Ancient Shields or Asgard Shields?

[JSPuddlejumper]

I believe it was brute force.

Why? Beam weapons have been proven time and again to be devastating against all shields.

And the Asgard beam sliced through the Ori ship (see the last battle against the 2 Ori ships). That is raw power.

Final note: Instead of launching 1000's of drones against Atlantis via Stargate, the Asurans launched a beam.


Against very advanced shields, beam weapons are the most effective.

And drones from the Asuran ship did no apparent damage to the Apollo.

[kirmit]

I believe it was brute force.

Why? Beam weapons have been proven time and again to be devastating against all shields.

And the Asgard beam sliced through the Ori ship (see the last battle against the 2 Ori ships). That is raw power.

Final note: Instead of launching 1000's of drones against Atlantis via Stargate, the Asurans launched a beam.


Against very advanced shields, beam weapons are the most effective.

And drones from the Asuran ship did no apparent damage to the Apollo.

The asgard beams likely had some level of force but imo no where near even to take down an Ori shield. The actual ship itself is a different matter, for all we know their ships could very fragile, it's only the shields that make them so formittable. In 'unending' they mention the beams causing the shields to fluctuate and right after the beams hit the ships thrusters causing a huge explosion.

[JSPuddlejumper]

If the Daedalus and the Apollo get the new weapons upgrades in season 4, I think you see how truly devastating the Asgard weapons are going to be.

Those Asgard beam weapons were specifically designed to slice through shields like a hot knife through butter.

[Betelgeuze]

It's hard to say, because we have never seen a fully functioning Ancient warship in a combat situation. The Atlantis shield is so strong partly because it is powered by a ZPM. Both the Ancients and the Asgard were at war for a long time before there demise, this would have led to advancements in shield technology for both races. I personally think that the Ancient shields are more powerful than the Asgard shields because they are more advanced overall.


But i wonder how much of the technology on Atlantis is the most advanced tech the Ancients had,Atlantis is millions of years old. Now the Ancients would have upgraded the shield when the war started. But if the Ancients are like humans, they might have tried to keep Atlantis as close to it's original state as possible fo historical reasons. This would explain why the transporters on Atlantis appear to be less advanced then the Asgard transporters. The technology that Merlin and Morgan used may very well have been invented by non-ascended Ancients. Just because it has not been found in Atlantis doesn't mean it was not invented by non-ascended Ancients.


I don't know to what extend Asuran technology can be used as a measure for Ancient technology, because they might try to emulate the Ancients, but they are not the same species, and Niam admitted that there was alot they do not know about the Ancients, so it's likely that the same can be said about their knowledge of Ancient technology. They might know a lot, but they don't know everything.

[kirmit]

If the Daedalus and the Apollo get the new weapons upgrades in season 4, I think you see how truly devastating the Asgard weapons are going to be.

Those Asgard beam weapons were specifically designed to slice through shields like a hot knife through butter.

I don't think they're going to have the impact you're hoping for. The Asgard weapons were designed to deal with the Ori's fluctuations, so if a ship doesn't have those fluctuations they're going to have a much greater time of overcoming them. They weren't designed like a hot knife through butter, that would be Ori beams against Ha'tak shields lol. It took the asgard beams quite a few shots before they even caused the Ori shields to fluctuation and then 2-3 shots to take out the ship, causing many secondary explosions in the process.

Against the Wraith, the beams with only work as well if they hit the dart bays or mechanical areas of the ships, I don't think they'd do much damage against the purple armour.

[phoenixatlantios]

If you include Atlantis, definitely.

But I am talking about regular ships.

Logically, their regular ships should have somewhat similar shield strength. But then, how could the Wraith ever win, even with 100 to 1 numbers.

Hehe, deactivating lurk mode:

I find it most intriguing that people are arguing that the Asgard shields are more potent than the Alteran ones. I've always assumed the Alteran shield technology was leagues ahead of the Asgard ones, mostly because at the start of season 8 of SG-1 Thor mentions the Asgard have "barely scratched the surface" of the Alteran library of knowledge (which to me indicates they wouldn't have had been able to create more advanced technology than the Alterans yet, else they'd have breezed through at least part of it).

Regarding the "white shield" being more potent; where does the theory that visible light dictates shield strength come from? It's an interesting theory, though I'm having difficulty understanding the apparent connection between reflecting visible light making a shield more potent versus absorbing it said light. I thought the most potent shield available would obliterate or absorb light photons (and all matter) as they impacted it, not reflect them all away. I'm interested to learn more if there's some sort of reasoning behind it?

One day the Atlantis team might find a fully operational Asgard or Alteran ship and fight the Asurans with it (they could find one in a time dilation field and try to figure out how to externally disable said field). It'd answer a few of the questions here, and I'm eager to see a fully functional Alteran ship functioning, even though it'd inevitably have to be sacrificed to maintain military balance.

Out of Alteran or Asgard shields I'd have to say the Alteran puddle-jumper shields look the best visually, though I really don't like the frozen look the other Alteran shields tend to have (especially in Adrift, the city shield is "frozen" like plastic - I expected it to be like energy swarming over a surface). If I had to pick the coolest looking from the Franchise though it'd have to be the Ori one from Beachhead; even though it weakened a lot you have to give it credit for encasing a planet in a blue bubble.

(As a side note: The buffer versus no buffer explanation regarding shield power was quite cool though, thanks whoever wrote that - it certainly does make a lot of sense).

[kirmit]

Hehe, deactivating lurk mode:

I find it most intriguing that people are arguing that the Asgard shields are more potent than the Alteran ones. I've always assumed the Alteran shield technology was leagues ahead of the Asgard ones, mostly because at the start of season 8 of SG-1 Thor mentions the Asgard have "barely scratched the surface" of the Alteran library of knowledge (which to me indicates they wouldn't have had been able to create more advanced technology than the Alterans yet, else they'd have breezed through at least part of it).

When thor said that he was refering to the entire database, not just shielding. Besides just because you're researching another races technology does not mean certain aspects of your does not already surpass them. Ancients may of been alot better with DNA structuring and things like that whereas the Asgard could be better with shields etc. I think Asgard shields surpass normal Alterran shields but not their Atlantis shield, that is the mother of all shields.

[JSPuddlejumper]

On the whole, the Ancients are more advanced than the Asgard.

But we are talking about a particular piece of technology. And since the Ancients were at peace for most of their existence, they are unlikely to research shield technology and weapons technology as much.

The Asgard on the other hand had to protect a lot of worlds against the G'ould, and had a prolonged war against the Replicators.

Finally, once you start approaching a technology plateau, advancement is very slow or none-existant. Imagine earth tech 30, 000 years from now.

Ancient warships had to be upgraded to travel between galaxies...


A lot of people assume that because it Ancient tech, it is definitely #1, without using evidence, logic or reasoning (thinking).

[phoenixatlantios]

A lot of people assume that because it Ancient tech, it is definitely #1, without using evidence, logic or reasoning (thinking).

I have to say I don't particularly like the implication that I and others do not think using logic or reasoning purely because we came to a different conclusion to you. The Alterans have been shown time and again during Stargate to be the single most advanced race to ever inhabit the milky way and their only known weakness is their overconfidence and limited numbers. The Alterans were able to create compact and efficient personal shields, shielded warships that could apparently easily dispatch hives (till overwhelmed by several) and the shield Atlantis used to withstand extreme siege.

The Alterans were on the brink of ascension during their war with the Wraith, and during that time would have made quite significant strides in military power, even though they seem to have had drone weapons and powerful shield technology before they originally left earth in Atlantis. Their society survived for an incredibly long period of time, constantly researching how the universe works and it's limitations. When they came to a period of war they would have had quite a lot of information to guide their decisions on how to create technology for shielding and such.

I don't recall finding out exactly how long the Asgard were fighting the replicators ("some time ago" from series 3 is quite vague), so I'm not easily able to determine how long they were building up shielding technology. I do think that the "barely scratched the surface" quote is quite relevant however, though it would be impossible to determine which sections they scratched. It would be fairly logical to assume that they had quite a general interest in the database though, as while they would require shield, weapon and power research to aid their war with the replicators, they would also have required the biology research to save their degenerating physiology, they certainly did some time-related research and I imagine they would've had some interest in the idea of ascension as well.

From outside the world of Stargate, I have the impression that the writers wished to make the Alterans the most technologically advanced race in the series (character quotes seem to indicate this) but also show that being technologically advanced isn't everything by having their race have crippling weaknesses (overconfidence/arrogance(?)/low population).

Based on all of that I would like to believe that my thoughts on the Alteran shield technology being superior to that of the Asgard is based on logic and reasoning. In the end only time will tell which side has the more powerful warship shields, as currently there have been no equal battles with fully functional ships of both Asgard and Alteran design to gage from.

Aside from that problematic comment, the majority of the arguments given for the Asgard shielding being superior to the Alteran ones are quite interesting, the attention to detail of several of the people here is quite impressive. Listing how they understand the different types of shields to work, what their limitations are, and so forth is certainly worth reading (for me anyway).

I still would like to know more about the logic behind the light reflection making a shield more powerful theory though, that one does elude me.

For the original question when I answered with the puddle jumper shield I must admit I completely forgot about the personal shield. I haven't seen a Asgard personal shield yet, and I thought the Alteran one was quite fun, so I'd change my answer to that. I like the Alteran Personal Shield the most

[jrd231]

Originally posted by Kirmit
I don't think they're going to have the impact you're hoping for. The Asgard weapons were designed to deal with the Ori's fluctuations, so if a ship doesn't have those fluctuations they're going to have a much greater time of overcoming them. They weren't designed like a hot knife through butter, that would be Ori beams against Ha'tak shields lol. It took the asgard beams quite a few shots before they even caused the Ori shields to fluctuation and then 2-3 shots to take out the ship, causing many secondary explosions in the process.

Against the Wraith, the beams with only work as well if they hit the dart bays or mechanical areas of the ships, I don't think they'd do much damage against the purple armour.

I'm not sure what you're basing this on. They never said the Asgard developed beam technology specifically to defeat Ori shields. They make no mention of anything that could even lead you to this determination. All the Asgard ever say is they are giving the Tau'ri all of their most advanced technology. If you go back and watch "Unending" it takes roughly 3-4 hits from an Asgard beam weapon to destroy an Ori battleship. Whether it has anything to do with where the beam hit is irrelevant. It took roughly 3-4 hits from an Ori beam weapon to take out the Odyssey. These two ships are on simliar levels.

Actually, they make no reference as to how the Ori shields fluctuate. When hit by the Asgard beam weapon does the power to the shields fluctuate, or does the shield frequency fluctuate? Do both? Are they mutually exclusive? Who knows why the Asgard weapon causes the shields to fluctuate or how they do.

All we know is that Asgard beam weapons can penetrate Ori shields and destroy an Ori battleship in roughly 3-4 direct hits.

Also, I watched Lifeline, and I guess I can go back and look again, but I couldn't tell if the Asuran ship was firing drone weapons or not. They looked like run of the mill energy weapons. I can't imagine that the Apollo, even if it had upgraded Asgard shields (they never said it did) could withstand an attack from Ancient drone weapon tech and suffer on damage.

[JackHarkness_Hot]

I think the Asgard shield are far more powerful because the Ancients left millions of years ago while the Asgard continued to clone and further their technology. That's over million of years of development, and secondly, the Ancient shield maybe great but definitely need the use of ZPM just to keep it going in a fire fight, unlike the Asgard shields that could take quite a punching before it fails.

[thekillman]

well it depends on the situation. on our battlecruisers, id prefer asgard ones. ancient ones probably coulnt even be switched on. if they could, then an ori beam would cut right through it, as our powersources cant handle the stress.

if i had the oddysey, id prefer ancient ones.