Borg vs Dominion

Discussion in 'SciFi & Fantasy' started by Truenemo1889, Mar 1, 2003.

  1. Nasor Valued Senior Member

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    6,231
    The writers throw around those sorts of numbers, but they don't seem to jive with everything else from the franchise. At Wolf 359 the Federation "only" lost 39 ships, but it was seen as a major disaster that greatly weakened them and required them to accelerate their ship-building programs - and even then, it took them several years to recover to previous strength levels.

    Wolf 359 was in 2367, and the Dominion War started in 2373. It just doesn't seem at all plausible to me that it took the Federation several years to replace 39 ships, but then just a few years later they were suddenly able to jump up to producing tens of thousands of ships/year. Sure, they would certainly have started crash building programs once it became clear that they were going to need a lot of ships for the war, but come on...that would require them going from being able to build around 15-20 ships/year to many thousands of ships per year.

    Even within most the DS9 events of the Dominion War, tens of thousands of ships doesn't seem to make much sense. For example, when the Cardassians and Romulans launched their sneak attack on the Founders homeworld, they only had 20 ships in their fleet. If the war really involved many tens of thousands of ships, that would be an insignificant drop in the bucket that could never possibly have accomplished anything. They were very surprised to find 150 Dominion ships waiting there for them. If the Dominion really had tens of thousands of ships, they would surely have expected far more than that to be guarding the Founder home planet...I don't see any way you can reasonably extrapolate them being surprised at 150 ships defending the Founder planet to a fleet of 50k-120k ships.
     
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  3. superstring01 Moderator

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    None of your numbers jive. The only "fleet size" numbers we are given was the number of ships destroyed in the wormhole by the aliens. That's 7,500 warships. It doesn't take a fool to recognize that an empire doesn't send all, or even half its ships away from the homeland. It's not unimaginable that the Dominion has 15,000-20,000 ships waiting at home. It took the UFP + Klingons (Romulans and Breen wash eachother out) to even stand up to the ALPHA QUADRANT Dominion, and this was its weakest point. The ONLY reason the UFP won was because of alien intervention and Section 31 bio-weapons engineering. Ship-for-ship, the Dominion wins easily.

    ~String
     
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  5. Hellblade8 Valued Senior Member

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    ...What?!

    Shebly said that it would take less than a year for them to restore the fleet. And it was a devistating loss in light of the fact that a single enemy ships basically pounded its way through 40 of theirs without breaking a sweat.

    Why would they have to start producing tens of thousands of ships per year? They already have thousands. Look at the registry numbers. Notice how the first Starfleet vessels had NX-01 and NX-02? And now we're up to NCC 75,000+?

    They've had thousands of ships for almost a century now.

    No, it wasn't the Cardassians and the Romulan governments. It was the Obsidian Order and the Tal Shiar--both of which are high level intelligence agencies. The Obsidian Order isn't supposed to have ships and had to build their twenty or so ships in secret.


    Because it was a sneak attack. Typically when you perform a sneak attack you don't expect your enemy to counter-attack with a force about three times larger than your own.

    Why would they? The Dominion prepared the trap. They had evacuated the planet and already knew the enemy fleet numbers. Why move thousands of ships to deal with an enemy when you already outnumber then three to one?
     
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  7. rajrajmarley Registered Member

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    It looks like this discussion keeps getting caught up in establishing relative strengths between the Dominion, the Federation and the Borg. The argument seems to continually get back to the Federation having defeated the Borg and then because the Dominion is stronger than the Federation it is therefore also stronger than the Borg. First of all, it's more like the Federation survived the Borg's fleeting interest in Earth rather than defeated them so the simplified logic flow-chart is done. Another big point is the number of ships which has been very easily dealt with. The Dominion may very well have several hundred thousand vessels (most of which are Jem'Hadar fighters) however the Borg have several million vessels and I believe most of them would be cubes. Were the collective to invade Dominion space with a million cubes, I honestly have to say that I simply can't see even the entirety of the Dominion fleet holding back such a force. That's approximately 2 cubes per ship - not happening.
     
  8. Michael 歌舞伎 Valued Senior Member

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    I don't understand why the Borg can not assimilate a Founder? I mean, once their nano probes (or whatever) infiltrate the Founder perhaps they will have total control over it's shape changing ability? A returning Founder would infect all the others and in effect end the war then and there? Founders are not "mystical" beings are they? I thought they were biological? Although I think that bore Odo changed into fire once if I remember correctly? Which seemed kind of stupid.
     
    Last edited: Jan 20, 2010
  9. Nasor Valued Senior Member

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    6,231
    They were attacking the enemy home planet. They surely expected there to be some defending ships. But they were clearly expecting a lot fewer than 150 - they were shocked to see so many. If the Dominion had 50k-120k ships, then they would surely have expected far more than only 150 guarding the Founder home planet.
     
  10. fedr808 1100101 Valued Senior Member

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    6,706
    But one must remember that wolf 359 was like Pearl Harbor, it basically was a small number of relatively unprepared ships facing a greater foe.

    ie, after Pearl harbor by the end of the war, the US has made 12 fleet carriers, 20 ish light carriers, and around 80 escort carriers.

    It was basically a wake up call for the federation.
     
  11. Amag Registered Member

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    13
    Dominion ingenuity

    Let me put it this way - the Borg will go at you with all the knowledge they have. They will take your knowledge. But they will not think on their own. In the true sense of the word, they can't adapt. Janeway had to help them fend off the bioships of species 8472. They haven't been able to combat transphasic torpedoes. Now look at the Dominion. When opposed by a race I can't seem to remember the name of, they created a massive disease - the quickening.

    Very off topic, sorry, but read this, I have a point. I watched the whole series of BSG, and I came across an episode (SPOILER ALERT, highlight it) where a disease affected the cylons. It nearly wiped them out, as it spread whenever they were reborn. That is just to give an idea of of a backhanded tactic the Dominion would use against their cybernetic enemies. Also, despite the many betrayals in the Dominion, the borg have had more. I note the episode unimatrix zero, in which, if I remember correctly, the borg have a bit of a civil war. If the Dominion could spark a Borg revolution, which wouldn't be extremely hard with their level of biological weaponry, the war would be won then and their, ripping out the opponents hearts from the inside. I went a little klingon, but my point is made.

    Despite this, the Borg still have better weapons, better ships, transwarp drive and one helluva shielding system. Meanwhile, the Dominion use sabotage, corruption and deceit as weapons. (Note I left out ship and troop counts, I will explain why.) Notice the Dominion ramming tactics. Assume they can come up with some manipulation of transphasic torpedoes. You may not think of them as technologically advanced, but take into account the fact that they were cut off from home. And the inconsistencies in ship counts- it shows something. We can assume the federation has made SIGNIFICANT upgrades to their weapons between the Borg war and the Dominion war. They didn't have ships like the defiant, huge fleets or quantum torpedoes then. A quantum torpedo seems to have an effect like that of a large nuke, as shown when Sisko fires on a Maquis settlement. Cut the Dominion some slack, their opponent had gotten better. Anyway, next point.

    I did say I'd explain why I left out troop numbers. I noticed something about the Borg and Dominion both. They are known throughout their territory thoroughly, and feared. People say the Borg didn't try, but can we assume the Dominion did? I'm sure they had other targets, and maybe they tried towards the end- but it was too late, reinforcements were cut off. Who knows what technological advances were made, how many tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of ships they built. They can likely clone AT LEAST as fast as the Borg can assimilate, as it takes less time.

    The Borg can travel through time, but so can the federation according to The Voyage Home, so I assume the Dominion can too.

    I'd say it's a fair match. The Dominion are, in a way, the Borg of the Gamma Quadrant. They are feared all around. No one wants to cross them. They dominate their territory. I like this matchup, because in many ways they are the same thing, just the excact opposite.
     
  12. Jud-Mos Registered Member

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    Ok, I've thought about this for a while and to address the founders being assimilated by the Borg, how can they assimilate something like that? If you remember in DS9, Odo once said that if you scan a founder when they are a rock, all you will detect is a rock. The Borg would never be able to find one to begin with. Also, if they did catch one in another form with liquid or blood, all they would have to do is become a solid rock, piece of metal to destroy any nanoprobes that would be in them. Also, we've seen that changlings can become other than solid and liquid objects like fire, fog and light! How could the Borg assimilate something like that?!?!!? The founders, as the Great Link, could probably go into space and become a star and incinerate any pesky Borg threat. So whether the Borg could or could not defeat the Jem Hadar, they would lose to the founders quite easily.
     
  13. Picard578 Registered Senior Member

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    Founders are liquid, can change form and have no central neurological system. In Voyager, we see that a Founder can defeat nanoprobes by shapeshifting, thus crushing them.
     
  14. Picard578 Registered Senior Member

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    Tain said that Founder's homeworld doesn't have "any defenses they know of". That could be fleet, or planetary defenses.

    Besides, Federation fleets range from 112 to 300+ ships (probably 900+, since 600-ship fleet in SoA was said to be composed of "elements of two fleets". We know about 7 Federation fleets, and numbers for fleets go up to 10. So, 112 to 900 ships, with 7 to 10 fleets gives 800 to 9 000 ships.

    Federation was expected to rebuild 39 ships lost at Wolf 359 in "under a year", at peacetime production rate. It means that Federation can produce 39+ ships a year at top of standard production rate, but even if we assume that 39 ships a year is actually full number of ships produced, we get a fleet (with 80 year known lifespan) of up to 3 000 ships - and certainly no less than 1 000, even accounting for losses and increase in industrial capacity over time. And that is low end, since 39 ships is "under a year" - which can go from 6 months up, because otherwise would be "under half a year" - and is actually only addition on top of standard construction rate needed to replace ships being retired.
     

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