Poll: What's More Survivable? Xenomorphs or Yautja

[TWEWYFan]

It's a tough call, but I'm going to say the Yautja. Mainly it comes down to the old "quantity vs quality issue." While the Yautja is probably a more skilled and versatile killer, there tend to be less of them in the typical hunt(1-3 from what I've seen). Whereas the only limit on the number of xenomorphs are the number of living things in the area.

On a side note, how many people are actually reading the prompt that states you *aren't* a civilian and that the predator will target you even if you throw your gun away?

 

[Reiper]

Assuming I'm fighting just one enemy, I'd rather fight the Xenomorph.

-Assuming I'm fighting just one, it means I'm not going to get cocooned in front of an egg because there aren't any queens or facehuggers around, so even if I lose my death will still likely be swift.

So, to beat a Xenomorph, all I have to do is get myself a gun I feel comfortable using, find myself a hardened room with a single entrance, set up a lawn chair on the opposite side of the room from the entrance, sit down in the lawn chair, point my gun at the entrance, and wait for the Xenomorph to attempt to brute-force its objective. Bam. No more Xenomorph.

I am a pretty big aliens nerd (read all the books and source materials), and remember, that a single alien does not necessarily remain single for long. Although there are conflicting accounts, in the absence of a queen, a drone will undergo a "hormone storm" and become a queen. I believe this is actually what the alien in the first movie was doing at the end.

So you actually might end up fighting a queen, or a whole nest, and the queens are actually incredibly intelligent, moreso than the average human.

Also, aliens are not super durable, but their exo skeleton is quite resistant to conventional gunpowder weaponry.

 

[Ignatz_Zwakh]

Xenomorphs. At least I might have a chance at noticing them, unlike Predators. While they can be clever, their mental faculties are nowhere near those of the Predator. Not to mention the weaponry and whatnot.

Either way though, I feel as though I'd be fucked. I could only hope to take my own life rather than being made into an alien egg-sack. The plus-side to fighting Predators is that I might be able to garner some modicum of respect if I at least gave it my all.

 

[Heronblade]

Also, aliens are not super durable, but their exo skeleton is quite resistant to conventional gunpowder weaponry.

resistant yes, but not by enough to render all conventional weapons useless.

Just like when dealing with any armored opponent, take a higher caliber weapon and use FMJ rounds if possible, and leave the standard 9mm sidearm and hollow point rounds at home.

 

[Flying Pilgrim]

I think Yautja are. Yautja usually spare a target if it is unarmed or too weak. Xenomorphs have no sense of morality or honor. A Yautja will usually try to mess around with its victim, while a Xenomorph will never falter to go in for the kill. They pretty much kill everything in their path in some way or another.

 

[Astoria]

I'm gonna say Xenos would be tougher to survive. At least with Predators there's a limit to how many would be attacking you, I can't see them bringing along a birthing group or something. Xenos on the other hand will just keep growing in number, and by taking away human numbers too. They also have the hive mind thing that the Predators don't have and their biggest weapon is their own body, not techonology like with the Predators. If you take away their guns what else do the Predator really have over us offense wise other than their size?

 

[bullet_sandw1ch]

predators. the aliens would use me like an asian hooker at a bar occupied by gene simmons. the predators would at least give me a weapon [here, have a wristblade]to fight. plus, at least if i die, i wont have a fist sized hole in my skull, my skull and spine will be on the belt of a powerful, honour-bound creature. plus, to have a battle like the yakuza leader and the predator had at the mid way point of predators would be awesome.

 

[bullet_sandw1ch]

I'm gonna say Xenos would be tougher to survive. At least with Predators there's a limit to how many would be attacking you, I can't see them bringing along a birthing group or something. Xenos on the other hand will just keep growing in number, and by taking away human numbers too. They also have the hive mind thing that the Predators don't have and their biggest weapon is their own body, not techonology like with the Predators. If you take away their guns what else do the Predator really have over us offense wise other than their size?

and predators wouldnt gang up on you, its not honourable. plus, if you kill one, the others may let you live for a bit longer as a sign of respect.

 

[bullet_sandw1ch]

Assuming I'm fighting just one enemy, I'd rather fight the Xenomorph.

-They can be "easily" killed with current-day weaponry. In Aliens the Colonial Marines use M-41A Pulse Rifles which fire 10mm rounds - which exist now (albeit, not in the '10mm caseless explosive-tipped light armor piercing' variety seen in the film). Corporal Hicks is also seen killing a Xenomorph (and possibly more, off-screen) with a 12-gauge Ithaca Model-37 shotgun.

-They're clever, but not particularly smart. In the Special Edition version of Aliens there are a few scenes where the Colonial Marines set up four sentry turrets to defend two possible entrances to Operations/Medical. The Xenomorphs walk right into the turrets' line of fire and many of them get gunned down ('shooting gallery' according to PFC Hudson). After implied heavy losses they let up their attack, even though three of the four guns are out of ammunition and the fourth gun only has five rounds left. In other words, they'll try to brute-force an objective before looking for an alternate solution.

-Assuming I'm fighting just one, it means I'm not going to get cocooned in front of an egg because there aren't any queens or facehuggers around, so even if I lose my death will still likely be swift.

So, to beat a Xenomorph, all I have to do is get myself a gun I feel comfortable using, find myself a hardened room with a single entrance, set up a lawn chair on the opposite side of the room from the entrance, sit down in the lawn chair, point my gun at the entrance, and wait for the Xenomorph to attempt to brute-force its objective. Bam. No more Xenomorph.

The Yautja would probably just use its cloaking device to sneak in, or use indirect weaponry against me, or just brute-force the objective and succeed since Yautja are often seen taking heavy weapons fire like it ain't no thang.

the xenomorphs would come through the walls, armoured or not. then, it'd be raping time, and you would be the lone "uterus" in the room.

 

[Dawns Gate]

I'd go with the xenos, they don't have firearms. At least I've got that going for me if nothing else.

 

[Nouw]

I go with xenos, I can just pimp-slap them and while they're dazed I run away!

 

[Tuesday Night Fever]

I am a pretty big aliens nerd (read all the books and source materials), and remember, that a single alien does not necessarily remain single for long. Although there are conflicting accounts, in the absence of a queen, a drone will undergo a "hormone storm" and become a queen. I believe this is actually what the alien in the first movie was doing at the end.

So you actually might end up fighting a queen, or a whole nest, and the queens are actually incredibly intelligent, moreso than the average human.

Also, aliens are not super durable, but their exo skeleton is quite resistant to conventional gunpowder weaponry.

There's nothing conflicting about it, because it isn't canon. Comics, novels, etc. (yes, even the movie adaptation novels since the authors often takes artistic license) don't count. The movies give zero evidence of average drones or warriors "becoming" queens.

I'm assuming you're referring to the deleted scene at the end of Alien in which Ripley comes across a cocooned Dallas? The Xenomorph wasn't becoming a queen, it was constructing a hive. During the making of Alien they hadn't even considered the idea of a Queen (that was James Cameron's doing in Aliens), so they thought that the Xenomorph life cycle involved capturing prey, cocooning them up to a wall, and the captured prey somehow being morphed into a new egg. If you look closely at that scene you can see that Dallas and Brett aren't strung up in front of eggs - their upper torsos are sticking out of eggs, implying that they've already started changing. This idea was scrapped, the scene was deleted, and ever since Cameron introduced the Queen it was never really brought up again.

In Aliens there is no evidence of a drone or warrior "becoming" a Queen. The director's commentary doesn't imply it either.

In Alien III they specifically state that the Xenomorph inside Ripley is a Queen. In a deleted scene for Alien III they actually introduced a new type of facehugger, often dubbed the "Royal Facehugger" or simply "Giant Facehugger," which is specifically meant to implant a victim with a queen, implying that drones/warriors don't "become" queens, queens are "born" just like any other Xenomorph. This new type of facehugger was supposed to be able to implant multiple victims (which was why both Ripley and the dog were infected - this was supposed to be explained better in the film, but the scene was cut). Still frames of the "Royal Facehugger" can still be found floating around without too much difficulty, and some versions of the DVD/Blu-Ray come with the deleted scenes/stills.

In Alien: Resurrection it was a rather large plot point that the scientists had to resurrect Ripley, because the chestburster inside of her was a Queen which would in turn produce eggs for them to create drones/warriors.

Though I don't consider them canon, the AvP films don't give any evidence of Xenomorphs "becoming" queens when there isn't a queen around. This is a convention that was added in the comics/novels.

Also, your point about conventional gunpowder weaponry... that's actually entirely inaccurate. Aliens is an excellent example. The standard service rifle of the Colonial Marines is the M-41A Pulse Rifle, which fires a US M309 10x24mm caseless round. In real life, 10x25mm Auto has existed since 1984 and has been used in numerous automatic handguns and submachine guns. In fact, at one point the FBI planned to make 10x25mm Auto its primary ammunition, but ditched it due to concerns over recoil. The M-56 Smart Gun fires a 10x28mm caseless round. Then there's the Heckler & Koch VP-70 handgun, which is seen used by Lt. Gorman, Pvt. Frost, and Cpl. Ferro in the film. This handgun exists in real life, manufactured between 1970 and 1989, and it fires 9x19mm Parabellum. Then there's the Smith & Wesson Model 39 which is used by Pvt. Vasquez in the film. It also exists in real life, and also fires a 9x19mm Parabellum round - but unlike the H&K VP-70, the S&W M39 gets an on-screen kill. And last, but most certainly not least, there's Cpl. Hicks' Ithaca Model-37 "Stakeout," a real-life pump-action 12-gauge shotgun, which gets one of the most memorable kills in the entire series of movies. "Eat this!"

Conventional gunpowder weaponry works just fine outside of non-canon comic books.

 

[Tuesday Night Fever]

the xenomorphs would come through the walls, armoured or not. then, it'd be raping time, and you would be the lone "uterus" in the room.

Hardly.

Notably, in the movies, the Xenomorphs don't prove particularly adept at brute-forcing their way through barriers. In fact, the only time in the series in which we see them brute-forcing their way through a wall/floor/ceiling/ANYTHING involves them sacrificing one of their own to use the acid blood to burn a hole through the barrier. This plan wouldn't be particularly effective with just one Xenomorph. Their typical behavior is to either attempt walking directly to their objective (which got them blown to shit by sentry turrets before they backed off), or finding an alternate route (going through the ceiling panels in Aliens, using ventilation ducts in Aliens and Alien III, etc.).

So if their first choice is to just walk directly there, having a single entrance and pointing a gun at it seems to work just fine. It worked freaking great for those sentry turrets until they ran out of ammunition, not that that would have been an issue if there had been just a single Xenomorph to walk into the line of fire.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Also, your point about conventional gunpowder weaponry... that's actually entirely inaccurate. Aliens is an excellent example. The standard service rifle of the Colonial Marines is the M-41A Pulse Rifle, which fires a US M309 10x24mm caseless round. In real life, 10x25mm Auto has existed since 1984 and has been used in numerous automatic handguns and submachine guns. In fact, at one point the FBI planned to make 10x25mm Auto its primary ammunition, but ditched it due to concerns over recoil. The M-56 Smart Gun fires a 10x28mm caseless round. Then there's the Heckler & Koch VP-70 handgun, which is seen used by Lt. Gorman, Pvt. Frost, and Cpl. Ferro in the film. This handgun exists in real life, manufactured between 1970 and 1989, and it fires 9x19mm Parabellum. Then there's the Smith & Wesson Model 39 which is used by Pvt. Vasquez in the film. It also exists in real life, and also fires a 9x19mm Parabellum round - but unlike the H&K VP-70, the S&W M39 gets an on-screen kill. And last, but most certainly not least, there's Cpl. Hicks' Ithaca Model-37 "Stakeout," a real-life pump-action 12-gauge shotgun, which gets one of the most memorable kills in the entire series of movies. "Eat this!"

Conventional gunpowder weaponry works just fine outside of non-canon comic books.

Well, were the real life guns meant to represent real life guns, or did the movie makers just get some guns they thought were cool?

Anyway, if the pulse rifles have fancy armour piercing rounds, why not everything else? Wouldn't have thought they were SMGs, though, even if they are based on Thompsons.

 

[zumbledum]

well as i would be dog food in either case extremely fast i think ill go for the preds, both sides do the up close stabby ow it hurt kills, but the xenos also do the drag away explode from the inside after some time omg im scared death, and the preds sometimes just blow you in half instantly without you seeing it coming , and that sounds much better to me.

 

[Tuesday Night Fever]

Well, were the real life guns meant to represent real life guns, or did the movie makers just get some guns they thought were cool?

Anyway, if the pulse rifles have fancy armour piercing rounds, why not everything else? Wouldn't have thought they were SMGs, though, even if they are based on Thompsons.

According to the film's armorer, the H&K VP-70 9x19mm Parabellum handgun was used as the standard-issue sidearm for the Colonial Marines because it 'looked futuristic.'

The Smith & Wesson Model 39 9x19mm Parabellum handgun was chosen to represent the real-life Smith & Wesson Model 39. It was a personal weapon belonging to Vasquez.

The Ithaca Model-37 "Stakeout" 12-gauge shotgun was also chosen to represent the real-life weapon, and was also a personal weapon belonging to Hicks. According to James Cameron, David Giler, and Walter Hill (the writers for the film) it was meant to be a "lucky charm" of sorts, passed down in the Hicks family since Vietnam. This was meant to be a nod to the fact that Cameron felt Aliens should be "Vietnam in space."

As for the M-41A being loaded with armor-piercing rounds, that's really not particularly fancy. Nearly all real-life rifle rounds are light armor piercing. As Heronblade mentioned earlier in this topic, all you'd really need to do is swap out your hollow points for FMJ. The use of explosive-tipped ammunition was likely meant to compensate for the fact that the rifles weren't actually firing rifle ammunition, but rounds meant to be fired from handguns/SMGs. That said, it's unlikely you'd really even need to use AP rounds, given the amount of damage caused to the Xenomorph by Hicks' 12-gauge buckshot shell (notably very much not armor piercing, and was still able to blow a large hole clean through the back of the Xenomorph's head). That's supposition, though, as the shot was fired point-blank.

As for the M-41A Pulse Rifle, it's based on the M1A1 model of the Thompson SMG with a modified Remington M-870 pump-action 12-gauge shotgun standing in for a 30mm grenade launcher. Though the gun fires a 10x24mm round, which by current standards would likely classify it as a submachine gun, in-universe it's still considered to be an assault rifle filling the same basic role as a real-life 5.56x45mm NATO M4A1 Carbine /w underslung 40x46mm M203 grenade launcher.

 

[The Youth Counselor]

[

The only rule for consideration is that, in the Hunt, you're not a civilian, you're some sort of armed authority (could be standard army, space marine, a cop, etc) and you can't cheat by simply disarming yourself to remove yourself as a target, as that is the simple and obvious answer that makes this no contest

Dammit, I voted before I read the rule.

 

[Thaluikhain]

As for the M-41A being loaded with armor-piercing rounds, that's really not particularly fancy. Nearly all real-life rifle rounds are light armor piercing. As Heronblade mentioned earlier in this topic, all you'd really need to do is swap out your hollow points for FMJ.

Erm, they were specified to be explosive tipped, weren't they? And that they were designed to be used against, amongst other things, vehicles. Saying armour piercing to merely mean FMJ is stretching things a bit.

That said, it's unlikely you'd really even need to do that, given the amount of damage caused to the Xenomorph by Hicks' 12-gauge buckshot shell (notably very much not armor piercing, and was still able to blow a large hole clean through the back of the Xenomorph's head).

12 gauge, yes, but was it specified to be buckshot? Even today, there's all sorts of things you can fire from a shotgun, presumably you'd get more inventive munitions in the future.

 

[Lunatic High]

Without any sort of advanced weaponry ie. automatic highpowered weaponry, rockets, .50 cal sniper rifle etc. both choices lead to death. BUT if I had to choose which to be killed by I'd choose the Yautja at least I'd end up as a trophy rather than an incubator

 

[Tuesday Night Fever]

Erm, they were specified to be explosive tipped, weren't they? And that they were designed to be used against, amongst other things, vehicles. Saying armour piercing to merely mean FMJ is stretching things a bit.

They also specifically stated "light armor piercing" - the emphasis there being on the word light. As in, body armor. The round fired by the Pulse Rifle would be about as effective against vehicles as any other average rifle round, except with far less effective range. We already have explosive-tipped ammunition in real-life, though it's typically used with much larger rounds, like the .50 caliber Browning Machine Gun rounds fired by the Barrett series of anti-materiel rifles or the 30mm shells used for the GAU-8/A Avenger rotary cannon mounted on the nose of an A-10 Thunderbolt II. The relatively tiny explosive tip used on a 10x24mm round wouldn't be able to pack even close to as much punch as those. As I said, the use of an explosive tip was likely deliberate to bring the 10x24mm round up to par with standard rifle ammunition (most of which is FMJ) in terms of armor penetration. In other words, it was used to make up for a short-coming in the round.

12 gauge, yes, but was it specified to be buckshot? Even today, there's all sorts of things you can fire from a shotgun, presumably you'd get more inventive munitions in the future.

It was loaded with 12-gauge buckshot according to the film's armorer. Given that the film's writers and armorer wanted to keep the technology of the Colonial Marines relatively grounded in reality, it also would have been the most likely round for Hicks to have loaded given how common it is, how effective it is against unarmored targets at close range, and with how little the basic design has changed over the last hundred or so years it's unlikely to have changed much more by 2179.