Space Combat in The Expanse

I break down the three major tiers of space combat in James S.A. Corey's The Expanse.
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Battlezone II Music by Carey Chico
Sci-Tech Intro Features Animated Elements by SKIBBZ.
Spacedock does not hold ownership of the copyrighted materiel (Footage, Stills etc) taken from the various works of fiction covered in this series, and uses them within the boundaries of Fair Use for the purpose of Analysis, Discussion and Review. Produced by Daniel Orrett. Owner/Executive Producer at Spacedock.

[@Spacedock]

So who's excited for a Season Three trailer? Gotta be soon right? :)

[@christopherkillian3368]

Spacedock I think I am and also... FIRST!

[@kodiak_qp614]

I'm eagerly waiting.

[@temiajuwon8893]

Can't wait

[@lunokhod3937]

He'll yeah!

[@johnnybestjojo7789]

Spacedock super hyped, especially after that ending

[@TheStRyder91]

"Combat in The Expanse generally takes place over extremely long range" Alex: Hold my beer.

[@garethlawton5278]

Seems the only combat that mattered was it's ratings and views. Hope someone else picks the show up, shame it was cancelled.

[@Kyntheria]

It's been picked up by Amazon.

[@s.31.l50]

Well, they have a limited supply of torpedoes, and the only other weapon they have is the close range PDC

[@corwulfattero]

more likely, "Hold my Juice." xD

[@NorthForkFisherman]

@@corwulfattero Better than "Hold my Donkey Balls".

[@miketacos9034]

I love that there are no energy shields. You get hit, you done for.

[@marrqi7wini54]

Right. No ship that size can withstand such a force. So either maneuverability, shooting down the ordnance, or making the first strike is the only way to survive. Tricking the ordnance such as chaff flares against torpedoes and missiles also works. That's one tech I'm surprised isn't used in the expanse as to my knowledge. And it's simple to. Even star wars the clone wars used it and that's a science fantasy.

[@TheEvilmooseofdoom]

@@marrqi7wini54 I would speculate that with a smart enough warhead might not be spoof-able. As a rough example lets pretend you are the warhead on a current air to air missile and you've been fired at a plane. That plane deploys flares and chaff. If your eyes are half as good as mine you can easily tell the difference between the actual plane and the chaff and flares, ignore them and keep heading towards the actual target. I like to delude myself that a missile as smart as I am will only be fooled if the other plane can produce a decoy that can not be distinguished from the real plane. In other words, a perfect copy. :)

[@sosig6445]

@@marrqi7wini54 if the warhead is lazer guided flares don't work and lazers are even better and more accurate in space

[@gabry96colo]

probably all torpedoes are guided by the ship radar or guided visually cause in space you don't have the horizon, in the expanse you can control a torpedo on the other side of the solar sistem, so you can probably acquire your target using the mothership and sending the info to the torpedo, countering the countermeasures

[@jemuelmongado5030]

Also they depressurize the ship and wear pressurized spacesuits during combat, so that hull breaches and bullet holes won't instantly blow the ship up.

[@dreadnought-ai]

The range of a projectile weapon in space decided by reaction time.... Finally

[@thegreatshamelessone]

Dreadnought AI Reaction time would need to be generated in advance by a super computer and not a human helmsman. Nobody has the manual dexterity to dodge a ship the size of the Donnager out of the way when a projectile whose speed starts at Mach 6+ and only gets faster from there outside a planets gravity well is coming at you.

[@VoidplayLP]

thegreatshamelessone Well yeah you couldnt Dodge a bullet after it has been fired but weapons with Low RPM(which railguns usually are) can be out-maneuvered by just moving somewhat unpredictably. At least the chances of getting hit are lessened a lot by that.

[@dreadnought-ai]

VoidplayLP - a target lead indicator is useless if you strafe randomly in every Direction like mad haha

[@TheHalcyonTwilight]

Mass Effect had the same rule, resulting in the excellent "Isaac Newton is the deadliest son of a bitch in space," speech.

[@theshinygoldenemperor2422]

Electric Futures If the spaces between them are enormous, then the ship will just have to move at least one times its length out of the way of the projected target. A pilot will just have to make some kind of adjustment as soon as they know the projectile has been fired. Something as simple as reverse thrust might suffice. It depends on the range though, and like SD said, railguns are used at medium range precisely because they are very difficult to react to at that kind of range, but as soon as you get further away, this advantage diminishes.

[@TheVargr]

In the book it is stated that the Donnager engagement was the first time CQB actually ever happened outside of simulations

[@jgt2598]

TheVargr Huh...that's actually kind of unrealistic. Taking pot shots at each other from infinity range is fine and all...but warfare and piracy (especially piracy) often involves going TO an objective. CQB should happen anytime the objective(s) needs to be arrived at instead of annihilated. Also, boarding was shown as (and would be) an effective way of disabling a ship without using up a lot of expensive ammo. So, I wouldn't find it incredibly believable to think that in the Expanse civilizations' 100+ years of space warfare ONLY those stealth ships' commanders used the strategy of long range hit, medium range hit, close range board.

[@TealJosh]

No one would be insane enough to launch a pirate attack against a CQB capable ship. Pirates don't have the money to have stealth tech and there hasn't been many wars before that point seen in the show.

[@thakillman7]

Warfare in the Expanse is rare and no major combat has happened in space until the start of the book. The books start with what is pretty much the first major war. Most of the space ships exist solely as a deterrent.

[@ScipiPurr]

It's totally realistic, and will likely be highly rare IRL if/when we build combat-capable spacecraft. Frankly, given that there is no widespread FTL in The Expanse and the fact that there isn't any stealth in space (except for these newly developed stealth ships in the show), threats can be identified and engaged well in advance. This includes engaging defending forces. CQB can only happen when one or both forces involved can mask their approach or mask themselves from an approach and chooses to fight at that distance. The only way to do they without stealth tech or FTL is perhaps to hide using the entropy of a planetary body (like with what our modern stealth tech does). However, at that point you already have planetary defenses to begin with and your ships would be deep in the planet's gravity well being on the surface or just under it.

[@R4V3-0N]

In modern combat with aircraft and ships it is very rare for close quarters combat relatively speaking

[@xensan76]

What really impressed me was the speed of that nuke in the beginning, covering thousands of kilometers in just a few seconds. This type of space combat is something we rarely see in visual media. I get it, it's hard to make battles exciting when you can't see two combatants on the screen simultaneously. But stuff like The Expanse has its own brand of tense and captivating combat.

[@Vaasref]

Epstein drive dude, it runs on efficiency !

[@TheFito680]

In book it took 8 minutes.

[@callumunga5253]

+Vaasref Nice reference, but I daresay you can't compress the Epstein drive to fit on a torpedo.

[@EugeneParallax]

Rather there's just no point to show the entire timeline of its movement, and Canterbury had no countermeasures against it either way. Beside, its enough to show it exactly like it was in Expanse - you show the ship firing a weapon, and then shown the result on the target. Just well designed and rendered few-seconds snippets of heavy PDCs showering slugs and Railguns firing have trumped all the Sci-Fi broadside battles of the past for me.

[@thelastholdout]

+Callum Shamwana You can actually. In the books they cover that the Epstein drive powers missiles as well, and in the show, when they display the closeup of the torpedo that Naomi loads the protomolecule sample onto, you can see markings that say "Epstein."

[@dreadnought-ai]

missile/torpedoes long-range (guided tracking weapons) Rail guns medium-range (high-speed projectile weapons) And point defence (pretty much CIWS) All over ranges measured in hundreds of kilometres. Goddamnit I wish more sci-fi did it this way.

[@failedexperiment9073]

Yeah zero realism in space combat in all movies and shows is a shame, even Expanse show didn't escape that and the shows that are talking in more realistic range are ALWAYS just TALKING in more real numbers, but ships are always on top of each other. Plus most movies and shows still ignore, that ships need thrusters in every direction to turn the ship ( but developers of computer games for some reason aren't that blind at this point ) Everyone is hiding behind words „it wouldn't look epic on the screen," but when I try to imagine such scenes, I found, that these imaginations in my head look far better than most of those melee fights, so these words are just excuse for those, who don't want to think in my opinion.

[@jgt2598]

Filip 3 From what I've seen Expanse nailed RCS thruster requirement and depictions of distance. If you look at the battle of spin station, for example, Rocinante's RCS fires realisticly for each maneuver, and a damaged thruster is a major plot point. Also, when the Donnager first engages the stealth ships at extreme range the exterior shots actually show neither side being visible in shots of the other.

[@failedexperiment9073]

I always like, when space opera has RCS thrusters and it always makes bonus points. However spin station battle is not good example of hard sci-fi battle, because show turned it into another melee combat. Donnager battle is one of my favourite sci-fi battles, however if you look at it closely, the ships aren't unfortunately that far away from each other ( speed of torpedoes is one of the proofs, since we see them moving near ships, each other and their position on Donnager's tactical screen).

[@daedalus-N7]

The only thing that they got wrong /missed was not using guided missiles to intercept the torpedoes. Relying solely on the PDC's to engaged guided munitions was idiotic...

[@thegreatshamelessone]

The concepts they are using and their weapons ranges and utility are based on 2D blue water navy concepts. If you were to go to 3D black water navy concepts the rail guns would be using targeting packages that are more advanced versions of what the AMRAAM uses and be hitting ships at 1000 plus miles because once you fire that shot outside a planetary gravity well it will keep going at speed until something interferes. Plus no ship could maneuver fast enough to evade a shot fired at mach 7+ speeds at initial time of shot.

[@benjaminodonnell258]

I agree The Expanse is the most realistic space combat yet depicted on screen, but I can think of a few things they could have added for even greater realism. *Countermissiles:* As someone else said, relying on PDCs alone to destroy incoming torpedoes is silly - it means you just sit there letting the torps approach until they reach close range and then pray your PDC algorithms are good enough to destroy them before they hit you. At long range, countermissiles would be practical, especially ones with shrapnel warheads, which create a large debris field that would be hard for incoming torpedoes to evade. *Shrapnel warheads:* Speaking of shrapnel warheads, why limit them to countermissiles? A torpedo with a shrapnel warhead would only need to explode nearby to the target, preferably somewhere in its future flightpath. *Drones:* Unmanned craft will always be faster & more maneuverable, because there are no squishy humans to crush with g-forces and no life support systems to take up mass. Basically, these would be larger torpedoes with their own weapon systems attached. They could also act as anti-torpedo countermeasures, by flying towards the torps and using their PDCs to create multiple zones of fire before the torps reach the target's own PDC zone. Drones would also be essential as reconnaissance devices, extending the radar/lidar vision of the mother ship by relaying reports back. It's possible that torpedoes could be "modular", with the same missile being usable as a torpedo, countermissile or drone depending on its software package & payload. But I suspect drones, at least, would be a separate unit.

[@markhaus]

Because although I think it would be interesting to see this (arguably more realistic) interpretation of future combat. Seeing futuristic drones execute combat algorithms doesn't create much drama in most storytelling scenarios I can think of.

[@benjaminodonnell258]

Marcus Grant I can see that. OTOH, watching the defensive drones shoot down incoming missiles and seeing them slowly thin out, and more and more missiles get through, could be made to be exciting...

[@theespatier4456]

Benjamin O'Donnell Yeah, those are significant omissions. Also wouldn’t reduce the drama.

[@dreammachine86]

This was what disappointed me most in the TV-show Donnager battle, relying on just PDCs to defend against torpedoes. Even a modern navy destroyer today uses intercepting missiles to defend against incoming offensive missiles, and then the ship's CIWS which is like The Expanse's PDCs will attempt to take care of any missiles that aren't intercepted. So there are at least two layers of defense; one at a longer range, rather than letting missiles that could destroy your (very expensive) ship and kill all your crew come into close range. I understand that the theme of the Donnager battle was the MCRN and specifically that commander being overconfident that they had the best technology and thinking no-one else stood a chance against them, but for 100+ years in the future technology it seemed underwhelming. Again I know that The Expanse's space weaponry is just meant to be more advanced versions of today's tech rather than something completely off the wall, but a little more sophistication would have been good. The US Navy's Arleigh Burke class destroyer, that is around 30 years old or so, has a missile type that can be used for offensive strikes and defensive interception. So it wouldn't be a stretch to think that a flagship warship in The Expanse could carry many hundreds if not thousands of variable warhead yield missiles that could vary their role depending on the circumstances, say a 'smart' missile intelligently deciding to intercept an incoming one if it calculates a highly accurate track even if it was originally fired as an attack, taking into account if there are other missiles that can still hit the original target and using all sorts of similar data in its decisions.

[@derekofoma5120]

I think there might be laws against the use of AI-controlled vessels or drones because I could list 20 practical uses they could serve in the expanse, but I've yet to see a single one implemented.

[@speestechsupport1341]

This why I love this show (realist combat, utilization of inertia, realistic design and science)

[@zauru192]

idk just watched first 2 episodes and there is tons of bullshit physics that just doesn't happen irl.

[@tandemcharge5114]

There's a reason why it's labelled as a sci fi series lmao. But in all honesty it's lightyears ahead in realism compared to any other sci fi shows or movies all the while maintaining a coolness factor

[@ze_rubenator]

As far as I remember the physics of that show is pretty plausible, apart from the Epstein(?) engine which would be impossible. Oh and the whole spinning asteroid thing, which would in reality tear itself apart.

[@bryan8259]

Just gotta read the books for more realistic characters to go along with all that

[@failedexperiment9073]

Spees Techsupport Well, the show has that realism reduced a lot ( range of battles, size of Jupiter's moons and their distance from each other also doesn't feel real + one of them apparently has zero G on the surface, ... ) compared to the novels.

[@theboard7512]

The MCRN Donnager is one of the most beautiful ships ever designed.

[@hanz5555]

And with the most overconfident captain I ever saw.

[@Raz0rking]

well..she had the most powefull ship of the time against 5 small ships...

[@gavinkemp7920]

and ran into the smallest ship with rail guns they had ever seen though why they have put rail guns on smaller ships beats me. power supply maybe ?

[@TheArklyte]

gavin kemp no explanation actually. Rochi can mount twin torps, which are essentially ICBM sized, so I find it doubtfull that gunboats build around railgun won't exist and be smaller then martian corvette.

[@TheArklyte]

Raz0rking she could have launched Rochi in the beginning and won. That's the whole point of having a smaller ship on board. To act as a "destroyer cover" for capital ship.

[@lord_kinbote3920]

Plasma torpedoes are probably essentially nuclear shaped charges: directing a nuclear explosion using a reflector to convert a tamper such as a slab of tungsten into a concentrated jet of plasma. Basically a HEAT warhead on steroids.

[@carlosdgutierrez6570]

so... a Casaba-Hotwitzer?

[@carlosdgutierrez6570]

@Execute order: 65! well as far i understand the covie plasma warheads release the plasma contained in magnetic fields rather slowly rather than in an instant like nukes, allowing to a greater heat transfer to the target. I know that is quite irreal but the expanse does a difference between nukes and plasma warhead so I supposed that their plasma ones work similar to the covies ones, a big ass magnetically contained ball of plasma.

[@inventor121]

@@carlosdgutierrez6570 or they just detonate the drive.

[@Danuxsy]

Railguns are way more effective lol

[@noahfenech3369]

space bazooka

[@lincolnnoronha4128]

The rail guns actually fire at a non negletible fraction of the speed of light. I think their effective range is a bit higher (something like 10.000 kms or 100.000 kms). Also, there is one instance in the books where PDCs are used effectively at rail gun range. But its a trick. The Rocinante fires its PDCs at a position where the enemy has been consistently evading rail gun shots to (being an algorithm doing the evading, it becomes predictible), than a few moments ladder, it fires the rail gun, making the enemy evade (as predicted) to the position where the PDC bullets are flying towards (being vaccum, they just keep going), and that makes the enemy ship get hit. ;)

[@JetEngine787]

Lincoln Noronha. Loved that! That was Bobby, wasnt it?

[@lincolnnoronha4128]

Brian Dolan: Yup. Bobby Badass drapper.

[@AlbertaGeek]

A rail gun slug sure as hells wouldn't shoot anything 100 000 km/s. That's a third the speed of light, and even with a lousy 1 kg slug, do you have any idea what the _recoil_ of that would be? a 1 kg projectile at that velocity would have a kinetic energy of 5.46E15 joules. Assuming a million *ton* ship that shot it, the entire ship would be accelerated in the same time it took to fire the slug to 3.3 km/s in the opposite direction. Even if the ship could survive that and not get torn apart, that acceleration would kill everything aboard.

[@ChazAllenUK]

+AlbertaGeek - He gave a distance. You are talking velocity. "kms" is not km/s, but a mistaken attempt to pluralize the unit km.

[@markhaus]

I think that brings up a good point about future combat. It's going to heavily rely on algorithmic tactics since they can react and perform more complex control tasks than humans. and a big part of one algorithm winning over the other is going to involve predictability.

[@pschroeter1]

I like how the torpedoes will drop off and launch facing the wrong way than maneuver and point themselves towards the target.

[@Mjr117]

You should do a "What would a real space battle look like" with you're space battle animation that could be really cool.

[@mitchelmclaughlin2313]

Martin Triscila this should be higher

[@Nethan2000]

Real space battles depend to much on what exact technology is available and practical. You may anticipate the first, but you'll never predict the second. Might as well ask a person living in Napoleonic times to predict armored warfare. Like, what's going to be better: lasers or railguns? Will spaceships have armor or is it too heavy? Will we have fusion-powered spacecraft or will we have to rely on chemical rockets? How about solar sails; are they practical? What's the effective range of average ship's telescopes? Space isn't completely empty; there's lots of random trash you can run into at high speeds. Can spaceships reliably destroy or deflect it with lasers or do you need to absorb and repair the damage they do hitting your hull? Bussard ramjet is impractical at accelerating (because catching hydrogen atoms costs you more momentum than you gain from using them as fuel). Will it shine at decelerating or is it complete garbage? Or will engineers find a way to use it effectively? This is the kind of questions that immensely affect the outcome.

[@Mjr117]

Nethan2000 I was just saying take any large sci-fi franchise like star wars or the expanse and add real science

[@thakillman7]

The Expanse is about how real as it gets without getting into REALLY nitty gritty science. Star Wars is about how unrealistic as it gets with regards to Sci Fi, and it may be more accurate to call it Fantasy.

[@Mjr117]

devak that's why I said apply real science to a well know science fiction franchise. Taking out hyperspace. Take a xwing and tie fighter and show what it might look like in real life. Nerdiest tried to do something like it but were wrong on a handful of things.

[@GI.Jared1984]

the funny thing is this isn't too dissimilar to actual modern naval combat

[@Daimon-X]

'Big guns never tire.' In space, no one can hear when you shoot...

[@PetersaberHD]

YOu can, if you're standing on the hull :)

[@kerninjathefrog6569]

"Sir Isaac Newton is the deadliest sonofabitch in space!"

[@krzosu]

But they can see the energy spike from firing the railguns ;D - the electromagnetic distortions would be quite easy to detect even from quite a far. Granted the first shot probaly would went unnoticed at first though. And the chemically proppeled guns would leave both heat and gas trails too.

[@CarpeVeracity]

They can, if you've got a microphone in both ships 😉

[@krzosu]

@@CarpeVeracity Establishing communication to enemy during battle is the worst idea it opens a possiblity if of cyber/hacking attacks.

[@cptnoname]

Very late to the party, but... TL/DR: effective range is arbitrary and it's going to vary by target It's stated in the books (when the Roci is forced to for its railgun in [to avoid spoilers] a "different mode") that the projectile fires at 5 km/s, which is pretty realistic given the length of any rail that the Roci could reasonably accommodate. At 5 km/s the kinetic warhead would pass the 1000 km range band in 200 seconds. That's one minute and forty seconds, by the way. At even one gee of acceleration, a target ship at that range would be able to put a ∆V of about 2 km/s toward evading that shot, and it could change its actual position vs any trigger-time projected trajectory by up to 200 kilometers, easily side stepping the projectile. At 10 gees a ship could displace itself 2000 km in the same amount of time. None of that takes into account the amount of time the enemy pilot needs to react to the incoming fire, nor the response time of the drive. Allowing a few seconds for a drunken pilot and a commercial drive would be negligible compared to a 1:40 flight time. Even the Canterbury could evade a railgun round at 1000 km. It would come down to how quickly the target can evade the shot, which would be a function of it's reaction and response time, acceleration capability and the physical size of the ship along whatever profile it's presenting to the attacker. Its lateral thruster capabilities would come into play as well, especially if it's presenting its forward face to the gun, in an attempt to minimize its profile. Roci would need to rotate slightly to avoid a shot at close range even at full thrust, since she has no real thrust laterally (with exception, maybe, for the books, where she lands horizontally instead of vertically, but those thrusters would presumably be only along the landing side of the ship). Let's assume the best possible scenario, where the Roci is trying to evade a shot fired against her from 90 degrees to port (or any other side, really). Even if they aimed at where her nose was projected to be at the time the shot arrived, she would have to displace herself as little as 45 meters to avoid the shot. At one gee, ~10 m/s², she could do that in 3 seconds. So the range would have to be less than 20 km if it took Alex and the Roci one second combined to respond. Of course, Roci can accelerate at 15 gees. Assuming the same response time and orientation, Roci could dodge a shot fired from more than 8873 *meters* away. The attackers' gunner will be trying to predict how the Roci might respond, and that will increase the size of the danger zone, but one would have to have near Jedi-like predictive powers to extend that very far. Unless Alex is drunk. But even if he's so drunk that he needed 5 full seconds to get the ship to fire it's thrusters, the attacker would have to be within 28.9 km. The MCRN's Donnager class has much bigger railguns, and with longer rails you get higher speeds, so the danger zone against one of these capital ships will also be greater, increasing proportionally with the muzzle velocity of the projectile. The only way to hit a ship in CQB with a railgun is to be really close or to produce such a volume of fire with other weapons that you can limit its options for evasion. Putting lateral rocket motors on the projectile to fine tune its path could increase the chances of a hit as well, but with 2kg slugs as per the books and the show that would be of pretty limited utility. Hitting anything with a railgun in The Expanse's world of high thrust ships would be next to impossible.

[@ItzmeFlez]

Very good explanation! I only recently startet watching the Expanse and am only halfway through season one, but so far I love it! The universe really does feel alive and so far every character seems really interesting. Defenitily one of my favorite Sci-Fi series so far

[@failandia]

you will love seaon 2, at the end it felt like i knew each of this characters, amazing show

[@AtemiRaven]

I did appreciate the fact that they tried to make it a little bit more realistic in The Expanse.

[@simonegeezer6238]

Love the show. Feels like space engineers physics. Flak weapons, like a battlestar, would've been a good idea

[@hansolo4017]

instant like when i saw the expanse. i beg you to do the battle of spin station.

[@joeyjojojunior1794]

Han Solo seconded. That conflict is epic. CQB with both PDCs going to town on their enemy!

[@BasicShapes]

Yeah...uhh...am I the only one who wonders why the ships are made of paper mache? Like I get you have to have tension and stakes, but for fuck's sake....Shed's headless corpse floats through space somewhere as a solemn reminder of what these guns can do to a person, and the Roci has like 30-something rounds zipping past everyone, and no one suffers a scratch. Isn't that problematic? Like why the fuck even have hulls if they are that useless? And don't tell me "it's because they were at close range", space is a vaccum, so those rounds would penetrate at virtually any distance as they wouldn't have slowed down, there's no atmosphere.

[@LordCommander-ui2fw]

Nice, very realistic weapon systems and general strategy. I haven't seen the Expanse yet, but based on my general research, space combat is handled much better than any sci-fi franchise I've seen so far. The fleets are very centered around battleship type vessels, as carrier types would be very inefficient as front-line capital ships in that type of engagement, and would likely be delegated to support roles. There are no fighter-craft; as such vessels would not be realistic, at least the piloted variety. And you only need watch the video to know how they handle ship to ship combat.

[@vichodeivis1219]

You will love what happens if they reach the sixth book. *This post and responses are filled with multiple minor to medium spoliers for the expanse books* The autors didn't forget that bullets don't just dissapear once they crossed the weapons effective range and wrote a beautifull space fight where this is important.

[@Spacedock]

My favorite battle in the series. Really hope the show gets to visualize that. :)

[@TheFito680]

Pella vs Rocinante is my favorite fight in the series too

[@Duomaxwell02M]

I really do hope they get to the part about Naomi's dark past, that's where the crap really hits the fan.

[@themadhammer3305]

Vicho Deivis its a throwaway clip in mass effect 2 where an officer is explaining to cadets the importance of a good targeting solution. I'm paraphrasing but as he says 'if you miss that projectile will hit the planet behind that ship, or disappear into deep space and ruin someone's day hundreds of years from now. Issac Newton is the most dangerous son of a bitch in space'

[@vichodeivis1219]

This was more like "Look there, and there... *Slap!!* "

[@PrograError]

can't wait for the next season

[@Riceball01]

Can't wait until S2 is free on Amazon Prime.

[@vandabo]

I think the Expanse series has some of the most realistic hard sci-fi space combat, but if anyone wants something slightly more futuristic but still grounded in reality, try The Night's Dawn trilogy by Peter F. Hamilton. It features things like faster than light jump travel, but everything that happens otherwise is mostly Newtonian. The ships mostly fight each other at long ranges by launching waves of "combat wasps" which are drones that have both offensive and defensive weaponry and countermeasures. The ship that more effectively uses them and maneuvers more tactically wins the battle. They do have directed energy weapons, but those are usually used at much closer ranges than most of the combat happens.

[@flyhigh6047]

the expase depict what real space battle probably be like

[@weldonwin]

Not entirely, there is still a degree of Rule of Cool. The most relistic depiction of space combat I have seen so far comes from the game 'Children of a Dead Earth' which takes place entirely within the solar system and is fought between ships which as basically all massive cylinders, battles being fought over the course of days or even weeks, with ships only coming into weapons range of one another for minutes or even seconds at a time

[@gavinkemp7920]

it respectsish the rules of our universe but does have a few thing that don't make sense like spining asteroid and the way they use rail guns. their drive will have a bunch of technological hurdle to beat probably involving superconductivity, x-ray to electricity convertion and of course fusion power... scott manley got a very good video on that topic and whilst i disagree with his conclusion he explains the real challenges of it.

[@Gogglesofkrome]

even the distances in the expanse really aren't accurate. Space battle would most likely occur at interplanetary distances when it comes to guided nuclear missiles, and there would possibly be lots of expendable drones being used in addition to the missiles. Not to mention, the blocky shape of the ships would mean that a lot of the hits landed on the fore of the craft would result in a high penetration rate, as opposed to just using what might as well be enlarged cylinders with a rounded out front to deflect incoming attacks. giant floating cylinders with tons of gun ports are obviously not very pretty, but I cant think of any other way that a ship design could be come to that would allow for realistic artificial gravity, while at the same time being structurally sound.

[@gavinkemp7920]

well for one the cylindrical aspect is not needed for gravity since it not spin gravity. second cylinders are great for optimizing volume to surface ratios but not for optimizing space usage. third cylinders are impossible to hide from radar. i also feel that whilst cylinders are strongest i think they get crippled but the least damage, other shapes can be made much more redundant. space battle wouldn't occur at interplanetary distance for a couple of reasons. for one if you actually want to control an area you need forces their, in the same way you still need infantry and an army to control territory, like the air force interplanetary missiles would be a great force multiplier but not a solution to maintain an area un occupied. to control, an asteroid, planet or a section of space like a shipping lane you need ships their to enforce that control. what is more military ship are more than likely to have counter measures to nuclear missiles. second the time needed for information to cross the expanse of the solar systems would range from minutes to hours. that not practical if you want to maintain control of your devises. as for drones i kinda agree but i'm not a hundred percent sure that they have an advantage over missiles.

[@smasher123ism]

Trust me, there are way more retarded OP ways of waging war in space compared to OP torpedoes. Such as Casaba Howitzers and Kirklin mines for missile defence.

[@zane714]

Dude... rip... when he talked about how the railgun rounds can pass through a vessel leaving it relatively unharmed aside from a hull breach it really made me think about the Donnager battle from Leviathan Wakes. Wrong place to be locked up at the wrong time...

[@mostlymessingabout]

"Lower realism" - throwing shades lol

[@Dwight511]

When you mentioned rail guns I remembered that scene in the first season. I was like WTF, that guy's head just disappeared.

[@steriopticon2687]

Since I'd read the book first, I was, "Are they really going to..." DONK "... uh, yep."

[@RebeccaCampbell1969]

Excellent video, a guide (one of many) for newcomers to the series

[@OldCurmudgeon3DP]

All that ordnance expended in battles and shrapnel from explosions... granted that "space is big" but that stuff doesn't stop until it hits something rather solid. Makes commercial, et al, traffic a hazardous proposition on top of the usual issues with space travel.

[@godmode8687]

Well i mean there are thausands of asteroids. And propably even more small stones in orbit around sun. So i guess every ship needs sensors to detect them and evade them. So it doesnt make to much af a difference i guess. Maybe they are even fast enough to escape the sun Sphere of influence completely.

[@jonsteen8344]

So would you say the expanse is an example of realistic space combat within our own scientific laws regarding space?

[@secondsein7749]

Jon Steen pretty much. Not only on combat but space craft movements as well. To rapidly decrease a ship's speed, they actually showed them turning the ship 180 and fire their main thrusters.

[@failedexperiment9073]

Jon Steen Novels - yes, show - no ( still realistic core mechanics, but way too much decreased distance ).

[@jeffersonian000]

There are a number of unrealistic features on the space craft in the Expanse, specifically the thrusters, fuel, and the space craft interiors. The thrusters have no explanation on why they are so efficient, fuel seems to only be a plot point with no indications of scale, and the ship interiors just don’t seem to line up with the ship exteriors. Other than that, yes, this series does a great job of simulating micro gravity civilization and combat.

[@charlesjohnson7657]

Scott Jefferson If we knew exactly how an Epstein worked, don’t you think we would’ve made one by now?

[@jgt2598]

Scott Jefferson Ummm...do we need full engineering details of something for it to be "realistic"? If that's the case, than there's no such thing as realistic sci-fi, one can only write "realisticly" in the present, about tech that has already been engineered. I would say the Expanse is (with regard to human tech) as realistic as fiction gets. We know some numbers regarding the Epstein drive, enough to calculate that it's not operating outside of understood physics. The spec. impulse would need to be crazy high, but not unphysically high, the energy requirements are high, but well within energy densities of nuclear reactions, etc. I completely missed the interior/exterior missmatch though. When I look at exterior shots of the Rocinante at least (when there's a human present for scale) it looks much bigger than the interior...which makes sense because the ship also has reactors, fuel storage, and an inter-hull space (that has actually appeared on screen).

[@RamdomView]

If QSwitched (Children of a Dead Earth) can be believed (I think so), ships can evade missiles by running missiles out of dV as ships will inherently have a larger mass fraction than missiles.

[@theespatier4456]

Alex Ye Yeah, this is the only reason why missiles don’t have infinite range (as well as orbital mechanics).

[@badbeardbill9956]

That depends on the missile. And acceleration. If a missile can close the distance faster than a ship can evade, then you need another way to deal with it.

[@j-twd930]

Problem is, missiles can afford to have a higher mass fraction as they only need space for a warhead and an engine. The rest of the mass can be fuel. However, ships still have to dedicate a fair bit of mass to radiators, crew areas, weaponry and armor. This will probably limit down the mass ratio of the spacecraft, reducing it's delta V. Spaceships do have advantages though, in terms of weapons AND armor. The ship can carry weapons to shoot down the missile (and it's launcher) while the missile does not. At most, it is just a puny nuclear warhead that at most just make the armor glow brightly for a few hours (barring a contact detonation, nukes in space are quite weak, although they are still good weapons in massed attacks, stripping down each layer of armor or irradiating the crew badly)

[@MrAwsomeshot]

I would love to see them make a game from this. A linear action adventure from CD projeckt red might be cool... maybe a sequel to cyber punk 200 years further into the future? But also an open world mmo type game, there are elements from EVE and ED you could combine with this the great lore of The Expanse to let players RP as crew together on MCRN or UNN ships as like a precursor to acquiring their own vessels and going into business for themselves.

[@Krestestovnikoff]

Holy hell, this video just made me feel REALLY melancholic until I realized that it's not the expanse triggering this feeling. It was the glorious Battlezone 2 soundtrack in the background! Damn, I loved that game!

[@romchompa6858]

about to rewatch this, i was impressed by the realism done by this one

[@XMachete]

Apologies for this meta-commentary: YT videos on The Expanse consistently have interesting and informative comments sections. I almost always come away having learned something new or having had something clarified about the physics and/or engineering principles related to the show.

[@mbogucki1]

I always wonder just how much collateral damage is caused by Railguns. In a large battle, you can have dozens if not hundreds of rounds fired that can literally fly through space forever. A few days after the battle, somewhere at the edge of the solar system, a belter is chilling having a beer on his ship when a couple of rounds randomly blow his head off. And what about those few rounds that head towards Earth or Mars? Would they survive the atmosphere? Even if they don't you got a few space stations and sats up there.

[@Erika-gn1tv]

Space is big. You're very unlikely to hit something on purpose, let alone by accident.

[@RockChalk263]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/nn3TmKuorppnaK8

[@dash4800]

that goes for any gun really. Imagine multiple ships firing thousands of pdc rounds

[@marrqi7wini54]

@@RockChalk263 The thing is there is no "shooting from the hip" in the expanse as the targeting computer will do those calculations though unfortunately the slug will destroy the target, and continue going as ships are not dense enough to stop rounds that dense going that fast. Nothing can be done about that.

[@benjaminodonnell258]

My one reservation about the realism of space combat in The Expanse is the absence of counter-missiles and drones. Missiles that explode into a wide field of shrapnel could be used to take out incoming torpedoes before they get into PDC range. Drones could be used for expanding sensor ranges and also for attacking incoming torpedoes or even attacking enemy ships.

[@marrqi7wini54]

Flechette do exist. But aren't used enough for ship to ship combat. kzbin.info/www/bejne/b5fKkoCemLmrebs

[@marcuswalker3056]

The most under rated show on Netflix it’s amazing

[@mkocel]

lol its not on netflix tho

[@christophereason9076]

Its all abt BSG, The Expanse and, Bab 5

[@Vaultboy-ke2jj]

Christopher Eason the three best sci fi shows ever in my humble opinion

[@Hypercat0]

Insert thank you gif here Captain

[@Mjr117]

Eh come on in the later seasons of stargate sg1 and Atlantis their space battles were great.

[@darwinxavier3516]

@Martin Triscila Pretty sure he's listing the higher realism shows that use Newtonian physics.

[@karlsmith2570]

Now I'm familiar with BSG & Babylon 5, but what is this expanse they're talking about in this video???

[@Zeleharian]

Railgun rounds are also pretty effective at besheding.

[@breezeark9154]

You sir, appear to be a space nerd with a penchant for sci fi. You sir, also appear to have gained a subscriber, congratulations.

[@kal2352]

It makes total sense. I mean we haven't seen a dogfight between aircrafts since the 1990s why would they exist in space?

[@elopeous3285]

Hello, i love your scifi content. Can you do sci fi species next like the aliens from Alien?

[@Heartbreak117]

Realistic for me! Love the movie and your analysis

[@failedexperiment9073]

* show

[@JezOnYT88]

All I can say is.... more expanse content please! Love this scifi

[@omg_RANCORS]

im 281 pages into Tiamat's Wrath. i cannot believe how good this story is.

[@flybeep1661]

Look for Expanse Donnager battle for an example of this kind of battle.

[@QseftJohn]

I'm not a physicist, but wouldn't an object going hyper sonic speeds cause a massive concussive blast if it went through a pressurized container; causing everything inside to mangle/liquid in the process?

[@TheArklyte]

QseftJohn it wouldn't. Why? Because said container would be already destroyed as the shell moves faster then the *speed of sound in metal.* Concussive blast _in the air_ is not the main danger when you get hit with a railgun. That's why military believe it to be so dangerous in perspective studies despite having no on board warhead and having very low caliber.

[@chriss2031]

Combat ships in this gerne depressurize their ships before entering combat because of that and other combat related issues.

[@QseftJohn]

Chris K, Mar's Donnager Class Battleship didn't depressurize when it was attacked. If memory serves me right, a shot from a railgun went right through the cell that was holding the Canterbury survivors. And I know that it was pressurized because they were all scrambling to seal it because they didn't have space suits on.

[@failedexperiment9073]

QseftJohn Donnager was suddenly ambushed, interior is depresurized if the combat is expected, so the crew has time to suit up, but when you are already fighting, you would have to leave the ship defenseless for a while to get into spacesuit.

[@VoidplayLP]

QseftJohn Well depressurizing the cells would be a Pretty Bad Idea cause you Generally Take prisoners to keep them alive. And they did depressurize everywhere except the Bridge and the cells.

[@snipelt738]

Love the idea of very long range space combat, but it will be more reasonable for laser cannons instead of railguns to rule the medium range combat which owns high accuracy and light speed trajectory. And this can greatly expand the scale of battle without the low speed railgun projectile in space scale. As for the railguns, they should b the ones suitable for close combat with their devastating punches.

[@rhianimal19]

I dunno about that reasoning around railguns, and projectile moving at extremely high velocity carries with it massive potential energy that is often expressed as plasma upon entering a target be it a hull, bulkhead or critical vessel system. Even without striking a vital component, the introduction of extreme high temperature plasma into an atmosphere would be catastrophic, much like a comet or meteor or asteroid exploding on contact with supersonic concussive waves when striking a pressurized atmosphere, like that inside any vessel. At the very least, anything struck with such a projectile would vaporize that material and turn it into plasma shrapnel contacting other parts of that internal vessel resulting in fires or combusting flammable materials instantly.

[@OmegaWinter13]

I am still curious, why can't torpedo be used in less than 1000km away.

[@lordwisehammer]

They can but I believe they are more susceptible to point defenses as they haven't had as much time to accelerate. That second part is speculation but I'm sure the Rocinante fires torpedoes at fairly close targets.

[@Vaasref]

I would guess they cannot accelerate enough to have a decent chance to hit without being shot down.

[@OmegaWinter13]

Thanks ^^

[@muddydave01]

Yeah, the Roci fired a torpedoe at the Anubis.

[@gameboxfreak]

Why fire a torpedo (which can be shot down by the enemy’s PDC’s) when your rail gun is in range which PDC’s can’t intercept? Also I’d Think a tungsten slug is cheaper than a state of the art guided torpedo.

[@upmostanimal8265]

Space combat in this franchise seems a lot like submarine to submarine combat to me. Not being able to (visually) see the enemy.

[@touko_nanami]

You may not be able to visually see them but most modern sensors could easily pick up any ship. For an example, even our current day Infared telescopes could pick up something as weak as a space shuttle engine all the way from Jupiter. Imagine what futuristic radar, lidar, and scanners could do against ships that are moving at a fraction of the speed of light.

[@thomasmchugh1989]

This is fantastic! Excellent video, high production quality!

[@khartog01]

There's an episode of TOS where the Enterprise crew hit a 1 meter long target with a photon torpedo at 20,000 km. I wish the newer shows reflected this type of combat.

[@daneilfranklin]

question? is boarding a thing in the Expanse universe?

[@vichodeivis1219]

It is. But against a military ship it usualy ends with a brief new star in the solar system when the boarded captain activates the self destruction.

[@otheraccount5252]

Can confirm.

[@warhammernerd52Daxx-Lorenzo898]

Can you do Space Combat: Warhammer 40'000, it's pretty much identical to The Expanse (there's also some great videos of masters and commanders settling their differences)

[@mkohlhorst]

Love the long range rail guns the UN used to remove the the stealth platforms of the MCRN. They were shown firing interplanetary distances and the shells were shown detonating to become multiple smaller projectiles just prior to impact. Now if only the show would use freaking lasers properly. The could very nearly replace PDCs all together with lasers... most definitely the point defense aspects of the PDCs. Longer range laser weapons suffer from the concentration of the light being dispersed in a coning effect but short to mid range they'd be more effective than and kinetic based weapon as space (being a vacuum) would increase their effectiveness. Literally the closer you got to a ship with laser weapons the more deadly it's attack capabilities would be.

[@CombreKon]

I think the pierce of the tungsten PDC are more effective than lasers would be.

[@zlozlozlo]

I really love the scientific accuracy and attention to detail in The Expanse show (I haven't read the books yet). I especially liked how the Roci crew put on their suits and depressurized the whole ship before going to combat. People would be punching holes in their hull, might as well prevent those holes from causing violent decompression.

[@CarCrash-TWU]

I watched the show and yeah the books are definitely worth it they're on audible and I've been working through them while working the show sticks pretty close to the books as well

[@zlozlozlo]

@@CarCrash-TWU I definitely plan to read the books. I already have the ebooks. I'm just afraid to start. I'm already a pathological procrastinator, and when I start reading a book series it gets even worse. I might actually get fired if I start reading The Expanse now :D

[@MWick-kn2xb]

Too bad it's going to be years until we can see the Heart of The Tempest. :(

[@MWick-kn2xb]

FlorribleBP maybe HBO or Netflix will buy it? Lol a nerd can dream.

[@narffran8151]

IMHO in the current Style of realization, which appears to leave out the time skips between the books, there is the slight Problem of the 30y skip between BABYLON & PERSEPOLIS, and since this one is major Plot point you can't write around it...

[@TealJosh]

I don't think the Expanse tv show can go as deep into the fantasy zone as the books did. At least I'm very reserved about it, it's hard to imagine the shift from kind of hard sci-fi seen here to the portals and telepathy and what not seen in the books.

[@sparrowlt]

some ships can also throw rocks at other ships if their crews are annoyed enough

[@carlosdgutierrez6570]

well... if you could actually hit the enemy by throwing rocks, your velocity plus the ship's velocity would wreck the enemy,

[@alientitimilk9073]

The reason why anti-ship missiles work in real life is because they are programmed to fly close to sea level meaning that you usually wont see them until their about 5-9km away from you, this being said I’d im it would be very easy to intercept and destroy torpedoes in the expanse since you can detect when the torpedoes are being launched and should have ample time it ready cwis or deploy intercept missiles. The way i see space combat happening is not in a capital ship to capital ship basis but in the same way carriers fight, except fighters would be loaded with anti-ship missiles and counter measures. Also since engineers dont have to worry about making space fighters aerodynamic they could put swivel guns on the fighters much like how they are on attack helicopters, and star citizen pretty much nails down what star fighters should look like in terms of armament

[@elkapro6534]

if PDCs can shred torpedoes, what do you think would happen to slower fighers that can't maneuvre fast because they would kill the crew with G forces? Edit: MIRV torpedoes would be way more effective, I am surprised they are not used in ship v ship battles.

[@alientitimilk9073]

El Kapro the fighters would just have to be at a range where PDCs are ineffective, any engagement above 10 or 50 kilometers would be more than enough to render them useless while still having ample time to detect and counter torpedoes, and from there the strike craft could use either railguns or missiles

[@elkapro6534]

@@alientitimilk9073 you still have railguns. And building fighters and training pilots is expensive. Also, bear in mind that space ships and fighters travel at hundreds of kilometers per second. And can't carry many torpedoes, nor railguns. They are simply not economically viable, since you can just build cheap torpedo and put nuke in it. What I don't understand, is why they don't use MIRV torpedoes. That way, one torpedo could split into five or so targets. Fire ten torpedoes at once and you have 50 warheads going towards the defending ship, possibly enough to overwhelm the PDCs.

[@alientitimilk9073]

El Kapro having large spaceship v. Spaceship battles is way more expensive which is why navies today have heavily adopted ships that can launch aircraft and strong weaponry wouldn’t be a problem, as seen in the show it doesn’t take much to pierce the hull of ships, conventional guns can do it so it should be more than possible to mount a couple self guided missile to a fighter. It would be way less riskier than sending in a full corvette or capital ship And the point about making a torpedo with multiple warheads is a good one and would be a effective counter to the smaller ships

[@cmbaz1140]

I really like the expanses battles ...the suspense is awesome

[@BalkanOkami]

Plausible AND cinematic... how did we get so %&@^ing lucky with the Expanse????

[@gravemindpenis]

So if torpedoes are the best way to destroy ship then just make a bunch of archer missiles from halo

[@PackedWolf]

Yeah but in Halo the Covenant ships have shields, which are extremely effective against missiles. Plus the Archer missiles in Halo are conventional explosive, not nuclear, lowering their size and allowing hundreds to be placed on a warship. Shiva missiles are the nuclear ones, with each cruiser-sized craft carrying 1-5 of them. The problem with porting Archer missile pods over to the Expanse is that construction methods there aren't as advanced, it would be hard to adequately defend the launch pods and missile storage bays from PDCs and railguns, which would blow up the missiles and the ship. In Halo, ships are much larger. Plus Covenant weapons generally one-shot anything the UNSC can build, so protecting the explosive parts of the ship isn't very important.

[@Chino56751]

Tell that to the Infinity

[@PackedWolf]

Infinity isn't a UNSC ship. It's so far advanced that it might as well be classed as a Covenant ship at this point - hell, it might as well be a Forerunner vessel it's got so many holy relics jammed in there. The sum total of all humanity's Forerunner discoveries were shoved into the Infinity. It's the most advanced ship in the galaxy if you don't include the Mantle's Approach (Didact's ship in Halo 4).

[@FinALIEN93]

its human-forerunner hybrid ship. Covenant ships are piss poor copies of forerunner tech as Covenants innovation is based on reverse engineering forerunner technology (explains why some of covie weapons and vehicles resemble forerunner equivalents so much. Infinity is the most advanced space ship still in operation. (Guardians dont classify as ships)

[@smasher123ism]

Archer missiles don’t use torch drives, aka fusion drive. They are conventional

[@adamlytle2615]

Would love to see an analysis of the fight scene in Babylon's Ashes where Bobby Draper sees how predictably the enemy pilot evades fire, and then leads them into the path of a rail gun round they fired minutes before-hand.

[@narffran8151]

it was a screen of PDC rounds, before using the railgun, but epic anyway.

[@adamlytle2615]

NArf FrAN riiiight, they dodged the rail gun fire and flew into the PDC rounds. That makes more sense.

[@assarstromblad3280]

There are also interplanetary IPBM's with nuclear warheads powered by epstein drives, made to be fired planet to planet for example, but not sure if this video just meant to bring up the ship vs ship combat of the expanse.

[@storebrandpeas5413]

In reality these battles must be so boring

[@lorenzvo5284]

nothing is boring when your life is at stake

[@failedexperiment9073]

Deer Viehch Only if it doesn't take too long, when Holden in Abbadon's gate goes on a dangerous trip, he gets bored after few hours of flight to his destination, because the strong fear cannot maintain that long, so he just wants the situation to end.

[@charlesjohnson7657]

Filip 3 His life isn’t directly threatened until the marines land on the station.

[@charlesjohnson7657]

Certainly not. Even at ranges of thousands of kilometers, most of the weapons are moving extremely fast and a single hit or burst from most of them will kill or cripple anything smaller than a battleship. It’s like a knife fight in the dark where occasionally you’ll see the knife coming.

[@ShinJudo]

Preach

[@jbee02]

I imagine the relational velocity of the two fighting ships can drastically effect the effective range of torpedoes.

[@foojub6907]

Why’s that

[@jbee02]

@@foojub6907 think of it this way. The faster torpedoes are moving the harder it will be for PDCs to track and shoot them down once they are within PDC range. Once launched, the torpedo will be under constant acceleration getting faster with each second. If I recall correctly I rember reading torpedoes accelerate at 100 Gs or 980 meters person second squared. Meaning every second of travel time the torpedoes increase their speed by 980 mps. What that means tactically, the farther away the two battling ships are when they fire torpedoes at each other, the faster the torpedoes will be moving when they enter PDC range, and they'll be more difficult for PDCs to shoot down. The closer the ships are torpedoes will be moving slower and will be easier for PDC to shoot down. If the battling gun ships are too close to each other torpedoes will become completely ineffective as they wont have the time to accelerate to high enough velocity necessary to have a chance to get past a single PDC. They'll be too slow. Now to answer your original quetion you have to rember that these war ships are always moving. Meaning the starting velocity of the torpedoes isn't zero. They're starting velocity is whatever the ships velocity was at the time of launch. That starting out velocity in comparison to the enemy ship will affect the both the maximum range of the torpedoes and the minimum effective range of the torpedoes. If one gunship is traveling to earth and another is traveling to mars and they meet in the middle where their velocities are at their highest, then the starting velocities of any fired torpedoes will be ridiculously high. So high that not only would there be no minimum effective range. So high that any PDCs wouldn't even have chance of shooting down a single torpedoe. Both gun ships have a guaranteed chance to destroy each other with a single torpedoe. But if the two gunships are traveling in the same direction at varying velocities than they'd have significantly different maximum and minimum effective range with torpedoes.

[@buttercup9709]

Sounds remarkably similar to combat in the honorverse. Most combat in that universe is done at thousands or millions of kilometres, mainly with large walls of ships firing enormous broadsides of impeller drive missiles. The broadside lasers and grasers are almost never used in large battles as most commanders are smart enough to know that flying into an enemy's broadside, even if you have the advantage, is extremely costly.

[@KillerOrca]

Seems pretty accurate to the UNSC from Halo as well, at least, when fighting other humans. Albiet MACs are scaled-up railguns, but other than that it fits well.

[@harryhamilton5869]

Any B5 battle totally destroys what you put up. The various tactics used and the visuals are beyond stunning.

[@0ExG0]

You should make a video of the opening scene of the Last Jedi about How not to fight in space talking about the ridiculous of the concept of the bombers.

[@VoidplayLP]

Well Star wars has artificial-gravity so they Fall inside the ship and have no reason to lose their momentum as they leave. Only get faster as they reach the artificial-gravity Zone of the target in fact.

[@0ExG0]

I won't enter in an argument about all of that but one thing. that ships would only work if its target stay still and doesn't try to move at all while see the those ships and that has one and only one way to attack and that is placed exactly above an nonmoving target and its alone and have no protection. Its impossible that those condition haven't in anything but a very bad written plot.

[@failandia]

it's Star Wars dude, don't start questionning it's science in the 9th film, they are not exactly great scientifically detailed representation of space battles. Star Wars is world war 2 in space, nothing more, now flighing fortress in space? sure whatever, bomb those space nazis

[@0ExG0]

That is not true, SW is a fantasy film about the good vs the evil with the hero caught in the middle put into a space theme. And not, fantasy is not a excuse for impossibilities.: kzbin.info/www/bejne/a2mWlo2qjpWbnNU

[@UESCBattleDroid]

Other sci-fi tend to use directed energy weapons as main weapons. Which would explain the short engagement ranges as energy weapons, and especially particle weapons, have enormous divergence and loss of power over distances.

[@VoidplayLP]

Noopi Man yeah but why do they do that? Imagine how easy the donnager could Take on some Star destroyers.

[@UESCBattleDroid]

I don't know about Star Destroyers shielding. And in those other sci-fi almost all defences rely pretty much exclusively on shield technologies. As weapons power output increases, materials will never be able to resist. Shields must be able to prevent the energy from ever reaching the hull as it would be destroyed immediately on impact. For example fusion reactors currently work by creating pressure and heat at millions of °C, at that temperature nothing can stay solid. So we use magnetic fields to prevent matter from touching the interior of the reactor. Basically electromagnetic or particle shielding makes low power weapons like chemically propelled projectiles, magnetic gun, and even low power torpedoes harmless. Torpedoes would have to be at least nuke level to do damages and would only be usable at range because of the omnidirectional blast, but they would be extremely effective if they hit. Also Star Destroyers have point defence. And turbolasers are not lasers, they're closer to plasma cannons.

[@VoidplayLP]

Noopi Man the Thing about Star destroyers is specifically the Lack of Point defense. And shields can still be overcome by physical and nuclear weaponry. The donnager can basically pummel a Star destroyer at Ranges where the Star destroyer cant even see and much less Hit the ship. Turbolasers would be pretty much useless against torpedos since theyre the slow firing Huge damage types of guns

[@UESCBattleDroid]

You'd have to use extremely heavy physical weaponry to bypass shields and a lot of it to deplete them, you'd also have to take into account the shape and speed of the projectile. Star Destroyer is 1.6 Km long and massively bulky. I doubt the Donnager as enough ammunition to take out a Star Destroyer. Which is the next problem. The Donnager needs ammunition. The Star Destroyer does not. It needs power and has more then enough for both movement, shields and weapons without refuelling often. As for Star Trek the question is useless. Warp Drive allows for a ship to drop right next to another immediately in weapons range, allowing for a quick kill on a enemy without shields. The Donnager would be cut in half by phaser fire or blown up by a photon torpedo before the crew could react (which is why cloaking technology is so dangerous in Star Trek and requires visual cloaking). Which is also feasible in Star Wars now that I think about it, micro hyperspace jumps are Star Wars cannon. The Expanse technology works, but only in it's own universe. It is more realistic yes, as it is unlikely that we will forgo any kind of weapon system in the future like Star Trek did (where the fuck are grenades? Electronic warfare? point defence against torpedoes? counter measures? jamming?) and it is also more realistic from what we know to be possible today. But so is most of Star Trek technology, problem is it was thought up in the 1960s so it's lagging a little (still, that shit invented tablets and cellphones in the 1960s ffs). As a general rules: - Don't pit sci-fi universes against each other. they are proportionate only to themselves. (sometimes they aren't...) - Star Trek and Star Wars almost always win. Empiric data seem to show that their weapon, shield and sensor systems are way more powerful than other sci--fi. - Don't pit Star Trek against Star Wars, numbers are all over the place and make no sense when compared to what is shown in the movies and series (winner would be the Borg anyway).

[@VoidplayLP]

Noopi Man ok i agree. Except that Star Trek and Star wars Always win. Warhammer 40k Takes the lead in basically everything. Everything Else i agree with though.

[@jgt2598]

I'm not really sure if using missiles alone as the long range offense is the realisticly best option. Think about it, the warship has the big reactors and big fuel tanks, therefore it has the most energy. You could get a much faster projectile if you accelerated it with the ship's available energy (i.e. firing a guided missile WITH a railgun). More velocity means less leading, more likelihood of getting a hit and more difficulty for the enemy's defensive system targeting.

[@VoidplayLP]

Jordan Thomas you know this is actually a really good idea. Just Put them in high speed launchbays for that Initial acceleration

[@stevefelten1197]

Great series most realistic science fiction story telling ever.

[@eliasquiaro3760]

I love this show and the realistic battles

[@fetusofetuso2122]

i spent so many hours on battlezone II I could recognise that music in my sleep.

[@markdavis160]

They wouldn't be very flashy for tv (pun sort of intended) but for CQC lasers ought to be as prevalent as autocannons for point defense. They might be less useful for penetrating the armor of heavy warships but they would be much more useful in taking out swarms of small missiles and melting the drives of enemy spaceships.

[@Mtn_Dewit]

When war comes to space, I'm sure battles will look exactly like what we see in the Expanse. No point blank range broadsides, no star fighters, no energy shields, just simple physics, reaction time, and realistic weapons.

[@harrishromero6447]

I think of it as a sniper duel.

[@harrishromero6447]

-Reaction will be done by ai. -Stealth is a major factor to defect radar. -Laser exist as more of a defence position like the 6th gen fighter. -Great radar or sensor -get better computers

[@Damaroka]

In addition to you comment on PDCs taking out vital components, crew are also turned into minced meat inside the ship by the standard 20mm tungsten coated rounds. That much kinetic energy can rip human bodies apart. Good you did this short. The scifi genre needs more shows like the Expanse. battles in space beyond visual range, taking at incredible speeds, over millions of kilometres

[@abrahamwilberforce9824]

The PDC rounds are chemical propelled I guess, so the dont have that much energy.

[@Damaroka]

Abraham Wilberforce haha, nice try kid. This is bait and I ain't falling for it

[@abrahamwilberforce9824]

Look at the image, there is actual gas recoil coming out of the donnagers and rocis getling PDC at the back. Using chemical propelled projectiles makes running the PDCs very easy and the low speed is not that problem at ranges closer than 5,000m!

[@Damaroka]

What's this low speed you are talking about? In our present day, in atmospheric conditions a 20mm round has a muzzle velocity of 850m/s with a kinetic energy of 47 Kilojueles. roughly the same velocity of a .50 BMG round but only 4 Kilojueles, and .50 BMG has been know to rip human bodies apart when hit. If you think that a 20mm round cant carry that much kinetic energy because it is propelled by a powder charge, then you are grossly misinformed, kid

[@abrahamwilberforce9824]

Hexanitrohexaazaisowurtzitane is an explosive, that accelarates its combustion gases up to circa 10.000 m/s, of course most explosive have lover velocitys and the bullet can not take the whole kinetic energy and momentum, but even WWII Armys had guns with over 1000m/s projectiles. So I am guessing that the PDC rounds are moving at a few thousand meters per second. The lag between firing and hit is not more than one or two seconds maybe not even, so I think chemical propelled rounds are doing very fine as PDC weapons. It is an Technology humans have a lot experience with and can rely on. Gauss canons can reach much higher velocitys, but you can barely dodge a bullet with one or two seconds delay, less time would not have a higher effect. Also a 20mm thungsten round at 1000-5000m/s can penetrate modern tanks, so it can penetrate space Torpedos and small vessels. I would doubt, that any martian ship would fire its PDCs at an heavy armoured ship like the Nathan Hale, so why would you waste the energy for reaching higher velocitys (double the velocity quadrouple the Energy) when you dont need it. An chemical propelled PDC would wigh about 100-500Kg, an gauss canons would need heavy couling and elctricity wires and could easyer fail. The PDC seen in the show have feflon coated rounds, so there lis not resistance in the barrel and the recoil gasses are leaving the barrel at the front and the end, so a chemical propelled PDC, would not get to hot than easy and dont recuiere heavy cooling technology.

[@doctorgears9358]

The books do a better a job of conveying that things take awhile and stuff happens over extreme distances. I get why they speed things up in the show, it would probably not be interesting to watch for a majority of people. I, personally, found it chilling in the book where they were waiting literal minutes for the torpedoes to hit the Cant. Everyone on that ship died the moment those torpedoes left their tubes.

[@Marinealver]

Well in the last episode showed that a generational ship communication array can be retrofitted into a laser based weapon that was used against the protomolecule station. So add that to the 4 spaceship weapons the Expanse has.

[@666wurm]

Teflon is a brand name. The material is called polytetrafluorethylene or PTFE.

[@JBRocky007]

While I like all of your content my favorite is The Expanse.

[@tf9822]

Although I agree the expanse is probably the most accurate example of space combat we've ever seen in sci fi, I never understood why one would want railgun rounds to pierce clean through starships. If the round goes clean through, it means it hasnt transfered all of its kinetic energy to the target and is then a hasard to whatever could be behind the ship you're firing at. Better to increasee the caliber or use fragmentation ammunition to keep sure they pierce the enemy armor, but get slowed inside the enemy ship, for optimal damage.

[@CollinBuckman]

You should do quick summaries of how space combat works in other sci-fi universes, like Star Wars and 40k.

[@virado255]

Something to look into would be a game on Steam called Children of a Dead Earth. That simulated how actual space combat would work with a fair degree of accuracy.

[@PatchyE]

This is surprisingly similar to Mass Effect's space combat. Only in Mass Effect the torpedos are only used to generate fast and randomly changing mass effect field to cancel out or disrupt enemy ship's mass effect field (kinetic barrier), and leave them vulnerable to the actual blow from the kinetic weapons (usually the mass effect field accelerated main canons, analogous to the electromagnetically accelerated railguns here). Also in Mass Effect, the computer-controlled rapid-firing short-range defense cannons are all laser-based (the GARDIAN system), though there are different wavelengths used in some races depending on how they view the trade-off between power and reliability/ease-of-maintenance.

[@nelumbonucifera7537]

Seems like HE shells or fragmenting rounds would be more effective. A round that over-penetrates does much less damage. Also curious that there isn't greater use of smaller missiles at shorter ranges for both offense and point-defense. Rail guns and PDCs are going to require constant use of thrusters to maintain attitude/vector. More engine and fuel weight means a smaller budget for armor and weapons.

[@pilotnamealreadytaken6035]

have you ever looked into covering the "Honor harrington" series or honorverse... i know the author is pretty tight on the IP but i would think he would be delighted to be covered on your channel as it would ONLY cause more interest.... I would love to hear you talk about all of that.

[@Dreamphile]

I'm enjoying your Expanse videos.

[@petermilligan4359]

I have a Spacecraft request. The ship in question is the "MCRN Scirocco" from the second series of the "Expanse". It appears to be a Frigate/cruiser class size ship seen in use by the Martian Navy and could be the opposite number of the UN's Navy ship the "Nathan Hale". It appears in several episodes and several are seen battling the UN above Ganymede. I have several screen shots if pics are needed. Cheers.

[@Duchess_Van_Hoof]

I somehow misremembered this as torpedoes being short range and railguns being long range

[@wbcorkery]

Such a great summary. Thanks so much.

[@timothypryor7952]

I'd really like to see an exploration of military tactics in space combat in the expanse universe.

[@BoterBug]

I made an RPG system that's basically the middle and close tiers, dressed up a bit more like Halo's weaponry and scaled down for relatively easy play on a battle mat. Single central mass driver effective at larger ranges (over five, up to 20-50 km), particularly as ship size goes up as it can get more accurate; then under 5 km, point defense cannons. In my system, missiles are deprecated because they can easily be shot down, but a swarm of them can still overload point defense systems. I made it for two reasons; the first, to complement a story I was writing in my own setting, and more importantly because we had a Star Destroyer in a Star Wars RPG and a single round took fifteen minutes with it, not counting enemy actions, so I designed my system to streamline capital space combat. I should really polish that up and self-publish someday...

[@Seth90]

Technically, there are also missiles when the target is too close for torpedos but not in effective range for guns - The Donnager just decided to skip them and directly go for the railguns. In the episode it's not clear, if missiles cover the same range as railguns or if they are between torpedos and railguns and the Donnager simply initiated the melee early.

[@demonmonsterdave]

Well, this video did what it said. I can't argue with that.