Combine Vs. Imperials?

[Kevin]

Striders and Gunships really aren't all that impressive compared to tanks, F-16's, or TIE-Fighters. They're only intimidating to foot soldiers.

Are you kidding? Those things are made of pure win.
The coolest things to be fought in any game.

And it's not the looks that matter.
F-16's or whatever jets in this case are human piloted, unlike the gunships, which are LIVING THINGS WITH A ROTOR FOR A TAIL AND A MACHINEGUN FOR A MOUTH(?).
Those things think on they're own and outmanouver the f-16's with ease.

And the striders either skewer the tanks with they're legs or get singular(ity) with them.

 

[morgs]

Exept tie fighters travel in packs, gunships dont, which means the TIES would own it from all angles.

 

[Mahalis]

You see three Gunships leaving the Citadel together during one of the pod rides.

 

[Langolier]

Are you kidding? Those things are made of pure win.
The coolest things to be fought in any game.

And it's not the looks that matter.
F-16's or whatever jets in this case are human piloted, unlike the gunships, which are LIVING THINGS WITH A ROTOR FOR A TAIL AND A MACHINEGUN FOR A MOUTH(?).
Those things think on they're own and outmanouver the f-16's with ease.

And the striders either skewer the tanks with they're legs or get singular(ity) with them.

Coolness isn't what we are discussing here. While a gunship might be more maneuverable than an F-16 it isn't nearly as fast and doesn't pack nearly the range or firepower. Any decent modern fighter plane could destroy a gunship long before said gunship even knew it was there. The Combine might (presumably does) have stuff much more powerful than that, but we don't know how much more powerful. The Empire sure as hell packs a punch though and it has nearly an entire Galaxy to supply it.

Rabarber Sucks

Either I didn't word my post very well or you need to work on your reading comprehension.

riomhaire

The Empire does not need to invade and destroy the Combine, they merely need to prevent it from ever gaining a sizable foothold in their own universe, which they are more than capable of doing. At best the Combine would be as much of a nuisance as the Rebel Alliance only without the heroic story-telling allowing them to win any major victories.

 

[Bob_Marley]

Are you kidding? Those things are made of pure win.
The coolest things to be fought in any game.

And it's not the looks that matter.
F-16's or whatever jets in this case are human piloted, unlike the gunships, which are LIVING THINGS WITH A ROTOR FOR A TAIL AND A MACHINEGUN FOR A MOUTH(?).
Those things think on they're own and outmanouver the f-16's with ease.

And the striders either skewer the tanks with they're legs or get singular(ity) with them.

AIM-120D AMRAAM and AGM-65 Maverick respectivly. It might be able to out manuver the F16, but the F16 can shoot it down from 112 miles away. And is also much faster. Against ground based synths you're looking at 17 miles for an AGM-65.

An F16 could blast them apart from well beyond visual range (another thing, the synths we know about have no BVR capability and would be at the mercy of any modern multi role fighter).

Against a modern military force the troops and synth deployed on earth would be utterly annihilated.

In a full scale clash the combine would probubly come out on top, if they're all they're supposed to be.

From what we've seen, the units deployed in a typical Imperial occupation force compared to those of our only known Combine occupation force, the Empire would come out on top.

 

[Kevin]

AIM-120D AMRAAM and AGM-65 Maverick respectivly. It might be able to out manuver the F16, but the F16 can shoot it down from 112 miles away. And is also much faster. Against ground based synths you're looking at 17 miles for an AGM-65.

Are you saying the combine will move in small packs?
What makes you sure the combine aren't EVERYWHERE!?
So there is NO ROOM to fire your missiles anyway?

And the only way a gunship can surely ba taken down is in a dogfight.
Have you completely forgotten the gunships ability to shoot down incoming rockets? And the jet-based air-to-air rockets might home in on the gunship, but they are incapable of doing those fancy moves, Gordon does to evade gunship fire, so those rockets will get they're thrusters handed to them.

Against a modern military force the troops and synth deployed on earth would be utterly annihilated.

You wish. The combine are merciless. They just kill with no remorse and thought.
The soldiers of today aren't perfect killing machines. They're still human.

 

[Langolier]

The rockets fired by an F-16 travel much faster than those fired by Gordon's RPG. Not to mention that a Gunship can only shoot down one rocket at a time. Imagine the Gunship is raining down suppressive fire on some infantry when out of nowhere a long-range missile from a F-16 14,000 feet up and 10 miles away knocks it out of the air in one go.

 

[Bob_Marley]

Are you saying the combine will move in small packs?
What makes you sure the combine aren't EVERYWHERE!?
So there is NO ROOM to fire your missiles anyway?

Talking about the combine occupation forces on Earth that we have encountered so far (because all other combine forces are an unknown quantity)
, these units operate in small groups or alone from all experience so far.

And the only way a gunship can surely ba taken down is in a dogfight.
Have you completely forgotten the gunships ability to shoot down incoming rockets? And the jet-based air-to-air rockets might home in on the gunship, but they are incapable of doing those fancy moves, Gordon does to evade gunship fire, so those rockets will get they're thrusters handed to them.

Its ability to shoot down rockets/missiles has only been demonstrated against slow moving, short ranged shoulder launched systems. There is absolutely no guarentee that it would be effective in any way against an air launched, high speed missile. Also, the Gunship's chin gun has a limited traverse and is clearly intended for ground attack. The ARAAM would almost certainly come from above (because, as far as we know, Gunships have a very limited service celing) and its coming at Mach 4. Things arn't looking good for the gunship.

You wish. The combine are merciless. They just kill with no remorse and thought.
The soldiers of today aren't perfect killing machines. They're still human.

They don't have to be. The only combine infantry that can hit anything beyond 25m are the snipers, who have great big blue lasers marking them out.Soldiers today are trained to enguage targets at 300m+ with issue assault rifles.

They have absolutely sod all in the way of air defense, and so would loose all their heavy viechles and air support (or at least the vast majority) to air strikes, followed by a mopping up of the overwatch and CP units.

Against a modern military force, the troops and synth of the Combine occupation force stationed on Earth at the time of HL2 wouldn't have a hope without off world reinforcements.

And you can't say **** about off world reinforcements, because we've only seen the occupation forces, therefore those are the only things that can be reliably commented on.

 

[McGooTheWise]

Let me just say a few things.

I think that the combine Overwatch it's self is being neglected in this argument. I've seen a strider use it's singularity cannon from the other side of the courtyard in front of the nexus. That's quite a ways if you think about walking distance. Besides that, the striders (Even just one) usually take out my whole platoon before I actually take it down. And let's not forget, it takes 7 heavily armed rockets to kill just one of them. That would be the equivalent of 7 laser blasts, by what you are talking about, yes? per strider.

The gunships we're talking about here were sent out on raid missions, and the others were sent out to kill a single man. I don't think the gunships would travel alone in a gigantic battle. They can also move quite fast. It also is apparent that the gunship can easily out maneuver the Tie's. The ties have to sweep down with speed, and then turn around when they're out of danger, and come back and fire again. A gunship is like a seal in the water when it comes to maneuvering.

I also think you guys forgot the hunter chopper. That could be sent out in packs to destroy battalions of soldiers with it's main cannon. We've seen how that thing spreads, and how quickly it shoots. You can take out at least 30 soldiers with one whole charge. The mines could also be used, and it's panic attack, where it scatters the mines all over the damn place... Imagine a whole fleet of choppers doing that. It would be the damn Hiroshima bomb. Nay, a modern day Hydrogen Bomb... Yeah.

The headcrab missiles could easily be used just to hit the walkers. Not sure who could be that accurate, but face it, those things probably move at about 10 MPH. Slowwww... The weight alone, and the force behind the thing crashing down could be enough to penetrate the cockpit... Just a thought. Very improbable, but that would be very damn cool.

And I think the hunters could swarm the footsoldiers easily, if not by shooting them, then by trampling them. Imagine a wild pack of angry bulls coming at you, and you're wearing red. yep.

Did we forget the APC's? They're mounted with a rocket launcher, that I suspect would be even a little bit stronger than the hand held one... I think and APC might be able to take down an AT-ST. And for the Star Destroyers, They're kind of like a flying citadel for the Empire, I really see not differene. And we can rule out using their mass destruction device. Even though it's not as powerful as the Death Star, the Empire needs the planet, and that could take a big chunk out of it. Also, if the combine lose the battle, They could just set off the reactor. They'd have more than one citadel in that area. It's only been 20 years after Earth was captured. To the combine that might not be a very long time, and they wouldn't need to send their whole force there, because that'd be a waste of supplies, and money. And if there are other citadels in the area, we've seen that the Citadel is still standing (partially) after the explosion. The blast came from inside the citadel too, so we can understand that the outside of the citadel might be a bit tougher than the inside. I think it's possible that the other citadels around it could survive.

Also, you're arguing that the combine don't have as many soldiers as the Empire, I thought it'd be obvious that the Combine thought of the hman race as Cave Men by their standards. (Sorry to any Cave men reading. I applaud you for actually being able to read.) The Combine have no use for the human race. Only their planet. To them Gordon is just that little itch on the top of your foot. All they need from earth is the recourses. Who knows, they might be harvesting different substances on every planet in the Galaxy. We have no way of knowing. If the combine really thought the human race was worth saving, they probably would clone the soldiers. I mean, we can already do it, so if they've mastered teleportation and space travel, I think it's possible that they have the means to clone the Humans, they just have no need.

I think another thing being overlooked is that the combine have just as thick (Maybe even thicker) helmets as the Clones. I mean, if the metal they used for the Citadel is so strong, why couldn't they just plop that on some bastard's head and send him off to fight? The headcrabs could penetrate the helmets of the Clones just as easily. Also it seems that there is no real head inside the helmet after the headcrab comes off, so I think the headcrab probably destroyed the guy's head when it clamped down. It's possible by the surgery the combine do on the humans that the flesh and bones soften, so therefor the need for very protective armor couldn't possibly be ignored.

If you're wondering why the hell the combine would bother making soldiers out of the humans if they have no use for them, consider this. The combine's main weapon here, sense they are reluctant to send their real force, is fear. Fear to uprise, because they're possibly fighting people in their own family, but they are no more family than there is between Men and Maggots. The combine just don't want to have to clean up the mess if the Human population does stand up. To you I guess it would be like if your dog, or cat pee'd in the carpet when they just came inside. So what do you do to keep them from doing that? yell at them, and scare them every time they do it. Soon they learn that if they piss on the rug they get yelled at. That's the closest I could emulate it.

I'm done typing for now. More later.

Ohh, and don't argue accuracy. That's just a pure game play effect. Let's just say that both sides are equally accurate, and they have deadly aim.

 

[MJ12]

man, I love what a geek debate this has become, I can't help but feel proud hehe

 

[Laivasse]

Arguing how good a fighter plane would be against Combine hardware is missing the point, don't people think? We've been told how good earth's miltary forces were against the full might of the Combine - and the answer is useless. It's no good saying 'yeah, but the plane would pwn the gunship by shooting from miles away',because for some reason or other that did not happen when the Combine invaded.

There's tons of reasons for why the forces we see in game might not seem like the type of force to topple earth in 7 hours - eg. it's a caretaker force; it's the result of the Combine being taken by surprise; it's a force that's been dispatched to pick up one man, or mop up ragtag ground based rebel foot soldiers later on; they're fighting Freeman, who is tough like a metal flea. As such it's no use saying 'well the Combine are weak because an F16 would take them down' because it's just not true - all the world's F16's couldn't take them down, nor could they last longer than 7 hours.

If you're discussing this kind of thing you can't just base the Combine's strength on what you see in game, or on your memory of one blind soldier who fired his gun into a doorjamb when you were right in front of him. You need to also base your assumptions on the background canon of the game, which states that the Combine was able to overwhelm all of Earth's forces in 7 hours. Combine forces > Human forces.

 

[Shift]

This topic has really gotten out of hand lol.

 

[Bob_Marley]

Arguing how good a fighter plane would be against Combine hardware is missing the point, don't people think? We've been told how good earth's miltary forces were against the full might of the Combine - and the answer is useless. It's no good saying 'yeah, but the plane would pwn the gunship by shooting from miles away',because for some reason or other that did not happen when the Combine invaded.

There's tons of reasons for why the forces we see in game might not seem like the type of force to topple earth in 7 hours - eg. it's a caretaker force; it's the result of the Combine being taken by surprise; it's a force that's been dispatched to pick up one man, or mop up ragtag ground based rebel foot soldiers later on; they're fighting Freeman, who is tough like a metal flea. As such it's no use saying 'well the Combine are weak because an F16 would take them down' because it's just not true - all the world's F16's couldn't take them down, nor could they last longer than 7 hours.

If you're discussing this kind of thing you can't just base the Combine's strength on what you see in game, or on your memory of one blind soldier who fired his gun into a doorjamb when you were right in front of him. You need to also base your assumptions on the background canon of the game, which states that the Combine was able to overwhelm all of Earth's forces in 7 hours. Combine forces > Human forces.

I'm not arguing that the combine as a whole is weak because of this. I've repeatedly stated that. The forces that invaded earth are an unknown quantity. Thus any comparison with them is ultimately useless. And saying that they defeated the earth's armed forces in 7 hours is still leaving it ambigious. If global nuclear war occured we (as in humans) could destory all of earth's armed forces in about 16 minuites. It'd be messy, but it could be done.

My point is it is useless to argue about the off world forces of the combine, because we've never seen them. We've no idea what they are capable of other than that they managed to cause a Breen lead capitulation against the already weakened armed forces of the Earth. Thats far, far too vauge to have any meaningful debate about what would happen if the Glactic Empire and the Combine clashed in a full scale war.

The Combine forces on Earth, from the force composition as I perceive it are indeed almost entirely used as a caretaker force. Their equipment for infantry seems to be for CRW in an urban environment, with aircraft soley dedicated to ground attack and infantry support walkers. They are, essentially, a very heavily armed glorified SWAT team.

At its core we can say one of 2 things:

1. We rely entirely on what we've seen so far. In that case, the Combine is getting pwnt.

2. We say that further information on the wider off world "front line" forces of the Combine is needed before any meaning comparison can be made between the two.

 

[Rapstah]

The forces that invaded earth are an unknown quantity. Thus any comparison with them is ultimately useless.

I doubt the Combine would teleport them out after Earth was conquered.

 

[McGooTheWise]

I doubt the Combine would teleport them out after Earth was conquered.

... I'm sure they'd have other fish to fry after that... Why in the name of **** would they have teleported their ENTIRE force to earth? There wouldn't be a single patch of land uncovered by even a fraction of their army, imho, so it wouldn't really make sense if they used their entire force. They probably just sent squads of their best synths, and units. Teleporting all their units would be too costly.

 

[Narvi]

Let me just say a few things.

I think that the combine Overwatch it's self is being neglected in this argument. I've seen a strider use it's singularity cannon from the other side of the courtyard in front of the nexus. That's quite a ways if you think about walking distance. Besides that, the striders (Even just one) usually take out my whole platoon before I actually take it down. And let's not forget, it takes 7 heavily armed rockets to kill just one of them. That would be the equivalent of 7 laser blasts, by what you are talking about, yes? per strider.

That's still walking distance. We were debating multi-kilometer engagements.

The gunships we're talking about here were sent out on raid missions, and the others were sent out to kill a single man. I don't think the gunships would travel alone in a gigantic battle. They can also move quite fast. It also is apparent that the gunship can easily out maneuver the Tie's. The ties have to sweep down with speed, and then turn around when they're out of danger, and come back and fire again. A gunship is like a seal in the water when it comes to maneuvering.

Yes, but does that mean the gunship will survive the first run? TIEs travel in packs as well, and are shielded.

I also think you guys forgot the hunter chopper. That could be sent out in packs to destroy battalions of soldiers with it's main cannon. We've seen how that thing spreads, and how quickly it shoots. You can take out at least 30 soldiers with one whole charge. The mines could also be used, and it's panic attack, where it scatters the mines all over the damn place... Imagine a whole fleet of choppers doing that. It would be the damn Hiroshima bomb. Nay, a modern day Hydrogen Bomb... Yeah.

The beam requires charging after each spread. Though it would be devastating towards infantry, armour support should be able to shoot the chopper down.

The headcrab missiles could easily be used just to hit the walkers. Not sure who could be that accurate, but face it, those things probably move at about 10 MPH. Slowwww... The weight alone, and the force behind the thing crashing down could be enough to penetrate the cockpit... Just a thought. Very improbable, but that would be very damn cool.

The thing is quite well armoured, and it's huge. Besides, headcrab shells come down with a lot of force, but they aren't exactly artillery. They've come down in the same street you were in in game, and it didn't hurt you much.

And I think the hunters could swarm the footsoldiers easily, if not by shooting them, then by trampling them. Imagine a wild pack of angry bulls coming at you, and you're wearing red. yep. .

Can we wait until the game comes out before we judge the Hunters in the argument? I really don't know their durability or anything like that. They could be ineffective against armour support, for instance, or mounted positions.

Did we forget the APC's? They're mounted with a rocket launcher, that I suspect would be even a little bit stronger than the hand held one... I think and APC might be able to take down an AT-ST. And for the Star Destroyers, They're kind of like a flying citadel for the Empire, I really see not differene. And we can rule out using their mass destruction device. Even though it's not as powerful as the Death Star, the Empire needs the planet, and that could take a big chunk out of it. Also, if the combine lose the battle, They could just set off the reactor. They'd have more than one citadel in that area. It's only been 20 years after Earth was captured. To the combine that might not be a very long time, and they wouldn't need to send their whole force there, because that'd be a waste of supplies, and money. And if there are other citadels in the area, we've seen that the Citadel is still standing (partially) after the explosion. The blast came from inside the citadel too, so we can understand that the outside of the citadel might be a bit tougher than the inside. I think it's possible that the other citadels around it could survive.

Your post is a bit incoherent. What are you saying? That the Combine would adopt a scorched earth policy? Or that the Citadel would withstand orbital bombardment? Or that adjacent Citadels would survive if one Citadel decided to nuke itself?

When you reach the point of such WMDs, you realize, the Empire would use orbital bombardment.

I think another thing being overlooked is that the combine have just as thick (Maybe even thicker) helmets as the Clones. I mean, if the metal they used for the Citadel is so strong, why couldn't they just plop that on some bastard's head and send him off to fight? The headcrabs could penetrate the helmets of the Clones just as easily. Also it seems that there is no real head inside the helmet after the headcrab comes off, so I think the headcrab probably destroyed the guy's head when it clamped down. It's possible by the surgery the combine do on the humans that the flesh and bones soften, so therefor the need for very protective armor couldn't possibly be ignored.

For the same reason that people don't wear tank armour on their head. Weight. Besides which, it's probably designed to shrug off bullets and pulse bolts, not headcrab teeth. Current body armour, for instance, isn't designed to stop crossbow bolts. Clones have body armour which withstand blaster bolts. It's very unlikely that headcrabs could penetrate the helmet.

If you're wondering why the hell the combine would bother making soldiers out of the humans if they have no use for them, consider this. The combine's main weapon here, sense they are reluctant to send their real force, is fear. Fear to uprise, because they're possibly fighting people in their own family, but they are no more family than there is between Men and Maggots. The combine just don't want to have to clean up the mess if the Human population does stand up. To you I guess it would be like if your dog, or cat pee'd in the carpet when they just came inside. So what do you do to keep them from doing that? yell at them, and scare them every time they do it. Soon they learn that if they piss on the rug they get yelled at. That's the closest I could emulate it.

...so?

 

[WingsofJecka]

TIEs travel in packs as well, and are shielded.

Someone doesn't know their Star Wars canon. Standard TIEs are not shielded in any way. Only a few select standard type of TIEs have shields and some special TIE variants that aren't widely in use.

Thought I clear that up.

 

[Jintor]

I still vote Combine but not Transhuman Overwatch.

 

[Iron_cube]

Imperials have freaking Gonks, therefore they win.

GONKS DAMMIT

Also : http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Stormtrooper_variants

 

[Narvi]

Someone doesn't know their Star Wars canon. Standard TIEs are not shielded in any way. Only a few select standard type of TIEs have shields and some special TIE variants that aren't widely in use.

Thought I clear that up.

Eh? I distinctly recall shield flashes from TIES in the movies.

Meh. I wish I had my DVDs.

Anyway, gunships are notoriously inaccurate at range. They have a tendency to shoot to your left...

 

[Jintor]

They don't have shields endofstory.

 

[Adabiviak]

...just thought of something the Combine have that the Imperials dont: teleportation. They simply plopped citadels in place all over the world, no? Say you plop a large chunk of metal, nay an explosive, inside a Star Destroyer, AT-AT, or whatever. That could be problematic in combat.

 

[morgs]

Arguing how good a fighter plane would be against Combine hardware is missing the point, don't people think? We've been told how good earth's miltary forces were against the full might of the Combine - and the answer is useless. It's no good saying 'yeah, but the plane would pwn the gunship by shooting from miles away',because for some reason or other that did not happen when the Combine invaded.

They could have easily taken down a few gunships, but more and more would have arrived. the planes would have had to re-fuel/ reload on land where they could have been taken out.

 

[soulslicer]

trust me, the mortar synths own any fighter plane any time.

 

[Narvi]

...just thought of something the Combine have that the Imperials dont: teleportation. They simply plopped citadels in place all over the world, no? Say you plop a large chunk of metal, nay an explosive, inside a Star Destroyer, AT-AT, or whatever. That could be problematic in combat.

Problem. We've never seen Combine teleportation that precise.

If I recall my HL canon they managed to find and teleport to Earth so easily by forcing open the Portal Storms, which were centralized around Earth.

 

[Iron_cube]

trust me, the mortar synths own any fighter plane any time.

Let me guess, you played MI and saw that unfinished peice of shit?

No one knows how these synths behaved ingame.

 

[McGooTheWise]

That's still walking distance. We were debating multi-kilometer engagements.



Yes, but does that mean the gunship will survive the first run? TIEs travel in packs as well, and are shielded.



The beam requires charging after each spread. Though it would be devastating towards infantry, armour support should be able to shoot the chopper down.



The thing is quite well armoured, and it's huge. Besides, headcrab shells come down with a lot of force, but they aren't exactly artillery. They've come down in the same street you were in in game, and it didn't hurt you much.



Can we wait until the game comes out before we judge the Hunters in the argument? I really don't know their durability or anything like that. They could be ineffective against armour support, for instance, or mounted positions.



Your post is a bit incoherent. What are you saying? That the Combine would adopt a scorched earth policy? Or that the Citadel would withstand orbital bombardment? Or that adjacent Citadels would survive if one Citadel decided to nuke itself?

When you reach the point of such WMDs, you realize, the Empire would use orbital bombardment.



For the same reason that people don't wear tank armour on their head. Weight. Besides which, it's probably designed to shrug off bullets and pulse bolts, not headcrab teeth. Current body armour, for instance, isn't designed to stop crossbow bolts. Clones have body armour which withstand blaster bolts. It's very unlikely that headcrabs could penetrate the helmet.



...so?

I really shouldn't listen to music when I write a big post like that. -.-

I just want to tell you again, the combine could send each of their units in numbers. We're not talking about 1v1 I hope, cause I'm talking a swarm of choppers verses a standard empirial strike force... That would probably be unfair, however, and I guess we haven't seen a standard overwatch strike force, but the gunships, choppers, and striders combined I think would have a good chance against any epirial walkers, and a force of soldiers.

(I can see that you're poking at every little hole in the combine side of the argument. )