Howdy, havent posted in a while, but I have read over what Schem and Para have been typing and I have to say that I agree with some of what each of you say and for the most part schem.
It appears to me that if the devs put this into there shielding model for ships, then as mentioned there would be some type of result from any colission. The damage begins to overload the sheilds, as a result power is increased to the shields to compensate and prevent an overload. This conitues until the ships power out put can no longer sustain the shield generation and fail.
That said, the energy of hte blast/impacts on the shields must go somewhere. It would seem that since any blast has a 360 degree radius, unless tailored for a more direct shaped explosion, that some or a larger portion of the energy would be absorbed by the shields( and in the case of energy based weaponry, all energy) and some would be blasted away.
Even in a gravitational environment such as earths, materials from an explosion can be blasted hundreds of feet and in some cases even yards away. Most of the debris is scatterd and not together. This is all done in mere seconds. With that in mind, if in space( a non-gravitaional area) it would stand to reason that the materials would fly farther, faster.
Given that, it would seem that an impact as destribed above between an incomeing object and debris from a previous explosion(near a ship) would be incredibly remote( escpecially since ships are moving away from the explosion and debris).
Let us say however that this does occur( for some reason or another, it IS possible). Well, if this does happen it wont be very often at all, certainly not enough for the devs to take hte time to put it into a game.
- Ok, the sceen is set. An attacking fleet is advancing into your space using debris from the hundreds of battles that have taken place in this most valuable system.
In such an environment it is more likey that impacts like this could occur. If a projectile round were to hit a small piece of debris say some where about an inch in size wouldnt do a gosh darn thing to a large bore projectile or missile if it was just hovering there, so it would have to be moving very quickly, say from an inpact that took place seconds prior to the encounter. What happens to the incoming object would be determined by how hard it is hit, where it is hit, what angle, etc.
----- The Point -----
Basicly any encounter between an incoming object and a piece of debris would take place a good distance from the shields. Assuming the pioece is large enough to affect the inboand object, the object type would come into question.
----- Missiles ----- If it is a missile, then most likely nothing would happen because of the size of the missile in comparison to the object. If something were to happen, the missile would be disabled since they( missiles of today) are designed not to detonate unless instructed to. It would only stand to reason that technology would advance in the years leading up to the time that SoaSe takes place. With that in mind, most likely tech. would have advanced to the point to rid a missile of any debris in its path.
----- Projectiles ----- As for weaponry which does not have it own propellant, the objects mass is what needs to be looked at. the debris needs to either have a large mass or be traveling at a great speed. The reason for this is do to the fact that the shell fired is metal, fuse, and explosive. In some cases a timed fuse is used. In any case the only way to stop something that travels so fast that it cannot be seen, is to eiter not be there, block it, or deflect it. Luck will be the governing factor for deflecting the projectile and most likely even in a debris rich environment a deflection will not occur from a small object though it is possible. large debris may block it, but most likely the ships shields will be what stops the projectile.
----- Energy Weapons ----- Energy Weaponry is the least likely to be affectd by any kind of debris. There are lasers in todays world that are burning up orbital debris so anything that got in the way would be destroyed or absorb the energy of the beam/pulse. Anything about the size of an inch would be vaporized or travel out of the beams path. It is possible I guess that some sort of fluctuation in the shields may occur that destabilizes or even dissapates a beam but that is unlikely. Even it it does happen, at teh speed in which energy travels, the beam that would be affected by the change would need to be right behind the beam that caused the problem.
----- The Summation -----
It is relatively simple, The speed at which the debris from any impact would travel away from the impact zone would make the likelyhood of the debris affecting an inboand porjectile, missile, or energy based source so remote that to put it in a game would make no sense what so ever.
On a smaller note, it is late and I can't really think right now, so if this is confusing, I am sorry.
