Re: Velocity limits on Starships...

>  Shudder indeed, although this idea has occurred to me in the past.
>Especially after reading the space-traffic-control section of
>Cherryh's _Pride_of_Chanur_ in which some tricks for attack a station
>at relativistic velocities (ie park in orbit a quarter of a second
>after their sensors tell them you've entered the system) are
>described.  I don't know how to make a board game to do this but a
>computer game might be possible.  Ahh, that's another thing I'm never
>gonna do.

>-joachim

Just as an aside, there WAS a C.J.Cherryh boardgame from Mayfair Games,
published back in '83 (I've got my copy in front of me...) - called The
Company War, based on the Merchanter novels (Downbelow Station etc)
which
are set in the same universe as the Chanur books, though in the
human-settled bits. As a game, it sucks - I bought it (second-hand)
because
I'm a fan of the novels, and wanted the background stuff in it. There is
a
rudimentary set of "tactical" rules in the game that makes no attempt
whatsoever to reproduce any of the combat tactics used in the books. I
find
Cherryh's vision of space combat to be very compelling reading, and
probably more like "what it might really be" than all the space combat
games put together (yes, FT included...:)); the game is disappointing,
but
probably goes to illustrate that what makes a good novel (or film, TV
etc)
DOESN'T necessarily make a good game - and vice-versa......

Jon (GZG)