VOY - Alice

[Durandal_1707]

Also, it's incredibly unlikely that Worf can make an energy shield capable of stopping bullets using nothing but a communicator and a paper clip, but the freaking Borg wouldn't be able to do it. I mean, c'mon.

[Kendrakirai]

“Reasonably” conventional means, as in “we don’t need incredibly specialized technology that can only reliably be delivered via equally highly specialized means, which causes the enemy to dissolve horribly”.

Which is the only way that 8472 could reliably be defeated. The Borg can be taken out just with sufficiently powerful or properly modulated weapons, they aren’t as invincible as you make them sound. The *real* problem is their sheer *number*. Even if they could be killed with water pistols, there’s unknown trillions of Borg. Every sentient being in the Alpha quadrant would have to kill hundreds, maybe thousands, apiece if there was an actual war.

Heck, even just quantum torpedoes were doing a number on the Borg.

But that all pales in comparison to 8472, who with six ships blew up planets, single ships taking out dozens of cubes, their ships and even themselves resistant to *everything* thrown at them - and you know the Borg would have been trying everything that they had ever encountered before, phasers, lasers, Masers, disrupters, photon torpedoes, mass drivers, Borg Tribbles, atomic fire breath, artificial singularities, The list goes on.

And, regardless of what was said later, which I’m still convinced is either a lie or just terrible writing (which, Voyager, that’s always an option, especially when wildly different writers do two different episodes), there was absolutely no evidence - in fact, there was evidence to the contrary! - that 8472 was ever going to stop at the Borg.

They made a huge mistake with 8472 with that follow-up episode. They should have left it a question as to whether or not Janeway did the right thing, with the various species who were hoping the Borg would get wiped out with no way of knowing if the alternative was an even greater scourge.

They should have left 8472 as a mysterious, mostly unknowable threat, made the question be ‘was it truly better the devil you know’. Instead we got a lame ‘oh it was a *misunderstanding* and we have allllll this information about Earth and the Federation and the Alpha Quadrant except for the fact you and the Borg are bitter enemies who would never ally unless the circumstances were Galaxy- threateningly dire, like say aliens from another dimension invading in an apparent attempt to wipe out all life in the galaxy, and that’s *totally* not us, we’re oh so innocent and misunderstood as we plot to infiltrate and overthrow the dominant powers of a quarter of the galaxy’ excuse.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

*Ahem*

The first Borg Picard guns down took a couple of shots. The second Borg Picard guns down took a whole magazine. They were already adapting and they were doing so consistent with how they adapt to phaser and phase pistol fire. Its there on-screen I don't know why people cannot see it.

Considering we don't see clear impact sequencing of the borb being hit, it's not very apparent that they're adapting. It's more likely the case that Picard is just a bit trigger happy and not adept at firing an SMG.

[Durandal_1707]

Which is the only way that 8472 could reliably be defeated. The Borg can be taken out just with sufficiently powerful or properly modulated weapons, they aren’t as invincible as you make them sound.

There isn't a single instance in the entire canon, unless I'm forgetting something somewhere, of Federation forces defeating a Borg cube in a fair fight. In fact, both major encounters we've seen have had a single Borg cube destroying nearly all of the Federation's available fleet, with Earth only being saved at the last minute by a Hail Mary assisted by magic and writer fiat. That simply isn't true of 8472.

[Kendrakirai]

Which is the only way that 8472 could reliably be defeated. The Borg can be taken out just with sufficiently powerful or properly modulated weapons, they aren’t as invincible as you make them sound.

There isn't a single instance in the entire canon, unless I'm forgetting something somewhere, of Federation forces defeating a Borg cube in a fair fight. In fact, both major encounters we've seen have had a single Borg cube destroying nearly all of the Federation's available fleet, with Earth only being saved at the last minute by a Hail Mary assisted by magic and writer fiat. That simply isn't true of 8472.

Star Trek is more than just the Federation. I recall there being several species in the Delta quadrant that had gotten somewhat adept at holding the Borg at bay.

After all, *something* must be, because by all rights, if they were even half as invincible as you make them out to be, just in the 20 years or so since Q Introduced humanity to the Borg, they’d have expanded exponentially to the point there’d barely be anybody *left* in the Delta Quadrant. Thousands of cubes, one or two per inhabited star system, a couple of weeks to effectively remove all opposition planetside as the assimilated populace turns on the unassimilated, and the cube(s) move on. Soon, new cubes are being made in the assimilated system and sent out to assimilate more worlds. And this process would only accelerate as new technology is recovered and implemented in all cubes.

You’re making the assumption that everyone in the galaxy has a similar level of technology to the Federation (which is probably untrue by dozens of episodes) and that the *only* way to beat the Borg *ever* is via being a pseudogod or making absolutely insane plays that only actually work because the Federation is on the other side of the galaxy, and the Collective just isn’t that interested enough to actually send more than one ship at a time, years apart.

[Durandal_1707]

After all, *something* must be, because by all rights, if they were even half as invincible as you make them out to be, just in the 20 years or so since Q Introduced humanity to the Borg, they’d have expanded exponentially to the point there’d barely be anybody *left* in the Delta Quadrant.

There was. Species 8472.

Thousands of cubes, one or two per inhabited star system, a couple of weeks to effectively remove all opposition planetside as the assimilated populace turns on the unassimilated, and the cube(s) move on. Soon, new cubes are being made in the assimilated system and sent out to assimilate more worlds. And this process would only accelerate as new technology is recovered and implemented in all cubes.

And this started happening as soon as Janeway removed 8472 from the equation. There was an episode called "Hope and Fear", where the (quite sympathetic, IMO) antagonist was a refugee whose planet was one of the dominoes that fell shortly after "Scorpion."

[Kendrakirai]

After all, *something* must be, because by all rights, if they were even half as invincible as you make them out to be, just in the 20 years or so since Q Introduced humanity to the Borg, they’d have expanded exponentially to the point there’d barely be anybody *left* in the Delta Quadrant.

There was. Species 8472.

Thousands of cubes, one or two per inhabited star system, a couple of weeks to effectively remove all opposition planetside as the assimilated populace turns on the unassimilated, and the cube(s) move on. Soon, new cubes are being made in the assimilated system and sent out to assimilate more worlds. And this process would only accelerate as new technology is recovered and implemented in all cubes.

And this started happening as soon as Janeway removed 8472 from the equation. There was an episode called "Hope and Fear", where the (quite sympathetic, IMO) antagonist was a refugee whose planet was one of the dominoes that fell shortly after "Scorpion."

Species 8472 was not fighting the Borg for 20 years, not when they were blowing up planets and destroying dozens of cubes in *minutes* of in-universe time. There wouldn’t be *any* Borg left at that rate if it had been happening for more than a couple of years.

[Yukaphile]

I mean, I object to how the Federation took out the cube in First Contact. I could buy if you have greater firepower or a specialized technology (like with Species 8472), then they can only adapt "so far" or not at all, and would thus transform this into a campaign of military conquest, but that was not good execution at all, and I don't think the Federation had advanced far enough to be on their level. At least as far as it was presented in the film. As I had said, I wish something Voyager had shown us is that their assimilation campaigns in the Delta Quadrant and elsewhere are probably largely decentralized, that only one or two cubes are needed, for each planet or coalition of planets. And the war with Species 8472 was an exception, not the rule. Necessary only a few times in their history. Because it felt like more of the same mindless post-First Contact retcon, that there are hundreds of cubes simply for eye-candy and action's sake, rather than being in any way clever, sophisticated, or intelligent. I'd even have the Tactical Cube from "Unimatrix Zero" be a custom-built cube for such eras in the Borg's history. What a waste.

[clearspira]

*Ahem*

The first Borg Picard guns down took a couple of shots. The second Borg Picard guns down took a whole magazine. They were already adapting and they were doing so consistent with how they adapt to phaser and phase pistol fire. Its there on-screen I don't know why people cannot see it.

Considering we don't see clear impact sequencing of the borb being hit, it's not very apparent that they're adapting. It's more likely the case that Picard is just a bit trigger happy and not adept at firing an SMG.

Admittedly yes the the lack of SFX is a problem in that scene. If I was to asspull an explanation maybe they have something similar to the NX-01 armour polarization ability where their plating starts to molecularly change in some way. After all, realistically even a drone wouldn't want to be lugging around something akin to the resilience of tank armour all day due to weight issues and the obvious fact that most people they attack will be using energy weapons (because they are only interested in assimilating those of equal or superior technology rather than being merely a plague of locusts trying to assimilate everyone) and thus possessing so much armour is inefficient.

[Kendrakirai]

I mean, I object to how the Federation took out the cube in First Contact. I could buy if you have greater firepower or a specialized technology (like with Species 8472), then they can only adapt "so far" or not at all, and would thus transform this into a campaign of military conquest, but that was not good execution at all, and I don't think the Federation had advanced far enough to be on their level. At least as far as it was presented in the film. As I had said, I wish something Voyager had shown us is that their assimilation campaigns in the Delta Quadrant and elsewhere are probably largely decentralized, that only one or two cubes are needed, for each planet or coalition of planets. And the war with Species 8472 was an exception, not the rule. Necessary only a few times in their history. Because it felt like more of the same mindless post-First Contact retcon, that there are hundreds of cubes simply for eye-candy and action's sake, rather than being in any way clever, sophisticated, or intelligent. I'd even have the Tactical Cube from "Unimatrix Zero" be a custom-built cube for such eras in the Borg's history. What a waste.

Once a ship is built, if you make it modular and upgradable enough, there’s no reason to ever pull it out of service, or at least, not for a number of years. That’s an *enormous* waste of resources and is grossly inefficient. The Excelsiors are still going in the Federation after like 50 years because of numerous refits, and they aren’t nearly as adaptable as a Borg vessel. And this was in a time of prolonged peace, where ships weren’t actually needed! The Borg are never truly in a state of peace.

The Borg need to Patrol and defend their space like any other power, and that requires ships. They need vessels to assimilate civilizations. It makes sense for them to have a huge number of ships, even if they don’t actually build new ones very often, just because they’ve been doing it for centuries and they almost never have to permanently take them out of service.

Incidentally, I can totally buy that the Federation would have beefed themselves up by the time of First Contact. Between technology developed specifically to fight the Borg, and a newly military mindset and buildup of ships thanks to the Dominion War, as well as the weapons developed to fight in *that*, plus reverse-engineered Jem’hadar And Breen weapons, there’s been a *lot* of progress since the last time the Borg had any information from the Alpha Quadrant. They simply hadn’t been prepared for that level of resistance. The last time the Federation (Not Voyager, the Federation) had encountered the Borg was about ten years prior. And even with Voyager’s information, that was a whole war out of date.

War is exceptionally good at pushing technology forward, especially with regards to weapons.