[High Guard] Preview/Date?

[klingsor]

For some reason I was thinking of spinal mounted mass drivers. For turret mounted ones, meh, not a problem.

I was assuming the compensators would be built into the mass driver itself, you are trying to offset the recoil, my fault for a lack of clarity and woolly terminology. Which leads to an interesting though that a smallarm with integral gravetics to control recoil and steady the firers aim would seque seamlessly to a gun drone. The idea of a gun chasing someone down a corridor is at once slightly silly and quite creepy. Is it any wonder the Imperium has a down on AI weapons. Rogue Trooper here we come.

There would be not point putting them on the projectile unless you have a delicate payload you want to protect from the viciously high acceleration - quite possibly hundreds, maybe even thousands of G though that being said you could have much less acceleration than a projectile from a gun must endure and still get a very useful MV which is good for smart rounds or indeed anything other than a solid KE round. This is getting into territory I would rather avoid - questions about what G the technology can compensate for. We know they can generate very high G as it is used to create superdense armour.

 

[EDG]

This is getting into territory I would rather avoid - questions about what G the technology can compensate for. We know they can generate very high G as it is used to create superdense armour.

Apparently they can compensate at least up to 6G, or people would be squished/unable to move under acceleration in ships that have high M drives.

Superdense armour is itself daft though - the idea is that it's compressing the material to near white dwarf densities... that's all very well, but that means it's about a billion kg per cubic metre. How many cubic metres of armour are there on a ship again? If each cubic metre of armour masses a million metric tons then you're going to need a really sturdy structure to support it (or some ridiculously powerful grav compensation to negate the mass)!

Or maybe the ship is covered with a monomolecular film of superdense material, but then it won't actually make much of a difference to the armour.

 

[towerwarlock]

Sorry but the handwaving by pointing out the heat caused by the friction is bull too. Try putting magents with the same poles towards each other and see what heat you get. And you guys are still missing the point. The Rail and Gauss weapons are actually repelling the projectile and the wiki is actually not even close to the fact. The only time there might be any recoil is if fire in an atmosphere as the item passes through the air.

 

[klingsor]

I assume that the 6G limit on acceleration is due to that being the limit on the compensators - but this is badly flawed, the military would happily trade discomfort for a few more Gs.

On the other hand actually working under high G conditions must be difficult. The problem is the only real world examples we have are astronauts and military pilots who experience high G only briefly not someone trying to say, fix a broken valve.

I suspect this falls under 'don't think about it too much'.

 

[klingsor]

Agreed heat and friction are irrelevant, so is air though.

I think you are fundamentally misunderstanding this. My physics was a good while back so I now lack the vocabulary to explain this properly but you cannot avoid recoil, otherwise you are defying Newton's Third Law and basically doing magic.

Back to two magnets repealing each other. A perfect example. They will both move - conservation of momentum, you cannot generate acceleration without an equal reaction in the opposite direction - recoil!

Basically you cannot generate acceleration from nothing without breaking the rules the universe works on - not yet anyway.

 

[EDG]

Sorry but the handwaving by pointing out the heat caused by the friction is bull too. Try putting magents with the same poles towards each other and see what heat you get. And you guys are still missing the point. The Rail and Gauss weapons are actually repelling the projectile and the wiki is actually not even close to the fact. The only time there might be any recoil is if fire in an atmosphere as the item passes through the air.

I think you need to remind yourself of some basic physics again. There is ALWAYS a reaction force, and railguns and coilguns are no exception.

And since when do magnets repelling eachother generate heat? That's the first I've ever heard of it (unless you're somehow inducing an electric field in something that heats them up??).

 

[EDG]

I assume that the 6G limit on acceleration is due to that being the limit on the compensators - but this is badly flawed, the military would happily trade discomfort for a few more Gs.

On the other hand actually working under high G conditions must be difficult. The problem is the only real world examples we have are astronauts and military pilots who experience high G only briefly not someone trying to say, fix a broken valve.

TNE FF&S says that g-comp increases with TL up to 6G at high TLs. You can withstand more Gs by being in special couches, but as you point out it's hard to move around .

 

[aspqrz]

I assume that the 6G limit on acceleration is due to that being the limit on the compensators - but this is badly flawed, the military would happily trade discomfort for a few more Gs.

I suspect this falls under 'don't think about it too much'.

I wasn't aware that Traveller Missiles were manned :shock:

And if they're not, limiting them to 6G is ... strange ...

Phil

 

[klingsor]

I was thinking of ships when I mentioned 6G. Is it a limit for acceleration as well? I assume it is a physical limit on the M-Drives and not because of the compensators as it is so hardwired into Traveller.

Mind you manned missiles have been tried - the Kamikazes.

If 6G is a limit from the physics of gravetics then suddenly other ways of boosting missiles are worth looking at - mass drivers for a high initial velocity or even old fashioned rocket boosters with grav plates for sustained acceleration and manoeuvring. What sort of power plant? MHD turbines spring to mind for some reason. Oh there is so much that could be done with a missiles book. Certain things, dimensions mostly and a mass limit, are fixed to match with standardised launch tubes but after that...

 

[EDG]

I was thinking of ships when I mentioned 6G. Is it a limit for acceleration as well? I assume it is a physical limit on the M-Drives and not because of the compensators as it is so hardwired into Traveller.

If there isn't a physical limit and the limit is just due to grav compensation tech, then there's no reason to prevent ships from going up to 7+ g acceleratiosn at higher TLs - if 6g is getting cancelled out by the compensators then going another g shouldn't be a problem (assuming you don't move around on the ship). Accelerating at higher g should be possible with more protection (acceleration couches etc).

 

[towerwarlock]

What I was trying to point out is that putting 2 magnets together at the same poles do not generate heat, just as railguns and gauss weapons would not not. By everyone's arguments, particle beam weapons and lasers should also generate recoil.

 

[EDG]

What I was trying to point out is that putting 2 magnets together at the same poles do not generate heat, just as railguns and gauss weapons would not not. By everyone's arguments, particle beam weapons and lasers should also generate recoil.

Oh right. Yeah, but railguns and gauss weapons should generate heat by the fact that they're having whacking great electrical currents going through their innards that generate the magnetic fields.

Lasers and particle beam weapons shouldn't generate recoil though. Plasma/Fusion guns might though, depending on exactly how much mass of gas is being used in each charge - but I'd imagine it'd be very little recoil.

 

[klingsor]

Well particle bean weapons should, the particles do have mass but the mass is so low it would be hard to measure the recoil - I think, I am not doing maths at 0007 time in the morning! I will quiz the physics guy tomorrow.

Lasers are tricky, this is where physics gets weird. Light is both a wave and a particle so if is a particle it has mass. Actually it would have recoil, that is how solar sails and photon (ie. big ass laser) drives work. Again though mass of the particles is very low.

Plasma would - again it is a mass and velocity thing.

Just about everything seems to generate thrust, the question seems to be how usable is it. Once again context matters. A good real world example is the ion drive, it generates very little thrust but can do so for a very long time with very little fuel so as pretty much as long as you have power it is good to go (actually is it like a baby particle bean weapon?). Compare and contrast with a liquid or solid fuel rocket, lots of thrust, high acceleration but horribly, horribly thirsty so a very limited burn time. Different tools for different jobs.

Heat is a killer issue. Getting rid of it will be a major problem for space ships and only one SF series that I can think of really worries about it, John Ringo's Looking Glass series. Not high literature but great fun and fairly solid science most of the time - having a physicist as a co-author helps!

This is quite fun, you are making me think about how I think things work - and making me argue for it.

 

[Vile]

But how does the 2nd law of thermodynamics come into play here?

I think Vile actually means Newton's 3rd law of motion - the one that says "for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newton%E2%80%99s_laws_of_motion

Um, yeah.

The point being, whether you pull or push a projectile, you are still subject to recoil. Really, it doesn't matter how you do it, be it a chemical or physical explosion (i.e. gunpowder or compressed gas) or an electromagnetic rail or coil. The mass of the projectile is one opart of the equation, but the acceleration you subject it to is another. Recoil is counterbalanced by the mass of the weapon (and the vessel it's mounted on), and can be reduced by mechanical dampers (or the counterweights mentioned earlier). After that, you're into magic future tech territory, although you're admittedly alrady there in overcoming the power requirements of these weapons.

So, there probably is not much of an issue with recoil for bigger ships, unless your railgun is really powerful, but I have doubts about fitting a usefully effective railgun on a lightweight fighter. A10 pilots probably have a good idea what that feels like. :wink:

 

[Paladin]

"no recoil" isn't literally "no" recoil, but minimally felt recoil; either through a method of transfer/dampeners. In my opinion, we can't comprehend/explain technology of the future that seems impossible today. All the physics/math on inertia/opposite reactions in the world are useless if you have technology that compensates or solves the issue. Size/scale of the weapons/ammo is also relevant.

The key phrase is "if you have technology that compensates or solves the issue". Personally I hate the assumption that physics problems will be magically solved in the future - the physics is still there, and a given problem has been solved then there darn well should be a description of how it's solved (even if it's technobabble - so long as it is at least consistent with the setting).

Personally, hate forcing a fictional setting of technology beyond our comprehension into having to be explained in modern terms (So I guess we're even. ). Go back 300 years and I gaurantee they couldn' begin to fathom even half of our technology or how it would work. They couldn't figure out how to fly, much less travel to space/land on the moon. Yes, the laws of physics are the same, but our ability to use and overcome those laws has changed.

 

[EDG]

Personally, hate forcing a fictional setting of technology beyond our comprehension into having to be explained in modern terms

I guess it's just as well that Traveller isn't a setting of fictional technology beyond our comprehension then.

Go back 300 years and I gaurantee they couldn' begin to fathom even half of our technology or how it would work. They couldn't figure out how to fly

Leonardo da Vinci might have something to say about that...

Yes, the laws of physics are the same, but our ability to use and overcome those laws has changed.

There were huge gaps in our knowledge of the sciences a few hundred years ago. Now, not so much. I think it's reasonable to extrapolate from what we know about science today, and assume that the foundations of science aren't suddenly going to be overturned at some point so that everything after that can't be explained.

 

[Paladin]

Personally, hate forcing a fictional setting of technology beyond our comprehension into having to be explained in modern terms

I guess it's just as well that Traveller isn't a setting of fictional technology beyond our comprehension then.

So how exactly does one skim hydrogen from a multitude of sources and convert it to fuel with a single processor?
How do you achieve Jump technology?
How do antimatter power plants work? ETA on a working prototype model?
Any suggestions for Terra-forming an entire planet?
Cyrogenic chambers?
Plasma rifles?
Proton Beams?
Disintegrators?
Meson Guns?
Grav tech?
...

Nah... that's not fictional technology [edit]beyond our comprehension[/edit]. :wink:

Go back 300 years and I gaurantee they couldn' begin to fathom even half of our technology or how it would work. They couldn't figure out how to fly, much less travel to space/land on the moon.

Leonardo da Vinci might have something to say about that...

da Vinci never achieved flight. He had gliders at best. If you count that as flying, then the Chinese win since they had kites in 400 BC.

Yes, the laws of physics are the same, but our ability to use and overcome those laws has changed.

There were huge gaps in our knowledge of the sciences a few hundred years ago. Now, not so much. I think it's reasonable to extrapolate from what we know about science today, and assume that the foundations of science aren't suddenly going to be overturned at some point so that everything after that can't be explained.

http://ei.cs.vt.edu/~history/humor.html





...so about that High Guard book. Is anyone else looking as forward to it's release as I am.

 

[EDG]

Nah... that's not fictional technology. :wink:

You'll note the bit I had in italics wasn't the "fictional technology" part, it's the "beyond our comprehension" part. I don't believe that there's anything still to come that is beyond our comprehension today. Sure, there's going to be a lot of things that surprise us and I'm sure there'll be the odd major revolution but I really doubt that it's going to be so off-the-wall that we couldn't possibly imagine or understand it today (maybe we can't predict it today, but that's different).

 

[cbrunish]

Back to the subject at hand. So when is High Guard coming out????????

 

[Gruffty the Hiver]

Back to the subject at hand. So when is High Guard coming out????????

Dunno.


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