Questions: Need help with the Science of Science Fiction

[BP]

In the classical sense of direct observations by a person on scene - most of our real world is still not explored!

 

[Captain Jonah]

In the classical sense of direct observations by a person on scene - most of our real world is still not explored!

Define explored. Discovered by someone or known to everyone.

Some of the cities here have hundreds of years of cellars and foundations under them. There are areas now 50 years old that have not been visited for a generation because they were walled up or covered over. The long sealed and abandonded subway and tube tunnels under new york or london for example. Once filled with people, now 50+ years later 99.9% of the people who live in those cities are hardly aware they exist or know how to find them.

With a decent guide you could spend years exploring under London alone. Areas that were once well known and frequented but are now empty and hidden. Move away and find lakes so deep that they have never been explored except by sonar mapping, cave systems vast and complex that have never been explored until someone cleared away a wall of mud and revealed a new tunnel. Oceans and seas that yield something like the Celocamph.

The crypto zoologists are constantly talking about big foot, the yeti, nessy, the creatures reported in the depths of the Amazon. The mega squid legends of centuries ago, the wood carvings of a squid big enough to pull down large sailing ships, myth and fairy tale till modern days when remains have been found, its easy to laugh at a wood carving out of a fantasy story till you see a pickled length of squid tentacle with suckers big enough to cover your face. To the best of my knowledge we have never seen or filmed a live one.

We have hardly explored our worlds deepest and darkest areas.

Lets face it, with the technology we have, the science, the research and the numbers of people on this little world, finding new tribes of stone age peoples in the jungles or entirely new or long thought extinct species should not be possible.

Yet we do it all the time.

Having an otherwise advanced world suddenly discover due to an earthquake that there exists a vast network of natural tunnels and caves that spreads out far under deepest oceans of the world can take your Traveller characters off the starship and into the realms of "Journey to the centre of the earth".

As BP says, finding new areas to explore isn’t a matter of needing new worlds. You just need to look in places no one else has looked before. That’s not so hard even on a world with 7 billion people or so living on it.

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

Robert Silverberg wrote a series of books that took place on a huge world.

Majipoor

Perhaps everyone is trying to make the world TOO big. You don't need a Jupiter sized world to have a huge world.

A "super Earth" that is 2-3 times as massive as the Earth, but less dense so that it has an almost normal gravity (a gravity of 1.3 gs could probably be adapted to eventually). That gives you about 10 times the surface area as a normal Earth.

Is that big enough?

 

[Mage]

Thanks everyone for all the advise, have been busy as of late so have not been replying to the thread.

@ Rikki Tikki traveller

What you suggest is perfect, thank you.


@ Captain Jonah

Wow, reading that post was a bit mind blowing. I will try to incorporate those ideas into my games.


@ BP

Can a world ever truly be explored completely? It would be interesting to set a traveller game on earth, in the future with more advanced technology, but focuses on exploring more of earth, be it underground, the oceans, or remote places.


@ Solomani666

Going about Third Imperium standard tech level, maybe a little higher. The idea of a larger world with high technology, compared to say when transport was not as developed on our world now as it was one hundred years ago, is the way I was thinking. Big world, plenty of tech, plenty of room to explore.

You give me a lot of things to think about with those three examples…

I like the idea of that world, may I use it? The idea of future city states potentially warring, even with advanced tech, and different cultures and possibly an indigenous species thrown into the mix is quite fascinating. I may need to read up on the city states in history for basic ideas, contect and framework to implement the concept.


@ pasuli

Those are good ideas to consider, thanks.


@ Lemnoc

People keep mentioning those, I will have to research them as I am not 100 per cent sure what they are, even with the explanations. I am not exactly the scientific type.

@ alex_greene

So it would be a must to have a world that big, and hollow with all the criteria I suggest. It does not seem very likely. You make a lot of interesting points.


@ Captain Jonah

May worlds around the sun seems like a neat idea. What would have pulled them into the habitable zone. Also leads to the interesting question ‘who did the terraforming?’. The setting would not be low tech at all. I like the DNA tag idea, it might be better incorporated into a Legend game with said portals and links between different worlds.

I picture the ringworld you describe, but have a hard time imagining it, like do you fall of the edge, how would it work, etc.


@ far trader

A many worlds system may work better. How would a multi sun system work? I like the suggestion.


@ rust

You make a valid point I guess.


@ Jeraa

Thanks for addressing my question on water.

 

[far-trader]

Thanks everyone...

You're quite welcome

@ far trader

A many worlds system may work better. How would a multi sun system work? I like the suggestion.

...quick answer, have a look at this wiki page linked below and see if it answers the questions you have and then ask the ones it doesn't

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_system#Multiple_star_systems

 

[Captain Jonah]

Thanks everyone for all the advise, have been busy as of late so have not been replying to the thread.

@ Captain Jonah

Wow, reading that post was a bit mind blowing. I will try to incorporate those ideas into my games.

Always happy to explode peoples heads. In a good way of course :lol:

Re exploring a world. Consider that we have had several thousand years of human expansion across the globe, we have had satellites looking down from space for decades, aircraft photograph the surface of the world in great detail, explorers use GPS to pin point locations and explore exact areas.

Yet for all that we have not explored all of the land of this world and have covered 20% ish of the oceans that make up more than half of our world. Every satellite and recon drone in a Traveller explorers cargo bay does not help him look beneath the jungle canopy, into the caves and tunnels that run through out the crust or peer into the depths.

It would be perhaps the saddest moment in a Travellers life when he comes to realise that there is nothing left to explore, nowhere new to go and nothing new to see.

Re warring city states. The 3rdI bans nukes, with an amber or red zone in place the navy could be blocking all imports of weapons to the warring factions. A Balkanised government structure and away you go. Tech 12+ cities with every modern convenience but reduced to fighting with tech 8 or lower weapons. Generals using microwave comms and low orbit satellites to command armies of men with bolt action rifles fighting a trench war. (think 40K Imperial guard sort )

Ring worlds would be some sort of relic of the ancients or some other precursor power. Yes you could fall off one with effect depending on if it has artificial gravity, mass or using spin to simulate gravity. Check online, lots of good stuff about ring worlds.

Multiple worlds. These could again be left over from some long forgotten ancient civilisation or they could be entirely natural, with a billion billion systems in the galaxy statistically there is going to be a few with multiple inhabitable worlds in the life zone. If the worlds or ring world are left behind by long departed creators you can also add all those nice little extras as I mentioned earlier. Or they could have been made ready for a colony that never happened and so there is no trace whatsoever of the creators. Just the mystery.

 

[Rusty_Unycorn]

Here's a Huge world for you: A rosette joined by a ringworld. Go for it.

 

[Rick]

Here's a Huge world for you: A rosette joined by a ringworld. Go for it.

Not even sure that would be possible! How about the Dyson sphere idea? Probably have a much larger livable surface than a ringworld and rosette combined?

 

[Rusty_Unycorn]

Here's a Huge world for you: A rosette joined by a ringworld. Go for it.

Not even sure that would be possible! How about the Dyson sphere idea? Probably have a much larger livable surface than a ringworld and rosette combined?

Sure it would work! Never said that the ringworld has to touch the planets of the rosette! SO you have five or so planets in a rosette and a ringworld built to the orbit size, with little pockets or dips in the ring world that allow the for the planets. If you get them close enough, then you could have their atmospheres be touching, allowing for aerial transportation.
Of course, travelling from planet to planet on the ringworld would take lots of time :twisted: Thus making the world even bigger at lower tech levels.

 

[Rick]

Here's a Huge world for you: A rosette joined by a ringworld. Go for it.

Not even sure that would be possible! How about the Dyson sphere idea? Probably have a much larger livable surface than a ringworld and rosette combined?

Sure it would work! Never said that the ringworld has to touch the planets of the rosette! SO you have five or so planets in a rosette and a ringworld built to the orbit size, with little pockets or dips in the ring world that allow the for the planets. If you get them close enough, then you could have their atmospheres be touching, allowing for aerial transportation.
Of course, travelling from planet to planet on the ringworld would take lots of time :twisted: Thus making the world even bigger at lower tech levels.

Still not convinced, Rusty! My uninformed mind still has the idea that the combined gravitational pull of the planets might deform and pull apart the ringworld - but I love the idea of a rosette of hundreds of planets in a single orbital path, each with their atmospheres (just) overlapping - got this image of Bob Shaws Ragged Astronauts/Wooden Spaceships idea of going from one planet to the other by balloon! Now that would be a great idea for a low tech traveller campaign!

 

[far-trader]

Here's a Huge world for you: A rosette joined by a ringworld. Go for it.

You know, like Rick, when I first read this it sounded impossibly wrong. On a second read I think I see what you're saying and yeah, it might just work at that.

You're talking about a ring world where at regular intervals there are these manufactured "settings" if you will, spaces left empty in the ring, just big enough for a world to sit within. The orbit of the worlds coincides with that of the ring. And the ring atmosphere and world atmosphere overlap. Yeah, that could work. Given the tech (magic) required for building a ring world it'd be pretty easy to do the rest.

The atmo overlaps would only be where the ring intersects the worlds, which would vary as the worlds turn. Actually thinking on that a little more below I'm not even sure the atmos would mingle or mix.

Hmmm, so the ring wouldn't be a true ring, more of an ellipse like an orbit. And it would have to have to be flexible so that while it "orbited" it would look the same seen from space but the surface would itself be going through "seasons" as one part draws nearer then farther from the star.

So, what would be the purpose of the worlds? Collected samples of alien biospheres? Organic ring shephards and biodiversity seeds? Emergency redoubts in case of ring catastrophe? Recreational or other places of different gravity?

I like that last one combined with the first. The builders set the ring gravity at their comfort level (let's say 0.5gs) and then imported whole worlds for whatever reason. Some smaller (low gravity) some larger (high gravity), each nestled into it's own little "setting". All with very similar atmosphere mixes (no more than filter or compressor masks needed) and over time that might even disappear as the atmospheres blend through bleed off.

I'm not sure you'd be able to cross by balloon though. Possibly, with a high tech high altitude enclosed balloon, but certainly not with some primitive hot air open wicker basket without fuel to keep the balloon aloft. Even aircraft would have to be pretty advanced. I'm thinking the separation required might even rule out any atmosphere mixing.

The ring and worlds might be a workable idea

 

[Rusty_Unycorn]

I'm not sure you'd be able to cross by balloon though. Possibly, with a high tech high altitude enclosed balloon, but certainly not with some primitive hot air open wicker basket without fuel to keep the balloon aloft. Even aircraft would have to be pretty advanced. I'm thinking the separation required might even rule out any atmosphere mixing.

The ring and worlds might be a workable idea

Pull off some Gravity tricks, make it so that they're within a workable distance (It's highly advanced alien technology. It does what ever the GM says it does), then fire up the catapults. :twisted:

You're talking about a ring world where at regular intervals there are these manufactured "settings" if you will, spaces left empty in the ring, just big enough for a world to sit within. The orbit of the worlds coincides with that of the ring. And the ring atmosphere and world atmosphere overlap. Yeah, that could work. Given the tech (magic) required for building a ring world it'd be pretty easy to do the rest.

The atmo overlaps would only be where the ring intersects the worlds, which would vary as the worlds turn. Actually thinking on that a little more below I'm not even sure the atmos would mingle or mix.

Hmmm, so the ring wouldn't be a true ring, more of an ellipse like an orbit. And it would have to have to be flexible so that while it "orbited" it would look the same seen from space but the surface would itself be going through "seasons" as one part draws nearer then farther from the star.

My original thought was somewhat similar. You have the rosette, with the ringworld crossing the spaces between the planets. Of course, instead of stopping to make space for a world, it simply has a very sharp bend and does a semi-circle around the planet.
As for the orbit... :twisted: Alien technology again. You could have it just be a circular orbit with no changes in seasons. Or maybe just have it maintain the circular shape and make it orbit around an arbitrary point that's just enough away from the sun to induce the seasonal changes.
Of course, my first thought for the purpose was "Party Central at the Tum-Tum Tree! Come to Away Station Anime for a good Troperiffic change!"
All you need is the Tum-Tum Tree and a rosette of tailored Jovians...