As I'm about to explain to BillyBob, it need not be the hard way, if we build support early enough. PoW can be a staged soft-fork, making 5% changes to the SHA-2/newPoW balance over time
Ah, but look at the actual PoW change plan that's gaining traction: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.18309140
If we popularise that plan, no clusterfuck is necessary. It will be smooth and painless.
I think there isn't going to be a HF.
You should read my post above.
The danger is that the BU team give zero fucks about what is good for mining, Bitcoin or cryptocurrency. If that's true, and it looks alot that way, BU hashpower attacks like that can cause a huge amount of damage to the credibility of Bitcoin, some developers at Core might have to leave, and the network effect that makes Bitcoin valuable could be seriously damaged. It took time to build this momentum up, and it would take more to regain it.
An orderly, pre-emptive change to an ASIC resistant PoW is literally the only thing we can do to stop that, and I'm very concerned that the "destroy it at all costs" MO is what's driving this. Jihad and Vermin can just accept multi-million payoffs in fiat, why would they care what happens to Bitcoin if that's the situation behind closed doors?
I doubt this much effort would be put into trolling the Bitcoin price. Segwit activation can't happen without major fireworks whichever way you want to look at it, I'd be amazed if Jihad and Vermin give it up and activate Segwit.