Deflector Shields: Difference between revisions

Other issues involve a shield's interaction with the same effects passing ''from inside''<ref>it would need to either be asymmetric or able to open "windows" for firing weapons and any non-inertialess propulsion, with all problems this entails</ref> and lower-grade effects<ref>if it blocks lasers, there would need to somehow be a method to only block radiation above a certain energy level or it would block visible light</ref>.

 

 

Shields are popular in fiction because it allows the [[Cool Ship]] to participate in battles without the inconvenience of having to spend the rest of the episode making repairs to physical armour and systems. In older or lower-budget movies and TV, they also eliminate the need to show battle damage on the ship; e.g. having your Ensign call out "Shields down to twenty percent!" can be a lot cheaper than showing a gash blasted in your ship's armor. The downside is that creators often have to resort to [[Explosive Instrumentation]] to provide combat casualties on a shielded ship. In somewhat-harder science fiction, shields are useful to overcome the seemingly overwhelming attacker's advantage--cities on planets can't dodge, so if there isn't some way to defend against space-launched missiles and kinetic projectiles, wars are going to be short and boring.

* ''[[Super Dimension Fortress Macross]]'': The ''Macross'' gained a force field early in its mission. Atypically, for most of its journey, the field could not cover the entire ship, so crewmembers had to move three small shields around the ship to intercept enemy fire. Later, an "omnidirectional barrier" was invented, which overloaded when hit by too much fire, destroying an unnamed large city in Ontario. ''Macross'' also uses focused pinpoint barriers to penetrate said shields, as a justification for space melee combat by kilometer tall [[Humongous Mecha]] punching each other.

** Of particular note is that when the Omnidirectional Barrier overloads, the energy goes outwards, leaving the ''Macross'' itself unharmed at the center. This is terrible when hovering above a city full of civilians, but pretty darned useful when hovering inside the command base of a 4 million ship enemy battle fleet.

* ''[[GaoGaiGar]]'' has the "Protect Shade," which not just blocks a beam weapon, but actually bends it into a pentagram before flinging it back at the attacker.

** The Mercurius Mobile Suit and Virgo [[Mecha-Mooks|Mobile Dolls]] from ''[[Gundam Wing]]'' had Planet Defensors, [[Attack Drone|Attack Drones]] that generate a forcefield capable of blocking most ranged weapons. Their only weaknesses seem to be [[Frickin' Laser Beams|lasers]] and melee attacks, but this is usually offset by the Virgos' powerful beam cannons, their working in teams, and the rarity of weaponized lasers in the setting.

** In ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny]]'', the Destiny, Strike Freedom, and Legend Gundams feature arm-mounted beam shield generators.

*** A bit subverted in that the field itself was later made to be weaponized as demonstrated by the [[Wave Motion Gun|Seravee]]. It allows the Seravee to store Particles externally and fire them without having to internally process the blast because the field can now contain the particles.

* ''[[Sonic X]]'' has Perfect Chaos create a spherical shield of water around itself when Eggman attacks in the Egg Carrier II that effortlessly stops the missile salvo he launched. The shield proves useless against Super Sonic, though.

* This is done in several different ways in ''[[Pokémon (anime)|Pokémon]]''. Mr. Mime can create invisible barriers. The attacks Protect and Detect do the same thing in the games. In the ''[[Pokémon Special]]'' manga, Sabrina's Pokemon can make invisible forcefields, encircling the entirety of Saffron City at one point.

** In ''[[Pokémon: Destiny Deoxys]]'', Deoxys creates a force field around LaRousse City to keep Rayquaza out. As well as blocking physical objects and energy blasts, the force field blocks any air movement from outside the city, which is bad for our heroes as all systems in LaRousse city, including the doors and the security robots, run on wind power.

* The ''[[Vandread]]'' Jura's main power was its [[Beehive Barrier]] and could even protect an entire planet. The super Vandread used it as a personal shield as well.

* [[Sailor Moon|Sailor Saturn]]'s "Silence Wall" attack is an example.

* In ''[[Martian Successor Nadesico]]'', there's the Distortion Field, which is powerful enough to deflect beam attacks head on. The only thing that is seen penetrating the barriers are special blades sharp enough to pierce it and a special lance that is actually powerful enough to ''pry it open''!

* Saki and Mai/Cure Bloom and Cure Egret of ''[[Futari wa Pretty Cure Splash Star]]'' can create barriers - going so far as to create ones big enough to protect [[Pretty Cure All Stars|their fellow Cures]].

* Subverted in ''Star Wreck: In the Pirkining''; the "P-Fleet" ships have shields, but for some reason, they're completely useless in the "Babcom 5" universe.

* ''[[Harry Potter (film)|Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows]], Part Two''. OK, it's a magical defense, but it looks like a shield and acts like a shield, especially when thousands of Death Eaters start firing indirect-fire curses at Hogwarts.

 

 

*** Used to great tactical advantage in the later books, where unmanned shield projectors were placed on the battlefield as booby traps.

** Anyway the whole point of having the shields work that way was so that [[Rule of Cool|we could still have swordfights in a laser-gun-technology society]]. Hence the special fighting style where thin blades are slowed just before contact.

* ''[[CoDominium|The Mote in God's Eye]]'' has one called the Langston Field, but Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle go into minute detail about how it works in a story collected in ''N-space''. This includes them claiming that they came up with how that technology worked and then wrote the story around those limitations.

** Gets around the above-mentioned Newtonian problem by draining energy from anything incoming. Energy beams are weakened, and projectiles lose kinetic energy and slow down. (Note that this makes the Field a zone around the ship rather than a thin bubble or wall.) The Field absorbs the drained energy, then gradually radiates it outward as heat--unless it absorbs too much energy, in which case it [[Phlebotinum Overload|collapses]], radiating all the stored energy inward ''and'' outward at once, destroying the shielded ship.

** There are also the personal force shields they find in that freedom fighter base -- they activate only when hit by blaster fire, but then will protect the wearer from pretty much anything, up to and including lava. Unfortunately, apart from one use in the next episode, the few that our heroes manage to salvage are never used again after "I Shrink Therefore I Am," presumably because [[Bounty Hunter|Axicor]] had them destroyed the moment he discovered them.

* ''[[Stargate SG-1]]'': Most spacefaring races have defensive shields for large ships, and these vary greatly in quality from race to race. The Ancients had a force field around an entire city, though it took a honking lot of power. Also, Goa'uld ships [[Cool but Inefficient|use force fields instead of glass for windows]]. Note that there is also a distinction drawn in one episode between forcefields that work like those on ''[[Star Trek]]'' (repel everything indiscriminately) and those that work like those on ''[[Dune]]'' (let slow-moving objects through); both exist in the ''Stargate'' universe. One thing about Goa'uld forcefields (that was pretty much always portrayed with continuity) is that they are one-way. Thus, they stop all attacks coming from the outside, but don't impede firing from the inside or launching smaller ships, with no need to open dangerous holes in the shield.

* ''[[Babylon 5]]'': The aliens from ''[[Made for TV Movie|Thirdspace]]'' have those. {{spoiler|They had them on ships and on the gate. To go through the gate from one side, the protagonists concentrated fire on the other side.}}

** While it wasn't stated onscreen, background materials reveal that among the younger races, only the Abbai have deflector shields. Abbai technology isn't really anything special in most regards, but their entire military mindset is based on defense rather than offense, so they're ahead of the curve in this regard.

** ''[[Final Fantasy X]]'''s Sin can protect itself with a gigantic spherical force field, which is effective enough to repel, overload, and destroy the Al-Bhed [[Wave Motion Gun|Wave Motion Guns]] and then [[Sphere of Destruction|expand to disintegrate anything in the vicinity]]. Strangely enough, Sin fails to use this shield when [[High Altitude Battle|engaging the party and their airship]] --though it may have been holding back willingly at that point.

* A common feature in the universe of ''[[Beyond Good & Evil (video game)|Beyond Good and Evil]].'' There are both large [[Deflector Shields]], designed to protect buildings from airborne attacks from the [[Alien Invasion]], and smaller, personal shields used by both good and evil soldiers to prevent you from damaging them.

** In ''[[Star Fox Adventures]]'', there are two mazes involving force fields, which basically behave like near-invisible walls (there's a little sparkle to them). One is found in a room after you activate the Quake Pad in the center, and the force field makes up the inner walls of the maze. Your challenge is to get to the exit before time runs out. Another maze also has regular walls, but force fields block your way to the end when you activate the Quake Pad. You have to turn off each one at a switch or by shooting a Blast Board, and most switches are blocked somehow. Again, a timed challenge.

*** Also, floating robots commonly have shields. The ones in Dragon Rock require you to use an Earthwalker horn to disable the generators, and the one in the Krazoa Palace has the unusual disabling method of shooting colored gems through color-changing flames.

* A strategic aspect in the original ''[[Star Raiders (video game)|Star Raiders]]''. Although a single hit when the shields were down would instantly kill the player, daredevil pilots would engage the Zylons with damaged (flickering) or destroyed shields ''anyway'' just to avoid a time-consuming trip to a starbase.

* In ''[[Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey]]'', all of the Schwarzwelt Investigation Team [[Cool Ship|Cool Ships]] --the ''Red Sprite'', the ''Elve'', the ''Blue Jet'', and the ''Gigantic''-- are equipped with a so-called "plasma shield." It's never made clear whether it's a shield ''composed of'' plasma or one that protects ''from'' plasma (seeing how the Schwarzwelt is, itself, surrounded by a plasma wall that disintegrates whatever it touches,) but not only is it explicitly enabled every time the ''Red Sprite'' jumps between dimensions within the Schwarzwelt, but presumably it's what keeps demons from tearing the ship to pieces while the Strike Team commandos are on a mission.

* In ''[[War Front Turning Point]]'', one of the Allies' response to [[Stupid Jetpack Hitler]] and [[Soviet Superscience]] are force field tanks.

* ''[[Starflight]]'' allows the player to manually raise or lower shields, if installed. The reason you don't leave shields raised all the time is that doing so may be seen as a hostile gesture, just like having your weapons constantly armed.

== Real Life ==

* The British Ministry of Defence [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/7487740/Star-Trek-style-force-field-armour-being-developed-by-military-scientists.html is seriously pursuing the development of real deflector shields for tanks]. The tanks' armour would contain super-capacitors that store large amounts of electrical energy, and then release it in a brief, powerful blast when an incoming projectile approaches. The incredibly powerful, localized EM pulse would physically deflect the projectile. The capacitor would then rapidly recharge to prepare for another attack. Projectiles as large as rocket-propelled grenades and small missiles could be protected against in this way. The only difference from ''[[Star Trek]]'' -- style forcefields is that these deflectors would work in pulses, rather than running continuously. And they probably wouldn't do much against [[Death Ray|Death Rays]]...

** HOWEVER, Red Alert had it right: the Soviets invented the system in the 70s, and even fielded it in Afghanistan (w/disastrous results - it worked too well, protecting the vehicle, but consistently blowing up shit'n'people all around it). Recently, the Russian army got its hands on version 2.0 (well, more like "dash-M", but that seems to be Russian military speak for 2.0 these days).

* Will always come up eventually during playtime for children, going something like this:

* [[The Mighty Thor|Thor]] can create "dimension disruptions" with Mjolnir to protect himself or his allies.

* [[Nick Fury]]'s tech division experimented with personal energy fields during the late sixties, ''always'' with [[Oh Crap|near-disastrous results]] for the volunteers involved. Oddly enough, most of [[Fun with Acronyms|S.H.I.E.L.D.'s]] opponents seemed to have perfected the technology without any casualties whatsoever.

 

== Films -- Animation ==

== Literature ==

* One of [[Isaac Asimov]]'s ''[[Foundation]]'' series books has a man trading his personal shield -- resistant even to ray gun fire -- to one of the guards in exchange for a private viewing of the generator facilities on a planet. Oh, the shield works, all right, but only for one day.

* Asimov seems to be fond of this idea: In ''David Starr, Space Ranger'', [[Lucky Starr]] acquires a personal force field generator, later called a "glimmer shield" because of its peculiar optic properties. It helps save the day in a couple of the later novels. {{spoiler|Lucky's glimmer shield is one of a kind, though: it is given to him by hyperadvanced Martians, and it is stated that that kind of technology is past the ability of human society at that point.}}

* In Christopher Hinz' three volume ''[[Paratwa Saga]]'', there is a form of this called a crescent web. It protects the ventral and dorsal areas while leaving the sides vulnerable so the arms can move (usually to aim a weapon).

* "Shielding" is one of the many [[Psychic Powers]] available in ''[[Psychonauts]]''. The psychic's shield is, of course, made of psychokinetic energy. At higher levels, it even has a [[Some Kind of Force Field|directly damaging property]] that hurts enemies that touch it.

* ''[[Star Ocean]] 2'' has several boss fights that are deliberately unwinnable (some of them require you to just survive for 60 seconds). Besides the ones that are against foes that are supposed to be "just too strong", the initial fights against the Ten Wise Men show them encased in some sort of energy field, the technobabble for which escapes me. The heroes have to search out a particular metal with which to fashion weapons allowing them to hurt them.

* ''[[Metroid Prime]]'': All the incarnations of the Power Suit include energy shielding; deflecting enemy attacks requires energy from the suit's [[Heart Container|onboard tanks]].

** Also, the Parasite Queen has a shifting force field. Sometimes it gives you a nice opening, and other times it spins to make it highly unlikely that shots will penetrate.

* The title character from ''[[The Guardian Legend]]'' is protected by a personal force field, which only materializes briefly when she gets attacked. When her life meter drops to zero, the shield can no longer protect her, and she will get destroyed if attacked again.

* [http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Personal_energy_shield "Personal energy shields"] in the ''[[Star Wars]]'' universe. They're canonically inconvenient, expensive, and not used often, to explain why the characters [[Forgotten Phlebotinum|don't carry them all the time]], but personal shields are featured much more prominently in the video games, where just about every protagonist seems to have one. Examples include ''[[Knights of the Old Republic]]'' and ''[[Dark Forces Saga|Jedi Knight]]''.