"Hamster Cage"

phavoc

Emperor Mongoose
The description needs to be edited:

ORIGINAL
Hamster Cage: This is a series of spun rings set at right angles to the rest of the hull. The rings must have a radius of at least 15 metres in order to produce a gravitational field. Machinery to spin a hamster cage uses 0.1 tons for every ton of spun ring. Unlike other designs, the hamster cage is usually set at right angles to the hull and installed in counter-rotating pairs, eliminating torque effects on the ship’s attitude. For each full percent of the hull which is made part of the hamster cage, the cost of the hull must be increased by +2%.

EDITED
Coriolis / Centripetal Hull - A series of spun rings set at right angles to the rest of the hull, the rings must have a radius of at least 15 metres in order to produce an artifical gravity field. These types of hulls may completely circle the hull, or they may need to be installed in counter-rotating pairs (multiple pairs are allowed), which eliminates the torque effects on the ship's attitude. Machinery to spin a coriolis / centripetal hull requires .1 tons for ever ton of spun ring (the ship itself will spin to provide gravity if the section completely encircles the hull). For each full percent of the hull which is part of the coriolis / centripetal hull, the cost must be increased by 2%.

Either coriolis OR centripetal label can be used. Hamster cage is pretty juvenile sounding, and shouldn't be used. I also modified the explanation because you can have multiple spokes or totally encircle the hull with your rotating section. The current description leads a reader to believe that you'd only install two at a time. It would probably be best to simply combine the double-hull and spun sections, as they are essentially the same.

But some questions that aren't answered - where is the cost savings for creating a hull that has no grav plating? This begs the question - how does the crew handle acceleration with no inertial compensator? If we are talking space stations, then no problem, it's not accelerating. But a spaceship WILL accelerate, and that changes everything. The only way for crew to occupy the spinning habitat rings would be for grav plating to be installed, which defeats the purpose of trying to generate a gravity field by spinning. With no grav plating you also are totally at the mercy of your acceleration/deceleration. Again, not a problem if your acceleration curve is pretty low, but if you are accelerating run at .1G, it's gonna take a LONG time to get anywhere. With actual spacecraft tech available, nobody would ever build ships of this type.
 
Hamster cage sounds like a popular colloquialism given to the system over decades if not millennia. Are you saying 21st century Earth cultures only use the most accurate and most scientific descriptions for all system and devices created? We then must not refer to those things moving around in space as ships (a vessel larger than a boat for transporting people or goods by sea.). Also, there are not navies in space.

They are referred to as hamster cages because images have people walking along the 'wall' as hamsters do tin their wheel. Henceforth hamster cage stuck.
 
Hamster cage sounds exactly like it is - an 'aka' term.

I would question the use of a 21st century Solomani term describing a way to generate artificial gravity more than 30 centuries in the future when it's currently a slang/aka term and not one in use by most space engineers (based upon their output paper wise. Can't say I have that many conversations with them).

But in the same vein, where are the 'pew-pew' beamers? Another slang term.

And following that, just how many people know what a hamster is throughout occupied human space? What's a hamster, and why is it in a cage would be the most common question I bet. Just like if you want to use 16th century colloquialisms today people look at you lake you are daft.
 
16th century English expressions are used quite a lot:
http://www.bbcamerica.com/anglophenia/2014/04/45-phrases-coined-shakespeare-450th-birthday

Much older technical terms are regularly used, like starboard. You still sail a ship.

Mortar is a piece of artillery named for a kitchen utensil that has been called that for at least 2000 years.

"Thou shalt not kill" is a 16th century translation of a ~3000 year old text, still in use.

"Pray be seated" is a 13th century form that can still be used.

Windows have not been renamed for ~1000 years.

Cui bono is a two thousand year old legal term in a dead language, that is still in current use.

These are a few old expressions that I could think of immediately, and English is not my first language.

Obviously most slang is forgotten quickly, but some terms stick around.
 
I would agree language will drift over the centuries as it does today. How many people today can read and write old english or latin? Yet, as AnotherDilbert states, we still use terms and phrases from those and other languages very much a part of our modern language. However, if we go with your logic, as sound as it is, how do we know what Anglic looks and sounds like? What colloquialisms do they use? What slang and dialects are there even for Imperial Standard?

For a moment here, we will break the RPG Fourth Wall and say no one (I think) is from 5000 years into the Imperial Traveller future so no one knows how Anglic is actually spoken. In fact, the good creators of Traveller created Anglic representing the language of Traveller, in other words, 'Folks, keep it simple and assume you translate everything in the game to English just like they do in nearly every science fiction tv show and movie.". People with French versions of Traveller amazingly hear and see it in French (le français?). So hamster cage or wheel is the popular term in english for now and it has a lot more flavor than centripetal toroid ring.
 
@AnotherDilbert - sure, there are many words that are still here. Latin hasn't changed a whole lot, except, well, for pretty much dying off as a language of the masses. It still exists, much like many other languages, by scholars (both secular and religious). Latin is an interesting example because it has been relatively frozen for a long time, yet it's also not progressed either. Babylonian, Assyrian, or any of the other ancient languages/texts from that part of the world might be better examples. But other languages have died off. Ancient Egyptian was a lost language until the discovery of the Rosetta stone.

In the 1400s 'fag' meant loose thread in something. Then it took on the aspect of describing drudgery. At one point it was used as slang to describe a cigarette. Today the British use it to talk about working hard, and some Americans use it as insult towards gay people. And that's just one word! There are literally thousands more (perhaps millions, depending on how far back you want to go and how wide of a net do you want to cast to look at languages, both alive and dead).

I would say, overall though, that most people haven't a clue about the older uses of or the ancient derivations of many of the words commonly used today. If you told someone born after 1980 that you were going to mimeograph this page they'd most likely look at you with confusion. Or someone from before 1960 they'd most likely not know either.

"Thou shalt not kill" is a 16th century translation of a ~3000 year old text, still in use. That saying originated in ancient Hebrew, and it's in the book of Exodus. I don't know if the origin of the phrase can be traced back beyond the 6th century BC. It's actually been translated before that, as the original scrolls were done in Hebrew, then I believe Greek, and I think before that it was Aramaic. At some point latin came into the picture, and of course there have been numerous English translations. I'm not quite sure I would agree that "hamster cage" and it's concepts are a good analogy to quoting from one of the primary commandments (not that people follow it, but still...).

@Reynard - My point here is that Traveller is science-y based. If you knew that hamster cage is slang for orbital constructs that can generate artificial gravity, you probably have at least a little bit of science background and therefore would understand a concept as basic as the coriolis effect. "Hamster cage" is a very juvenile sounding label. Plus none of the other descriptions in the section use slang terms to describe them, so why do it for this particular one?

So I'd be interested in hearing the reasoning behind keeping the term and how it's usage is appropriate.
 
phavoc said:
So I'd be interested in hearing the reasoning behind keeping the term and how it's usage is appropriate.
While I do not disagree with you, the idea of this phrase lasting out into the worlds for so long etc does seem illogical, I sometimes like that a game system does not eliminate all reference to our world or life. Sometimes the reason to leave it in has less to do with solid logic and more to do with fun and comfort.

Not to mention I would not have known what a Coriolis was but I did know hat a Hamster Gage was. So if it is to be changed, stick to Centripetal Hull.
 
If we are going to be completely realistic Traveller Anglic would perhaps bear the same resemblance to English, as English resembles 3000 year old Proto-Germanic. You wouldn't understand a word. Neither Centripetal, Coriolis, nor Hamster Cage are likely to be understood 3000 years from now.

Coriolis refers to one of the deficiencies of the system, so hardly likely to be chosen as a marketing name...

I've seen this concept referred to as "rotating wheel" or "torus centrifuge".

In my mind a hamster cage looks like this:
pPETNA-5231969_main_t300x300.jpg


This would be a hamster wheel:
hamster_wheel_running.jpg



Either way, it's a game, it does not matter much what we call it.
 
-Daniel- said:
phavoc said:
So I'd be interested in hearing the reasoning behind keeping the term and how it's usage is appropriate.
While I do not disagree with you, the idea of this phrase lasting out into the worlds for so long etc does seem illogical, I sometimes like that a game system does not eliminate all reference to our world or life. Sometimes the reason to leave it in has less to do with solid logic and more to do with fun and comfort.

Not to mention I would not have known what a Coriolis was but I did know hat a Hamster Gage was. So if it is to be changed, stick to Centripetal Hull.

I just responded to the language drift issue. I don't really care about any of that. My argument is that as it stands NOW, is that 'hamster cage' doesn't fit with the rest of the descriptions, and it's more of a slang term rather than a more appropriate descriptive one. I'm not attached to using coriolis or centripedal, another similar term works for me. But I though hamster cage was inappropriate for Space Stations when it came out (Along with "throw and catch" for a mass drivers / catching system. I, too, have tried to figure out a better term, but while I think mass driver works a lot better than "throw", I'm stumped for the 2nd part of this.

I can see using a "sometimes referred to as a 'hamster cage', using that term as the primary label doesn't fit with the overall labeling of other similar topics within Traveller, High Guard or it's predecessors.
 
AnotherDilbert said:
I've seen this concept referred to as "rotating wheel" or "torus centrifuge".
If we want a nickname I like the "Rotating Wheel". Offers a clear picture, no reference to "old earth" to break other folks believability, and sounds good too. :mrgreen:
 
Then stop calling spacecraft and starcraft ships and boats. Stop using old earth nautical terms including navigation, naval fleets and torpedo - "a self-propelled, cigar-shaped missile containing explosives and often equipped with a homing device, launched from a submarine or other warship, for destroying surface vessels or other submarines." Fair is fair.
 
Reynard said:
Then stop calling spacecraft and starcraft ships and boats. Stop using old earth nautical terms including navigation, naval fleets and torpedo - "a self-propelled, cigar-shaped missile containing explosives and often equipped with a homing device, launched from a submarine or other warship, for destroying surface vessels or other submarines." Fair is fair.

That's true. We should call lasers 'pew-pew beamers' too!

But getting back to the issue at hand - what is your argument to retain 'hamster cage'? You've yet to stipulate one. And why should it remain unchanged?
 
You can call your major combatants frigates and man'o'wars; I have.

Once you get artificial gravitation at tech level eight, the hamsters will just have to adapt to the modern labour market.
 
"That's true. We should call lasers 'pew-pew beamers' too!"

So far the ONLY person to say 'pew pew beamer" is you and that makes it a failed argument. It's never been a term for lasers.

"But getting back to the issue at hand - what is your argument to retain 'hamster cage'? You've yet to stipulate one. And why should it remain unchanged?"

Because it is a valid term for the structure and been used before in popular media and other circles. Also, as far as I know, no one has ranted about that descriptor existing in 2300AD. Mature there but juvenile in Traveller? When did Traveller become oh so grown up and too serious? And once again, why is this particular valid term singled out over every other similar colloquial?
 
Reynard said:
So far the ONLY person to say 'pew pew beamer" is you and that makes it a failed argument. It's never been a term for lasers.

Very true. But no one else has called for a cessation of using the term ship, or boat. So I guess that makes us even is citing our own individual examples? I'm not sure if coup counting is going on here or not. It's not something I do on a regular basis when discussing things on boards. Maybe I missed the memo though?

"But getting back to the issue at hand - what is your argument to retain 'hamster cage'? You've yet to stipulate one. And why should it remain unchanged?"

Reynard said:
Because it is a valid term for the structure and been used before in popular media and other circles. Also, as far as I know, no one has ranted about that descriptor existing in 2300AD. Mature there but juvenile in Traveller? When did Traveller become oh so grown up and too serious? And once again, why is this particular valid term singled out over every other similar colloquial?

Since I don't play 2300AD I wasn't aware of it being in there. It's usage there, however, still doesn't take away from my argument. When you talk about popular media, which ones are you referring to? A simple use of the term in the Google search engine returns a great many images and pages related to the actual hamster and the many types of habits you can purchase (some that look like space stations even). Nary a mention of the usage of it on the first three pages... but plenty of things about hamsters!

To your second point, in the section that hamster cages are listed, you have double hull, hamster cage, and breakaway hull. Don't you agree the terminology sticks out like a sore thumb?

And to your final point regarding singling the term out, this isn't the first time I've done it (did it for space stations, too). What's wrong with trying to bring the standards up? Providing feedback on the book IS the purpose of this entire section after all. Sometimes suggestions and opinions (even rants!) get included, other times they do not. If no one speaks up about anything then there's no purpose to having a beta.

I would ask you the same question - why are you so against the change or the suggestion of a change? Are you especially attached to the terminology? If clarification can aid other players, that should be a good thing, correct? If the powers that be decide to ignore this post then so be it. If the change is accepted, then yay!
 
phavoc said:
A simple use of the term in the Google search engine returns a great many images and pages related to the actual hamster and the many types of habits you can purchase (some that look like space stations even). Nary a mention of the usage of it on the first three pages... but plenty of things about hamsters!
Sorry, but when I read this I just had to see a Hamster Spaces Station.

This one is just too funny.....


18mkmprl9rkg5jpg.jpg


I will now return you to your original conversation. :mrgreen:
 
I find it amusing that the term hamster cage is causing so much discussion when the names of so much stuff in the book are incredibly unscientific and firmly belongs in the pulp sci-fi/fantasy realm.

Ion cannons that have nothing to do with ions, tachyon cannons that have nothing to do with tachyons etc.

Just accept the silliness, change it for your game if you don't like it.
 
-Daniel- said:
phavoc said:
A simple use of the term in the Google search engine returns a great many images and pages related to the actual hamster and the many types of habits you can purchase (some that look like space stations even). Nary a mention of the usage of it on the first three pages... but plenty of things about hamsters!
Sorry, but when I read this I just had to see a Hamster Spaces Station.

This one is just too funny.....


18mkmprl9rkg5jpg.jpg


I will now return you to your original conversation. :mrgreen:

Almost wants to make you go our and get a few hamsters for "Hamsters in ..... ssssppppppaaaaacccceeee!!!!"

Sigtrygg said:
I find it amusing that the term hamster cage is causing so much discussion when the names of so much stuff in the book are incredibly unscientific and firmly belongs in the pulp sci-fi/fantasy realm.

Ion cannons that have nothing to do with ions, tachyon cannons that have nothing to do with tachyons etc.

Just accept the silliness, change it for your game if you don't like it.

If you find the conversation silly, don't contribute to the silliness. Or add to the silliness. Either is acceptable.

Using your own statement, we should just accept the texts and rules and change whatever things we don't like. End of beta. Just publish the rules and take our money and we'll change all the stuff we don't like for things we do like. Though that does kind of make it pointless to have a rules system don'tcha think?
 
Giant space hamsters are in Spelljammer, not Traveller.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsters_of_Spelljammer#Giant_space_hamster

Man I miss Spelljammer.
 
PsiTraveller said:
Giant space hamsters are in Spelljammer, not Traveller.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsters_of_Spelljammer#Giant_space_hamster

Man I miss Spelljammer.

And Kia videos.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gclcnemDpZU

Clearly they had Traveller in mind when coming up the video background. Robots and troopers in battledress.
 
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