Re: FT Combo: Super Carriers and FTL

On Tue, 27 Oct 1998 14:31:18 +0000 (GMT) Thomas Anderson 
<thomas.anderson@university-college.oxford.ac.uk> wrote:

Quoting me:
>> Then, on Sun, 25 Oct 1998 23:40:41 -0500 John Crimmins 
<johncrim@voicenet.com> wrote:

>>> So how do other people work FTL? I have a few more alien races to 
deal with, and I need some different ways for them to get around. I am 
personally fond of the Pournelle Alderson Drive, so I am probably going 
to work that in with one of the minor powers. Any other thoughts? <<<

>> Alternative methods of going FTL fall into one of two (or more, but 
I can only think of two at present) categories: FTL in normal space, 
and FTL by means of hyperspace. (Note that there will be a lot of 
duplication in terminology here, which could be confusing.) <<
 
> third group: instantaneous travel. alderson drives, TK drives, etc. 
unless this was your zeroth group, i didn't quite get your taxonomy.

It was. Those of John's methods that I recognised were what I called 
"teleporters", i.e., instantaneous travel. _Other_ methods could be put 
into two groups: normal space travel or "otherspace".

Later, John wrote:

> GW warpspace works kind of like B5 Hyperspace. But it tends to be much
less attractive. And a lot more expensive. <

Hmmm... shades of "The Game of Rat and Dragon". Anyone for space combat 
with the help of a friendly cat and large flares? Let's see someone 
write pinlighting rules for FT.... <g>

Again quoting me:
>>-- Telesthetic travel, from SPI's StarForce <<

> This is one that I am unfamiliar with.  How does it work? <

Psionic teleportation, requiring specially-trained Telesthetics (all 
women, BTW -- Redmond Simonson was poking fun at male gamers. In this 
future history, women ran things and men got to be grunts) and AIs to 
create a "discontinuity window" through which ships could pass. Ships 
could be helped by StarGates, large space stations orbiting at the edge 
of a solar system as combined launch pad and defence platform (all 
space combat was psionic, involving either throwing the enemy out of 
the system, or refusing to be thrown, thus stunning the would-be 
throwers).

Safe "shift" range for a ship by itself was 5 LY, or 1 if shifting into 
space occupied by an unfriendly StarGate. "Overshifts" could be 
attempted, but you ran the risk of not going where you wanted to, and 
suffering for it. A friendly ship at the other end could extend this to 
10 LY, a helpful Gate at either end to 15, and a Gate-to-Gate transfer 
was 20 LY.

Phil, who rather liked the Lady May. Come to think of it, my own cats 
might be good at pinlighting
------------------------------------------------------------
"We gotta get out into Space, 
 If it's the last thing we ever do!"  
   -- Return to the Forbidden Planet
A sentiment echoed by Phil Atcliffe 
	      (Phillip.Atcliffe@uwe.ac.uk)