Re: [GZG] Gzg-l Digest, Vol 37, Issue 24

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http://mail.csua.berkeley.edu:8080/mailman/listinfo/gzg-lOn Tue, Sep 28,
2010 at 7:49 AM, Roger Burton West <roger@firedrake.org>wrote:

>
> I think this is a fairly key thing. While we don't have canonical jump
> distances and so on, if a ship can cross several AU in a few days then
> it's moving somewhere around 1% of lightspeed at its fastest; that
gives
> you a megaton-range impact from a 1kg lump of rock that's lying in its
> path. Now, you can PSB and say that that's from a known direction
> ("double front shields"), but it still has implications for the sort
of
> energy level that can get through all the defences and actually damage
> the ship.
>
>
The problem with going down this road too far is that you start
questioning
other aspects of the game. If navigational shields and/or armour can
protect
against megaton impacts due to rocks lying in the way of the ship, just
how
much energy is being generated by ship weapon systems? Or, for that
matter,
fighters? You start to get to the point where the weapons aren't Star
Trek
or Star Wars level of destructive, but something closer to Iain Banks'
Culture.

And then you work out the size of the ships and take loses of power due
to
miniaturization, but still end up wondering why tanks -- in the same
universe -- aren't vapourizing anything in their path with energy
weapons
instead of using slug throwers.

I'm not disagreeing with anyone here, but as I like to caution, you can
only
use "real life physics" in FT so far before you run head first into a
logical wall. (See older discussions about missile momentum and throwing
rocks at ships at X% of the speed of light.)

-- 
Allan Goodall		 http://www.hyperbear.com
awgoodall@gmail.com
agoodall@hyperbear.com