Borg vs Cybermen

[Anwar]

Mid-TNG run: Borg (Back when they were scary and cool)

Post-Voyager: Cybermen (After the Borg were neutered)

Well, that was series-specific neutering.

A threat like the Borg requires a lot of cannon fodder to be killed off to maintain their threat while allowing the good guys to get away (like how Doctor Who has the Daleks kill tons of folk to maintain their menace even though the Doctor wins in the end). Voyager couldn't supply any cannon fodder and had to win (otherwise the show would be over) so the Borg had to be easier to beat.

Show the Borg in a series where there's lots of cannon fodder they'll be back to normal.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

The simple fact that the Borg can assimilate any technology (via their nanoprobes) would seem to give them the advantage. All it would take would be for them to assimilate one Cyberman, Dalek, TARDIS, or whatever, and they can instantly adapt to anything that race can produce.

 

[The]

Nanoprobes still operate off the same principals of the physical universe. I don't see them being able to adapt to the most technologically advanced species in the universe. Besides, all it takes is for a Time Lord to go back to their origins and nuke them. Done.

Wow, I'm such a nerd for debating this. I feel so dirty....

 

[Anwar]

But they wouldn't do that for the Daleks or Cybermen, why bother doing it for the Borg?

 

[Winterwind]

Well, the Borg would be a much bigger threat than the Cybermen could ever be.

And they did try it with the Daleks. They sent the Fourth Doctor back to do it in "Genesis of the Daleks".

 

[DarthTimon]

At the risk of serious thread necromancy, the Cybermen win this easily. They expand more aggressively, have more individual autonomy, invade in massed attacks rather than the Borg's piecemeal approach, and as per the Matt Smith era, it was considered better to blow up planets than fight a handful of Cybermen. They're several leagues beyond the Borg.

 

[Turtletrekker]

At the risk of serious thread necromancy, the Cybermen win this easily. They expand more aggressively, have more individual autonomy, invade in massed attacks rather than the Borg's piecemeal approach, and as per the Matt Smith era, it was considered better to blow up planets than fight a handful of Cybermen. They're several leagues beyond the Borg.

I think I agree that the Cybermen would take out the Borg. Cyber-soldiers seem much more versatile than Borg drones.

In the real world, I have to think that the Borg owe much of what they are to some of the old Cybermen stories, "Tomb of the Cybermen" in particular. It would be easy to file off the serial numbers on that story and convert into a Borg story. Just turn the tomb into a non-functional Borg cube and change the names and you're off to the races.

And there might be a few who will say something about a ten-year-old thread being resurrected, but I've never read it before and it's been an interesting read.

 

[Redfern]

Concept-wise, heavily inspired by the Cybermen, visually, the Borg were possibly inspired by the Cenobites from Clive Barker's "Hellraiser" released only a year or two earlier: albino skin, all black garments and body mutilation via hardware piercing flesh.

 

[Qonundrum]

The Borg leapfrogged the Cybermen in presentation in 1990, as the Cybermen looked like art deco robots apart from their first outing in 1966, which had them looking mummified and rightfully creepy.

Since then the Borg largely remained serious (if not one-note), and the Cybermen simply became second-fiddle comic relief. In the most recent escapade, seeing

Spoiler: Only as protocol

their heads whizzing around shooting people is a direct ripoff of 'The Orville' and looks very much like cheap comic relief too.

Didn't a semi-recent episode claim they found a workaround to gold? Which is at least Cybermen adapting more than the Borg did.

 

[JRoss]

The alien powers and civilizations in Doctor Who operate on an order of magnitude above those in Star Trek. They aren't constrained by logic or physics. Here's how I break it down, in ascending order of power.

Daleks
Cybermen
Borg
Dominion
Hirogen (based on the portion of the galaxy they must control)
Federation
Klingons
Empire (from Star Wars)
Romulans
Breen
Ferengi
Sontarans
Cardassians
Autons

 

[Pindar]

Given that the Borg couldn't stop one Federation ship, Voyager, over a number of years why would they be any more effective against the Cybermen?

 

[The Nth Doctor]

Given that the Borg couldn't stop one Federation ship, Voyager, over a number of years why would they be any more effective against the Cybermen?

In the Borg's defense, Voyager had plot armor on its side which frequently prevented it from being squished like a bug. Just look at the victims of Wolf 359 and the Battle of Sector 001.

 

[Pindar]

In the Borg's defense, Voyager had plot armor on its side which frequently prevented it from being squished like a bug. Just look at the victims of Wolf 359 and the Battle of Sector 001.

No doubt the Borg assimilated whole civilisations, but whenever the hero ship goes up against them in any series they always lose.

If the cybermen were fighting them in the Trek Universe they would join forces eventually as the Doctor Who TNG Crossover comic had them do, then they would both lose to whatever Federation ship they went against.

Inthe Who universe they would team up then double cross each other the cybermen would come out on top briefly and then would be seen off by the Doctor.