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🕑 Added 2015-04-25 00:29:14 +0000 UTC

Comments

Nyrath

Well, even with hyperdrive, the C-57D probably cannot carry any spare mass.

John

There's a whole sequence about them breaking down the C-57D's drive coils and other parts, basically marooning them on the planet until they rebuild the drive. That's a major issue I'd say. It's sad that we know so little about the United Planets, other than they have a space fleet of sorts, but one that doesn't think twice about unmounting ship's weapons for use on the surface. Those two big square blaster guns? Those are ship's weapons, removed from the ship and mounted on weapons platforms. It's a bit late 1700's to earlier 1800's naval operations.

Nyrath

Oh, how could I have forgotten the C-57D's cannibalized hyperdrive! That was a great background bit, the FTL com was so huge the ship could not carry both the com and a drive. Yeah, Alaspin minidrag venom is neurotoxic, but also corrosive enough to eat through metal. I think the antivenom was more a pious hope than a real cure.

John

A really good set of updates this week. The two that sparked some thoughts were FTL communication and "Pets". For FTL Communications, I'm reminded of the efforts of poor Chief Engineer Quinn in building a FTL communications device, primarily by disassembling the United Planets Cruiser C-57D's hyperdrive. This has implications. It means that the United Planets have FTL communication, but not their starships. At least not while they are in space. It's also faster than a starship, as it was implied that they would be able to send a message back to Command and receive a reply in a short period of time. So that implies that other star colonies in the UP have these "ansibles" either by scraping a hyperdrive or hauling the parts to build one with them. However, Commander Adams' remarks about Quinn building one also implies that this is not a trivial task or that the parts are readily available. "I'll bet any quantum mechanic in the service would give the rest of his life to fool around with this gadget." -- Chief Engineer Quinn, C-57D Because of this fact, these ansibles are rare, hard to maintain, and require a dedicated staff to operate and repair. And if one breaks, the only place to get spare parts is Earth. That pretty much means one per colony, and it's not instantaneous communication, but it's faster a ship. Pets, on that one, I think there was an anti venom for Minidrag neurotoxin. But for it to have any use, you'd have to have it on you for immediate injection. Much like the Cone Snail, you get hit by this stuff, you're dead.