About Intediction Field related technology

[Toshiro]

To that I agree.

Most players will never use a fleet sized one anyway. They just have to keep in mind that it takes two ship anti-interdiction fields to break one ship interdiction field.

Anything fleet-sized is likely to be GM controlled and GM combated.

 

[Zack]

Well that is why I want to have a wiki rules page that outlines this.

 

[Wes]

Also, I am RPing that normal folding is not possible at ALL in Interdiction fields--I'm using the TDD for that goal, which is teleportation rather than travel.

If anything, I think our estimate of the Interdiction field's power over a folding system is pretty high.

Also, seeing as a ship has to charge TDD and its fold systems and has limited use per time, I think it adds a very specific element of interest and strategy to the RP--more like a specific move you can only use so often as part of a more elaborate plan, or to save yourself from a doomsday attack.

If you mean TTD, the relic Transuniversal Teleportation Drive, please note that it is ONLY for travel to other universes (that is, travel to and from other RPGs) and since we don't RP-hop anymore, that no one should be using TTD systems. TTDs have not been in use for years, ICly and OOCly. They are also extremely illegal to use or even for most ships to possess. Most Star Army ships don't have them anymore, either.

 

[Toshiro]

Than a lot of ship wikis need editing.


https://wiki.stararmy.com/doku.php?do=se ... tion+Drive

Even Hotaru and Himitsu currently utilize them, as do a number of our larger ships.

 

[Andrew]

I agree with Toshiro on the fact we do not need another numbers based system. I am not going to sit and use a calculator either to roleplay. I am a believer in story, progress through story and the judgements of GMs to make calls-especially in situations such as the 5th battle.

On that note I am totally in for a revision of definition in terms of the interdiction technology for clarification purposes.

Wes- my apologies we did use TDD breifly to move a massive group of ships. I will make sure its not used anymore.

 

[Wes]

Than a lot of ship wikis need editing.
https://wiki.stararmy.com/doku.php?do=se ... tion+Drive
Even Hotaru and Himitsu currently utilize them, as do a number of our larger ships.

I've updated the TTD wiki page so it's more descriptive.

 

[Fred]

I take credit for what I did Zack and will say so freely - I know which topics I started, what arguments I spearheaded and what points I won in the end. You're free to play the hypocrite and disclaim that - I honestly don't give a damn how much you decide to lie to yourself. Moving on.

* * *

This was the sort of thing I was referring to in regard to the gravity wells star systems generated and the way it might interact with starships themselves.

Okay, so it's very rudimentary, but the goal really is to just communicate the idea, not to get overly complex. And no, the symbols (star/planets) are not on scale. The star and its planets have gravity wells of their own. The star obviously has a much bigger tug than its planet. Those are represented by the gray part.

The red line is pretty much the hypothetical trajectory of a starship coming in-system with the aim of orbiting the first planet. At the merest hint of gray (gravity) the ship disengages its fold drive and then proceeds with his main FTL drive (the CFS for KFY ships, typically) though the farther the ship gets in the gravity wells; the more it gets difficult to maintain the subspace bubble to keep a high FTL speed.

By the time the ship enters the attraction of the planet, FTL gets rather scarce and the ship is better off just disengaging the superluminal drive to use the STL engines.

As for ship mounted systems, they'd effectively simulate the gravity generated by a spatial body... or actually work to make a hole in the gravity generated around - sort of lightening a region to alow usage of higher FTL speeds... or maybe even earlier use of the fold drive, if onboard power would allow.

Edit: 9 AU fleet-sized interdiction fields make me cringe. 1 AU is already pretty big - do you really want to subject ships to needing to travel 45 minutes to get to the ship emitting the said field? It just seems very big to me.

 

[Toshiro]

As I said, the 9 AU field is for fleet-sized engagements, and is 9 AU in volume. My calculations show it to only be 1.3 AU in radius/2.6 AU in diameter. I only see it in fleet applications and on Scorpio or Iori.


Most, if not all, other Interdiction fields are 1 AU in volume, and much smaller in radius.

 

[Zack]

Fred, you have even tried to take credit for the NSS Alliance plotship. I asked you nicely to stop because it annoys me and I don't want to turn this into something personal by debunking each of your claims.

If we are going to go for Toshiro's size and field number system we just need a small wiki page describing how the tech works and the basics of the system. We don't need a listing of planets for this.

 

[Andrew]

Fred, you have even tried to take credit for the NSS Alliance plotship. I asked you nicely to stop because it annoys me and I don't want to turn this into something personal by debunking each of your claims.

I take credit for what I did Zack and will say so freely - I know which topics I started, what arguments I spearheaded and what points I won in the end. You're free to play the hypocrite and disclaim that - I honestly don't give a damn how much you decide to lie to yourself.

Oh stop your blubberin...Keep your personal issues off the forum.

 

[Derran Tyler]

Personally, I think it would be far better for the setting (especially in lieu of the speed reduction rules) if FTL usage was limited to strictly interstellar and interplanetary travel. Combat-usage of FTL makes everything seem far too much like a sci-fi version of DBZ, with warships basically zipping, throwing around beams and missiles that can wipe out continents with little regard for their surroundings.

I like Zack's idea of incorporating something similar to the damage ratings for interdiction fields and drives. In that regard, why not simply assign a ship's drive a rating and interdiction fields ratings?

I'd imagine it working like so --

Interdiction devices have a rating between 1 and 6, 1 being the weakest and 6 being the strongest.

FTL drives have ratings between 1 and 5; 1 being the weakest and 5 being the strongest.

If you have a drive rated at 3 and you enter a 4 rated interdiction field or above, you can't transition to superluminal speeds. Your drive must equal the interdiction field's level or it simply won't function.

In that regard, interdiction fields ultimately would always end up being more effective (which is why the strongest Interdiction device is a 6). Level 6 fields, however, require a lot of power to operate and therefore would be limited to planetary installations or space stations. Likewise, level 5 FTL drives would be able to overcome pretty much all ship-borne interdiction fields.

Ultimately, I think it changes the tactical landscape of battles for the better.

But hey, I'm just the avatar of the overpowered NDI, right? What does my opinion matter.

 

[Fred]

Question is, once the interdiction fields are up, are we willing to have plots wait several minutes while ships travel toward one another to get into weapon's range? I'm sure we can deal with this unconditional measure (actually, more time to talk and give instructions wouldn't be so bad in a battle) but there could be drawbacks as far as space navigation goes.

There remains the effect of star system/planetary gravity that I suggested to consider. I still think this is a worthwhile idea. I believe it's one of the nuances which would make star systems more interesting to interact in.

I also believed that tying this trait to the anti-FTL field technology we use could either help capitalize on/or lessen these environmental factors.

 

[Derran Tyler]

Look at it like this -- from an RP standpoint, slowing things down to more reasonable speeds incites more drama. It actually brings in the concept of maneuver instead of 'I will basically zoom in at 100,000c, fire a volley of planet-destroying weapons and be gone before you even know what shot at you.'

And really, given how vast space is (do you really understand how much volume there is in a 1 AU cube?) even if you're within 10,000 miles of an opposing ship, you might not be able to detect them anyway.

 

[Fred]

Yeah, I do get the idea of how big it is. It'd be a box big enough to contain the Sun, Mercury, Venus, Earth and its moon... and then some. I'm not the one whom created 1 AU range interdiction fields. I just try to deal with them... though I figure that the 1 AU could very well be as much a net to catch and keep in the affected ship - you don't have to activate your interdiction field at an extreme distance if what you are worried about is not letting it escape. If however your goal is to close in to a target without as much risk of being exposed to transposition weaponry and FTL torpedoes, then, it might make some sense to trigger it as soon as you can and then just wait out getting to your target.

Also, sensors in SARP are kinda uber. MEGAMI electronic suites can apparently detect a quantum power source 250 light years away (yes, I know - I'm dealing with sensors next once we come to a good compromise with interdiction field system revisions) so as things stand now it's sort of hard not to notice something within a light second unless you're not looking at the console (and then the computer might spot it for you) or that the other is really, really, reallyreallyreally trying to hide itself good.

So, when the matter comes to dealing with interdiction fields, it all depends on the power of the ship's FTL drive system to resists it, or once you are caught, how much speed you can coax out from your STL engines to run away.

I suppose ships with higher FTL will have a slight edge on less lucky ship because even if an opponent uses his STL engines to break free, it can always FTL jump closer and renew the interdiction field. Possible cheapness in application? Would someone using an interdiction field somehow risk the disadvantage of nor being able to use his FTL drive for a certain lapse of time afterward to mitigate this a bit, you think?

How about low FTL torpedoes idea like I mentioned before? Does the interdiction field hinder torpedoes whom would just go at low FTL speeds such as 3c in the same fashion as they would starships? Or should we just squash the concept of FTL torpedoes altogether in the future and rely on STL propelled warheads to keep with the idea of torpedoes being guided, fast enough to reach their target (some ships, though, might actually be able to be temporarily faster than the torpedoes) and bearing a big payload.

This might help balance things and restore the usefulness and accuracy of the lasers, with the particle weapons and the solid-projectile railguns coming up afterwards in terms of speed and accuracy.

 

[Toshiro]

Yeah, I do get the idea of how big it is. It'd be a box big enough to contain the Sun, Mercury, Venus, Earth and its moon... and then some.

Again, we are speaking in terms of volume, not diameter, so this is not necessarily correct.


Edit:

My fleet sphere calculations may be off for diameter. I have to find a calculator which can handle the calculations. For some reason, a 1 AU volume sphere keeps coming out to 1.24 AU in diameter...cube roots are funky once you get into numbers at or approaching 1 for the base number. If I'm NOT wrong, you may be correct after all. O.O

If I'm right though, it's a nice nearly-round figure--1 AU spheres would have a diameter nearly half that of a 9 AU one.

 

[Zack]

No surprise but I agree with Derran. However I do think that if we introduce a number system for power output it should be a 1-10 system simply because the DR system is 1-10 and more consistency within the rules is always a good thing.

Even using Toshiro's system we still have the same result in terms of problem fixing. If Fred really wants to keep pushing for no FTL near planets we can have players assign interdiction values to objects like planets, suns, black holes, ect as needed.

Either system support a wide variety of play styles and most importantly don't involve suddenly changing the entire setting to create massive consistency issues.

 

[Cannonball]

How about low FTL torpedoes idea like I mentioned before?

Now, I'll be the first to say I like Torpedos and Missiles as weapons - probably one of my favorite types to use in space battles. On the issue of them potentially being crippled by interdiction fields, I think it's worth noting that ICly ships can try to run their FTL engines under interdiction...but only if they enjoy having their engines burnt to a crisp.

That might just be another symptom of the inconsistency stemming from lack of information we have but - as the torps themselves don't care if they have an engine a few seconds from now - it could allow them to keep their speed. Also, building more disposable, more "forceful" engines into them could make a difference.

This might help balance things and restore the usefulness and accuracy of the lasers, with the particle weapons and the solid-projectile railguns coming up afterwards in terms of speed and accuracy.

While I would find it hard for most railguns to operate as truly significant fractions of lightspeed (if they do, I'd probably class them as particle weapons - big ones, but particle weapons all the same), I do agree that slower weapons would see more use, and we might see a bit more weapon variety knocking about.

 

[Yangfan]

For reference, all 3XF ships already go out of hyperspace jump at the outer edges of systems and start using their conventional FTL engines, and reduce to STL speeds once they began orbital entry.

Around one and a half hours later, the convoy flashed back into reality near the outer rims of the Ohara system.

I've been doing this because this is what makes sense for me. I don't know about the rest of you, but I don't pull my car onto the curb at 40 mph.

 

[Wes]

I like the DR 1-10 style idea.

 

[Fred]

So, are we commited to making it so that once an interdiction field is up that unless it can be countered, starships need (are stuck) going at STL speeds? That even units like the Combined Field System will not be able to function in regard to propulsion? Same for the hyperspace fold?