Since both days start with a "T", my little pea brain got confused and did our RPG installment on Tuesday instead of Thursday, which means now we're doing our Poll Position today (Thursday) instead of its regularly scheduled Tuesday. Alliteration is hard, people.
Luckily we have a titanic cross-cultural Versus for your Thanksgiving (another "T", run!) consideration:
{democracy:209}
How shall we decide? Here are a few of my thoughts:
- On its most basic level, this is a fight between a cube and a sphere. Cubes have eight pointy, dangerous corners that would jab right into you if you bumped into it, but a sphere can really bash your brains in if it hits you in the head. You can stack a cube but you can roll a ball. Rolling is more fun, therefore, advantage Empire.
- Both of these vessels have exposed pipes and rigging, which is very untidy. So on the Martha Stewart presentation scale, both are the same. Let's get some smooth edges here, what are we, barbarians?! Draw.
- The Borg consists of countless, virtually identical mindless cyborgs who are directed via a dispersed network of energy called "The Collective". The Empire consists of countless, literally identical clones who are directed via a dispersed network of energy called "The Force". Draw.
- The Borg Tactical Cube is directed by a black-clad half-human half-machine woman. The Empire's Death Star is directed by a black-clad half-human half-machine man. Neither can act. Draw.
- The Borg are relentless, merciless killers who trashed the entire Federation and countless other civilizations across the galaxy. The Empire got beaten by teddy bears and their Death Star exploded by a single small ship. Twice. Advantage: Borg.
- Individual Borg soldiers often hit what they aim at. The only thing any Empire soldier ever hit was Alderaan, literally the size of a planet, and they needed the Death Star to do it. Advantage: Borg.
- The Borg gave us Hugh, the huggable cyborg, who had feelings and emotions after snuggling with the Enterprise. The Empire gave us Darth Vader, who was an emo angsty tween before he became the baddest man in the whole downtown before converting back into a pasty-faced Emperor-killing emo father. Advantage: Empire -- no one hugs Darth Vader even after he kills the Emperor.
So it's pretty even. I'll have to throw it to the audience for more input and evaluation -- what say you, HeroMachine nation?
I love how so far, 100% of votes go to the Death Star.
I gave it to the Borg cube, because Death Stars are fragile. But then again, they’re each only fragile in one specific spot, and no cube is small enough to reach that spot, so I should have voted Death Star.
In true nerd fashion, I’m going to argue with your assessment of the acting, though. The prequel Skywalker guy can’t act, but by the time there are Death Stars, it’s all Vader. And if you think James Earl Jones can’t act, I’m not sure we can ever be friends.
I’ll Go with the Borg Cube because after just a couple shots it will have the frequency of the Death Stars Deflector shields and will be able to fire right through them as well as transport troopers right inside to begin assimilation!! Resistance is Futile!!!!!
The Death Star will just blow up the Borgs. Done. Fight over.
The big advantage of the Borg is adapting to new weapons, but the Death Star’s super laser is a one shot kill, which ROTJ shows us can target ships just fine. Death Star shoots the Borg, who then blow up real good, and aren’t around to adapt. Repeat as needed. Death Star wins.
Yeah, as people have said above, Death Star will win. This is not a battle between the Borg and the Empire (in which the Borg would dominate), it’s just a one-shot battle between two vessels.
And happy Turkey Day everyone that celebrates it!
Actually, initially, it all depends on which side of the Death Star the Borg Cube warps in facing and how ready the Death Star is to fire. We all know the warm-up sequence of that big bad planet-destroying laser is slow. So if the Cube warps in behind the laser, the Borg win. If it warps in in front of the laser, there’s still the warm-up to consider, so it’s 50/50. If the Death Star manages to shoot before being “infected” with the Borg, they win. If not the Borg win. So, in the end, in the majority of the times you run this scenario, the Borg win. The Death Star might manage to win the first encounter, but we all know what happens when the Borg loose a ship. They send more. A whole LOT more. And then, they gain a super-bad-ass-planet-busting Borg sphere to replace that wimpy sphere they had before.
PLUS, I bet the Borg will make that thing warp-capable, able to have it’s own shields independent of planet-based powering stations and able to fire in seconds, not hours.
Borg win by a landslide.
You know, as much as I’m a Star Wars guy, I can’t even begin to refute Worf’s logic. I pretty much had it in mind that the Death Star, despite its awesome super-weapon, was at a disadvantage against the Borg, but Worf really explained how much so. So, yeah, Borg hands down.
Also, I’d just like to say: Borged-up Stormtroopers might end up being the scariest thing to ever to see. Unless they still haven’t learned how to aim after assimilation.
This is absolutely, positively, unequivocally NOT a contest. The Death Star kicks the shit out a Borg cube Every. Single. Day. Of. The. Week.
The Death Star can destroy a PLANET with a single shot. That’s all you need to know. The amount of energy that the Death Star would have to put out to do that is billions of times greater than anything a single Borg cube, or even a fleet of Borg cubes, can possibly match.
And don’t anybody try to claim the Borg would “adapt” after the first shot. We know there is an upper limit to the Borg’s magical “adaptation” ability. They were killed when Worf blew up the Enterprise E’s deflector dish in First Contact. If they couldn’t adapt to that, there’s no way they could adapt to the much greater energy of a Death Star Superlaser. Absolutely no chance.
The Death Star wins. Period. End of discussion.
“We all know the warm-up sequence of that big bad planet-destroying laser is slow.”
You don’t need a fast warm-up sequence when you can lock onto a target and shoot it from millions of miles away.
You’re also forgetting that the Death Star has its own hyperdrive. And hyperdrive is much faster than warp drive. In the Star Wars universe characters regularly make cross-galactic trips in a few hours, a few weeks/months at most. In the Star Trek universe it was repeatedly stated that Voyager would take YEARS to travel across just one quarter of their galaxy. Since the Borg never attempted a mass invasion of the Alpha Quadrant, it’s fair to say their warp drive is not much faster than Voyager’s was. So if the Borg warped behind the Death Star they would detect it and could jump away.
You also assume the Death Star wouldn’t be able to hold off a Borg cube long enough to bring its Superlaser to bear. I’ll remind you that the Death Star is designed to hold off capital ships, which is why the Rebellion had to send a small group of fighters to take it down the first time (the second time they made the mistake of bringing their capital ships because they thought it wasn’t operational, and they were nearly wiped out in the battle). There is no reason to assume the Death Star wouldn’t be able to hold off a Borg cube. Plenty of Delta Quadrant species have been holding off the Borg for years (perhaps centuries). Even the ones with technology vastly inferior to the Federation have often been able to avoid assimilation. And the Death Star is many times more advanced than anything the Federation has come up with. So logically it must be many times more capable of resisting a Borg attack.
That breakdown of who has the edge is pretty hilarious. Well written, Jeff.
doornik you are assuming way too much.You are assuming the death star could detect their ship. You are assuming that the borg would use their hyperdrive and not one of their conduits that can go from the delta to the alpha in a matter of minutes. The borg ships are ALOT more advanced than what the Federation has so it does not matter how long it would take the Voyager to do anything. You are also assuming that the DT’s laser could even penetrate the Borg’s shields. Those inferior civilizations that were “holding off the borg” usually do it by hiding. You are obviously a SW fanboy and are making up stuff. I prefer SW but The Borg would win hands down. Like Worf said. The DT has only one super weapon. It has to be facing the Borg. If it manages to get a shot off sure it might win. But by that time the Borg ship will have already scanned it and before it is destroyed sent out the info to the collective. Then the DT will be dealing with hundreds of cubes. And how exactly is the DT more advanced than anything the Federation has come up with? It can’t even generate its own shields. The Borg beam a large number of drone’s to the moon’s surface and blow the station generating the shield. Bye Bye Death Star.
Two words: Borg-Ewoks.
The Borg have two major edges over the Empire: Transporters and the Collective. One of the reasons the Bord have been so successful is the Collective gives them a tactical superiority in almost any conflict. Orders are literally at the speed of thought and simultaneous.
I see the battle going down like this: The Cube drops out of warp immediately behind the Death Star. A squad of Borg transports to the surface of Endor and takes over the shield generators. The Cube uses it’s superior maneuverability to stay out of the line of sight for the super-laser. While engaging the Death Star as a ship, the Borg send squads which begin to assimilate the crew and tech. DS becomes Borg Sphere with a great weapon.
Yes, the main gun could, in theory, destroy the cube. However, since it is manned by Storm Troopers who can’t hit anything, there is a really high chance they would miss. Several times. Tech against tech, The Death Star wins, no contest. Tactics versus tactics, Borg.
It really depends. Is Gary the Stormtrooper on board the Death Star?
“You are assuming the death star could detect their ship.”
If it can target a planet from half a solar system away, it can target a Borg ship at a similar distance. You have no reason to assume that it couldn’t. And even a fraction of that distance would be far outside the Borg’s ability to retaliate.
“You are assuming that the borg would use their hyperdrive and not one of their conduits that can go from the delta to the alpha in a matter of minutes.”
I’m assuming you’re referring to the transwarp hub. But here’s the problem. If the Borg could use that to travel quickly from the Delta Quadrant to the Alpha Quadrant, then why didn’t they? Obviously they didn’t use it because for whatever reason it wouldn’t work. And even setting aside the fact that the crew of Voyager destroyed the Borg’s transwarp network at the end of the series, the transwarp hubs were pre-existing structures. So it’s not like they could use them to sneak up behind the Death Star. What are they doing to do? Stick a transwarp hub next to the Death Star and hide it under a big sheet? Maybe put a sign on it that says “NOT a transwarp hub”?
While we’re on the subject, you appear to be giving the Borg an unfair advantage. In your scenario, the Borg cube has the element of surprise and is able to see the Death Star, and get behind it, before the Death Star even knows the Borg are there.
“The borg ships are ALOT more advanced than what the Federation has”
And yet the Federation, not to mention dozens of other even less technologically advanced species, have still been able to thwart the Borg constantly. So clearly either Borg technology is nowhere near as advanced as it seems, or they have some sort of huge glaring weakness that is easy to exploit.
“You are also assuming that the DT’s laser could even penetrate the Borg’s shields.”
The weapons of every Federation ship we saw in First Contact were able to penetrate a Borg cube’s shields. And every one of those weapons positively pales in comparison to the Death Star Superlaser. Which, again, can DESTROY PLANETS. Let me repeat that. It DESTROYS. PLANETS. This isn’t me just making stuff up. This is simple physics. The sheer amount of energy needed to even attempt such a thing is, quite literally, astronomical.
“Those inferior civilizations that were “holding off the borg” usually do it by hiding.”
Really? So were the Krenim “hiding” from the Borg? The Voth? Neither of them struck me as a civilization of Borg refugees.
“The DT has only one super weapon.”
You’re forgetting the thousands upon thousands of other weapons the Death Star has that would be quite capable of holding the Borg at bay while the Superlaser is brought to bear. You also seem to be assuming that the Borg would know enough about the Death Star to even consider sneaking up on it. They’ve never shown any capacity for stealth before, even when they knew their enemy. And they wouldn’t even be expecting the Death Star to let loose a weapon that can instantly blow up an entire planet. So why would they go to the trouble of appearing “behind” the Death Star even if they could?
“And how exactly is the DT more advanced than anything the Federation has come up with?”
Two words: DESTROYS. PLANETS. That’s how. To borrow from another website: “The absolute minimum energy requirement for destroying an Earth-like planet is roughly 5E16 megatons. This is 500 million times the K-T extinction asteroid impact (and hundreds of millions of times the firepower of an individual ISD or Shadow planet-killer). However, this does not even come close to the firepower of a Death Star. 5E16 megatons would just barely overcome gravity, and the planet would expand so slowly that it takes ten minutes to double in size. Obviously, the destruction of Alderaan exceeded this quantity by many orders of magnitude. In fact, an energy estimate derived from Alderaan’s rate of expansion leads to an estimate in the 1E22 megaton range (yes, that’s at least 100 trillion times the K-T extinction asteroid impact, or as much energy as our Sun has generated since the time of Moses).”
That level of destructive power is far beyond anything the Federation has ever produced.
More than that, the Death Star is far larger than anything the Federation has ever built. The ability to construct a space station the size of a small moon and not have it tear itself to shreds the instant its engines come to life automatically implies a massive technological advantage. Even the largest Federation space stations come nowhere close to matching the size of the Death Star.
Even without the Death Star as an example, the Empire (the entire SW universe really) is far more technologically advanced than the Trek universe. Both franchises have published technical journals which list the capabilities of their respective ships (engine speed, weapon energy output, etc.). In every case I’m aware of, the SW ships completely outstrip the specs of Trek ships in the same class. Hell, there are troop transports in the SW universe that are canonically stronger, tougher, and faster than the USS Enterprise. Bottom line: Purely in terms of technology, the SW universe is more advanced than the Trek universe in just about every way.
“It can’t even generate its own shields.”
Yes it can. Do your research. The Death Star had hundreds of shield projectors. In fact the whole reason the Rebels had to send a small compliment of fighters against the first Death Star was because only a ship that small could slip through the tiny gaps in the shields. We’ve never seen any evidence of Borg fighter craft, so they would have no chance of employing that strategy.
Also, in addition to hundreds of shield projectors the Death Star had thousands of turbolasers, ion cannons, and laser cannons. The first Death Star also contained a complement of seven to nine thousand TIE fighters, along with tens of thousands of support craft, bombers, and gunships. Star Destroyers could dock inside it.
A Borg cube is a capital ship. Exactly the kind of ship the Death Star’s defenses were designed to counter. Barring an extreme stroke of luck bordering on divine intervention in favor of the Borg cube, the Death Star is the clear winner.
“The Borg have two major edges over the Empire: Transporters and the Collective.”
Borg transporters can’t get through shields. Why do you think the Borg order people to “lower your shields and surrender your ships”?
And that “tactical superiority” of the Borg collective sure didn’t stop the crew of a single Federation starship from kicking the Borg’s ass up and down the Delta Quadrant.
ATTENTION HERO MACHINERS: ….
Death Star.
THAT IS ALL….
After reading this discussion I realize I am but a nerd yellow belt but I’ll give my two cents anyway. Yeah, it’s safe to assume the Death Star’s planet-killer weapon could destroy a Borg cube. But the key phrase here is “planet-killer” as in big, stationary object designed to hit an even bigger stationary object (yeah, I know, the Death Star is essentially a giant floating weapons platform but its not like you can just swivel the thing around). Somebody already pointed out how the planet-killer weapon needs to be powered up. It’s probably safe to assume the Borg have the technology to determine when the planet-killer is being brought online (if nothing else they could just look out the window) giving them enough time to perform a risky yet daring tactical maneuver like say turning left. The Death Star’s conventional weapons probably wouldn’t be of much use against the Borg cube, nor would the TIE fighters though it would be fun to watch them smash into the cube’s force field like flies against a windshield. Once the Borg determine the nature and location of the Death Star’s shields’ off-site power source (I assume somebody got fired for that bright idea) they could send a bunch of drones to destroy it or simply blow it up from space. Once the Death Star’s shields are gone, Borg drones would beam onto the Death Star and kill or assimilate everyone aboard. But that leads to an even more interesting question as in what happens when an army of Borg drones encounter evil, pre-backstory Darth Vader? Better yet, what would happen if Darth Vader somehow managed to get aboard the Borg cube? Will someone please write that movie?
@Doornik1142(14 & 15): That was epic! A tip of the gas mask for that awesome smackdown! Death Star would evaporate a Borg cube.
P.S. – I would like to see a Borg Ewok.
P.P.S. – I think Darth Vader would allow himself to be seduced by the Borg Queen and the two would team up, leading to the eventual creation of Borg Troopers and the Borg Death Sphere someone already mentioned.
P.P.P.S. – It took the Federation flagship to destroy a Borg cube but a one-man fighter piloted by a whiny hydro-farmer with no military experience to destroy the original Death Star.
Advantage:Borg. Yes, the Death Star has a really big gun…
On the other hand, the Borg ships can repair themselves from any state short of total destruction, and their shields are a LOT tougher than anything in the Star Wars Universe. Meanwhile, the Borg cube is no slouch at putting out enormous quantities of firepower!
And, hey, after the first encounter, the Borg cube is going to have a Superlaser, too! 😀
To reiterate my point, in a straight space battle, the Borg cube is BADLY outgunned. What Doornik keeps saying is absolutely true. The original Death Star had fully internal deflector shield projection, and the only reason the second Death Star needed to get deflector shield protection from the Endor moon was because it wasn’t finished, and therefore couldn’t mount deflector shield projectors across its entire surface. The thing was brimming with millions of anti-ship weapon emplacements. But he’s still wrong.
The Borg aren’t going to worry about whether their Cube gets destroyed. Their goal will be to transport Borg onto the Death Star before their ship is rendered into space particles. Because once the Borg put a small, but significant force on the Death Star (and adjust their shields to handle blaster technology), then the Death Star has lost this fight, even if they vaporize the Cube. With no defense against an invading force that is assimilating everything that they come across, the Death Star crew would probably fall to their Borg invaders in a month. Hence, Borg win, hands down.
The first encounter would be a clear victory for the Empire. The second one might be tougher… as the borg would try to adapt. By the third or fourth wave of drones, the pouty little clones would get assimilated… THEN WE ARE TALKING SOMETHING COOL… 🙂
ya, deathstart kills planets with a single shot. Borg go boom now.
Not a whole lot to add that Worf didn’t say already. A Borg Cube would not be able to survive the encounter with a Death Star, however if even a few Borg manage to get onboard, they will eventually overrun the ship. The question then becomes is it likely the Borg would be able to board?
When we first saw the Borg encounter an unknown species, they sent scouts to determine if there was anything worth consuming. At this point we would have to make an assumption, that being whether shield technology from Star Wars would block Borg attempts to transport as most shields from ST do. As Doornik informed us, the Deathstar has gaps in its shields large enough for small vessels to fly through, which would render them effectively useless against transporters. They also seem to as a matter of course beam large numbers of drones over to vessels when they determine a ship is lost. As such, I see the a first encounter going like this.
The Borg Collective detects an energy source of unknown origin and unknown technology a diverts a cube to investigate. The Borg drops out of transwarp near the Death Star. Not recognizing the vessel, the Death Star raises shields and arms weapons and attempts to ascertain the origin of the vessel, either by contacting it and ordering surrender, engaging a tractor beam to drag the much smaller ship in, and/or a series of deep scans.
In the mean time, the Borg have beamed a a single drone onto the ship which interfaces with the nearest computer. The Empire discovers this almost immediately and kill it, going to report the incident to the bridge. By the time the bridge is able to react however, a second drone has replaced the first at the computer, blaster fire is ineffective. The Drone’s interference with the computer causes power fluctuations in the area.
The bridge, recognizing the threat, immediately begin firing on the Cube, which does not have the defenses to withstand the attack. As large amounts of the cube deteriorate under intense turbolaser fire, realizing the Cube is lost the Borg beam dozens to hundreds of drones onto the Death Star in isolated locations before the Cube is destroyed.
Environmental conditions begin to change in random areas of the Death Star, maintenance crews sent to investigate and make repairs do not report back, having been assimilated. In the mean time, the Borg gain access to essential systems and begin to systematically take control of the Death Star. Assault teams sent to retake the effected sections are ineffective at best or assimilated at worst. After a short period of time, the Borg build multiple new transporters and begin sending excursions into other areas of the Death Star. As the Borg begin striking areas unprepared for attack and previously isolated from the infection, their numbers rapidly grow and soon the Death Star is overrun by drones. Attempts to evacuate or to disable/destroy the Death Star fail as the Borg have already taken control of these systems.
The Empire reports the Death Star missing with all hands, a few years before a much larger Borg invasion…
To answer a few points from earlier, why didn’t the Borg use transwarp conduits to reach the Alpha quadrant before? They did. They made a number of Romulan and Federation colonies along the Neutral Zone disappear before the Borg were encountered by Enterprise-D. They further did this without being detected by any Federation or Romulan ships in the area, indicating they do in fact have some stealth capacity per “TNG:The Neutral Zone”. Also, the transwarp conduit has zero presence in normal space, recall in “VOY:Endgame” their was a conduit that let Voyager out right next to Earth that the Federation could do nothing about and knew nothing about until it was opening. Further, the Borg were indicated to have multiple Transwarp Hubs, five more after Voyager destroyed the one in “VOY:Endgame”. Further, Doornik, could you explain how being able to target a planet from great distance, a planet being an extremely large object moving on a set path, would imply they could target a much, much, much smaller ship, presumably with some kind of electronic warfare capabilities, plus the capacity to maneuver and evade? The Krenim were never indicated to have ever engaged the Borg in a serious capacity, and, frankly, the Voth were in hiding, existing only on phase cloaked city ships.
The destructive levels of Federation technology are not to be underestimated. The Soliton Wave generator, (TNG:New Ground) was as powerful if not more so, capable of destroying most of a planet but also gaining speed and power the further it travels before reaching the target. Further, the Xindi, a technologically inferior race to the Federation were capable of building a one shot planet killer (Half of ST:ENT), the Federation was capable of generating a black hole on demand (Star Trek(2009)), or the Genesis Device which could reduce a planet to subatomic components (ST:II). Further, Borg Cubes and even Federation shields were shown to be able to withstand multiple hits from the weapons of Species 8472, which were also capable of busting apart planets “VOY:Scorpion”.
Further, the high end figures from the technical manuals from SW are countermanded by on screen evidence, which is higher canon. In the ship to ship combat we see in ROTS, multiple weapons seen detonating inside the ship from fire were shown to be little more powerful than small conventional bombs that exist today. A weapon even a millionth the power of what is claimed by said technical manual would have turned the entire air supply of the ship into one big fireball and killed everyone in it, instead of merely throwing a clone trooper across the room. Further, unless such a weak weapon were effective in battle, there would be no point in firing it, indicating other ship to ship weapons aren’t going to be orders of magnitude stronger.
Star Trek has also demonstrated extremely sophisticated construction capabilities, such as when Voyager survived for a long period of time within the event horizon of a singularity (Voy:Parallax) and a Romulan mining vessel withstood having a black hole inside it for a not insubstantial period of time (Star Trek (2009)). While being able to build something moon sized is certainly impressive, structurally it still does not compare to that.
@Abraxas(24): Good thing you didn’t have a whole lot to add. 😉 😛
The Cymeks fron “Dune: Butlerian Jihad” would kick both their asses. but if would’ve been Empire vs Borg rather than cube vs sphere I would believe the empire could win. single battle? Borg.
We are the borg.
The borg had Assimilate tech beyond the Death Star.
If smashing does not help something else from the borg database
You will be assimilate.Resistanse is futile
Borg cube, because, well, it’s not *a* Borg cube, it’s BAZILLIONS of them, and they’re all connected. You get rid of one cube, there’s a dozen more right there.
Introduce anything to even slightly disrupt the Borg’s hive mind and they become virtually useless. The Death Star’s super laser is designed to destroy planets, and as demonstrated in RotJ it can target much smaller objects (anyone remember the Rebel cruiser). The Empire trumps the Borg every time.
Oh and Imperial soldiers not being able to hit anything? Ok, so I guess all the Rebel soldiers killed by stormies actually died from crossing their eyes.
Resistance, as they say, is futile.
(That FYOO-tile. Not fYOU-tuhl. There is a difference.)
My, my, my, this discussion poll position really set off a discussion.^^
Seriously, it’s great to read all the passionate arguments. And I have to admit, my first thought was that the Borg Tactical Cube would win, no doubt. Yet, after reading many threads from Pro-Death-Star-Faction, I’m not so sure anymore. I agree, that the Death Star’s planetdestroying weapon system could easily evaporate an entire Borg Fleet. Given that were a talking about a space station the size of all small moon, filled with Stormtroopers and Tie-Fighters, the Death Star should be an unstopable dreadnought. At least in theory. However, Luke, Leia, Han and the other rebells have proven in two movies that quantity doesn’t equal quality. Remember, both death stars were destroyed by spaceships that were smaller and (asumingly) technically less advanced than any Borg Tactical Cube.
So I stand by my opinion: The Borg would win against the Death Star. The Borg’s Tactical Cubes are more manuverable than the space station, and they have the advange of transporter technology.
Also, please remember, we are talking about the borg here. Be honest. When you watched the star wars movies, were you ever frightened of the Stormtroppers?. Sure, Darth Vader is menacing, but I was never scared of the Foottroops. When I watched Star Trek 8: First Contact, which was also the first time that I saw the Borgs (I wasn’t such a great fan of “Star Trek: The next Generation” back then), I thought they were terryfing. After all, beneath their uniforms and helmets, the Stormtroppers are still human. Clones, maybe, but still human. The Borg are…not! They are the SciFi aequivalent to zombies. And I’m not talking about Zombies from Voodoo-Folklore, I’m talking about Zombies from “Night of the Living Dead”, “The Walking Dead” etc. The Borg show no fear, no mercy, no confusion. They are harder to kill than you’re average Stormtropper. And they assimilate their foes.
By the way, this discussion has given me the idea to a new Star Wars Comic that one should tell Dark Horse Comics about. Star Wars Universe vs. The Borg. I think the story should play between “Star Wars: A new Hope” and “The Empire strikes back”. The plot is simple: the Borg invade the Star Wars Universe and both the Empire and the Rebells are forced to join forces for a while in order to defeat the common enemy. Wouldn’t be cool to see Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader fighting side by side with their lightsabers and Jedi/Sith powers against dozens of borgs?
@Jeff: How about an idea for the next poll position. The Borg vs. The Justice League. Or the Borg vs. The Avengers. Or has that contest already taken place?
We are the Borg.
We will add your technological and biological distinctiveness to our own.
Resistance is futile.
You will be assimilated.
Some fascinating arguments, but I side with the Borg faction. I have only one thing to add to Worf’s and Abraxas’ summaries.
I am sorry, but the fact that neither the Federation nor the Borg have been shown to use planet-destroying weapons does not mean that they are incapable of building them. The Federations has ethical prejudices against such a weapon, and for the Borg it wold be pointless – they are not interested in destroying anything, they exist to improve themselves by assimilating the technology and biology of other races. Destroying planets would have no tactical value for them within the context of their goals.
And I can’t help but wonder how long it would take the scattered pieces of the Borg cube (after the superlaser blew it up) to either reassemble and generate a new cube, or find other ships and grow into multiple cubes…
If any Borg miracously make it onto the Death Star resistance is a DEMP gun. For the Borg it then becomes futile to resist as they start going down faster than their poor remaining hive mind can count.
I think it safe to assume Borg electronics are well shielded, otherwise ST:FC would have ended a lot more quickly after Picard set off a large EMP on the Enterprise about 15 seconds after he realized there were Borg present. The fact the Federation does not use such a basic technique to combat Borg infestations is pretty good evidence such a technique doesn’t work. Compound that with the fact we have the technology now to shield electronics from an EMP, let alone the Borg who can be safely assumed in the Star Trek timeline to be at least five hundred years more advanced (the Federation as we see them being almost 400 years), and it isn’t hard to see why an EMP is not a winning argument, or a winning strategy.
If you think about it, with all his cybornetic parts, Darth Vadar has already been assimilated into the Borg….huh…huh
I’m not sure you can take the fact the Federation didn’t do something to mean it wouldn’t work, Abraxas. How many ways to improve engines, cure diseases, travel in time, etc, etc, have individual crews discovered, only to forget next week? Besides, setting off an EMP would probably mean losing their gravity, and Federation ships never turn off the gravity.
Yes, on a number of occasions they have forgotten a new or esoteric bit of technobabble discovered in a previous episode where it would have come in handy. However, how often have they forgotten about the absolute most basic and elementary functions of of technology ad physics? EM pulses aren’t hard to make or particularly unique, we see on more than one occasion in ST Starfleet generating them as a matter of routine for the express purpose of disabling electronics such as VOY:Warhead and VOY:Warlord.
Is it reasonable to assume, from an in universe perspective, that Starfleet in designing countless weapons systems and even entire classes of vessel to combat the Borg, that not one engineer thought of using an EMP against the Borg? Further, your explanation for why they wouldn’t use one doesn’t mesh with what we see in ST. Sovereign Class and Intrepid Class ships use bioneural circuitry, not electronics. Galaxy Class use Isolinear circuitry. The way an EMP works is to alter the magnetic field to produce a current through conductive materials, which creates electrical arcing, bridging, and surges which can damage components. While this can be catastrophic for electronics, other methods of “wiring”, such as nerves or fiber optics don’t suffer from this problem.
What we actually see in Star Trek, however, is repeated exposure to EMPs without seeing much, if anything, in the way of damage from them. Antimatter annihilation, the preferred payload in photon torpedoes, produces enormous amounts of gamma rays, which in turn react with surrounding atoms by stripping electrons from them. This in turn creates the differentials in the conductive material which causes the current which results in the damage from an EMP. At no point that I recall do we see this EMP, which would be quite intense, have any appreciable impact on ship operations, e.g. lose gravity.
I again go back to the fact we have methods now for shielding electronics from EMPs. What are the odds the Borg either don’t have or neglected to use this technology and the entire rest of the galaxy has completely failed to notice, up to and including people like Picard who know literally almost everything about them and have devoted considerable time and energy coming up with ways to kill them? I’m sorry, an EMP vulnerability simply does not make sense for the Borg based on on screen evidence.
If the Borg know how to shield themselves against a modulating frequency phaser, it would seem to me that an EMP would be child’s play to shield themselves against. Furthermore, some of the circuitry visible in ST:FC during the scene where the Borg are putting cybernetic prosthesis onto the newly assimilated crewmen look more like fiber optic than electronic wiring, which as Abraxas has pointed out, is inherently EMP-resistant. Using a DEMP gun seems like a worthless strategy.
DEMP. Destructive ElectroMagnetic Pulse. It doesn’t just fire an EMP pulse, the charge is also designed to deal damage.
I was joking about the losing gravity thing, Abraxas. My brother first pointed it out to me: Federation ships that don’t have enough power will divert life support into whatever system they need, but will never turn off the artificial gravity. They’d clearly rather die than float. And it was on my mind when I posted. *shrug*
I don’t think it’s possible to consider any battle with a Borg cube a battle with just ONE Borg cube. The cubes are all basically just cells in the greater organism of the Collective. The whole point of the Borg is that they don’t exist individually. So you’ve got to take the Collective into consideration, and once you do that, it’s Borg hands-down. Even if the Deathstar took out a cube, all that would do would be to draw the Collective’s attention to the Empire’s yummy new technology.
@SutterKain (20): Who WOULDN’T allow themselves to be seduced by the Borg Queen?
I think it would be much fairer fight between Borg and Collector Cruiser from Mass Effect 2. But victory in this fight I attach to Borg because of it’s advanced technology.
Let me just explain that I am a Star Wars person. Voyager was good but starwars will always be my favourite of the two. That said, i reckon the borg would totally annihilate the death star.
Being assimilated is, in my opinion, worse than being vaporized on your own planet.
@haz(43): Um, are you being ironic? Look, even if I saw the Borg queen in a bar really drunk and winking at me and calling me over with saucy tosses of her hairless, white and veiny detachable head, I don’t think I’d go. No way I wanna wake up next to that. I don’t care how nice her assimilation is.
@Abraxas(25): Ok you make a few good points, but you missed one important step in the whole story: The Empire realises that the Borg are onboard the ship, and send their troops en masse to take out the Borg. No matter how good they are, a single Borg Cube, carries thousands of Borg at most. The first Death Star carried 600 000 troops, and the second had over 1.5 million troops. It doesn’t matter how inaccurate the troopers are, if they have enough in the group. And the Borg don’t seem to be much for dodging or taking cover, do they?