That Minefield

[Photon]

Shouldn't the Jems have just have run the gauntlet and get these ships to the Alpha.

1) Better shielding, many might survive
2) Little regard for their own lives by ramming ships.

They mighta lost 1/3 to 1/4 of their incoming ships and still could have kicked ass. Of course, that would have ended the war but may have started a really cool season of guerrilla warfare and rebellion

 

[SchwEnt]

Doesn't even require manned ships, does it?

Keep pouring unmanned drones or hell, big rocks, thru the wormhole into the minefield until they're exhausted. Once all mines have been detonated and depleted, then send in the Dominion ships. Or does that not work?

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

See, the mines were kinda self-replicating mines. The reason the Dominion couldn't just roll through the minefield is because it would just Wolverine itself.

 

[Timo]

It should probably still be possible to devise a type of sacrificial target (or mine-detonating death ray) that blows up mines yet does not feed them with wreckage/energy suitable for self-replication raw material. It's something they couldn't have figured out in just a couple of days - but it's unrealistic that it would take them months to do so.

A more realistic scenario would have them figure out the way to blow up the mines so that they get starved of self-replication resources - and then spend months blowing them up via that method, until the entire field did get starved. But that would deprive us of the plot element of "timetable surprise" that affects the events.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[SchwEnt]

See, the mines were kinda self-replicating mines. The reason the Dominion couldn't just roll through the minefield is because it would just Wolverine itself.

Right. I know about the self-replicating bit.
But it can't be an endless closed-loop system, can it?
It isn't a perpetual energy machine, infinite production of mines. Isn't there some law of energy conservation that applies?

In any case, I was thinking the Dominion could hurl stuff (or whatever it takes to explode the mines--energy, sensors) at the minefield, excessive detonations that overwhelm the capacity to replicate and replace. Hell, just enough to clear a hole...

 

[Hartzilla2007]

See, the mines were kinda self-replicating mines. The reason the Dominion couldn't just roll through the minefield is because it would just Wolverine itself.

Right. I know about the self-replicating bit.
But it can't be an endless closed-loop system, can it?
It isn't a perpetual energy machine, infinite production of mines. Isn't there some law of energy conservation that applies?

This is Star Trek, your feeble real science does not apply.

 

[Timo]

excessive detonations that overwhelm the capacity to replicate and replace

By the as such sensible rules of Star Trek, the more stuff or energy you throw at the minefield, the greater feast the surviving mines have, and the more siblings they bud from their bountiful loins, or however the process works.

The key would be to kill the maximum number of mines with the minimum amount of energy, or with a type of energy the rest of the mines cannot harvest. If there indeed exists an "energy trawl" that can feed off death rays aimed at it, one wonders if starships don't use that technology as well - with each survivable hit against the shields making the targeted starship stronger.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Non-Beard Riker]

That idea with the mines was a little bit dumb, from a writing perspective. Should have just created some "space anomalies" or something instead.

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

Oh yeah, cause subspace magic is much better than a piece of machinery.

"The Defiant was a little dumb, from a writing perspective. It performed too well against the Dominion. Should have made it a 'space anomaly' or something instead."

 

[Distorted Humor]

I always wondered where the energy for the replication mines came from...

 

[Farrens]

I always wondered where the energy for the replication mines came from...

The same place as the energy for all Star Trek technology.

Magic!!

 

[rahullak]

I suppose they convert the matter of destroyed mines to energy and then back to matter (new mines) again. Though, I agree there should be some limit to the number of times this can happen (Law of conservation of matter and energy and all that).

 

[Timo]

Why not the matter of the destroyed ships? Why not directly tap into the energy of the phased polaron beam being fired at the neighboring mine? The conservation laws should be on the side of the mines there - it's difficult to think of a mine-detonating sacrificial lamb smaller than the mine itself, or of an efficient death ray weaker than the destructive energies of the mine itself.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[rahullak]

^
Yes, perhaps the destroyed ships and energy weapons can also be used as fodder for the matter-energy conversions.

 

[T'Girl]

See, the mines were kinda self-replicating mines.

If so, then why all the effort of actually laying the mine field? Why not just place a single "self-replicating mine" at the mouth of the wormhole, and then let it create the entire mine field all by itself? Wouldn't that have been just the tiniest bit easier for the crew on DS9?

I mean really, did we ever see one mine "self-replicate" even once?

 

[CorporalCaptain]

The way I read it, when a mine detonates, its surviving neighbors replicate replacements. That's why you need a whole field, much more than just a single mine, and much more than the number of mines that would be expected to detonate simultaneously.

Plus, the field needs to be big enough so that once replacements are replicated, there are still mines fully charged to make more replacements that are ready to replicate, while the others that just made replacements are recharging.

 

[Timo]

If so, then why all the effort of actually laying the mine field? Why not just place a single "self-replicating mine" at the mouth of the wormhole, and then let it create the entire mine field all by itself? Wouldn't that have been just the tiniest bit easier for the crew on DS9?

In order to achieve that, you'd have to pump energy/matter into the growing minefield somehow. And the process might not be too gentle or efficient, if it's intended to work in combat conditions and nowhere else.

It's probably much better to tax the resources of the (soon-to-be-lost-anyway) station than the resources of the poor mines themselves for the initial creation of the field.

I mean really, did we ever see one mine "self-replicate" even once?

Of course not. That's what the cloaking devices were for!

Food for thought... The principal role of the mine is not to create damage. It is to frighten. A minefield that does not exist is the most efficient one: the enemy can't sweep it no matter how hard they try, you don't need to spend any resources in physically creating it, and still it will stop the enemy from getting through if they think it is there.

If Starfleet manages to convince the Dominion that they have created a self-replicating minefield, and if they then actually sow just a few thousand mines programmed to dodge incoming fire and to only detonate every now and then when the enemy tries to get a ship through... Why, the enemy dare not attempt penetrate that field by simply pushing through, hoping that the first few ships will exhaust the field (as would actually happen, because the self-replication is but a bluff)!

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Gul Re'jal]

The way I read it, when a mine detonates, its surviving neighbors replicate replacements. That's why you need a whole field, much more than just a single mine, and much more than the number of mines that would be expected to detonate simultaneously.

That's exactly what Dukat told Weyoun about replicating.

DUKAT: Well, I admit the work is proceeding more slowly than expected, but as you know, these are not ordinary mines. Every time we deactivate or destroy one of them, its neighbour replicates a new one.

 

[Jimmy_C]

I thought that the solution that the Dominion devised was clever. By isolating each mine with an (anti) graviton field, they are basically projecting a cloak around each mine, blocking the outside. So they don't know when their neighbor was destroyed, and they don't replicate more mines.