The bigger you are...

[El_Phil]

The ensign seemed way too relaxed about the entire situation. And the tactical officer a bit too dopey, but then non-engineers never seem to grasp the details of engineering. On the other hand Roeding seemed to go into too much detail. Individual systems and specs on escape pods... That's a Scotty 'I know this ship like the back of my hand' type moment

Also check the italics in the UBB code I'm seeing a few
supposed
you want to uses non capitals there instead to get
supposed

One entirely personal thing, pilots on escape pods just seem wrong to me. Makes perfect sense, but I try to fit together a 'pod' with two pilots, engineering ratings and it doesn't fit for me.

However a nice load of BLAM! and a good situation to add some details too. Very interesting to see how it develops.

[Ron_Lugge]

"Escape pod" isn't accurate.

Its an escape *shuttle*. I. E. a shuttle craft (great big thing to ferry people around) retrofitted to work in combat enviroments and reserved for the admiral's exclusive use.

And the only points where Roeding is a technical know-it-all are the places where "everybody knows!" things go. Like everybody knows that those engines are very dangerous because of overheating, except the computers have it under control.

And as far as figuring out that you need to cut computers when they act unreliably, well, thats just common sense and brains -- and even then, he doesn't really understand, either, that you can't cut computers.

And as far as the ensign being to calm, I think I need to go back through there. I think I forgot to mention the sweat causing condensation on the suit -- and he's not sweating 'cause he's hot, the suit is AC'd.



Hm... specifics are always nice. OK, going back through this thing on the bus home... (PDAs are nice!)

[dogscoff]

Yeah, I enjoyed it. One (very) small thing that caught my eye:

Roeding still knew he heard the bitter taste of defeat.

Maybe this was a deliberate gag, or an example of the "esoteric jargon" mentioned in the previous line, but surely you can't hear a taste. Not without some kind of wierd surgery, anyway.

If (understandably) you were avoiding repetition of the word taste with the phrase "Roeding still knew he tasted the bitter taste of defeat" then use a synonym: The bitter tang of defeat, bitter spice of defeat, experience the bitter taste of defeat... Hmmm, there aren't actually that many synonyms for "taste" are there? Anyone know any decent online thesauruseseses?

[Ron_Lugge]

Um... "bitter taste of defeat" is a common phrase; as such hearing it isn't too unreasonable. I mean, you can't really taste defeat so much as it is a bitter thing to deal with, and bitter is a taste... am I making any sense?

[dogscoff]

Ron_Lugge said:
Um... "bitter taste of defeat" is a common phrase; as such hearing it isn't too unreasonable. I mean, you can't really taste defeat so much as it is a bitter thing to deal with, and bitter is a taste... am I making any sense?

Yeah I know. My point is that your characters hears the bitter taste of defeat. You're mixing metaphors.

You either hear the sound of defeat, or you taste the flavour of defeat. You don't hear the taste, or taste the sound, or see the smell and so on.

[Hunpecked]

My point is that your characters hears the bitter taste of defeat. You're mixing metaphors.

"Listen! Do you smell that?" -- Ghostbusters I