Pre-Christmas Chat with Aaron

Timstone · #1 December 13th, 2004, 07:56 AM

Whoa! That's a cool option. I doubt it will make it into the game. Privateer: Freelancer had that incorperated too. It was very uncomfi when you have a fight near a planet.

Suicide Junkie · #2 December 13th, 2004, 01:32 PM

A ring around your planet... falling into the atmosphere...

Ok. First question: Why are you using your cables to hold up the ring when it would be easier and safer to have the ring spinning in orbit and holding its own weight up? Just imagine the mechanical stresses on the sections between the cables.

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Some free salvage of resources and technology from ships shot down near planets would be nice...
If you're on the defensive, you need all the help you can get

Baron Munchausen · #3 December 13th, 2004, 06:36 PM

Quote:

Suicide Junkie said:
A ring around your planet... falling into the atmosphere...

Ok. First question: Why are you using your cables to hold up the ring when it would be easier and safer to have the ring spinning in orbit and holding its own weight up? Just imagine the mechanical stresses on the sections between the cables.

First of all, the theory of 'space elevators' and the stations that could be at the top of them is that they are held in place by centrifugal forces. The excess force is necessary to allow things to be sent up the cables. If you have a complete ring -- which would be a really huge structure but we are already used to thinking of stellar Ringworlds and so it doesn't seem so huge by comparison -- it wouldn't be stable anymore than the Ringworld around a star. A solid ring around a star or a planet would be pushed and pulled in all sorts of inconveniant ways just by virtue of being a single piece instead of a free floating body that can vary its orbit somewhat without hitting things. The cables are still needed to hold it in place or it would lose 'center' on the planet. For the stellar Ringworld Larry Niven had to invent those 'thrusters' that figured in one of the later stories.

Suicide Junkie · #4 December 13th, 2004, 08:54 PM

If you've got cables connecting to the surface, you can easily use them to nudge it in the right direction and keep it in the right spot.
The point being that with your ring spinning, and a small net inward pull by the cables, the pieces of the ring will drift to a slightly higher orbit and the rubble will diffuse from there.
It will take a lot of energy to deorbit the ring parts. The enemy force might as well glass you with "conventional" weapons designed for the task instead

Kamog · #5 December 13th, 2004, 10:42 PM

Instead of cables, if you had solid towers supporting the ring, then you won't have to worry about the ring moving around.

Baron Munchausen · #6 December 13th, 2004, 11:16 PM

Quote:

Kamog said:
Instead of cables, if you had solid towers supporting the ring, then you won't have to worry about the ring moving around.

That's even more difficult than the cables, though. The stresses on cables for just a planetary space elevator are getting close to the maximum possible that ordinary matter can handle. That's why they need to develop carbon nanotubes so they can have the molecular bond itself as the strength of the cables. A rigid structure would be much more demanding. Niven had to invent a fictional material (scrith) to explain how the stellar Ringworld was even possible.

Baron Munchausen · #7 December 13th, 2004, 11:18 PM

Quote:

Suicide Junkie said:
If you've got cables connecting to the surface, you can easily use them to nudge it in the right direction and keep it in the right spot.
The point being that with your ring spinning, and a small net inward pull by the cables, the pieces of the ring will drift to a slightly higher orbit and the rubble will diffuse from there.
It will take a lot of energy to deorbit the ring parts. The enemy force might as well glass you with "conventional" weapons designed for the task instead

In the sense of decelerating the ring parts so they 'fall' out of orbit, yes that would take a lot of energy directed in just the right way. But if the ring loses its centering on the planet then the ring will simply collide with the planet at full speed.

Suicide Junkie · #8 December 14th, 2004, 12:05 AM

So, simply hit the self destruct button, and chop it into blocks that orbit freely.

Or better, just unlock the pieces so you can put 'em back together when you have a chance to rebuild.

Fyron · #9 December 14th, 2004, 04:13 AM

If anybody has any questions they would like to see asked, but will be unable to attend the session, feel free to post them now, and they will probably be asked.

douglas · #10 December 22nd, 2004, 02:30 AM

How did this thread manage to fall to page 2? Why didn't it get stickied?

Anyway, I can't make it to the chat, but I have a few questions I'd like answered if someone would ask them for me.

1. How will the AI scripts be structured?

2. Will it be possible to give high-level orders to your ministers, such as "Military Advisor! I want a force prepared for attacking X system pronto! Assemble it one warp point away in Y system."?

3. Will it be possible in the scripts to dynamically create and change data specifically associated with particular ships, systems, and other objects, such as designating a ship as being assigned to the task of protecting a particular system with a specified priority? If so, will orders be available to do such things in game to help the ministers figure out what to do when you give them high-level orders?