Explanation of Lantean Stupidity

[Tetsujin]

Interesting theory. It might also be possible that the Wraith did in fact have a fleet of Hiveships that were made into "Superhives" via multiple stolen ZPMs during the war. Then over the thousands of years since then, having exhausted all of the stolen ZPMs, they had no way of powering the superhives and dismantled them.

It would make some sense. For example, even though Atlantis is technically far more powerful than the Daedalus, if they had no ZPMs, the Daedalus would be far more useful.

This would be likely except for the fact that it took them a while to figure out how to make the ZPM compatible with the organic systems of the hiveships. This would seem to imply that research in combining the two haven't been done or was not successful during the war. This would also seem to contradict the statements that the wraith won through numbers.

Also any ship in the SG universe would be superior to another if you removed the ships source of power. The only difference here is the Lanteans and Asurans are the only ones who have been shown to manufacture ZPMs.

[Tetsujin]

http://forum.gateworld.net/threads/8...1#post13970944

1.
I am not nessesarily saying you pulled it from nowhere. Just from what I am seen my theories have more of the canon behind them than yours. If you have a few instances of an ability and a large quantity of instances without that ability the latter is most likely to be the norm. You can argue the possibility of the Wraith being able to detect Lantean ships through their cloak but at this point with the current information it is only a possibility and not a likelihood.


2.
I will and have agreed that neither of us can be absolutely certain of our claims. At the same time I do not agree that our claims have the same level of credibility, even if the disparity changes based on the exact subject. You tend to argue towards the limitation of an super advanced civilization that has been touted of being so advanced that even the next advanced species 10,000 years later could not fully understand their technology. This makes your arguments have less credibility than mine on a fundamental level. You are applying the limitation you would expect of human technology when the Ancients at almost every turn have proven they are beyond all other races in what they are capable of technologically even after 10,000 years of being gone.


3.
Although the disparity in ship strength may support your major thesis, it is fairly strong evidence against your minor thesis because, quite frankly, Lantean stupidity isn't a sufficient explanation for their defeat. In other words, even if we assume that that the Lanteans were incredibly stupid (or at least incredibly bad strategists), they still couldn't have lost.[/quote]

You are failing that what you call the “major thesis” is an either or in the Lanteans being dumb or the writing being bad. You have given no strong evidence that the Wraith were any more powerful than they are now, only the possibility(even though unlikely). Given that all information on the show I could find indicates either stupidity in universe or bad writing I do not see how you can feel I am incorrect with the evidence you have given. I too believe that they should not have lost, but the fact is they did either through not exploiting technology they could have or through the writers needing them to lose and not wanting to bother coming up with a good reason.


4.
While a ZPM does make a ships more powerful within what its fundamental technology is capable of handling, even a ZPM powered Aurora can have their shields depleted and must allow them to recharge as they are not of the same capability as the shields on cityships which are impenetrable until there is no more power. We also still do not know the number of Wraith ships, the duration of combat, or any other circumstances surrounding the engagement. This particular instance does us no good as we have no information surrounding these events and no way to extrapolate one way or the other with any accuracy because of it.

4.
Again how is it different in a way that makes it applicable across the scope of the entire Wraith-Lantean War?

5.
I did not even imply that there would not need to be any structural supports at all so I do not see the relevance. Again without energy limitation figures we do not know what the upper limitation of structural support is. We also have to keep in mind we are dealing with materials that are far beyond what we build with. If the strength of their construction materials were that limited they would not have made the ships so large to begin with, especially since they have to be durable enough to land.

Also since the wraith ships are organic in nature microfractures or even minor structural failures would not be that big of an issue unless they compromised overall integrity since they will just heal.


6.
How much power would your sensors really take if you have to make your ships hive ship size. Also given that even a ZPM powered hive could not fully penetrate the cloak seems to lean towards the wraith simply not having sensors that can penetrate the cloak at all under normal circumstances.

Yes, but that would only be so if it was near efficient at least. Building a ship large enough that you have to overburden its insides with generators to try and compensate makes no sense. You would just build a smaller ship within the sweet spot power:weight or at least near it.




7.
Again I am missing how this can be taken as they evolved due to extreme aggression. They seemed to have evolved due to it being in their coding to make themselves effective.




8.
Or that they were researching it and another batch of replicators did it themselves. Your very quote about the Asurans shows that the intent was to make smaller weapons and nanites are bordering on as good as it gets. They might have researched making them human form at some point but that does not mean that was the conclusion of their research.



9.
Well that is a limitation of your imagination and not the technology. Go watch Terminator 2 and then we can talk about how nanites in larger form can have their uses. Fact of the matter is they can be in any shape they want. That is objectively more useful than a static shape if no effectiveness is lost. This is factually true without you feeling so.

10.
The point is that they have a very powerful shield capable of smashing into and boring through energy shields and armor. The explosive on a dart that would be able to defeat said shield would most likely be enough to destroy the dart itself and may or may not destroy the drone. If they possessed the technology to destroy drones at the dart level with reactive armor why would they not have applied this to all larger ships?


11.
I agree that these may support a reactive armor, but they also may support using the explosive mechanic of the drone inside a vessel and decreasing the energy spent burrowing different holes through the ship. Any explosions near the hull could be the result of the drone damaging something volatile. Drones are limited by the level of control a person can exert over them and their creativity when controlled manually. It is more likely that when on auto the drones merely explode when impacting a smaller target while they burrow into larger targets then detonate.

12.
If you follow the exact same rules for every single species or culture, which would not be fair or effective. You couldnt just destroy species because you dont like them, but maybe your could if they were proven detrimental to all around them. Also given that without introduction to Ancient technology the Goa'uld might have been a different species entirely we cannot assume what the ascended Ancients would do about them. Given that they are irredeemably evil on a genetic level at this point I do not see why they would keep them around and allow them to negate the possibility of any other species making headway.

13.
If you can call taking away just enough of his power to not make him ascended anymore but letting him keep anything that a Goa'uld could potentially acquire and then go on a killing spree not a punishment. Also the fact that since Anubis was not ascended Oma could have destroyed him on the corporeal plane but was restricted from doing so thus had to sacrifice herself. If forcing her to deal with him was the punishment then they would have left hum completely alone and told Oma to deal with him.(more or less)



14.
Other than shun you. Also there really isnt much evidence of ascended being being able to do anything on any real scale other than Orlin and Chaya Shar. In Orlins case it showed fully how irrational the ascended beings are. Instead of taking away the weapon and sealing the memory of it(which they are shown capable of doing), or maybe even just not allowing its construction in the first place they destroy the entire civilization. In Chaya's case they allowed her to protect the planet but only those on the planet at that time and no one else. This one I can at least see as partially fair as the Wraith are not “evil”(even though they are jerks) and merely hungry. In Oma Desala's case she simply helped individuals by showing them the possibility of ascension with them doing the mental/spiritual legwork themselves.

15.
That comment was in no way meant as factual but as personal opinion(I thought it was obvious enough based on the “I'd be willing to bet” part). It was not meant to argue anything really other than my sneaking suspicion someone knew beforehand who he was which is why they also demoted him post haste. My statements are backed by the show when they are actually meant for the sake of debate but are you attempting to say that since I made this one statement based on mostly personal opinion that all my other statements have no backing?

16.
You may just not run your generators at full capacity at all time. That doesn't really mean that you will get rid of some entirely. We also do not know the size nor the type of reactor the wraith use for power generation. It is most likely avoided for the fact that they do not want to open that can of worms, because the wraith are supposedly energy limited in their technology. The ambiguity and lack of other technology to ballpark the Wraith means we do not know where to place wraith power generation at all so any speculation on them being more or less powerful and thus affecting ship size can be only speculation based on what we desire and not based on canon.

[Ripple in Space]

This would be likely except for the fact that it took them a while to figure out how to make the ZPM compatible with the organic systems of the hiveships.

That's not necessarily a contradiction. Just because the Wraith could do something 10,000 years ago doesn't mean it would come easy to them now. Even with 21st century tech, we'd struggle to duplicate the Great Pyramids. Also Todd mentioned something specifically about Hiveship engineers being few and far between. We also know they had that entire breeding facility based around integrating a ZPM with their organic technologies.

This would seem to imply that research in combining the two haven't been done or was not successful during the war. This would also seem to contradict the statements that the wraith won through numbers.

Also any ship in the SG universe would be superior to another if you removed the ships source of power. The only difference here is the Lanteans and Asurans are the only ones who have been shown to manufacture ZPMs.

That was my point... If they had anything like a Superhive 10,000 years ago, it would only make sense to decomission it after they ran out of stolen ZPMs, as it would be a sitting duck without a proper power source.

[Tetsujin]

That's not necessarily a contradiction. Just because the Wraith could do something 10,000 years ago doesn't mean it would come easy to them now. Even with 21st century tech, we'd struggle to duplicate the Great Pyramids. Also Todd mentioned something specifically about Hiveship engineers being few and far between. We also know they had that entire breeding facility based around integrating a ZPM with their organic technologies.

True, but at the same time we are talking about a constant culture of beings rather than entirely different culture from long ago. Ancient Egyptians(and other cultures) have their mysteries because a lot of what they did was either not written down or destroyed/lost, cloacked in myth and allegory, or simply can not be understood because of the language barrier. The Wraith dont have that same level of issue which are further stunted by them going into stasis for hundreds of years at a time and being a telepathic species.

That was my point... If they had anything like a Superhive 10,000 years ago, it would only make sense to decomission it after they ran out of stolen ZPMs, as it would be a sitting duck without a proper power source.

That is an if that was never mentioned and probably would have been considering a superhive can duke it out with a fully powered cityship and would have brought the Lanteans a whole different level of headache. It was also stated that they captured 3 ZPMs and they were all used for the cloning facility the Wraith used to win the war and were later depleted.

These are possibilities, but not likely based on the canon.

[Mister Oragahn]

The attero device had a flaw that was largely detrimental to the Wraith. They needed the gates to move fast and send their drones and darts through them, notably for gathering food.
The Lanteans had superior FTL drives.
It just kept destroying devices which may have been precious, as we're supposed to believe, but which only the Lanteans could rebuild.

[Mister Oragahn]

I have read a lot of threads on here with posters that cannot figure out how the Pegasus Ancients/Lanteans could lose a war to the wraith, or do some of the other stupid things they did.

For you people here is my theory on the Lanteans: They are stupid. Really it is that easy.

Let me explain further; the Ancients were the most powerful race ever seen in SG. They had a galactic empire for dozens of millions of years and developed amazing pieces of technology surpassing any other race in accomplishments. As the grandest of accomplishment they were able to ascend starting a few million years ago. This was their true downfall as a corporeal species.

When the plague hit, many of their people died, an undisclosed number of Ancients ascended in the MW and a few that were not advanced enough to ascend fled to Pegasus. This already suggests that the Ancients who went to Pegasus were not as advanced as the rest of their brethren as they could not ascend.

In Pegasus we know that these “ungifted” Ancients continued to study ascension as a big part of their existence. We saw machines to manipulate DNA, Time Dilation Fields, and energy based life forms held captive, all to help them understand why they could not ascend when their brethren could. This occupied them for some 2-3 million years and they started seeding humans back to the galaxy as they prepared to ascend.

In that time we know that at least some of them ascended but not how many. So imagine for 2-3 Million years continually having the best and brightest of your race ascend, always leaving the “ungifted” people to run the society. This is likely why there were so few great accomplishments of science in this period of their civilization as most efforts went to ascending, and once that had occurred the annoying non-interference clause kicked in.

This also explains why their population was small as they kept ascending and not concentrating as much on race expansion.

After millions of years the only remaining population was essentially the most “ungifted” descendants of the “ungifted” Ancients that fled MW.

So when they discovered those pesky Wraiths, most of their resources were concentrating on ascension with only the stupidest of the “ungifted”, “ungifted” ancients left to fight.

To be fair even the stupidest of the "ungifted", "ungifted" were still amazingly advanced compared to most species.

Huh, most of the ascension actually took part after they returned from Pegasus.
Not only that but we got to know some Lanteans who ascended.
Their problem probably was that they were too utilitarian and to active, caught in a war, to be able to take distance, meditate and reach whatever they had to reach to ascend.
All the technological tricks perhaps were attempts at creating shortcuts to ascension because they were running out of time.
In the end, after having lost so much, they got massively depressed as a civilization, and considered that their focus on technology had brought them nowhere, so they turned into pilgrims seeking isolation.

If it comes down to compare track records, where do WE stand, really?
The real issue being about the show never giving a satisfactory explanation, while inadvertantly throwing plenty of clues that the war was something else entirely.
We don't even know if for some philosophical questsions, some Lanteans might have went a different path, at the beginning, when the Wraith weren't even anything close to what they'd become.

Consider the demonstrated abilities of the Wraith's technology, at a time when humans could actually smack their mightest ships with relative ease, at best by exploiting a mix of Lantean leftovers and Asgard tech, itself coming from a civilization having already admitted to have barely scratched the Lantean database.

Remember the story about the discovery of that "dark world"? That one event where it seems everything bursts at all seams all of sudden.
This for me, through all these years of SGA and after, has been the biggest c**k teasing ever, and the story of the Wraith coming out of simple insects having evolved due to their dietary regime was as lame as it was unsatisfactory.

If you read the quotation provided by quadhelix here, you see that it actually TOTALLY at odds with the summary that's given by the hologram. It so fails to begin to explain why this very odd combination, which could --- strike that, SHOULD have resulted into a blend of semi-retarded humanoids with insect abilities and a thirst for blood, produced smart humanoids with magical powers which looked like a twisted version of those of the Lanteans.
So that's why judging of the "stupidity" of the Lanteans in light of this very obvious big unknown factor reeks off of laziness or ignorance from those too speedy to lambast a civilization based on very few bits collected here and there.
It's way too much speculation. Heck, you only need to look at archeology and science and see how one single minuscule discovery has the power to cast entire theories to the incinerator.

[Mister Oragahn]

I don't think that it was ever explicitly said that the Ancients did anything to create the Wraith beyond seeding humans on that particular planet. The Stargate wiki mentions in its Behind the Scenes section for the Wraith that, "It is speculated in Stargate Atlantis: Legacy: Secrets that the Wraith were instead of [sic] a deliberate genetic mutation by the Ancients in order to help the people in the Pegasus Galaxy gain a type of resistance against the Iratus bug." If something like that had been mentioned in the show, there would be no need to cite a novel.

Interesting. However, we'd get even further away from the original story, because there wouldn't be any surprise, really, as the Wraith would be a very distinctive evolution destination that could even be predicted in labs, or and proably more than anything else, totally observed.

If the mutation had turned out to be some form of mutation that could "infect" other humans, isolating the worlds with much lower levels of technology would have not been a problem.
On the other hand, if it had already infected several human populations, implying a migration through stargates (that's the only device humans could remotely have a chance to use, considering their level of technology), all that before the mutation would "reveal" itself, then the problem would have already spread to several worlds, nixing the original plot of the one single dark world.
That, and a quarantine still being absurdly easy to put into place anyway.
Lock planets, cut the DHDs and go DNA-scanning all humans. Piece of cake.
Plus the fact that the Lanteans monitored the worlds with their satellite network.

What about this simple idea:

The iratus bug has nothing to do with the Wraith other than also being the result of a mutation of an insect species; that mutation of the insect having been caused by its exposition to "Something" that the Lanteans found on the planet.
That Something having also managed to produce the Wraith and prove unstoppable.

That Something's main trait would be parasitic in nature.
A leech, in other words.
In theory, it could "corrupt" any ecosystem and turn it upside down, and perhaps it could even do it beyond DNA mutation.
Perhaps even a planet itself wouldn't be safe from that thing the Lanteans found or woke up.

Getting back to a small scope, when that Something's essence would get mixed with a relatively "dumb" insect, you'd get massively blood sucking insects which inject a very virulent infectious agent through their saliva; an infectious plague that turns humans into monsters.
Monsters, NOT Wraith -- there are way too many differences between Spider-Sheppard and any observed Wraith.
The retrovirus itself was based on this and guess what? It turned a real Wraith chick into a beast as well (which had to be shot down at the end of the episode).

But the writers had decided at some point that it was all about the iratus bug, and then considered that they'd have great storylines by turning Wraith into humans.

Oh the irony! See, when Wraith were retrovirus'd, they turned into humans? So where did those super powers and soul-binding abilities come from? ... FROM THE INSECT!!!!1!
I guess you didn't know that crossing blood-thirsty DNA with human DNA would suddenly produce super advanced humans with the ability to drain or inject life-force (oh, just like the ... ancients! OMG), calling distant tribes via psy-FTL (take that, dark stones!), ghostly illusion casting, super cell regeneration and telekinesis. I'm leaving out the ability to take control of a human with bits of DNA (Teyla), and I'm leaving out the ability to actually force a human to his knees just by the power of one queen's mind (The Hive).

Logical ?
Eh. Not at all.

If anything, it is better to consider the retrovirus has an erroneously named genetic tool which exploited the iratus' bug viral mutating agent (a very advanced form of virus) in a "reverse" way, to actually imbue Wraith with human DNA (all that based on their WRONG theory that the Wraith originally were corrupted humans, hence the 'retro' prefix).
In other words, Beckett neutered the part of the virus that contained the "monster" genetic code, or removed it, and put human DNA in place, inside the virus, using the formidable infectious ability of said virus to corrupt Wraith cells with human DNA.
Said formidable mutating power being part of the Something the Lanteans found on the Dark World.



Besides, thinking of the virus that turns people into spaceships by using their brain... think for a moment what would happen if they had done that to a Lantean. Oh yes!
Automatic acquisition of knowledge and super-human abilities, straight into the DNA and databank of your über-class hiveship!
Dang!
There you get your hiveship feeding off hyperspace and planets' entire ecosystems' lifeforce, plus potentially from other planes of existence altogether.

Are we to pretend that never ever happened during the war?

This, btw, is a half rant, not directed at anyone in particular.

[Mister Oragahn]

I don't recall that many "win the war" devices that actually could have worked out - indeed, only Attero really springs to mind. Arcturus was unlikely to work, the Replicators may well have replaced the Wraith as a threat and were also far too vulnerable to Wraith hacking, and the exploding tumors and mini-drones wouldn't really be game-changing.

Mini-drones? No. Drones alone were ostentatiously powerful, at least against current era Wraith ships.

But the tumour machine? As hilarious as it sounds, considering that the vast majority of Wraith tech is biological, the gain obtained from a mere signal broadcast that turns all their structures into ticking bombs seems obviously great. The real problem being to fine tune it so it doesn't kill other lifeforms, basically anything that has DNA.
But man, what a fantastic weapon of mass destruction. You basically turn anything that has DNA into a bomb. Way to burn a planet!
It's actually a fantastic tool, as it uses biological material to actually grow cells which are capable of gathering a formidable amount of energy.
It could even have been tailored from the study of stolen Wraith power bioplant technology.

[Mister Oragahn]

On the one hand, the Atlantis expedition seemed to be able to replicate the technology fairly easily in "McKay and Mrs. Miller." On the other hand, even the Arcturus reactor chamber was huge, so it might not have been feasible as a weapon.

Huge?
The "prototype", perhaps, but still dwarfed by the vast cavities found in a hiveship, or even the size of its computer core, which reminds me that a Ha'tak's computer core wasn't particularly small either.
However, the version cobbled by humans was quite small.
Besides, when you're looking at a mean to best ZPMs, you could allow yourself to build a larger ship, especially if it could give a hand in resplenishing your other ships' power cores and ZPMs.
And as a stationary power plant, it would have certainly not been useless. At this point, its size would easily be considered negligible.

[Mister Oragahn]

i agree with you. To me it would seem silly that the culture of human slaves would go no further than worshipping the goauld with the mythology as estabished on earth. Given how busy the Romans and Greek were with poetry and literature and what not about worship, that alone could be a huge source of interesting material from the Goa'uld.

While they were evil enslavers, i doubt their civilization was 100% stale for 5000 years, and they certainly must've had more pleasures in life than screwing the pretty people from around the galaxy and murdering people and eating food. 5000 years is a long time and just look what Earth produced in terms of culture in that period.

Also note that while our Dark Ages are consistently seen as a period of time we'd better skip, it was a time of cultural blooming.


Do note that the Ancients simply might've had a different reason to stop us if they would interfere: the extreme mess, tortures and exterminations of civilizations and races we indirectly have on our hands. Not in the least from messing with the Goa'uld power hierarchy. We did bring the Replicators to our galaxy and we did bring the Ori to our galaxy. The Ascended beings might've concluded that it was better to do it a cleaner and slower way like the Tok'ra intended than to do it our messy way.

Just because we have certain ideals and morals doesn't mean everyone has the same.

I rarely lurk on these boards but I know that I like the way your opinions went.
A much more mature, reasonnable and realistic approach.
There's a group of Gaters here who clearly had no problem pointing out the huge amount of hypocrisy lost on many people about human ways, both IRL and in the show, especially in SGA, which was lightly acknowledged in S5 during an argument between Ronon and Sheppard in some dark corridor while hunting monsters, finally admitting that they had screwed up.
All SF shows had no problems to have their characters to think twice about their past and future actions and ideologies, but SGA was absolutely empty of that, much more than late SG-1, which itself was already dumbed down since the Showtime era.
There was such an emptiness, a huge moment building up, that the moment they released it through SGU, it quite went overboard and nBSG^3.

[Mister Oragahn]

I have read over the thread and people arguing against the lanteans being idiots somewhat glaze over the fact that any of the lantean inventions that did function could have clinched the wraith war.

1. Hyperdrives: Since the Leantean's have intergalactic hyperdrives there is really no reason for their base of operations to be in the same galaxy as their enemy. Find somewhere else to set up shop and create a carrier to ferry warships between galaxies(since they feared the wraith stealing the faster hyperdrives they only equipped intergalactic drives on city ships.)

An obvious point. However, what we saw of the Wraith was a fragment of what they once were imho. I think it's pretty obvious by now.
It doesn't take into account the capacity for higher power production (and potentially better FTL drives), which means faster speeds.
What's the point of being able to move in and out of a galaxy if the enemy, largely mobile by virtue of living in ships, can use the time you need to get in and out of Pegasus to move across its territory?
Besides, where is the advantage of operating from outside when the enemy can grow clones and ships out of energy?
By the time you arrive with your new ships, the Wraith might have already rebuilt their forces, if not more.

2. Mini Drones: In case you are too lazy for the first plan in is complete form you simple begin with step one and then produce a crap ton of mini drones and regular drones. After you have done so proceed to send them to guard human worlds via stargate. This means the Wraith can attack from space in great enough numbers but ground troops trying to cull would be decimated. This plan can also be enacted alongside the first. I also always wondered why they had mini drones but still were afraid of being boarded? Me personally I would have opened a hangar hailed the wraith and dared them to try and board my ship to steal technology.

We always saw spaceship crews, technicians and, at best, some kinds of lightly armed security officers.
The closest thing we saw to a combat suit were the ones used by the Vanir, barely different than the ones seen in SGU, but coming with several bits of technology hinting at certain performances on the battle field.
But then, on the other hand, fully equipped Wraith could boast a variety of stun devices, guns, grenades and would be pumped up by life force., the kind that would allow them to withstand the hits from mini-drones with more efficiency.
With only have ideas of the realistic uses of displayde tech of both sides, it becomes evident that aside from knowing little of what went on during the war, there are enough reasons to believe that it could have been considerably harsher than anything seen.
For notice, if you pick the best stuff that is known to be portable and applied into the design of a combat suit, anything the Lanteans would have produced would have largely surpassed anything you saw in Halo and would have largely come close to the morphing suits used by transhumans in the book Hyperion. That is, the kind of advanced suits that would totally steamroll the already superior FORCE suits.

3. Attero device: The Lanteans build the stargates so they can turn them off or at least do what we did on accident and disable the network through an exploit. Even if the wraith became desperate enough to use the stargates through sheer hunger they wouldnt do it in great numbers since they would trade possible death in life trying to solve their issue and certain death on a full stomach.(this is just my opinion)

The attero device was a great asset but it destroyed stargates. Although it's claimed the Lanteans loved their stargates, it seems they were kinda worried about the fact that it obliterated entire populations. All ther grand seeding project going down the drain.
I guess that the moment they might have considered using it as there was little to lose, it was already too late.
It's kinda curious that the attero device would destroy stargates. Like if Wraith FTL was somehow a derived form of wormhole drive, although it relied on hyperspace.
Or perhaps the AD rendered entire regions of subspace unstable, and although the Lanteans would know how to navigate through them (subspace being hyperspace), the Wraith wouldn't, but this instability would greatly affect the stargates, perhaps by creating energetic chaos and surges of energy. Depending on the way stargate would have been connected to subspace, this could explain what happened.
Besides, were we sure that the AD only consisted of that box device? Couldn't it have been more like a complex remote control system, activing much larger system installed here and there across the galaxy, systems potentially not even originally meant to be used alongside the AD?
After all, Lantean tech is very bendable and versatile. What one can do with stargates and shield emitters on Atlantis and gateships already tells a lot.

On the goa'uld, I do not think the lanteans would have had any real means of rational deduction to not decide they needed to go. An mere aggressive species, fine maybe stay out of it, but that was not the goa'uld. They were literally mentally unstable(those who used the sarcophagi) genocidal egomaniacs. The fact that they still functioned as a race showed that they understood reality and what they were doing but they were incapable of seeing that it wasnt the best thing. Honestly why would eradicating people who dont want to be your eternal slaves be wrong objectively?

A very, very few of them were mass killers. Objectively, I don't find the Goa'uld worse than present time humans. Not to say that the System Lords gave a meaning to the lives of millions of humans, eons ago. They brought them enhanced life and strength, a high form of culture and writing, flew them across the stars. The Goa'uld merely exploited the primitive humans' drive for infighting. Let's be honest, our entire history is an endless series of wars after wars, sometimes for the benefits of a few people we never meet at all. Rings a bell?

Oh, slaves? Countless highly praised antiquity civilizations had them deeply integrated into their models. Besides, the official disappearance of slavery is but a recent thing on Earth.
What the Goa'uld did thousands of years ago was illumination in comparison.
Plus the Jaffa who won battles lived a wealthy life.

On the ascended beings. It would kind of hard to have people worshiping you if you do not go down to the "lower" realm looking like a light bulb flaunting your power. If a few of them would go down disguised as the species they were trying to guide they could help as wise sages and also have a covert ascended moment on big issues and no one would be the wiser. The show could have ended with carter being a covert ascended being and it would have all made sense considering how she has ALL the plot power.

You meant Kara Thrace, right?

[Ripple in Space]

The attero device was a great asset but it destroyed stargates. Although it's claimed the Lanteans loved their stargates, it seems they were kinda worried about the fact that it obliterated entire populations. All ther grand seeding project going down the drain.
I guess that the moment they might have considered using it as there was little to lose, it was already too late.
It's kinda curious that the attero device would destroy stargates. Like if Wraith FTL was somehow a derived form of wormhole drive, although it relied on hyperspace.
Or perhaps the AD rendered entire regions of subspace unstable, and although the Lanteans would know how to navigate through them (subspace being hyperspace), the Wraith wouldn't, but this instability would greatly affect the stargates, perhaps by creating energetic chaos and surges of energy. Depending on the way stargate would have been connected to subspace, this could explain what happened.
Besides, were we sure that the AD only consisted of that box device? Couldn't it have been more like a complex remote control system, activing much larger system installed here and there across the galaxy, systems potentially not even originally meant to be used alongside the AD?
After all, Lantean tech is very bendable and versatile. What one can do with stargates and shield emitters on Atlantis and gateships already tells a lot.

To me, that whole plot was very poorly thought out. Considering Dr. Felger, a mid-level SGC researcher could crash the Gate System, in addition to Ba'al, Nerus, and Carter to varying degrees, you'd think the Ancients who designed the gates themselves could temporarily disable the gate system, activate the Attero Device, and then pick off whatever Wraith ships survived before reactivating it...

[Mister Oragahn]

Perfect example: the Lanteans did have stealth shields on their large transports, such as the one carrying ~300 people in "Before I Sleep"... which was torn to ribbons because the Wraith saw through the cloak.

Which neatly comes full circle with the fact that only advanced Wraith ships could do such a thing, pretty much proving that back then, at least at the end of the war, the Lanteans were not only being spammed with enemy warships, but at least some of them were the kind to give Atlantis a run for its money if we'd be talking about hiveships.

Finally, do we ever actually see the Ori themselves use force, or do they simply guide that refusal to follow Origin is evil - if you want to punish the heretics, that's really your decision.

The Ori would argue (and believe) otherwise. The would argue that promoting Origin advances the younger races spiritually by giving them discipline and peace; it advances younger races intellectually because Origin is the only subject worth studying. As for technological advancement - what could technology provide the younger races that the Ori and their Priors do not?

From the point of view of the Ori, those that deny Origin are more evil than we see the Goa'uld System Lords, enslaving those who hear them to doubt and ignorance.

All in all, the Ori weren't saints, but once in Origin, did we ever see any proof that people were enslaved or mistreated?
What was harsh was the price of admission, which admitedly, I understand would get raised, since they had finally found their enemy and after all this long wait, also could wipe them out.
Now I'm not saying the Ori had any right into that, but we only got one side of the story about the rise of Origin. Like science guys = cool virtuous geeks and religion guys = deaf genocidal zealots.
Yet there was wiggle room as Danielori could obviously pick the Book of Origin and deliver a very convincing message in a much cooler way. Not to say that this is the very argument what's his name (Armin?) got with a Prior.
The BoO (:|) appears to be a convenient piece of propaganda, from which you can pick any reading you wish. The Priors going the brute way was quite odd btw, since this should have been a last resort option. They had all the gimmicks one could use to impress local populations, far beyond anything the Goa'uld could do. The Ori could effectively stop slavery in exchange of a mandatory pray. Small price eh?

[Mister Oragahn]

To me, that whole plot was very poorly thought out. Considering Dr. Felger, a mid-level SGC researcher could crash the Gate System, in addition to Ba'al, Nerus, and Carter to varying degrees, you'd think the Ancients who designed the gates themselves could temporarily disable the gate system, activate the Attero Device, and then pick off whatever Wraith ships survived before reactivating it...

The entire SGA show was very poorly thought out. Well, especially beyond season 1. They were quite lucky to have established such a potentially good universe in a hurry when they had decided to produce a show out of the blue instead of just making a ending movie to SG-1.

First season of SGA, by all means, was clever and promising. Oh my, it didn't take long for the whole thing to blow, though!

[NoobTau'ri]

I have read a lot of threads on here with posters that cannot figure out how the Pegasus Ancients/Lanteans could lose a war to the wraith, or do some of the other stupid things they did.

For you people here is my theory on the Lanteans: They are stupid. Really it is that easy.

Let me explain further; the Ancients were the most powerful race ever seen in SG. They had a galactic empire for dozens of millions of years and developed amazing pieces of technology surpassing any other race in accomplishments. As the grandest of accomplishment they were able to ascend starting a few million years ago. This was their true downfall as a corporeal species.

When the plague hit, many of their people died, an undisclosed number of Ancients ascended in the MW and a few that were not advanced enough to ascend fled to Pegasus. This already suggests that the Ancients who went to Pegasus were not as advanced as the rest of their brethren as they could not ascend.

In Pegasus we know that these “ungifted” Ancients continued to study ascension as a big part of their existence. We saw machines to manipulate DNA, Time Dilation Fields, and energy based life forms held captive, all to help them understand why they could not ascend when their brethren could. This occupied them for some 2-3 million years and they started seeding humans back to the galaxy as they prepared to ascend.

In that time we know that at least some of them ascended but not how many. So imagine for 2-3 Million years continually having the best and brightest of your race ascend, always leaving the “ungifted” people to run the society. This is likely why there were so few great accomplishments of science in this period of their civilization as most efforts went to ascending, and once that had occurred the annoying non-interference clause kicked in.

This also explains why their population was small as they kept ascending and not concentrating as much on race expansion.

After millions of years the only remaining population was essentially the most “ungifted” descendants of the “ungifted” Ancients that fled MW.

So when they discovered those pesky Wraiths, most of their resources were concentrating on ascension with only the stupidest of the “ungifted”, “ungifted” ancients left to fight.

To be fair even the stupidest of the "ungifted", "ungifted" were still amazingly advanced compared to most species.

Your post is almost entirely wrong. The Ancients made some of their greatest accomplishments in the PG. As an example, they developed insta-drive and the Attero device, that even the Asgard could not understand how it works.

What I do agree with you, though, is that the ancients went into a serious moral decay in Pegasus, and the entire focus of their civilization became ascension.

Hell, the Ancients went as far as manufacturing neo-humans in a primitive state to better understand their own evolution, and they ran massive social engineering projects as seen in "The Game" trying to understand the moral implications of godliness.

The "grandest" achievements of the Ancients, like the Dakara Device for instance, were done in the MW galaxy, granted, but that's because in the MW Galaxy they were an actual civilization spanning multiple planets, and not just a pitty little city-ship surrounded by medieval humans they created in lab tubes.