Adapting Forbidden Planet as a Traveller setting

[Werner]

Here is the link for the background:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Planet
What do you think about adapting this movie as a Traveller Adventure? What tech level are we talking about here? What are the similarities and differences between the setting of this movie and the standard Traveller setting? Ignore the cheesy science fiction affects and the clunky robot for a bit and translate it to something more contemporary.

 

[Timerover51]

Here is the link for the background:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Planet
What do you think about adapting this movie as a Traveller Adventure? What tech level are we talking about here? What are the similarities and differences between the setting of this movie and the standard Traveller setting? Ignore the cheesy science fiction affects and the clunky robot for a bit and translate it to something more contemporary.

I would have to go back and watch my DVD of the movie so as to catch everything, but here are some thoughts.

The entire planet is one big power plant, so you have no power limits, but it does not appear that the Krell had fusion power. That makes sense, as the first fusion bomb had not been detonated that much before the movie. The movie was made in 1956, with the first hydrogen bomb test in 1952 and the Castle Bravo shot of 15 megatons in 1954. Fission reactors were just starting to come in. Probably the Krell did have fusion power, allowing for added information since the movie.

The technology for direct conversion of mental thoughts into physical matter existed, and I would have to see where, if anywhere, in Traveller 5.10 that shows up. The process would be mentals images tapping into the planet power plant and then converting energy into matter and projecting that matter to a varying distance. Matter Transport is Tech Level 25, but this is far beyond that, so maybe Tech Level 33. the highest listed?

The movie does have interstellar Faster-than-Light communication, but that is Earth and not the Krell. However, that is beyond Tech Level 15, so places Earth as more advanced than the current Traveller Universe, along with the interstellar drive being beyond the Jump Drive.

Overall, the Earth's technology would be somewhat above what the Traveller Universe is, while the Krell technology is about 33.

That does not make for an easy conversion of the movie into the Traveller Universe.

I do have the Krell in my Out Rim sector, having them fascinated by the wide range of Biomes on Earth, and therefore turning the sector into a large biological experiment and study area using Earth's creatures. Altair IV does appear to be a bit arid, so the plentiful supply of water on Earth provides a much wider range of habitats. No "brain booster"equipment however, but I do use some concepts borrowed from Andre Norton for other technologies on various planets.

 

[Enoki]

But make sure to update the ray cannons...

In the movie the ship's captain has a line that (they're shooting at the monster) the cannon is hitting it with something like "... ten billion electron-volts..." which is like nothing. It's one of those pseudo-scientific lines that when you hear it and know about how much that translates into say watts it makes the line hilarious.

 

[Timerover51]

But make sure to update the ray cannons...

In the movie the ship's captain has a line that (they're shooting at the monster) the cannon is hitting it with something like "... ten billion electron-volts..." which is like nothing. It's one of those pseudo-scientific lines that when you hear it and know about how much that translates into say watts it makes the line hilarious.

Rather than rolling on the floor laughing at the comment, how would you express the view that the creature is absorbing an immense amount of energy in terms that the viewers in 1956 would understand?

It was only 11 years after the atomic bomb drops, within 4 years of the first text of a hydrogen bomb, using liquid deuterium, and two years after the Castle Bravo test and the "Lucky Dragon" incident. The U.S.S. Nautilus had not travelled under the North Pole yet, and Sputnik was a year away.

 

[Enoki]

Rather than rolling on the floor laughing at the comment, how would you express the view that the creature is absorbing an immense amount of energy in terms that the viewers in 1956 would understand?

It was only 11 years after the atomic bomb drops, within 4 years of the first text of a hydrogen bomb, using liquid deuterium, and two years after the Castle Bravo test and the "Lucky Dragon" incident. The U.S.S. Nautilus had not travelled under the North Pole yet, and Sputnik was a year away.

See, it can be done correctly. Just in 1956 nobody knew what an electron-volt was...

In any case, I absolutely love the look of those ray cannons! That is so imaginative.

 

[BlackBat242]

1 TeV: A trillion electronvolts, or 1.602×10−7 J, about the kinetic energy of a flying mosquito.

 

[Werner]

10 billion electron-volts is 10 billion electrons. I would like to see the weapon that harnesses the power of 10 billion electrons, THAT WOULD BE SOME AWESOME WEAPON!

 

[mike wightman]

No it wouldn't.

edit - I now understand your post

 

[Werner]

No it wouldn't.

Just having a little fun. If 10 billion electrons passed through your body, you probably wouldn't even feel it. I wonder who wrote that line, if he wanted to impress the audience, might he have hired a technical consultant to get the science right at least where it doesn't have to be wrong. He could have said 10 billion volts instead of 10 billion electron volts, it wouldn't have cost the movie any extra money to say that.

 

[Timerover51]

10 billion electron-volts is 10 billion electrons. I would like to see the weapon that harnesses the power of 10 billion electrons, THAT WOULD BE SOME AWESOME WEAPON!

Electron volts and electrons are two totally different things. Electrons are atomic particles, along with protons and neutrons and other particles. In one mole of hydrogen, weighing two grams, using hydrogen as the simplest atomic molecule, you have 2 X 6.02 X 10 to the twenty-third power of electrons. Ten billion electrons at equivalent to 1.0 X 10 to the tenth power. Go look up the Avogadro constant. That was taught when I was in high school in sophomore chemistry. Given that the human body is primarily composed of water, consider how many grams of hydrogen are present in your body, then multiple that number by Avogadro's Constant/Number. Ten billion electrons are a meaningless figure at that point.

Electron volts is a measure of power.

 

[mike wightman]

Close - the eV is a measure of energy 1eV = 1.6x10^-19 J

so 10 billion gives us a whopping energy transfer of 1.6x10^-9 J

 

[BlackBat242]

Close - the eV is a measure of energy 1eV = 1.6x10^-19 J

so 10 billion gives us a whopping energy transfer of 1.6x10^-9 J

As I cited in my earlier post - albeit phrased as 1 trillion electron-volts - along with a practical real-world example of the power of that energy, which is 100 times as powerful as the FP raygun.

 

[Jetrock]

As a big fan of 1950s-70s Space Opera aesthetics, it sounds like a fun setting, and the film itself is a limited enough look at that universe where you'd need to fill in a lot of blanks, but could also utilize a lot of other 1950s space-opera sci-fi for settings and flavor (lots of Gernsbackian pointy rocketships, aliens in rubber suits, etc.)

 

[Werner]

As a big fan of 1950s-70s Space Opera aesthetics, it sounds like a fun setting, and the film itself is a limited enough look at that universe where you'd need to fill in a lot of blanks, but could also utilize a lot of other 1950s space-opera sci-fi for settings and flavor (lots of Gernsbackian pointy rocketships, aliens in rubber suits, etc.)

In the case of Forbidden Planet, it's a flying saucer, parts of it is Star Trek, other parts are Lost in Space.

 

[Werner]

As I cited in my earlier post - albeit phrased as 1 trillion electron-volts - along with a practical real-world example of the power of that energy, which is 100 times as powerful as the FP raygun.

It is just a case of bad techno-babble, somebody probably flipped open a science book and searched for key phrases that sounded awesome and cool without understanding what they meant.

 

[Jetrock]

In the case of Forbidden Planet, it's a flying saucer, parts of it is Star Trek, other parts are Lost in Space.

I'm sure it served as inspiration for a little bit of both series, in both set design and overall tone. While Traveller was inspired thematically by the SF of this era, its aesthetics were more a product of 1970s SF, since that was the state of the artwork at the time (for those of us whose introduction to Traveller was The Traveller Book, the ship on the cover certainly looked like the Millennium Falcon), to the point where even discussing a more 1950s spaceman/rocketship aesthetic for Traveller feels different from the game most of us know--but the themes fit.

 

[Werner]

I'm sure it served as inspiration for a little bit of both series, in both set design and overall tone. While Traveller was inspired thematically by the SF of this era, its aesthetics were more a product of 1970s SF, since that was the state of the artwork at the time (for those of us whose introduction to Traveller was The Traveller Book, the ship on the cover certainly looked like the Millennium Falcon), to the point where even discussing a more 1950s spaceman/rocketship aesthetic for Traveller feels different from the game most of us know--but the themes fit.

Traveller is a bit harder science fiction than Star Wars, for one thing the heroes of Star Wars never seem to much use for a spacesuit, there is always a convenient habitable planet with breathable atmosphere nearby.

 

[Vargr Breath]

Forbidden Planet is the first movie I remember going to see. And I think it started my lifelong love of Sci-Fi. That movie and some of the early Sci-Fi TV shows on in the early 50s were at the time our Star Trek and Star Wars.

 

[Timerover51]

It is just a case of bad techno-babble, somebody probably flipped open a science book and searched for key phrases that sounded awesome and cool without understanding what they meant.

Forbidden Planet was cited by Gene Roddenberry as part of the inspiration for Star Trek.

 

[Grav_Moped]

I'm sure it served as inspiration for a little bit of both series, in both set design and overall tone. While Traveller was inspired thematically by the SF of this era, its aesthetics were more a product of 1970s SF, since that was the state of the artwork at the time (for those of us whose introduction to Traveller was The Traveller Book, the ship on the cover certainly looked like the Millennium Falcon), to the point where even discussing a more 1950s spaceman/rocketship aesthetic for Traveller feels different from the game most of us know--but the themes fit.

I came in in the early 1980s with a background of classical SF reading. '50s rocket ships make perfect sense, which made most of the supplements and adventures seem strange (why weren't the ships tailsitter spheres, prolate spheroids/teardrops, or needle-shaped? Meant I'd have to make new deck plans for everything if I wanted to use them... )

Funny thing is, nowadays the most advanced actual rocketships look like those ones from 1950s SF... tailfins and all.