Re: Philosophical scenario - A chance meeting
 

Well, you cannot totally ensure your race will survive but it would help if you never went home. If you never went home, the alien (or alien tech) could not track you back to the home system.

Of course you're never sure whether or not the alien scanned and read all records in the computers of your ship, used mental telepathy on you, read the warp point signatures on the quantum singularity, or other such hogwash. So without knowing the 'bounderies', you can't really know the solution.

But the best solution would be to blow each other and the nebulae up.

Re: Philosophical scenario - A chance meeting
 

This is one way of enforcing an 'equal' result. Another way would be to exchange ships -- each crew take the other ship home -- so that each empire would know just about everything there is to know about the other. (Although life support compatibility is required here... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif That would be the non-violent way of attaining an equal result.

Re: Philosophical scenario - A chance meeting
 

"Gee, this sure is a neat little vessel. I hope that human guy likes my ship as much as I like his. OK, time to go hom--Say, what's that ticking sou--"

KABOOM!

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif

Re: Philosophical scenario - A chance meeting
 

On a related note, I have a colony ship in Carrier Battles Deluxe #1, which has +2% experience http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Now that some ships with guns have shown up to guard the warppoint, it will be colonizing something soon.

Re: Philosophical scenario - A chance meeting
 

Baron Munchausen gets his choice of cookie, ice cream or cheese, for guessing the method they used in the book.

Hunpecked gets his choice of cookie, ice cream or cheese, for his...Perspective on it.

That is all. Please continue.

Re: Philosophical scenario - A chance meeting
 

Easy solution.

Try to establish peaceful communications then, regardless of the results of the communication, leave as fast as you can. Don't head straight home, that'd be rather foolish. Instead, move out at a 60°-90° angle in relation to your world. Continue until you think you're out of his sensor range, then head off at another oblique angle, then another. When you're sure he can't see you, go home and prepare.

This of course presumes the other ship doesn't simply nuke you on sight!

Re: Philosophical scenario - A chance meeting
 

Or follow you at the edge of his sensor range, presuming it to be larger than your sensor range.

Re: Philosophical scenario - A chance meeting
 

Omnidirectional broadcast; contains all known facts, but no conclusions, of the encounter. Avaoid flavor. Pick a star at random that is between 30 and 150 degrees from your home star. Head towards it until you reach it, or run out of supplies. If you reach it, and find a settleable planet, start farming. If you reach it and there isn't such a planet, pick a different star along the same general line, within a few degrees, and head towards that.....

Re: Philosophical scenario - A chance meeting
 

Board the ship, kill the crew, ransack her computers & then blow the ship to vapour. Then head home and start gearing up for war, or a 'chance' peaceful first contact if they happen to have a big ole empire.

Either that or turn around and run like hell. If they follow, they're hostile, if they don't they're not.

Re: Philosophical scenario - A chance meeting
 

Yeah. Be insanely aggressive vs. what you can see. Let's hope they don't have any observers you don't know about that can report back about the insanely aggressive shoot on sight aliens they have to worry about......

Who saw which direction you left.....

Or managed to drop a nifty on the outside of your hull.....