halo Wars, and Halo: Reach. Halo Wars though is the only one where they actually hit the ground with MAC’s (but its a weaker MAC and its only in gameplay, no cut scenes of it)
I misread that and assumed it was 30,000 KILOmeters per second. My bad. You can see why I’d think the yield should be muuuch higher.
Ah alright, I thought as much, but included calc’s anyway :3
It’s extra embarassing because I literally typed out 30,000 m/s and still didn’t catch myself in my assumption. x_x
So back on track, I’m somewhat familiar with the effects of those kinds of yields on the ground. The hole an attack like that should punch in to the earth is not going to be so large as to easily detect the Arachnids. While I know you are not the fanboy who made such an extreme claim, I find the strategy to be a poor one at best, and his claim of easy victory based on this dubious at best. What say you?
I doubt the UNSC can magically detect the bugs from orbit, afterall, the Spirit of Fire’s marines got ambushed by the flood in Halo Wars, and the flood as it later turned out had entire hives on the surface. So I’m guessing massive troop spam by the UNSC/Covenant should work, though I’m unaware of how many bugs a hive has. However, judging from the slow plasma fire in the movies, the UNSC ships should have no problem avoiding them and landing troops and vehicles. The book bugs on the other hand might be very problematic….
Can the plasma from the bugs be shot “down”? IIRC from the movies, when the troooers landed the dropships were shooting at the plasma, but i dont remember if they shot it out, if it can be shot, then the plasma bugs would be no threat to the ships in orbit either UNSC or covenant… And for locating the hives, the most logical step would be to sen ground troops, just like in the movies, locate them and then bomb them, with either mac rounds or archers…
“I doubt the UNSC can magically detect the bugs from orbit, afterall, the Spirit of Fire’s marines got ambushed by the flood in Halo Wars, and the flood as it later turned out had entire hives on the surface. So I’m guessing massive troop spam by the UNSC/Covenant should work, though I’m unaware of how many bugs a hive has. However, judging from the slow plasma fire in the movies, the UNSC ships should have no problem avoiding them and landing troops and vehicles. The book bugs on the other hand might be very problematic….”
-
I’ve never read the book, and I only recently began rewatching the show. The Plasma Bugs are more accurate with what they can see, really, and the carrier bugs do apparently sometimes carry Plasma Bugs to use as defense turrets while in space. They tend to use saturation fire for ships in orbit, although now that I think about it I am completely unfamiliar with the maneuverability of Halo ships. I don’t suppose you have any clips showing off their ships that I could take a look at?
-
“Can the plasma from the bugs be shot “down”? IIRC from the movies, when the troooers landed the dropships were shooting at the plasma, but i dont remember if they shot it out, if it can be shot, then the plasma bugs would be no threat to the ships in orbit either UNSC or covenant… ”
-
Yes, missiles are totally useless in Halo, right? So if you can shoot something down it will never be useful. I’m pretty much sick of you at this point, Kaiin, as you’re extremely quick to assume everything will always go perfectly for whatever Halo forces are in whatever match you participate in, that they will never mess up, that nothing will ever malfunction, and if it is with in the realm of possibility to maybe intercept or avoid an attack then they always 100% will, always 100% of the time. You assume the most immediate path to enemy destruction, because you assume intel will never fail, that no fight will ever be lost, and that any weakness in the enemy is going to be completely exploited with ease to the point that the enemy never has a chance. It’s time for you to shut up, pal, because people like you are why there are people who hate Halo. You are the bronies of the gaming world. Now be quiet and let fans who don’t make other people want to take a power tool to their own head participate in this discussion. Watch and learn a little something.
@Sauro
“I don’t suppose you have any clips showing off their ships that I could take a look at?”
-
There are a few..
-
Here we see a UNSC Frigate take a “sharp” turn to follow a Covenant Assault Carrier, though its a little hard to tell.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=-btn5gbB1FI&feature=player_detailpage#t=163s
-
Here we have a Halcyon class light cruiser going through a star wars esque asteroid field.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=deTZyC3OmUA&feature=player_detailpage#t=16s
-
And the last scene off the top of my head is the bulky and cumbersome 2.5 km long Spirit of Fire carrier.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=sT_jhaMoeqM
-
I’ll try to find more, but I can tell you now, the Halo ships in the cutscenes really don’t match the ones in the books. Damn 2001 Space Odyssey influence!
“With Brain Bugs stealing intel, they’ll be more difficult to bring down than some lucky, well placed MAC round. I would also like to know where the figures on that slug came from.”
-
I believe UNSC uses Command Neural Interface for high ranking officers. Unless you’re referring to info even pawns would know.
Im not goning to start this shit with you,……. Anyways, for anyone else, I was asking because if the plasma bugs shoot can be shot, point defense turrets on both covenant or u UNSC ip ships would do quick work on aproaching plasma….
O and btw, i found this,
-
m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=XPFj4k-ETho
-
-
Near the end, the spirit of fire uses scans, from orbit to make a map of the structures the covenant is looking at, so they could use this to find bug hives
O and btw, i found this,
-
youtube.com/#/watch?v=XPFj4k-ETho
-
-
Near the end, the spirit of fire uses scans, from orbit to make a map of the structures the covenant is looking at, so they could use this to find bug hives
www.youtube.com/watch?v=aswzBHKs12Y
-
After watching this scene, I think the UNSC/Covenant are going to need a seriously huge amount of troop and vehicle spam…
-
Which reminds me, why don’t the starship trooper guys ever use grenades or other heavy weaponry, vehicles, etc more often? Some air support would have done wonders during the above scene, though it’s been forever since I’ve seen the movie so maybe there was a reason for it. *shrugs*
If someone was smart enough to permit the Halo forces to have the options of Orbital Bombardment, would this assist them in fighting it out with the Arachnid empire, let alone the Shonen Trinity?
@Cross
They can bombard from orbit, the question is, “will the bugs use their telepathic powers to mess with the UNSC/Covenant scanners like the flood did in Halo Wars? Are they even capable of doing this?”
@SgCombine
An equally valid question worth noting in discussion’s regards, as well.
Ok its been said the bugs could do serious dqmage to unsc ground vehicles, but can they damage say, a scarab?? I mean, ive only seen the movies as well, and i think one of the bugs that cou,d do some damage woukd be the tankers, but even then i dont know how much damage they would do….
“I’ll try to find more, but I can tell you now, the Halo ships in the cutscenes really don’t match the ones in the books. Damn 2001 Space Odyssey influence!”
-
It’d help if I had a sense of size of the smaller ones in the first two links. The carriers in Starship Troopers are 550 meters long.
-
“I believe UNSC uses Command Neural Interface for high ranking officers. Unless you’re referring to info even pawns would know.”
-
You’ll have to expand on that if you want to deliver your point.
-
“Im not goning to start this shit with you,…….”
-
You can start shit, just don’t be stereotypical. Halo has a bad reputation for a reason, and it’s through no fault of its own.
-
“Near the end, the spirit of fire uses scans, from orbit to make a map of the structures the covenant is looking at, so they could use this to find bug hives”
-
Surface scans aren’t exactly the same thing as penetrating the ground deeply.
-
“After watching this scene, I think the UNSC/Covenant are going to need a seriously huge amount of troop and vehicle spam…
-
Which reminds me, why don’t the starship trooper guys ever use grenades or other heavy weaponry, vehicles, etc more often? Some air support would have done wonders during the above scene, though it’s been forever since I’ve seen the movie so maybe there was a reason for it. *shrugs*”
-
In the first fight in the first movie, they think the bugs are unorganized idiots which will be easy to mow down. They meet considerably more resistance than they expected, running in to organized battle groups. Carpet bombing is used afterwards to kill bugs. Explosives are used to clear fairly deep in to cave entrances. Eventually trenches, force field fences, ect are employed. By the third movie they also develop planet destroying bombs and mechs to fight the bugs with. Land vehicles never receive any attention. In the show we see something which looks like it may be an IFV or fill a role similar to the Merkava Tank, but it’s sparsely shown, for reasons I stated above. Their most common vehicles are transport trucks for moving cargo, drop ships, and two forms of mech. Neither of which stand up to the bugs as well as the movie version mech does.
-
“If someone was smart enough to permit the Halo forces to have the options of Orbital Bombardment, would this assist them in fighting it out with the Arachnid empire, let alone the Shonen Trinity?”
-
This is not “set amount of bugs vs set forces from halo”, Cross. This is if the Arachnids were trying to form, hold, or expand an empire in the Halo Galaxy, essentially. The Halo factions will have all of their usual equipment, forces, ect at their disposal, although they will also be dealing with each other as well. It’s not starship troopers vs halo either, so do not mistakingly make that assumption.
-
“They can bombard from orbit, the question is, “will the bugs use their telepathic powers to mess with the UNSC/Covenant scanners like the flood did in Halo Wars? Are they even capable of doing this?””
-
I think only the God Bug can get in to peoples’ minds at range, but I don’t recall exactly.
-
“Ok its been said the bugs could do serious dqmage to unsc ground vehicles, but can they damage say, a scarab?? I mean, ive only seen the movies as well, and i think one of the bugs that cou,d do some damage woukd be the tankers, but even then i dont know how much damage they would do….
”
-
I would imagine that it would get swarmed and the crew attacked, as opposed to a big bug being sent to attack it.
” It’d help if I had a sense of size of the smaller ones in the first two links. The carriers in Starship Troopers are 550 meters long”
-
Unsc frigates are 478 – 535 meters long, depending on the class, not much smaller than the carriers in SST, but seem to be much more manuverable,
-
” Surface scans aren’t exactly the same thing as penetrating the ground deeply”
-
IIRC from the movies, the bug hives were not so deep, at least not all of it( an escape pod puncher trough the celing of one, without much effort)
” I would imagine that it would get swarmed and the crew attacked, as opposed to a big bug being sent to attack it”
-
Ummm yeah, assuming they could get on it…..
“It’d help if I had a sense of size of the smaller ones in the first two links. The carriers in Starship Troopers are 550 meters long.”
-
UNSC Frigates are generally just a little big shorter than the SST carriers, the UNSC cruiser in the second link however is over a kilometer in length (the Covenant CCS class cruiser that followed it is about 1.7 km long).
“big”
-
Damn just caught that, I meant a little bit, not big xD.
I surmise that UNSC frigates appear to be as agile as a SST carrier, however, the SST carriers require skilled hands to do such maneuvers. The Frigates, however, are far superior at acceleration. There’s also no instance of them being used in atmosphere to my knowledge. Strafing runs to deploy troops would be their best option to avoid plasma bombardment. Bug response would likely be to increase levels of saturation fire, which would mean increasing bug presence over all, making it more difficult for a beachhead to be established by the UNSC forces once the fighting begins. The fighting is going to be particularly gruesome and nasty on both sides.
-
“Ummm yeah, assuming they could get on it…..”
-
There would be literally hundreds of them zerg rushing it in an attempt to crawl up it.
-
“IIRC from the movies, the bug hives were not so deep, at least not all of it( an escape pod puncher trough the celing of one, without much effort)”
-
Bugs use transport tunnels just under the surface to get everywhere. These extend deeper like ant hives for protection and because it’s hard to shove three thousand bugs for a “light skirmish raid” through just one tunnel.
“There would be literally hundreds of them zerg rushing it in an attempt to crawl up it.”
-
www.halopedia.org/images/4/4d/69504874-Full.jpg
They would have to make a pile of bodies at least 10-15 meters high to get on it, or do what Master Chief does, destroy the joints on the front two legs somehow(maybe by using those plasma shooting bugs from the third movie to do that)
-
As for the UNSC, perhaps its best if they stuck to mobile bases like the Mammoth
www.halopedia.org/images/9/92/H4-E3-Campaign-8.jpg
instead of try to establish the large bases they usually deploy in Halo Wars. Even with all the automated turrets and stuff, I can still see it getting overrun by the bugs zerg tactics, at least the Mammoth can retreat. The Covenant on the other hand should be pretty safe since their bases have massive energy shields protecting them (although Covenant doctrine is usually charge headlong into any opposition).