Ways out of the near star map

[oletheros]

Intresting...
Has someone tried to "reverse-engineer" a Eber Stutterwarp drive, or are there not enough remnants to do so....?
Certainly, if a 9.3 Lightyear Stutterwarp drive is possible, what research is going on the subject...?

The point that was made in Ranger is that Ebers have a higher tolerance to radiation, which accounts for the fact that their stutterwarp drives go further before fatal discharge. Essentially, the distance is keyed to Eber physiology, which means that humans cannot take advantage of the technology... unless someone was to come up with a radiation-resistant DNAM.

Still, it would be interesting to see the Chinese Arm through the Eber lens (as it were), looking at all of the 9.4 lightyear clusters that the Ebers could have visited... or are still lurking in. One thing in particular is interesting: the Zeta 2 cluster is significantly larger if you measure in 9.4 ly jumps instead of 7.7.

Edited to add:

It's very tempting to look at the Eber's home cluster and not wonder what happened 4,000 years ago. It's like a 4,000 year-old game of 2300, set in the same place with the same rules and a different species.

Also, I wanted to share that my main mapping software is CHview, which I've been using on Windows for years with no issues. It's a basic little application. Rugged, though. There is a 2300AD near star list somewhere (I know, because I have it). I didn't see it on the first page of searching, but I did find this.

 

[rfmcdpei]

From a 2320AD perspective it seems that the 61 Cygni cluster is ripe for exploration. As I said before, I would expect the 61 Cygni system to have been visited by daredevils already. Likely they did not find any earthlike world (then the push would have been stronger), but building an outpost there would make strategic sense. There are quite a few promising systems in the cluster, but I guess the challenge is keeping exploration expeditions supplied.

If we're looking for lost colonies, then the 61 Cygni Cluster might be an ideal choice. A and B are dimmish stars, and B's a minor flare star, but 61 Cygni is relatively close to Sigma Draconis (I think that a ship would only have to go thruogh a red dwarf system).

The point that was made in Ranger is that Ebers have a higher tolerance to radiation, which accounts for the fact that their stutterwarp drives go further before fatal discharge. Essentially, the distance is keyed to Eber physiology, which means that humans cannot take advantage of the technology... unless someone was to come up with a radiation-resistant DNAM.

Eber stutterwarp might be a desirable stardrive for radiation-resistant cargoes on unmanned ships.

 

[Anders]

Still, it would be interesting to see the Chinese Arm through the Eber lens (as it were), looking at all of the 9.4 lightyear clusters that the Ebers could have visited... or are still lurking in. One thing in particular is interesting: the Zeta 2 cluster is significantly larger if you measure in 9.4 ly jumps instead of 7.7.

I did a quick mapping, and the result can be seen at
http://www.nada.kth.se/~asa/Game/2300AD/eber3.pdf

I was surprised by the result! Kormoran isn't the closest of the old Eber colonies to their homeworld, it is the most remote. In fact, the Chinese arm worlds are a cluster far from the core of Eber space. To reach them they would have had to expand a long way, about 11 jumps from home! That is about the number of steps Sol-Gamma Serpenti. Had they continued 2-3 steps further they would have met the Sumerians. Kormoran is quite close to the Core the Eber way. But then again, why should they go there? There are so many directions they could have expanded (I just did a 35 ly cut-off for clarity).

It's very tempting to look at the Eber's home cluster and not wonder what happened 4,000 years ago. It's like a 4,000 year-old game of 2300, set in the same place with the same rules and a different species.

Maybe we should create the game of Twilight 1700BC? Looking at the map it would seem that the Ebers would have had a great empire. Since the Nightmare bioweapon would only have wiped out planetary populations (and not even all of them, as Kormoran demonstrated) there ought to be a few other surviving cultures.

 

[oletheros]

Kormoran isn't the closest of the old Eber colonies to their homeworld, it is the most remote. In fact, the Chinese arm worlds are a cluster far from the core of Eber space. ... But then again, why should they go there?

I favor the idea that the Ebers used some kind of stutterwarp tug to get to DM -68 47 and thus to their colonies in the Chinese Arm. The why is still up in the air, but it's a long (and difficult) way to go, so there must have been a good reason. I think some kind of persecution might be the answer. Also, there is the whole "holistic Eber" movement on Kormoran, which might have been the impetus to "get away from it all."

Many questions, very few answers. A lot of speculation.

 

[BMonnery]

Intresting...
Has someone tried to "reverse-engineer" a Eber Stutterwarp drive, or are there not enough remnants to do so....?
Certainly, if a 9.3 Lightyear Stutterwarp drive is possible, what research is going on the subject...?

The problem is the author of Ranger misread the basic materials. He postulated that the Ebers have better radiation resistance, and hence survived the 7.7ly breach. He missed the fact that when the breach occurs the engine ceases to function. The apparent effects are handwavable by saying the Ta in drives is the nuclear isomer (Ta-180m). The energy and type of radiation though isn't a case of radiation poisoning, it's a literal frying of the crew, accompanied by what is effectively a small nuclear explosion*.

Thus, there is a problem with the Ebers. Either they used disposable drives, or there is an uncharted Brown Dwarf. My personal vote goes to the latter.

* As a sidebar, any civilian starship is a potential WMD, over charging the drive and then docking at a space station is a real killer....

 

[oletheros]

The problem is the author of Ranger misread the basic materials. He postulated that the Ebers have better radiation resistance, and hence survived the 7.7ly breach. He missed the fact that when the breach occurs the engine ceases to function. The apparent effects are handwavable by saying the Ta in drives is the nuclear isomer (Ta-180m). The energy and type of radiation though isn't a case of radiation poisoning, it's a literal frying of the crew, accompanied by what is effectively a small nuclear explosion*.

Bummer.

Still, this is the fun part of going through the canon with a fine-toothed comb: who do we believe? Personally, I like the idea that the Ebers had some kind of stutterwarp configuration that was a lot leakier, but travelled further. As ideas go, it's got longer legs (so to speak).

 

[BMonnery]

Bummer.

Still, this is the fun part of going through the canon with a fine-toothed comb: who do we believe? Personally, I like the idea that the Ebers had some kind of stutterwarp configuration that was a lot leakier, but travelled further. As ideas go, it's got longer legs (so to speak).

Ranger is clear that it's a normal warp and they just survived the radiation. Of course, that doesn't fit but ack well.

 

[su_liam]

That's the sense I got. I decided to modify it a bit and say that their drives were a slightly different configuration. Rather than going along quietly building up charge until they catastrophically delaminate at 7.7 ly, the Eber drives start bleeding radiation immediately(or after only a few light years). It basically trades off lethal levels of radiation for longer range. I also figured that the Eber drive could operate for more than 9.4 ly, but the radiation would kill even Ebers. I figure less than 10 ly for that, but the question didn't need to come up.

 

[Anders]

I have never really bought the idea of radiation levels being the limit. If they were, why not add lots of extra shielding? Encase the drive in a thick shell of depleted uranium (if gamma is the main type) or boron-water mixture (if it is neutrons or other particle radiation) - the extra mass decreases efficiency, but it is worth it if the ship can go that extra light year. One could even put the nuclear reactor/drive at the end of a long spur far away from the crew section and let the inverse square law deal with the radiation. No, the drive has to crash somehow after a certain distance.

My own take on the Eber drive is that it was based on Hafnium isomers, getting more "capacity" for stutterwarp charge (see my pseudo-explanation here) However, this was indeed a pretty radioactive drive, so Ebers probably had to put up with a lot of stray radiation or do some unknown nuclear stabilization technology to keep it manageable (this is in my setting the big secret, and many human organizations would be willing to pay or do anything to figure it out).

So, tugs, really big empire or an unknown brown dwarf? I think tugs make sense, and could explain why the colonies we know were so isolated that they survived the Decimation - once things really fell apart the tuglinks were among the first to go, so the war among the local colonies occurred only using nuclear weapons. It would also mean that the empire could be slightly smaller than my sketch, or that the Kormoran finger was just the newly colonized counterpart of the 61 Cygni cluster - several very promising worlds within short tug distance from the homeworld.

Of course, if the Ebers used tugs they could have jumped distances of 14.1 lightyears. Which means there could be surprise ruins elsewhere.

 

[oletheros]

I think tugs make sense, and could explain why the colonies we know were so isolated that they survived the Decimation - once things really fell apart the tuglinks were among the first to go, so the war among the local colonies occurred only using nuclear weapons. It would also mean that the empire could be slightly smaller than my sketch, or that the Kormoran finger was just the newly colonized counterpart of the 61 Cygni cluster - several very promising worlds within short tug distance from the homeworld.

I like the idea that the tugs were fairly new, which means that the Kormoran colonies were bare startups. This explains the paucity of ruins on Daikoku and Heidelsheimat, as well as the lack of ruins on Syuhlahm - they just hadn't gotten past the survey stage on that planet.

 

[Colin]

I favour Eber drives having a different, 'leakier' configuration. Of course, that leads me to muse on the stutterwarp drives used by the Medusae and their Enemy. Please keep in mind that most of my stuff is in storage, but if I remember right, those drives were both faster and had a *much* longer range.

 

[oletheros]

Of course, that leads me to muse on the stutterwarp drives used by the Medusae and their Enemy. Please keep in mind that most of my stuff is in storage, but if I remember right, those drives were both faster and had a *much* longer range.

"Their point of origin is somewhere in close to the galactic core, and they possessed stutterwarp-type ships capable of travelling those distances in a reasonable span of time."

"Technology had reached a point where stutterwarp ships could and did reach the outer fringes of the spiral arms, and there were plans to develop a stuttenuarp capable of reaching the nearer galaxies."

That's quite a jump in distance, right there.

 

[Duke Pellinor]

...
So, tugs, really big empire or an unknown brown dwarf?
...

I favour the idea that they are also pickier than we are when it comes to colonising planets, perhaps they are willing to travel further to locate more ideal living conditions?

Anders (or anyone else for that matter), do you have any idea how to do this with your map for the 2320 wiki?

 

[rfmcdpei]

"Their point of origin is somewhere in close to the galactic core, and they possessed stutterwarp-type ships capable of travelling those distances in a reasonable span of time."

"Technology had reached a point where stutterwarp ships could and did reach the outer fringes of the spiral arms, and there were plans to develop a stuttenuarp capable of reaching the nearer galaxies."

That's quite a jump in distance, right there.

I don't see thst. Tens of thousands of light years separate the core from the tips of the arms, while even the nearest galaxies--the Magellanic clouds, say--are separate from the Milky Way by hundreds of light years.

 

[kmsoice]

...wha?

I don't see thst. Tens of thousands of light years separate the core from the tips of the arms, while even the nearest galaxies--the Magellanic clouds, say--are separate from the Milky Way by hundreds of light years.

Huh? Did you mistype something here? Yes the tips of the arms are about 50 000 ly from the core but the Magellanic Clouds are about 163 000 ly from Earth and the Andromeda Galaxy is about 2 200 000 ly distant.

 

[Peter Schutze]

>are separate from the Milky Way by

depends on your timescale <laugh>

depending on the theory the milky way is 'colliding' with/absorbing the magellanics or andromeda or this has happened in the past and they are moving apart

 

[rfmcdpei]

Huh? Did you mistype something here? Yes the tips of the arms are about 50 000 ly from the core but the Magellanic Clouds are about 163 000 ly from Earth and the Andromeda Galaxy is about 2 200 000 ly distant.

Typo, yes--my apologies!

 

[Anders]

Anders (or anyone else for that matter), do you have any idea how to do this with your map for the 2320 wiki?

You mean a scrollable, clickable map that could be used to go to the right systems? I have something halfway there here. This one is zoomable and scrollable, and I can relatively easily do new versions. I don't know if I can make it clickable too, that merits some study. I also know how to make a non-scrolllable imagemap that can contain links, which would be pretty useful too.

 

[nerdvana]

You mean a scrollable, clickable map that could be used to go to the right systems? I have something halfway there here.

How did you do this?!

 

[Peter Newman]

I did a quick mapping, and the result can be seen at
http://www.nada.kth.se/~asa/Game/2300AD/eber3.pdf

I was surprised by the result! Kormoran isn't the closest of the old Eber colonies to their homeworld, it is the most remote. In fact, the Chinese arm worlds are a cluster far from the core of Eber space. To reach them they would have had to expand a long way, about 11 jumps from home! That is about the number of steps Sol-Gamma Serpenti. Had they continued 2-3 steps further they would have met the Sumerians.

What do you mean, if?

The Eber's did meet the Sumerians. Enkidu, Gilgamesh's 'wild-man' friend, was really an Eber.