Future Tech Advice and Assistance Thread [O.O.C.]

[SquareDisc City]

Time travel is going to be difficult, very difficult, to RP well, and I shan't be surprised to see many people unwilling to RP with it. But it is not helpful to assume automatically that it will be RPed badly.

[Mini Miehm]

Time travel is going to be difficult, very difficult, to RP well, and I shan't be surprised to see many people unwilling to RP with it. But it is not helpful to assume automatically that it will be RPed badly.

It will be. It always is. We've only been doing this for a decade or more in some cases. It WILL be RPed badly. It can't not be RPed badly, by virtue of it being so prone to moronic wanking that it's had entire IC(admittedly fuckawful series) treaties written concerning its use. It's bad, and people who use it should feel bad. Full stop.

[OMGeverynameistaken]

It's an established fact that the most difficult part of time travel is the grammar.

[Kyrusia]

To speak exceptionally plainly, issues of time travel are varied - even in the realm of fiction. Completely ignoring the issues involving potential paradoxes, alternative worldlines, issues involving superposition, and such things as closed time-like curves, and just purely operating within the issues that arise from the potential of time travel being extant as a real and exploitable technology (i.e. we're not talking about time dilation or the particular eccentricities of relativity), there arise problems.

Some of these problems have been addressed over the years; I'm sure many of us remember a certain "treaty" that arose out of the desire to exploit, and then limit, the use of timeline-altering or otherwise temporal technology. I'm sure there were others, both minor and major. Even, again, ignoring these "In Character" issues, there are problems.

Chief amongst these is, in my eyes at least, the issues involving fictional continuity and the actual stability of such a thing in a fictional world where fractal realities already exist. What I'm trying to say, anyway, is that in this fictional environment, time travel is not only silly in my eye, but pointless. Even in the realm of a very small, character-driven plot between very close players, it is pointless. Why? Because most entities in this fictional world exist with some degree of understanding that reality itself is already fractal; that for any possibility, for any change, there already exists that world - flourishing as it is - and distinct from the one they currently inhabit. Simply look at the fractal nature of Sol System.

Sure, not everyone ICly acknowledges this fractalization of existence, but one must accept - mechanically - that it is true simply by the fact that no one person can be said to control 'True Sol' or 'Prime Sol'. Each player - or group(s) of players - respect, within their own interwoven canon and continuity, a primary Sol; some others do not even acknowledge Sol, just to show the diversity of opinion in this community.

How this relates to the problems of time travel is simply this: in a world where one can always willingly disavow the existence of entire alternate or parallel realities, one can just as easily disavow the existence of an altered line of causality in the reality or sliver-of-the-fractal-world in which they inhabit. We already accept the existence of the Principle of Fluid Time - something often necessary in FT simply due to the fact many of us have busy lives; further, many of us either wholly disavow the aspects of time dilation in respect to relativity (or find clever ways to avoid it). The same principles can be applied to time travel, as well; however, unlike time travel, these issues do not (usually, if ever) impact other players.

Which is why time travel is a problem and, according to apparently many members of the community, is essentially forbidden - amongst countless other reasons, chief of them likely being the absurdity and complex problems which arise from it.

In FT, you have a community that is not only driven-by, but connected-through both countless eons of IC time and over a decade of OOC development; this has lead to an exceptional tapestry of interwoven canon and continuity, tying seemingly distant player entities to others in layers that would boggle the mind. If you were, for example, to attempt to go back (through time travel) and nullify or slightly change the Alpha Centauri Accords which play a direct pivotal role in the establishment and founding of the Raumreich Oversector. Sure, it might be an interesting plot, but something as simple as removing one provision (outside of the using of retcon) could lead to an IC cascade which essentially nullifies the entire past of some player's entity whom, originally, was perhaps only involved on a tertiary level. Yet, suddenly, this slight change - which would otherwise be canon - has lead to the collapse of that player's entity's history, nominally without his consent.

As you can imagine, this might gravely effect not merely one player (or one small group of players), but an entire community, leading to changes effecting their own, local/player entity canon/continuity which they did not participate in or otherwise did not consent to. In a community, such as FT, where history is often created between player creations (rather than simply being assumed to having had occurred), no doubt you can see how this might cause a problem.

In short: using time travel as opposed to retcon (which means such a thing never existed) can lead to unforeseen consequences which may otherwise violate the precedent which affects all roleplayers, that being they have (essentially) absolute control over their own creations. This, of course, is simply added to the list of potential problems - some already addressed, though not including one of the larger ones; that being that, historically (from an OOC perspective), the amount of players which have attempted to employ time travel or related technology poorly or purely as an "I Win Button", as opposed as a purely unique plot point, approaches nearly 100%.

As you can imagine, no doubt, this has left a bad taste in the mouths of many. As such, players are typically advised to not even contemplate time travel as an exploitable mechanic ICly, much less actually utilizing it. When one further takes into account the view on players accruing merit, and thus more "wiggle room" with their concepts in the community and how much "wiggle room" being able to go back and willingly alter the causal timeline of reality would require, I sincerely echo this bit of advisement.

[Libraria and Ausitoria]

I would advise you to re-read the terms and definitions listed in the OP of this thread, because you lack an understanding of what the FT community expects, accepts, and how it works.

So you think I shouldn't be allowed to discuss the interesting possibilities of monetary policy with time travel just because it's not commonly discussed? How very boring of you.

I fully agree with you all that time-travel means any attempt to establish a history and continuity practically impossible. However I do believe it could be explored for character-based RPs, as individual people would still have their own timelines. Of course such RPs would have to be set in a place with no history or continuity in the first place.

[Kyrusia]

So you think I shouldn't be allowed to discuss the interesting possibilities of monetary policy with time travel [...]

Pointing out as specified in the original post:

"In short, this is an advice and assistance thread, not an argument thread. If you would like to argue the merits of a given technology, that is more than acceptable - but not here. This is different from giving different advice/assistance or different interpretations of what is "best"; this can be done without argument or conflict. [...]

"Furthermore, this thread, while capable of providing advice for all walks-of-life within the NationStates Future Technology community and assistance in regards to many different styles of roleplaying, is primarily concerned with the general community outside of individual groups or closed roleplaying regions, communities, organizations, groups, or canons. Such is to say that this thread's advice and assistance is primarily concerned with the standards, conventions, and agreed-upon norms of FT-Prime (Future Tech outside of closed communities and Future Tech with historical continuity dating back at least a decade); as such, any advice given comes, by default, with the caveat of "within the general Future Tech community/FT-Prime". Advice given will always have this caveat; players seeking advice on a specific canon or close roleplaying group may be pointed to their respective threads for further advice and more pertinent and relevant assistance."

Individuals, from all walks of life and from all corners of the community, are free to give advice and assistance insofar as it is in direct relation to assisting or advising players, both new and old, of the standards, conventions, and general player opinion within the general Future Technology community. As you can likely tell, the general view of instances of time travel seems quite dim, just from gauging the posts extricating "problems" regarding it versus ones detailing "strengths" as either an extant system or for its use in plot.

That being said, you are free to advise or assist in regards to such insofar as it operates within the purview of this thread; however, since it is an apparent concept which many players find either "absurd", "comical", or "silly", then the below (also from the original post) further applies as to its assistance and advisement within the purview of this thread:

"It is often said in Future Tech that you may "do as you will, because no one can stop you". This is patently true; however, players that act in a manner that is not congruent or complimentary to the community's, implement absurd creations that violate these standards or otherwise diminish the ability for other players to enjoy the roleplaying venture, or - in general - are simply "silly" with no caveat insofar as how that "silliness" might be applied - such is to say, "Silly for the sake of silliness" without any added enjoyment - are likely to find themselves with few avenues to interact with the community.

"It's true, you can do as you please; no one can stop you. Just as well, you can't force people to recognize your creations simply by existing. Behavior and conduct is paramount to earning respect and merit as a writer and roleplayer in the Future Technology community; poor behavior tends to reflect poorly on the player and, ultimately, may lead to many individuals ignoring that player and his entities simply because it's not enjoyable to interact with the player."

As such, and I feel this is necessary in regards to the ongoing assistance provided - especially in regards to the topic such as "time travel" (topics for advisement or assistance regarding "space fighters" and "FTL inhibiting systems" also, likely, deserve this disclaimer): as stated, a player may do as they please, a player may employ any system or technology they please, but if they do not adhere to the standards of the community, act brashly, or otherwise implement concepts which make interaction with others either un-enjoyable or impossible, it should not come as a surprise that members of the community do not claw over themselves to interact with them.

That being said, let's move on from this topic, as assistance and advisement regarding it seem to be devolving from generally-accepted opinion or otherwise stretching outside of the range of acceptable behavior and the purview of this thread. The shift of behavior to rather blunt vitriol and its potential to devolve into pure argumentative chat-chat being my primary concern; thus, a shift in topic to avoid its continuance is required.

How about... Something concerning the potential issues of superluminal (FTL) communication; specifically advisement and assistance regarding the potential strengths and weaknesses between the various methods of superluminal communication employed within FT.

[Nazis in Space]

[...]That being said, it's highly likely that, with the advent of human augmentation and powered exoskeletal armor, new forms of martial art would arise to both counter and take advantage of increased capabilities.

Panzerkunst!

For instance, vavarjur style martial arts amongst my nation have evolved to focus on focused, powerful strikes in an attempt to overwhelm the enemy's armor, while defensively it has become far more fluid and agility-based to take advantage of cybernetics and powered armor augmentations.

Note: Historically, the presence of armour tends to result in a focus on grappling. Pale, Kampfringen, Jiu Jitsu... Obviously, this isn't necessarily applicable to posthumans whose chrome steel fists come complete with a plasma booster to penetrate an opponent's breastplate at mach 5, but I did feel the need to mention this.

But speaking of post-human chrome steel fists - a 160 kg cyborg can, I think, safely be expected to have greater energy reserves than a 4 kg rifle. If propelling charges are still used, this doesn't necessarily say much, since wattage matters, but if the rifle's relying on a reactor/ battery/ whatever, too, then it's safe to say that rifles are massively less powerful than the combatants themselves.

And suddenly you've an excellent excuse to seek H2H CC, simply because the chrome steel plasma fist provides, say, an order of magnitude greater energy on target than a bullet.

Hm... The Legion is well aware that there are aliens out there that are bigger and stronger than Humanity. So hand-to-hand combat tends to focus on things that allow a smaller combatant to fight effectively and as quickly as possible (usually by lethal means).

The Legion's armed forces have all soldiers train in hand to hand combat techniques developed for baseline humans.

The only thing I'm debating is whether to have some sort of new martial art developed for this, or simply have their training comprise of a bunch different martial arts.

Maybe just say it's the later, but in practice it appears to be the former. I mean, after learning so many different techniques I'm sure that in combat they'll just seem to blend into one.

So basically, think a mixture of lethal martial arts (Krav Maga, Combato, etc) and grappling martial arts (Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, Judo, etc).

This may give you some pointers. A casual look suggests a great deal of Judo + a great deal of knife/ bajonet fighting + a little bit of striking. The basic tendency seems to be that stabbing is the preferable solution, followed by throws to get rid of the guy that might try to stab you, followed by chokes and joint locks to subdue folks.

And punching for distraction.

[Dreadful Sagittarius]

How about... Something concerning the potential issues of superluminal (FTL) communication; specifically advisement and assistance regarding the potential strengths and weaknesses between the various methods of superluminal communication employed within FT.

Possibly one of the trickiest questions for people in FT, I believe, and one where even those with roughly similar, in both function and effect, Faster-than-Light methods can differ enormously. Speaking for myself, I can posit a similarity in superluminal communications between my own Polyarchy, and the Honorverse of David Weber, at least in the 'strategic' rather than 'tactical' scales. (That is to say, I do not limit this to solely military communications, but rather cleaving a line between the strategic, or interstellar, and the tactical, or in-system, scale.)

Again, this applies mostly to myself but can also apply to others, but due to my own reliance on either having to send physical memory devices holding recordings or transmitting radio waves, I'm forced to adopt couriers. These can either be drones or ships with an actual crew due to requiring the communication device or operator to travel to the destination point via FTL in order to deliver said message.

The major downside to this is that it's all very limited in range, and the inability to learn of any crisis at a sufficient distance away with enough time to bring resources to bear upon effecting it has played a part in why the Polyarchy is so small, and why the few star-systems it owns are all so closely packed. Of course, to me this is most acceptable given how it plays into the traditional attitude of my people to the larger galaxy; 'nice to visit, but you wouldn't want to live there'.

A minor addendum; given the structure of the system, it's also cheaper than say, providing multiple quantum entanglement communicators like those of Mass Effect to each world and ship.

[Libraria and Ausitoria]

Are tachyonic particle beams generally accepted? Or sometimes accepted?

I shall not attempt to offer my own opinion on what is credible or useful until I understand what is permissible on this topic:

Individuals, from all walks of life and from all corners of the community, are free to give advice and assistance insofar as it is in direct relation to assisting or advising players, both new and old, of the standards, conventions, and general player opinion within the general Future Technology community.

With all due deference, do you mean that we are always free to state our opinions (i.e. offer advice) in response to questions; and simply not free to contradict any previous advice (i.e. start a discussion) about its relevance/applicability? Or are we only free to state opinions/offer advice which we already know to be conventional? What if we are not sure?

In any case, presumably people ought to offer different advice if they think some advice is unconventional? And wouldn't offering advice differing from previous advice effectively make a discussion? Are we only allowed indirect discussions - i.e. we cannot directly question somebody else's advice, but we can offer different advice for different reasons?

I ask merely for information, since if this topic offers advice without allowing different advice then that seems to sound like the old (NS) UN when it was impossible to get rid of earlier decisions; and the OP says that different advice is permissible. Hence my confusion.

[Kyrusia]

The original post is quite clear in regards to this question:

"That being said: this is the OOC Advice and Assistance Thread for Future Tech. If you intend to post with the intent to be disruptive: don't. If you post asking for advice, a degree of etiquette need be understood; in short, if you ask for advice, you're not obligated to agree with the advice, but you are obligated to respect the advice in the manner to which it was given. If you intend to post to ask for advice, then point at those giving the advice as if you were above criticism, it is best you take your questions elsewhere.

"Refer to the above. In short, this is an advice and assistance thread, not an argument thread. If you would like to argue the merits of a given technology, that is more than acceptable - but not here. This is different from giving different advice/assistance or different interpretations of what is "best"; this can be done without argument or conflict. If it devolves into conflict, you may be asked to "cool your proverbial jets" or, in extreme cases, asked to leave the thread - officially or unofficially.

Simply put, individuals are free to offer advice and assistance in regards to questions warranted or in regards to topics raised - tangential or otherwise - through the course of the thread. That being said, as the original post indicates in regards to the nature of this thread and the general NSFT community (read: FT-Prime), there is a degree of a limited purview; specifically, when it becomes apparent that a topic: 1) extends into realms not typically covered or, more specifically, generally considered unacceptable by the community due to the violation of its standards (chiefly through a contravention of some degree of the general principles, as defined in the original post) and is, thus, off-topic; 2) seems to rise to a level of agitation in which continued discussion either approaches purely argumentative or devolves to players directly attacking not the precepts or presuppositions posited, but other players themselves; or 3) devolves into some aggregate of the above or otherwise becomes cyclical and fruitless.

This system has worked, fairly well I might add. It has been understood quite simply as the above, and as defined within the original post, without much further need for exposition. Frequenters to this thread seem to readily grasp the difference between "disagreement" and "argument", something I'm quite pleased with; I'd like to keep it that way. Hence why, in the instance of the above conversation, the topic was diverted - and will continue to be diverted until such a time it is apparent its raising is no longer a source of vitriol.

In short, you can offer differing opinions in regards to advice and assistance given; when it devolves to attacking another player(s) or otherwise devolves into a back-and-forth argument with no added perspective or actual assistance given in the posts, then it is time to move on - no matter how "interesting" the topic of assistance might be. If people want to continue more "colorful discussions", there is a thread provided (and aptly named), or they may utilize one of the linked IRC channels.

Hope that clarifies and otherwise allows this thread to go back to its stated purpose.

---

Response to Dreadful Sagittarius:
I didn't realize this was actually how the Polyarchy functions. <themoreyouknow.jpg>

This does, however, remind me of a discussion I had with Mack a while back; specifically the discussion involving communication "hub vessels" and how they, at least in the instances of his given civilization aesthetic, both make sense and allow for unique weaknesses in regard to interdiction and interception.

If my memory serves me correctly (And this likely has been modified if he decided to actually adopt it, I'm not sure.), in effect, for a given squadron/flotilla/etc., at least one ship would serve a dedicated purpose of housing, storing, and processing information between dedicated, entangled systems. Specifically, Ship A would have an I/O system (say I/O.1) on board, as well as a dedicated I/O system (say I/O.2) off board, each slaved to the other (due to particular issues involving the entanglement of more than two quantum systems and complex problems arising from the flipping of states in such leading to degradation/scrambling/stuff not supposed to be here). Ship A would, in effect, hand over I/O.2 to the hub ship (Hub.B), allowing for direct connectivity with it. This would mean that information from Ship A would feed to Hub.A, then could be relayed to Ship B through it's own slaved ansibles (I/O.3 to I/O.4 and back, respectively).

When ships rotated out of a given squadron, their slaved ansibles would be rotated to new hub vessels. I think we also contemplated that this mean that, more or less, there were at least two hard-coded copies of communications, allowing for administrative redundancy and analysis of battlefield situations and any potential incidents that might arise after-the-fact.

Of course, this system has some pretty glaring flaws - not the least of which being the destruction of a hub vessel would lead to the essential dissolution of the squadron's communication infrastructure, sans whatever analogue systems they may have in the case of emergencies ("One ping. One ping, only."). I think that was sort of the point though, and ones sometimes over-looked by newer players: crafting certain weaknesses into their own concepts for the sake of plot and, well, sometimes the faults are unique, interesting, and "cool" in their own way. In this instance, for example, I think the "hub vessel" eventually evolved into not merely being a communications core, but an ECM and electronic warfare vessel in an attempt to "lessen" the weakness (and to add a rather logical strength to a vessel already designed for intercepting, analyzing, and transmitting communicable information).

[Dreadful Sagittarius]

I didn't realize this was actually how the Polyarchy functions. <themoreyouknow.jpg>

This does, however, remind me of a discussion I had with Mack a while back; specifically the discussion involving communication "hub vessels" and how they, at least in the instances of his given civilization aesthetic, both make sense and allow for unique weaknesses in regard to interdiction and interception.

If my memory serves me correctly (And this likely has been modified if he decided to actually adopt it, I'm not sure.), in effect, for a given squadron/flotilla/etc., at least one ship would serve a dedicated purpose of housing, storing, and processing information between dedicated, entangled systems. Specifically, Ship A would have an I/O system (say I/O.1) on board, as well as a dedicated I/O system (say I/O.2) off board, each slaved to the other (due to particular issues involving the entanglement of more than two quantum systems and complex problems arising from the flipping of states in such leading to degradation/scrambling/stuff not supposed to be here). Ship A would, in effect, hand over I/O.2 to the hub ship (Hub.B), allowing for direct connectivity with it. This would mean that information from Ship A would feed to Hub.A, then could be relayed to Ship B through it's own slaved ansibles (I/O.3 to I/O.4 and back, respectively).

When ships rotated out of a given squadron, their slaved ansibles would be rotated to new hub vessels. I think we also contemplated that this mean that, more or less, there were at least two hard-coded copies of communications, allowing for administrative redundancy and analysis of battlefield situations and any potential incidents that might arise after-the-fact.

Of course, this system has some pretty glaring flaws - not the least of which being the destruction of a hub vessel would lead to the essential dissolution of the squadron's communication infrastructure, sans whatever analogue systems they may have in the case of emergencies ("One ping. One ping, only."). I think that was sort of the point though, and ones sometimes over-looked by newer players: crafting certain weaknesses into their own concepts for the sake of plot and, well, sometimes the faults are unique, interesting, and "cool" in their own way. In this instance, for example, I think the "hub vessel" eventually evolved into not merely being a communications core, but an ECM and electronic warfare vessel in an attempt to "lessen" the weakness (and to add a rather logical strength to a vessel already designed for intercepting, analyzing, and transmitting communicable information).

That's all a fair point. Personally I never considered the idea of a modular approach to a QEC/ansible type device, and your own comment on the effects on communications should such a hub be destroyed are a major consideration for myself in not constructing a similar device, since in the eyes of the Polyarchy it would be at tremendous risk of either destruction from unfriendly powers, or overuse, like an internet router trying to service an entire block of flats (apartment complex). (To be fair, I recognise that such a device would operate on a vastly greater scale than said router, but it would also have a reflectively greater consumer base to deal with)

Of course this now has terrible implications for my own 'virtuality', the Abyss. I'd always considered it to be one great entity, but with this lack of a superluminal communication method I shall have to ponder on how events in different star systems effect the Abyss, and how the method of communicating them has an affect in its operation.

[Kyrusia]

[snip]

In general, my FTL communications tend to be typical to the setting: entanglement ansibiles with variable modulation (akin to changing frequencies, bands, etc.) with me essentially hand-waving away the problems arising from multiple entanglements to a given state. Essentially, "space radio".

However, given that I'm in the process (slow as it may be) in the creation of a new native FTL scheme/exploitation, it's likely that - in this instance - it will also be accompanied by a native communication regime. It's just sometimes difficult to balance between "IC logistical strengths, avoiding weaknesses" and "making things make sense within the given aesthetic of the entity, and not becoming absurdly 'strong' as to allow for natural weaknesses to develop in the system as necessitated by plot".

Advise for the day for everyone: actually give a sizable amount of time considering how your space-people intend to communicate with one another.

[SquareDisc City]

The concept of FTL communication I drew up (and never fully finished) was a modification of classical electromagnetism. "Warpomagnetic waves" travel in an ether that permeates space. They're emitted by accelerating particles with "warp charge", and an incoming wave will accelerate such particles. So far, just a technobabble alternate version of (pre-relativistic) electromagnetic waves.

The key 'feature' is that the ether is dispersive. Higher frequencies travel more slowly than lower ones. That's contrived to get make transmitting and recieving more data in some sense harder - since to increase the data rate, all else being equal, you must increase the (frequency) bandwidth and thus the absolute frequency. The lower frequencies suited for long-range communication also require larger antennae since antennae scale with wavelength of the transmission, again something that just "feels right". It creates a trade-off between data rate and latency.

The upshot is that the longer the distance, the less the amount of data it's practical to send, at least for a real-time communication. Relay stations are likely, but they can't just send everything along, information needs to be distilled and aggregated. Even if you made a big chain of high-frequency relays, the transmission along them would still be slow in latency terms because the high frequencies don't move through space as quickly as the low ones.

To give an example, the factories scattered across a solar system might report a vast array of minute detail to the system office, which in turn can send finely detailed instructions. Much less information, however, can be sent from the system office to the head office that's a fair way across the galaxy. Equally the head office can't micromanage the system's operations, ensuring that local management remains relevant. The same considerations would apply to the military.

And of course when latency isn't important, we get a new version of an old adage: "Never underestimate the bandwidth of a freighter full of quantum dots doing warp 9."

[Lubyak]

Due to the nature of Imperial & Federal FTL communications, it has been found to be exceptionally difficult to achieve high bandwidth FTL communications at long ranges. Within star systems, warp pulse radio is effective enough at enabling FTL high bandwidth communications, but the warp pulse quickly dissipates over interstellar distances making it near useless for interplanetary communication.

Quantum entanglement can be used to achieve some measure of FTL electronic communication, the process necessary to create quantumly entangled receivers is long, arduous, and expensive. This limits entanglement based communications to low bandwidths, and often limits them to the most important communications links (e.g. between high level government offices, High Command and Fleet Group headquarters, etc.) Some civilian use of quantum entanglement based communications has begun to arise in the stock market and financial sector, where the speed of communication is of exceptional importance.

The most common method for long range, FTL, communication is the simple courier ship. Designed exclusively for maximum possible speed through a transition lane, and equipped with large databanks and high traffic warp pulse transmitter/receiver systems, courier ships make up the most common elements of any given planet's daily orbital traffic. While capable of traveling faster than most vessels, courier ships are still vessels in a transition lane, and thus are susceptible to issues of weather that may affect its velocity. However, courier vessels are the most economical method of FTL communication between planets.

[Oppressorion]

Well well, something else I can answer!

Actual FTL comms are not possible. Instead, messenger pods have to be used...which is not interesting, unless you know of the Star Drive's particular quirks in how it provides FTL. It isn't just a name - the Drive needs to be in extremely close proximity to a concentration of energy to work. As such, established systems have stellar stations in orbit around their stars to receive messages, wielding incredibly powerful heat shields and equipped with a supply of pods, usually exchanged weekly for civilian traffic and higher for official (which has empowered an annoyingly independent mindset among the colonists).

Military excursions aren't so lucky - heat shields are expensive, necessitating a much higher orbit for the comms ship and a much higher latency for the messages to get through (since it takes longer for the vessel to get into position). On the other hand, as this only applies to transmitting data, officers at home can give out orders much faster than the ships can respond...which gives some great opportunities for miscommunication and independence on the fleet's part, now that I think about it.

[Steel Union]

*snip*

This does, however, remind me of a discussion I had with Mack a while back; specifically the discussion involving communication "hub vessels" and how they, at least in the instances of his given civilization aesthetic, both make sense and allow for unique weaknesses in regard to interdiction and interception.

If my memory serves me correctly (And this likely has been modified if he decided to actually adopt it, I'm not sure.),

*snip*

I still want to use this. I just have no idea how to thematically justify it. Obviously, the benefit of QE is that it's instant communication, anywhere, period. Distance isn't a factor. So, it really doesn't make sense to have your entangled particles sitting all aboard one single vulnerable ship for a major fleet, just asking to be slagged. Even if it's somewhat of an ECM vessel. Really, the safest place for your entangled particles would be a huge underground bunker buried under tons of concrete in a military stronghold. But that's boring.

I might have the particles in fortified installations, say naval bases or something. Probably with each pair of linked particles distributed randomly to an installation upon the creation of the ship. Each installation would have dedicated pairs linking them to other installations. So Ship A communicates to Hub A, which looks up which hub ship B is linked to (which is Hub B), transmits the data from Ship A to Hub B, and then Hub B transmits it to Ship B. All of it happening nearly instantaneously, of course. It could still lend to interesting story, if one of the installations is knocked out, as which ships were affected in a single fleet would be fairly random instead of the whole fleet losing comms.

Iunno. It's still an idea I'm toying with since we talked about it. I like it I just need to find an excuse to use it and make it interesting.


As North Mack, I used to use standard STL radio for ships in the same fleet. Which was especially fun when they got spread out over a large, potentially light minutes wide area in some battles. For longer range communication, each ship carried a large compliment of FTL Buoys. Basically small FTL drives with a power source and small computer tacked on, and that's it. The buoy would record a message, then autonomously jump to the desired target, before relaying its message over STL radio. Generally buoys were used to relay information and orders from distant fleets to command elements, and vice versa. Which was quite fun, because sometimes the buoys could take multiple days to reach far targets, and then just as long to return.

[The Ben Boys]

I never liked the idea of FTL communication (aside from Tachyonic Anti-Telephones, which I find insanely awesome from the parts I understand). Instead, I usually use a system by which messages are just delivered by ships crossing through FTL, like how ships used to carry messages to the colonies in the 1700s and early 1800s by crossing the oceans.

[The Fedral Union]

I have FTL coms.. They work. I don't think how they work will ever come up in a storyline unless the odd jamming happens. A-lot of this stuff should really go in a technical manual.

[SquareDisc City]

I'm surprised how common it seems to be to do much or all FTL comms by sneakernet. There's nothing particularly wrong with such, ICly or OOCly, but my thinking has always been that technology to just send a message faster than light will be more basic and probably invented earlier than technology capable of sending a physical object.

[Libraria and Ausitoria]

In short, you can offer differing opinions in regards to advice and assistance given; when it devolves to attacking another player(s) or otherwise devolves into a back-and-forth argument with no added perspective or actual assistance given in the posts, then it is time to move on - no matter how "interesting" the topic of assistance might be.

That's much clearer, thank you.

---

With hub-vessels operating quantum-entangled communications, would I be correct to presume some are used like repeating-frigates - repeating messages from far away to nearer vessels and vice-versa?

[Feazanthia]

I'm surprised how common it seems to be to do much or all FTL comms by sneakernet. There's nothing particularly wrong with such, ICly or OOCly, but my thinking has always been that technology to just send a message faster than light will be more basic and probably invented earlier than technology capable of sending a physical object.

Until very recently, it was believed that quantum entanglement would not transmit information faster than the speed of light - sci-fi writers just used it because it sounded cool and people who didn't know much physics wouldn't know that QE couldn't violate the causality principle.

Just last year, however, this was proven to be false. Quantum Entanglement can be used to send information faster than the speed of light. We can only send one bit at a time, but it is FTL.

[Thrashia]

I'm surprised how common it seems to be to do much or all FTL comms by sneakernet. There's nothing particularly wrong with such, ICly or OOCly, but my thinking has always been that technology to just send a message faster than light will be more basic and probably invented earlier than technology capable of sending a physical object.

Until very recently, it was believed that quantum entanglement would not transmit information faster than the speed of light - sci-fi writers just used it because it sounded cool and people who didn't know much physics wouldn't know that QE couldn't violate the causality principle.

Just last year, however, this was proven to be false. Quantum Entanglement can be used to send information faster than the speed of light. We can only send one bit at a time, but it is FTL.

And if the receiver/sender can send a full message, bit by bit, then you have a complete telegraph-esque FTL messenger service.

[SquareDisc City]

I'm not familiar with the research Feaz is citing, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's one bit per entangled particle pair. Want to send a megabyte? Hope you've both got 8 million entangled particle pairs set up and in place!

In an FT setting, of course, this would be another way to encourage/justify message brevity rather than big yottabyte-shifting FTL networks.

[Thrashia]

I expect a certain dirty Russian Imperialists to jump onto the idea of an FTL telegraph service...

[Mini Miehm]

I don't mind the idea of an FTL telegraph service. I would really prefer that over some of the more common methods I see popping up. Also FTL sensors. They bother me. Do you really need to see what's going on twelve light minutes away in real time? Really?