 October 1, 2013 - 9:38am | Look at #5 & #2 especially since most of these are not space but the lack of gravity. http://www.cracked.com/article_20644_6-reasons-life-in-space-sucks-that-sci-fi-doesnt-show-you.html?wa_user1=4&wa_user2=Weird+World&wa_user3=article&wa_user4=feature_module Sounds like a great job but where did you say we had to go? |
 October 1, 2013 - 11:28am | What's so bad with simulated gravity? I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 October 1, 2013 - 1:32pm | The ships in SF seem no rely on momentum-based gravity, but ships would not always run at a full gee, and ships with ion engines are supposed to move too slowly for normal levels of gravity. Like the USS Discovery II and the Bebop, ships could have an internal centrifuge for quarters and living area. Oh and here is a neat video of a man on earth, walking in a centrifuge at differing speeds. |
 October 1, 2013 - 2:00pm | Actually, the rules say that ion engines can provide up to 1 ADF. So they can get 1g (regardless of how you interpret and ADF). And for most ships, they probably do run at 1g or some large fraction thereof (i.e. 0.6-1.4) most of the time. It's much faster to accelerate to the halfway point, flip over, and decelerate the rest of the way. Of course you have to watch the 0.01c limit but that's where the fractional accelerations can come into play (beyond personal preference) or you might have to do multiple accel/decel runs but overall for the most part you'll only be in zero g when in orbit/docked and during the flip overs. I can acually see the majority of time being spent under "gravity" of some sort whether on a planet's surface, in a rotating space station, or under acceleration in your ship. There will be some sizeable fraction of time spent in zero g but it won't be super-long continuous stretchs like astronauts experience today. The exception may be small chem drive equipped system ships. However, I don't see those being very common as it's really more cost effective to put ion drives on the ship and cut your travel times down by being under accelleration the entire time. Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
October 1, 2013 - 4:55pm | Yeah, I keep forgetting the ships in SF are souped-up torchships. The KH game makes no mention of gees per MP moved. (I wish there was a chart or something) I'm use to other games like Jovian Chronicles, that notes speed in gees. |
October 1, 2013 - 6:17pm | Terl makes a good point about the actual "G" being simulated via thrust that there is no reason that it could not be .6-1.4 other than perhaps a ion engine cant get up over 1g. So a ship full of yazirians might maintain .7g for their cruise because they like that gravity and it feels natural. This brings up the issue of what's considered standard? Like everything else in the Frontier that has a stardarized standard, I imagine that there is a standard gravity that you could expect on a Space Fleet vessel or a star liner - 1g. How did this standard come about? Who established the standard? Was it simply market driven to estblish this standard? Is 1g too high? Would perhaps .9g be a better standard? I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
October 1, 2013 - 7:57pm | Well if the actual standard was 1.06 Earth gees (10.42 m/s/s) then the trip to 1% c would take exactly 80 hours or 4 days. At 0.85 earth gees it would take 100 hours (5 days). Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
October 1, 2013 - 9:07pm | I assume the 1g gravity standard is based on Gran Quivera, as it is the hub of the Frontier sector. |
October 2, 2013 - 4:08am | That is interesting Terl Obar, and a good point made by Malcadon. I had thought, mased on the title, that this discussion would get into issues of horizontal vs vertical decks, which it didnt. That is of course a reason for adding artifical gravity: compatibility with a plethora of other deck plans from a host of other settings. Not that I feel like we're so starved for deck plans that this is required or even favorable. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
October 2, 2013 - 4:21am | One thing we have neglected to discuss is the effects of cosmic radiation- they are apparently quite serious and till this point we've ignored them altogether it would seem. Since the Frontier has a lot of screen/ field technology at its disposal i would guess that the answer to this is that ships are built with field /screen generators that provide an adequate level of protection. (We pretty much already assume that star ships have all the neccessay safety technology built in). This could be used in game- a ship has to evac a deck becaise the cosmic ray defector for that deck has failed, a technician needs to fix it wearing an insuit or get a shot of bio-cort (essentially a quick heal compound if you think about it) and nutra-rad. In fact this could be a quirk of a new old PC ship . The crew deck CRD doesnt work but this fact doesnt register on any screen. Over time PCs begin experiencing effects fron cosmic ray exposure -5% to -10% in combat from damage to eyes. They must figure out why they have symptoms and fix the problem on their gift horse of a ship. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
