Faults of The Sisko

[Griffin]

Purely personal choice, I always liked the ship hugging shields rather then the bubble shields. Bit more naval and less Sci Fi.

I prefered the bubble shields, but for that reason.

[Atekimogus]

Not really. All TOS ships had conformal shields under all conditions - we never saw them until TNG came along. Once we got to TNG/DS9, we usually saw bubble shields, with the exception of the fleet battles and the E-E in Nemesis. I propose that bubble shields were initially introduced as a technological improvement - the idea being that since there's always a degree of bleed-through (ships suffering damage before shield failure), to hold the shields as far away from the hull as possible, to minimise the effect, at the cost of being a bigger target and requiring more power to sustain a greater shield surface area. Once the war came along, with tight-packed fleet formations, they had to pull the shields in closer to avoid getting in each others way. The E-E can probably best be explained as post-battle analysis demonstrating that conformal shields were actually superior to bubble shields (perhaps due to technological improvements during the war), hence the switch back.

Makes sense in an IU sort of thinking, altough I do want to add that in early TNG the shields of the E-D could go from 100% to zero without you noticing that a battle was going on - apart from a slight shaking of the camera - whereas in DS9 times when the Defiant got hit, with shields still 89% there, all the C4 in the consules would explode, smoke on the bridge, power outages etc. etc.....

So imho, it is a rather delicate balance between stronger shields vs. risk loosing vital system to bleed through damage.


Out of universe I remeber reading on drexlers blog (iirc) that they didn't include shieldbubbles in fleetbattles simply because it would have been unpractical and to expensive to create them for every impact whereas for smaller engagements (like Defiant vs Lakota) they were inbudget and so got used.


(Personally I prever the bubble shields, I remember the fight in Yesterdays Enterprise with the E-D shooting through shields or the Battle Defiant vs Lakota and they just look much much cooler with visible shields.)

[Jim]

While the bubble shields would use more power due to the surface area, it seems rather easy to emit a shield of that shape. Wouldn't it be rather difficult to emit a shield that would follow the surface of a ship, with all the bends and corners and straight parts? It seems that while it might not take as much energy to have on, it would take a lot more computing power (or such) to maintain.

[Mikey]

Out of universe I remeber reading on drexlers blog (iirc) that they didn't include shieldbubbles in fleetbattles simply because it would have been unpractical and to expensive to create them for every impact whereas for smaller engagements (like Defiant vs Lakota) they were inbudget and so got used.

I don't see how that's a determinant - in TWoK, for example, there were no shield FX either way - we only know that conformal shields were used because of the bridge monitor showing the shields going up conforming to the perimeter of the ship. That could have as easily shown an ovoid around the ship with no difference in technique or cost.

[Atekimogus]

Out of universe I remeber reading on drexlers blog (iirc) that they didn't include shieldbubbles in fleetbattles simply because it would have been unpractical and to expensive to create them for every impact whereas for smaller engagements (like Defiant vs Lakota) they were inbudget and so got used.

I don't see how that's a determinant - in TWoK, for example, there were no shield FX either way - we only know that conformal shields were used because of the bridge monitor showing the shields going up conforming to the perimeter of the ship. That could have as easily shown an ovoid around the ship with no difference in technique or cost.

Well, I am not sure what you are implying since at the time of TWoK bubble shields where not invented yet (FX wise). In TNG onward they had them and under certain circumstances - like huge fleet actions - they were impractical to make (budget, CGI-wise whatever) so they left them out.

(Ironically, the way shields behave in TWoK they are more like the technobabble thingy from Enterprise (polarised armor, was it?)), so maybe "actual" forcefields as shields were just a later invention.)

No matter, imho the way shields are portraid in Trek is FAR to random to make much inuniverse sense of it.

While the bubble shields would use more power due to the surface area, it seems rather easy to emit a shield of that shape. Wouldn't it be rather difficult to emit a shield that would follow the surface of a ship, with all the bends and corners and straight parts? It seems that while it might not take as much energy to have on, it would take a lot more computing power (or such) to maintain.

Good point actually. When we see it it is always a perfect bubble, if it would be easy to follow the form of the ship one would expect the shield-bubble to roughly follow the lines of the ship even when they expand the shields, so maybe there is an added benefit projecting the shield in bubble form (better energy dispersion, stronger shields because of technoblabla....)

[Jim]

Good point actually. When we see it it is always a perfect bubble, if it would be easy to follow the form of the ship one would expect the shield-bubble to roughly follow the lines of the ship even when they expand the shields, so maybe there is an added benefit projecting the shield in bubble form (better energy dispersion, stronger shields because of technoblabla....)

In actual terms, the egg is super strong becaue of its shape. Fields like magnetic fields tend to arc in some sort of bubble shape. bubbles are round, naturally, becasue it is the best distribution of the forces involved.

Plus, arent warp fields generally bubble shaped... if it was 'better" to have fields matching the shape of the ship wouldn't the warp field outline the ship?

[Mikey]

Well, I am not sure what you are implying since at the time of TWoK bubble shields where not invented yet (FX wise). In TNG onward they had them and under certain circumstances - like huge fleet actions - they were impractical to make (budget, CGI-wise whatever) so they left them out.

I'm not implying anything. I am stating that it is not only possible, but precedented, that FX limitations have absolutely no bearing on canonical representations of the type of shields being used.

[Atekimogus]

I'm not implying anything. I am stating that it is not only possible, but precedented, that FX limitations have absolutely no bearing on canonical representations of the type of shields being used.

Then we have to agree to disagree (or maybe it is just a misunderstanding) since as I mentioned, the canonical representation of shields was thrown out of the window as soon as the assigned budget for an episode run out.

The way I see it, from TOS, TMP, TWoK, TSfS to TNG they had shields, but no idea how they are supposed to work or look like (Hell, I have read "offical" ToS novels from a time before TNG when "shields" were actual PYHSICAL objects, more like spaced armor). They functioned pretty much like polarised armor-plating from Enterprise.

Then came TNG, from that time onward shields had the bubble form, a FX effect representing a force field HOWEVER this neat FX effect was not used when it was deemed impractical (for whatever reason, be it rendering time, budget etc.) hence we have instances where there are bubbles (Defiant vs. Lakota) and instances where there are none, like in the huge DS9 fleet battles.

And that is all to it imho. Feel free to invent any fitting iu explanation for yourself, OOU they just ran out of juice doing bubbles for 100+ ships and thats it. If you have time just search on doug drexlers blog, there is a neat article about it somewhere.

In actual terms, the egg is super strong becaue of its shape. Fields like magnetic fields tend to arc in some sort of bubble shape. bubbles are round, naturally, becasue it is the best distribution of the forces involved.

Plus, arent warp fields generally bubble shaped... if it was 'better" to have fields matching the shape of the ship wouldn't the warp field outline the ship?

Exactly, that is why I am agreeing with you. It must be quite the effort to produce hull-conformal shields and since we haven't really seen any justifiable reason for doing so (I guess the difference between the surface are of the Defiant and a bubble enclosing the Defiant isn't all that big) I am wondering (from an in universe perspective) why they do it sometimes.

[Jim]

I am honestly not that up with power distribution within ships systems... but...

As you mention, the difference between the Defiant's shape and a bubble could be quite small. ... now, during a battle you would want to preserve as much power as possible... Is it possible that during battle they simply pull the bubble shields back as small as possible as to conserve on overall power drain and to make the ship (including shields) as small of a target as possible? This would keep more power in the banks for propulsion and for weapons, while making most of the shot taken at the ship miss due to its small size. (like trying to hit the very center dot on a dartboard bullseye (2x) as opposed to the entire bullseye (1x)) if the ship has extensive redundant backups, losing the first few system circuits would not really matter as much (due to bleed-through)

[Mikey]

Then we have to agree to disagree (or maybe it is just a misunderstanding) since as I mentioned, the canonical representation of shields was thrown out of the window as soon as the assigned budget for an episode run out.

You must be misunderstanding me. This isn't a matter of opinion - TWoK shows explicitly that shields can be confirmed canonically with absolutely no external FX of said shields. Your point is correct IF you limit it to saying that "external representations of bubble shields are limited by FX constraints." What you say above is incorrect, because there is canonical evidence of shields being represented without any external visual FX.

[Atekimogus]

You must be misunderstanding me. This isn't a matter of opinion - TWoK shows explicitly that shields can be confirmed canonically with absolutely no external FX of said shields. Your point is correct IF you limit it to saying that "external representations of bubble shields are limited by FX constraints." What you say above is incorrect, because there is canonical evidence of shields being represented without any external visual FX.

Ah, I guess I know now what the misunderstanding was, you think I questioned the existance of hull-conformal shields with no FX, but this is not the case (which would be quite foolish, since there are plenty of instances were shields were there, but just not seen like you said in TwoK).

All I said was that ever since TNG we had bubble shields, except under certain circumstances like huge fleet battles, where they were omitted indeed because of budgetary/CGI reasons. However, afaik, there were never a masterplan behind it, depicting a change of technology, or somesuch, the CGI department just wanted to make the battles look as cool as possible and shield effects were not always possible.

As you mention, the difference between the Defiant's shape and a bubble could be quite small. ... now, during a battle you would want to preserve as much power as possible... Is it possible that during battle they simply pull the bubble shields back as small as possible as to conserve on overall power drain and to make the ship (including shields) as small of a target as possible? This would keep more power in the banks for propulsion and for weapons, while making most of the shot taken at the ship miss due to its small size. (like trying to hit the very center dot on a dartboard bullseye (2x) as opposed to the entire bullseye (1x)) if the ship has extensive redundant backups, losing the first few system circuits would not really matter as much (due to bleed-through)

Possible...........however I think it unlikely. We do know that shields get weaker when they are extended around another ship, however since this is used multiple times to protect other weaker ships we can assume that the loss of shield strength is not so much as to render this tactic ineffective, therefore having a hull conformal shield or a shield projected about 5-10 metres outward shouldn't make much difference both strength and powerwise.

As for profile....also possible...but considering interstellar distances again..how much of a difference would it make for small ships like the defiant and how likely you are to dogde a hit because of it in a huge ship like the GCS?

Since the use of shield effects is completely random without much in universe ryhme or reason maybe we just overthink it....

[Captain Seafort]

All I said was that ever since TNG we had bubble shields

There have been post-TNG cases of conformal shields, either implicitly (as in TUC, where the PTs were depicted detonating on the hull until the shields failed and the last one punched through) or explicitly (Call to Arms and Nemesis - both of which depicted shield effects a few metres from the hull).

[alexmann]

I agree with seafort's tech advancements thing.

[McAvoy]

All I said was that ever since TNG we had bubble shields

There have been post-TNG cases of conformal shields, either implicitly (as in TUC, where the PTs were depicted detonating on the hull until the shields failed and the last one punched through) or explicitly (Call to Arms and Nemesis - both of which depicted shield effects a few metres from the hull).

I have to check but it has been awhile, were they any significant hull damage done to the Enterprise prior to failing of the shields? I mean scortching of hull is one thing but replacing hull plating is another.

The other would be VOY Flashback episode when the Klingons fired on the Excelsior.

[Jim]

That made me think, I do not recall many inages of actual damage during the TNG years. I remember obvious hull damge shown in Khan, and damage shown in VOY... but I really do not recall seeing damage in the TNG tv series.