Why nukes in Sci-Fi are awesome & how they work. Join the cult of the bomb.

[@jayburn00]

Actually, the nuke propelled ship was going to be crewed, but be so large that acceleration would be survivable.

[@justicar5]

Project orion was designed to carry passengers, and is still the most feasible interstellar craft we can make

[@syedushherahmad311]

Rico: Kaboom? Skipper: Yes rico, kaboom

[@alexs5814]

Ah yes, sure. The nuke is always a one shot kill. Unless of cource you are playing bagpipes whilst it falls on you.

[@eamonrustom2510]

The sun giveth and the sun taketh away.

[@KillerOrca]

Unleash the power of THE SUN Interesting note on the NOVA; it really is jsut a scaled up thermonuclear warhead. Instead of it being a smaller nuke blast to set off another nuke, its NINE nukes all combined together to compress additional nuclear material.

[@EGRJ]

"We use the whole nuke! That's more nuke, per nuke!"

[@W1ldTangent]

One of the specific properties of the "Titanium-A" armor in Halo was it's ability to ablate when superheated. Thus, they put meters of it on the outside of their ships to hopefully keep enough that they don't get stripped down to the superstructure.

[@mervinreyes3008]

Felt like they fuckedup by not trying to change their armor design to incorporate more slopes and active cooling. The first is meant to make laser and plasma splash or take up more surface area and hopefully spread that energy in a more manageable way. The second would maybe slow there armor loss some

[@thelordofcringe]

​@@mervinreyes3008halo is a lot of surface level hard scifi ideas but absolutely zero understanding of how any of it actually works

[@leerman22]

I wonder how well tree trunks would do as ablative armor in the zero oxygen environment of space. Unless the beam of particles has a lot of mass it would just boil off water, carbon and hydrogen.

[@mervinreyes3008]

@@thelordofcringe to be fair not a lot of creators are thinking about things like power scaling and such which is what I think this falls under. for the plot

[@thelordofcringe]

@mervinreyes3008 nah, they absolutely were. Og halo was basically a bunch of 20 something nerdy dudes making a hard scifi lore for their game about shooting aliens. They actually did try pretty hard to give it all the right tech and ideas, they just didn't actually understand most of it which is why it falls apart under very close inspection. It works just fine though, hence why it's lore is still popular online among scifi nerds.

[@tomarmadiyer2698]

My favorite nuke idea takes staged thermo and adds 'shaped charge' to the descriptor. I want to donut the moon.

[@tomarmadiyer2698]

*squeaks* He said shaped charge!

[@highlorddarkstar]

Look up Casaba Howitzer.

[@wilemelliott]

correction, Project Orion had a manned component. Thats why it had the big ass shock absorbers between the plate and the ship. The Michael from Footfall [Larry Niven, and Dr. Jerry Pournelle] and the actual Project Orion battlecruiser that scared the hell out of JFK [theoretically armed with Casaba Howizters] are two examples.

[@brenomatos8384]

Correct, and add to this that the Orion project ships were not designed like today's, saving mass whenever possible, no no no they were monsters, built of solid steel in something like a naval dock, predicted to have a mass of dozens of thousands of tons and carrying thousands of tons of cargo and hundreds of passengers. With so much mass, acceleration wasn't that uncomfortable.

[@knighthunter5333]

“Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds” -Oppenheimer Nukes are true definition of f&ck around and find out.

[@PeachDragon_]

If project Orion kept going we'd have interstellar travel

[@sluggaboyzWC3]

So for types of nukes we have, the original mushroom, the double dip, the air fryer, the microwave, the melon, and nuclear lasagna maker.

[@Tomyironmane]

"We'll meet again... don't know where, don't know when... but I know we'll meet again some sunny day!" ♫

[@duongquan4986]

Hello fellow Fallout enjoyer

[@anticlaassic]

Dr. Strangelove sends his regards

[@carldooley9344]

7:20 I need to reread the Forever War. I remember the exploration of relativistic effects on someone who lived through the war... who left on the first ship, wasn't in long enough subjectively to get to maximum rank, then survives to the end of the war and 'retires' to his own personal planet that he purchased... on an enlisted salary.

[@moo4boy]

The bomb pumped laser is used in the Honorverse as the primary warhead on missiles for long-range combat. It is typically multiple lasing rods pumped by a single nuke

[@williamhare4456]

The Honorverse is weird when you know that to be able to do what the pulse rifle does (destroying a person’s torso even if it only hits their finger tip) the rifle’s shot has to be traveling at 1.5~1.8 times the speed of light and impact with the force of a dozen TeraNukes when hitting an object that can stop it. what makes it more horrific is every single family on Manticore and Sphinx is required to have a pulse rifle. (Within easy reach of three year olds.) P.S. can you tell that David Weber has no comprehension just how truly horrifyingly powerful his universe is the power to destroy cities is in the hands of an unsupervised three year old.

[@matchesburn]

@@williamhare4456 The "darts" used in pulse rifles are explosive tipped rounds. You can definitely make something that has an explosive filler that is a non-crew served weapon touch someone's hand and delete the rest of their torso with said filler with the technology in the Honor Harrington universe. Hell, given the right set-up, you could do that now, today, with some shoulder launched projectiles. Definitely not on the same order of Honorverse, but given how far in the future that takes place in, they probably have stuff that makes octanitrocubane of today look like fireworks by comparison.

[@Tarllybob]

@@williamhare4456 now if Weber would just finish the next book...

[@StarScapesOG]

Finally! No one ever talks about honorverse, despite how unusual the tech concepts are in it in comparison to the run of the mill sci-fi...

[@williamhare4456]

@@StarScapesOG the biggest problem is that the entire Honorverse setting falls into the uncanny valley. It has deep technical explanations and scientific explanations for every aspect of its space weapons but can’t explain how warped space time is powerful enough to “Destroys” energy, photons of light and doesn’t have any unintended effect on the universe. (Stars within light months of a side wall should be destabilized and explode.)

[@DarkVeghetta]

Atomics are awesome! - sincerely, the entirety of pre-Cold War SciFi

[@terranampire6077]

Love nukes, simple as.

[@g3heathen209]

Supposedly the soviets converted a freighter into a ship sized nuclear bomb.

[@vi6ddarkking]

For those who have ever played Stellaris you probably Know of the Kaizer moon and its over kill Main Mac. Why am I mentioning this in a Nuke Video. Because one we Build our own Attack moons in real life. That may be will be Main Gun. But unlike in Stellaris the shell will be either a Nova Bomb like in Halo. Or the equivalent of a nuclear flak shell where fleet killer amounts of nuclear shaped charges eliminate entire fleet formations per shot.

[@Sho_veL]

Sounds needlessly expensive when we can just spam nuclear missile spaceships but kool.

[@lunatixsoyuz9595]

Gundam Seed had a great nuclear showdown at the end. One side armed to the teeth with nuclear missiles while the other a nuclear laser weapon. It even featured a few weapons powered by nuclear reactors. Too bad one of those reactors was overloaded and had an unrealistic explosive meltdown, but the last few episodes got tons of nuclear fireworks as compensation.

[@paktahn]

glad to see someone post this seed is my favorite au of the gundam franchise i like how it actually had use of nuclear weapons

[@lunatixsoyuz9595]

@@paktahnI liked it when I was young, but looking back it had a lot of problems (a lot of it related to Jesus-kun syndrome in the latter half). I think the first half did an amazing job carrying the weight of the series, and the latter half was just so flashy that it was easy to get fooled that the plot was ridiculous. Though its talking points were decent.

[@paktahn]

@lunatixsoyuz9595 yeah the plot is no where on the level of universal century but the mobile suit designs are some of the best in the gundam franchise far better than the comically bad ones in g gundam

[@lunatixsoyuz9595]

@@paktahn I agree Seed had lots of solid designs, and I really liked how you could see an evolution to them, especially when you started including the spinoffs. On the other hand, G's designs were good in the fact that they were pretty over the top in styling. That said, there were other Gundam universes that were better than CE. I was a big fan of IBO, and Witch was good (though a bit lacking for a Gundam vet). And it's not like UC has it's own bad stories.

[@seanbrazell7095]

"Progress reports arriving. The farms of Aerolon are burning. The beaches of Canceron are burning. The plains of Leonis are burning. The jungles of Scorpia are burning. The pastures of Tauron are burning. The harbors of Picon are burning. The cities of Caprica are burning. The oceans of Aquaria are burning. The courthouses of Libran are burning. The forests of Virgon are burning. The Colonies of Man lie trampled at our feet. "

[@tomlawrence1335]

Fun fact the only reason the Orion project stopped was because of the ban on nuclear testing otherwise its a solid idea and testing proved promising. Also fun fact the fasted man made object ever launched into space was a man hole cover

[@Valen-vl5ds]

Project Orion 100% involved human passengers. the pusher plate was on the end of massive shock absorbers that would soften the acceleration from the blast and also it wasnt launched into orbit off a single nuke it was a series of small nukes of 1 kiloton or lower yield . Another thing that would help is that the Orion vehicle itself was super heavy like absolutely no weight cutting measures full steel construction with solid beams and lead shielding. the pusher plate itself was meters thick and of course it was carrying hundreds of these small nuclear bombs as fuel. the actual calculated acceleration was only up to 4g so very survivable for a human.

[@BartJBols]

I wonder if they would make the housing prices lower much near the space port

[@jimmyseaver3647]

What I find stupid is that when the military nukes the aliens in an invasion movie, they only use one. The trick is to use multiple. Skyline, terrible as it was, made that point clear when a nuke managed to actually cripple the alien mothership only for it to regenerate because nobody was in position to hit it again.

[@KristovMars]

SPOILER ALERT for "The Trade of Queens" by Charles Stross (book 6 of his Merchant Princes series)... . . . "The trick is to use multiple." At the end of this book series an all-out nuclear carpet-bombing is launched by the US against an enemy that just 9-11'd them a bit with a stolen nuke. Hundreds of warheads blanket most of a continent. Stross' description is awesome and horrific. I couldn't stop reading despite the horror on the page. Despite growing up during the cold war and knowing on some level that it might all just end one day. But thanks to my youth and living somewhere other than the US, it was always pretty abstract. Stross made it feel very real.

[@ptonpc]

I hated that film. The drone scene was the best part. Thankfully the sequel was better (Not hard considering how bad the first one was).

[@hobomacjones]

Cam Mitchell: "Well, like my Grandma used to say, 'if at first you don't succeed'…" Samantha Carter: "Try a larger thermo-nuclear reaction?" Mitchell: "Her words exactly."

[@MrMustang1945]

So… “How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb.”

[@anticlaassic]

YEEEEHAAAAAAAAW!!!!!!!!!!!

[@elitemook4234]

It’s honestly annoying how people have been conditioned to seriously underestimate how insanely powerful nukes and all conventional weapons are.

[@Tomyironmane]

either that or to consider them to be unstoppable world ending devices.

[@zeehero7280]

parry this filthy casual!

[@DOSFS]

@@Tomyironmane Country ending but not world ending... if not use enough----

[@anticlaassic]

Well yes, most people think getting shot is not a big deal as long as it doesn’t hit the heart or head. No, guns kill very agonizingly anywhere on the body.

[@be-noble3393]

I’m just happy the see The Forever War mentioned. It gets largely overshadowed but worth the the read.

[@Loskenne]

Thanks!

[@spinetanium3296]

I think one of the reasons BSG had fuck off levels of armor was that their ships were built in space, and powered by Tylium, which had insane energy density. They didn't have to worry about getting megaton-sized Battlestars into orbit.

[@Arbyfig]

well there is no real statement that battlestars were constructed planetside then launched into orbit, I mean the fact that we never see Galactica in atmosphere (other than the adama maneuver also) suggests that it is not atmosphere rated, not to mention ships could just jump into orbit. If we consider BSG deadlock canon than the battlestars were built on Daedalus or other shipyards

[@dakkath414]

Sunny D(estruction): apply directly to the forehead

[@mechwar31]

"will always be portrayed as a one hit kill" meanwhile, in Battlestar Galactica...

[@ryank5424]

"I say we off and nuke the site from orbit.....It's the only way to be sure"

[@Finsterfeuer]

Perry Rhodan is a good book series for nukes. The main weapon for a long time are nukes in the 1000-6000 Gigaton range. A ship isn't stoping on your command? Just plant an atomic sun in front of them and they will stop or be vaporized. Transformkanonen fire these 1000 Gigaton nukes faster then light and with a rate of 1 every 7 seconds. PRAISE THE NUKLAER SUN.

[@spatialgaming1967]

Following the sentiment expressed by a very smart foxgirl tech. If you want to destroy an interstellar warship, you need nukes, and lots of 'em!

[@ericzaiz8358]

They actually did test the Casaba Howitzer in the early 60s to test it out for a anti ICBM weapon. It worked really well. They also tested out the bomb pump laser as well... It... worked but it didnt have enough OOOFT to do any add damage.

[@CJ_Welch]

Here comes the sun~ Fucking oh no! Something so bright it’ll sunburn your soul!

[@ThatsMrPencilneck2U]

Back in the 1960's, the ships in Star Trek had weapons far more powerful than nukes, but nuclear weapons were still very much respected. By the 1970's, with Star Wars, space weapons were just flashy lights without much oomph. After that 1st SW film, Star Trek's idea of space weapons became underwhelming, as the whole genera went straight down hill. I didn't see another exciting space battle, until some things that looked like a cross between a spider and your worst nightmare arrived at the Narn colony in Sector 14.

[@Reddotzebra]

My favorite weapons tech in Sci-fi is still just teleporting nukes aboard your enemy's ship. Or the slightly more convoluted tachyon waveguide cannon, which converts nukes into FTL particle bursts that then turn back into nukes INSIDE your enemy's ship, made slightly less impressive by having a high failure rate when fired at ships using gravity compression technology.

[@tomarmadiyer2698]

We got the mw4 music and then Is that Dwarf Fortress on the outtro? *Sings the funky dwarf song*

[@jordan_Paul233]

Commander: "Load NHEAT!" Gunner: "Nuclear High Explosive Anti-Tank loaded!"

[@kreedome]

in the early parts of the book series "backyard starship" the main character uses a nuke pumped x-ray laser to obliterate a larger opponent

[@CharliMorganMusic]

Nuclear shaped charge. Pretty sure that would punch through the earth's crust

[@CharliMorganMusic]

1m of water will block neutrons. However, it's heavy

[@IrrationalTriangle]

So BSG the Galactica is the only ship able to tank a nuke in the fleet. I believe due to "Depleted uranium" meter thick armor. (could be another substance but Uranium sounds cooler)

[@meiketorkelson4437]

In one of my books, I use a nuke on the Moon to throw up enough material to take out a space cruiser in orbit.

[@peridoodle2644]

Slight correction, when the second stage of a Thermonuclear weapon ignites, it is not fissionable materials undergoing fusion, it's hydrogen. If I remember correctly they usually use Tritium

[@Jaeger_Bishop]

You totally missed the oppertunity to make a "Children of Atom" reference....

[@isaacstandley730]

I'm so happy you went into different ways to use nukes. I recently learned of the nuclear explosively shaped projectile idea and love the idea of uaing nukes to throw boulders at significant fractions of the speed of light.

[@HOLO_Enjoyer]

Good to see this is new channel is working out well. Much as i love wows there's not much you can make with it.

[@ghostridergunship]

One of those internet videos that has been seared into my brain is an old video of tickle-me-elmo being lit on fire while laughing. This video intro reminded me of this.

[@Sho_veL]

Sir! They’ve opened fire. And they’re shooting.. melon howitzers at us…

[@barrybend7189]

So disappointed you aren't showing the Gundam GP02 because it's designed to use a nuclear weapon and ride the edge of the shockwave.

[@mill2712]

Like an Orion Drive.

[@barrybend7189]

@@mill2712 nope just sit there at near point blank and defy God.

[@one-shotrailgun8713]

​​@@barrybend7189so just like the Orion Drive? I agree with the second part of "defy god" (as realistically the gundam should be disintegrated without a massive shockplate.) but the first part is literally what the Orion Drive does. Blow up nukes point blank.

[@yankeeclipper4326]

Glad to see The Forever War recommended. Such a great book that is largely forgotten today.

[@scrollkeeper5272]

Nukes in games and media will always be a great source of fun and horror.

[@Poctyk]

It's interesting how thanks to technology nukes rapidly shrank in yields after the 60s

[@paktahn]

it wasnt so much technology as it was scientists who realized that damage does not necessarily scale with size and that you get more bang for your buck from the same amount of fissionable material by dividing it among multiple smaller bombs that is why all united states ballistic submarines carry mirv warheads on each missile they one missile can lay waste to a massive swath of land or can hit multiple targets in different locations

[@Poctyk]

@@paktahn But that's precisely because of technology. If your reentry vehicle strikes within

[@paktahn]

@@Poctyk i hate to tell you but virtually all modern nukes dont need to be within 200m to destroy a target the bomb dropped on Hiroshima had a blast radius of over 1500 meters the bomb had a yield of 13 kilotons a single modern mk5 w88 mirv warhead has a yield of 475 kilotons with a blast radius of over 9000 meters it has nothing to do with the technology as i had stated in my earlier reply as i said as yield increases blast radius does not increase proportionally you can cause more destruction over an area with the same amount of fissionable material if you spread it out rather than use it all in one spot this is the main reason nuclear weapons got smaller not that they became more accurate and the change to smaller was made over 50 years ago

[@Poctyk]

@@paktahn >had a blast radius of over 1500 meters And barely damaged the bomb shelters. Good luck damaging something like reinforced nuclear missile silo without a direct hit. Again the reason why MIRVs became popular is because better technology allowed missiles to lob them close enough so that even relatively smaller warhead (only a few hundred kilotons) could still take out important targets like command bunkers. You "win" (noone wins) nuclear war by making sure that enemy can't launch nukes not by terror bombing cities.

[@paktahn]

@@Poctyk the mirv warheads are not meant to take out silos that is what the minutemen single large warhead icbms are for the united states cold war nuclear response plans have been public for quite a while the land based icbms are targeting hardened structures the subs along with bombers are to be used on airbases important infrastructure that would support a war effort and your idea of winning is wrong because it is an impossible goal even if you were to initiate a first strike the launches would be detected by satellite and radar giving enough time for the other side to retaliate with their own icbms there is no way for one side to knock out the others ability to retaliate with any publicly known weapons the terror bombing of cities you mentioned is the exact reason that neither side is willing to risk all out nuclear war

[@thelordofcringe]

One argument against MAC cannons and railguns is that the metallurgy required to make barrels that dont fall apart after a couple shots is less realistic than faster than light travel.

[@thanqualthehighseer]

i'm slightly disappointed that this wasn't voiced by Elmo. and then da bomb go boooooooom.

[@dracphelan]

If you want to read an interesting application of project Orion, read Footfall by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle.

[@zeehero7280]

Praise Atom! let all be divided in his glory! Atom's glow shall bless the universe!

[@mrfawkes9110]

This may be your best thumbnail.

[@leonpeters-malone3054]

The thing about nukes and a vacuum? They're worse. You see instead of that nice big fireball, pressure wave, all that fun stuff. It's all energy in the X-ray spectrum. And if my memory is right, about 1 megaton per 100m of instant death turn to goo. And that's before we talk inverse square law. And that's before we talk about what it does to your ship. Systems? Metals. X-Rays do bad, bad things.

[@Fyrwulf]

One of the ABM systems (Spartan, I think?) had a large but very efficient warhead specifically designed to disable ICBMs warheads using this phenomenon. Actually, a lot of the warhead designs from that era were very interesting.

[@craigmorris4083]

There is a movie about loving the bomb. I highly recommend it to everyone. 😊

[@geoffreyentwistle8176]

My own personal favorite nuclear weapon is one I designed myself in Children of a Dead Earth: the miniature nuclear shell. It's a bomb the size of a soda can that's a viable boosted fission explosive, and weighs so little that is viable as a kinetic weapon payload. Or as nuclear flak. Its yield is less than 2 tons, but it has about 5kg of mass... Quantity can sometimes be a viable replacement for quality, if you can build it right. XD

[@jaredcolon4535]

I love that you have a picture of Elmo smiling like yes nuclear weapons cause destruction big boom as if Elmo was to be saying "Elmo will start nuclear war, for FUN HA HA HAHAHA HA HA HA"

[@RorikH]

Outside of the Orion Drive, there's another awesome nuclear-explosion powered propulsion system in which you basically dissolve a bunch of uranium in water, keeping it surrounded with dampening rods when stored, and then pump it into the reaction chamber for your engine, where, no longer dampened, the uranium goes critical and pushes you forward on a plume of radioactive steam moving at up to a few percent of the speed of light. No one's ever tested the idea because in the event that it does work you have created a cloud of radioactive steam moving at several percent of the speed of light, which is not considered desirable to anyone in the same biosphere. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_salt-water_rocket

[@BartJBols]

This would be incredibly wasteful, you would in essence be throwing out perfectly fine fuel still burning as exhaust. It would be more efficient and powerful to keep the uranium inside the craft heating up the water.

[@Jackthetech]

I had to pause on the "Kyle Hill, Scifi Jesus" cause I was giggling too much.

[@bartlester591]

When you’re talking about nuclear or nuclear plus weapons, I prefer the nova bomb from Andromeda an idea where you can shoot it into a star and turn that star into a temporary black hole

[@joshuahudnell7401]

Still can't get over this thumbnail.

[@tx31]

Glory to atom! 🤪 Side note: Sad you didn't add the noot noot when talking about nuke shape charge. Would have been a fun shout out to fellow si-fi youtuber where I learn that was even a thing to begin with.

[@JCDFlex]

Well done sir, I see what you did there! o7 GLORY TO ATOM!

[@8vantor8]

PRAISE BE ONTO ATOM

[@fl00fydragon]

If you on't mind I am going to use the idea of using the reactor core and it's shielding as a way to protect the crew in a story I am writing.

[@jarredeagley1748]

Using nukes to strip point defense and engines is a very important lesson to learn in COADE

[@foracal5608]

Mmm a nuke pumped laser or a nuke shape charge that could if assualting a massive bunker would be the tool of choice

[@davidnemoseck9007]

Loved the video. When's Steve coming back?

[@bulvan1323]

Poseidon Torpedo, because you're not done with washing away your enemies but also want them to drink toxic water 🌊🏙️🤢

[@OptimusJedi]

I endorse this video.

[@matthewdarwin9729]

Halo nova bomb was 9 nukes bound together with a rare earth element casing that infused the bomb into something far bigger. I.E. bye bye moon

[@generalnawaki]

The Sun Eater series has nukes and its the new Dune.

[@zeehero7280]

some forms of Clarketech energy shields can shrug off nuclear detonations, at least from nukes up to a certain size. but several nukes will still collapse even an asgard shield system. Not to mention Stargate has the Naquadah Enhanced nukes, Mark9s, Gatebusters, which can wipe out a small country with a single warhead. so, a nuke but bigger.

[@thelordofcringe]

Naquadriah nukes took it to absurd levels in sg1, was pretty cool

[@Chaun1998]

Just you you are aware, there is a Sci-Fi series called The Deathworlders, by user Hambone, that exists almost exclusively online. Somewhere around Chapter 30-35 Daar uses 7 or 8 12.25 Gigaton Nukes to destroy an orbital ring. It's literally just a huge ring space station, around a planet. I don't know what a Gigaton blast would look like, but I kinda want to see, I'm just worried that one of those being let loose on the surface of the planet, might accidentally devastate a continent. kzbin.info/aero/PL0TV2mCk83zBbWxnbA7ndfHFlctKzHGIL

[@moffjendob6796]

Aww.. missed on Honorverse, which uses the the missile that shoots a nuke that shoots a buttload of lasers as the primary armament.

[@highlordtedpool6081]

Let us bathe the world in Adams holy glow.

[@leerman22]

Also many of these nuclear weapons can be powered by ACF bombs, antimatter getting freaky with lithium deuteride!

[@albusplaustrum06]

Blessed are the Children of the Atom who bathe themselves in His glow.

[@phalanx3803]

lol i just had a thought for a normal nuke you say the power of the Sun but when its in the form of a bomb pumped laser you could say the power of a Quasar.

[@luxordeathbed]

May the blessing of Blake be visited on the heretics...

[@abnegazher]

My beef with nukes is that they're all too small, too "TaCtIcAl" today. We need moon-sized nukes.

[@bananaborn4785]

meaby i do actualy like nukes...

[@kwyoushyt6356]

Sci you will get molested by tanknerds by statin the HEAT jet in a shaped charge is being liquified, it's not

[@legionofthedamned157]

I hear meters of armor and looks at 40k

[@cp1cupcake]

You should have released this video on August 15th or September 2nd. Because the date of Nuclear Weapon Appreciation Day changes based on where you live.

[@Funkin_Disher]

To be fair, if you happen to be a member of the Black Watch then nukes ARE just a mild inconvenience.

[@ptonpc]

Buckets of instant sunshine! Space combat in Peter F Hamilton's universe feature heat management too.

[@catgath9718]

For the algorithm

[@Annihilator2011]

A-Bombs work well on earth because of three factors: The Ground, Gravity and Atmosphere. The major destructive force of an atomic bomb is the over pressure wave and subsequent vacuum the detonation creates in the atmosphere which spreads the force across the ground and violently draws it back as the air rushes in to fill the space the detonation created. (This is why an airburst detonation at approximately 2000 feet creates far more damage than a detonation at ground level.) In outer space there is no gravity or atmosphere so the force of the detonation is radiated outward in an omnidirectional pattern, without atmosphere to transmit the energy only a very small portion of that force would be applied to the target... If it were possible to create a shaped nuclear charge that applied it's force in one direction it would be an effective weapon against space ships and platforms but I do not believe there is currently any method of shaping a nuclear detonation.

[@fredlandry6170]

In Battletech they love Nukes! 🥰

[@karos009]

nuclear bombs overall in space do the same thing as plasma. melt armor.

[@failsc2player]

You know, when you set off an explosion that in a fraction of a second generates more energy then the sun and creates light strong enough flat out kill you... yeah, totally on par with regular bombs.

[@thelordofcringe]

We literally detonate regular explosives far larger than the smallest nukes.

[@AdmiralSpaceballs]

real shame that The expanse did not go on , they had ideas for much better stuff then nukes

[@Imperial.Monarch]

I have found home. Glory to the Bomb!

[@SoloRenegade]

A tank with a mobility kill is not "useless". a mobility kill means only its propulsion is out, not the weapons or crew. It can still shoot, it is still a well armored pillbox with firepower.

[@Poctyk]

With proliferation of AT weapons, including something as (relatively) simple as RPG warhead dropped from a drone, or any kind of guided weapons, you really should bail from mobility killed tank unless you want to become a hero

[@SoloRenegade]

@@Poctyk sure, depends upon the context. But I have Personally done this in actual combat, in an environment in which the enemy had the means of penetrating our armored vehicles. Sometimes there are other factors at play and it's perfectly ok to sit tight and shoot back. We'd often park and let them shoot at us, because other factors made it even more dangerous to move, or because we couldn't abandon the guys in the downed vehicle etc. And if it called, for it we might also assault or flank the attackers if we could.

[@highlorddarkstar]

@@SoloRenegade insofar as a mobility kill means you’re unable to complete your mission objective, that makes you useless for the mission purposes. You are correct that it doesn’t make you useless, but you’re going to be waiting for recovery not achieving your actual objectives.

[@SoloRenegade]

@@highlorddarkstar "You are correct that it doesn’t make you useless, but you’re going to be waiting for recovery not achieving your actual objectives." as opposed to? do you plan on jumping out stripping down naked and running in circles screaming? of course you're going to wait for recovery, or move to the rear. It's not like you can push forward. Pillboxes are valuable though. If you're claiming pill boxes and bunkers are worthless, then maybe you should go to Ukraine and teach them how to breach teh Russian lines.

[@highlorddarkstar]

@@SoloRenegade no, all I’m claiming is that “useless “ depends on your point of view. If you’re the general in charge of the operation a mobility casualty is useless. If you’re closer to the action, you can do useful things with a stalled gun. So referring to your tank turned pillbox as “useless “ isn’t unfair or incorrect, even if you have other uses.