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A Sword Without a Hilt: A Song of Ice and Fire/D&D 3.5 Crossover

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Goldfish said:
Totally off topic, and this is my paranoia combined with too much Shadowrun speaking, but does anyone else think the recent run of, err, bad luck, experienced by the Boeing Max 8 passenger jet feels like an extended run aimed at tanking Boeing stock and damaging their brand?
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From what I've heard, there's a combination of things going on. First, the Lion flight was definitely not Boeing's fault—the airline knew the sensors were faulty and sent it out anyway, and they predictably failed, activating automatic anti-stall measures. This latest one we don't know much about yet, but it is becoming clear that Boeing rushed these into production with a shorter development cycle than usual, understated their differences from previous models so pilots wouldn't have to go through (expensive) retraining on the new machines, and it just recently came out that there have been a number of complaints about the inadequacy of the pilot's manual, including at least one that called it "almost criminal."

Considering how hard it would be for a conspiracy to generate all of this evidence, I don't think there is one. Especially since Boeing's behavior can be handily explained by being a company that ignored risk in pursuit of profit.
 
Also, fuck Boeing. Airbus is better, purely for name reasons. Air - bus ! It's a kid's book come to life!
Meanwhile "boing", seriously? Sounds like they expect their planes to bounce when they inevitably crash :D
 
DragonParadox said:
She pointed out that even if he does have to learn how to hit things with swords he can also take scholarum lessons, or any other sort of lessons in your rapidly expanding academic bub.
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Best Sister continues to be everything the title implies. Excellent.

--[] Viserys, Dany and Lya take Samwell to meet Teana, assuming that she (there's no way she doesn't) keeps evening hours in the Scholarium.
---[] On the way there, explain that there are many more ways than just the one to slay monsters, and that you yourself have rarely wielded a blade of steel against them. Lya and Dany not at all.
---[] In this world of awakening magic, it is often that very thing that cuts deepest against the dangers it has returned to the world. Or simply reveals them.
---[] Make it clear that you are in no way offended by his use of magesight, but rather intrigued as to how he learnt to use it.
---[] Be on hand as Teana explains the Scholarium.

@Azel this should do it.
 
Did you know that the French company Thalès is developing a unified air traffic control system for all of Europe - and is calling it SWIM ?

Yeah, they're just asking for crashes there :D


I wonder if our Empire will be needed air traffic control at some point. We do have increasingly fast airships, after all... Where will Dragons fit in there ?
 
@Snowfire, made a small addition to your part.

[X] Plan For Tonight And Tomorrow (Including Engagement)
-[X] Tonight:
--[X] Try to figure out how Sam got his magic.
--[X] Viserys, Dany and Lya take Samwell to meet Teana, assuming that she (there's no way she doesn't) keeps evening hours in the Scholarium.
---[X] On the way there, explain that there are many more ways than just the one to slay monsters, and that you yourself have rarely wielded a blade of steel against them. Lya and Dany not at all.
---[X] In this world of awakening magic, it is often that very thing that cuts deepest against the dangers it has returned to the world. Or simply reveals them.
---[X] Make it clear that you are in no way offended by his use of magesight, but rather intrigued as to how he learnt to use it.
---[X] If he is curious or asks you why you look so mundane under magesight, explain the effects of a Greater Ribbon to him, then let him take another peak with the aura suppression off.
---[X] Be on hand as Teana explains the Scholarium.
-[X] Tomorrow Morning:
--[X] Melee Finale: Asha Greyjoy vs. Velaena Valaryon (no relation to Valaena Velaryon)
-[X] Tomorrow Afternoon:
--[X] Melee Finale: Sandor Clegane vs. Moberyn Artell (no relation to Oberyn Martell)
-[X] Tomorrow Evening:
--[X] Watch the play that will be performed in the harbor together with Lya.
--[X] Get a nice spot on a roof or balcony and have a simple picnic with her, using Invisibility Sphere to have some privacy.
--[X] Use this private moment, reminiscent of the simpler days back in Braavos, to propose to her.
 
TalonofAnathrax said:
Also, fuck Boeing. Airbus is better, purely for name reasons. Air - bus ! It's a kid's book come to life!
Meanwhile "boing", seriously? Sounds like they expect their planes to bounce when they inevitably crash :D
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I really don't have a dog in the fight when it comes to Airbus and Boeing, but my best friend is a pilot for a major airline and he says that he and his fellow pilots really don't flying in the newer Airbus planes. IIRC, the dislike comes from the degree of automation which makes it very difficult for the pilots to take back control from the computer if needed, along with the flight computer being able to override them too easily. I guess the goal was to reduce the possibility of human error, but that just opens up a whole new issue.
 
Goldfish said:
I really don't have a dog in the fight when it comes to Airbus and Boeing, but my best friend is a pilot for a major airline and he says that he and his fellow pilots really don't flying in the newer Airbus planes. IIRC, the dislike comes from the degree of automation which makes it very difficult for the pilots to take back control from the computer if needed, along with the flight computer being able to override them too easily. I guess the goal was to reduce the possibility of human error, but that just opens up a whole new issue.
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Right. I know of at least one incident where the pilot's of an Airbus had to physically disconnect a faulty sensor before they were able to regain control of the aircraft.
 
Goldfish said:
I believe much of Southern Westeros' greater population and infrastructure development will act as a hindrance rather than an advantage. The South has more people, yes, but that just means the land has been much more thoroughly exploited for millennia, the forests reduced, the natural resources depleted, and the infrastructure geared toward primitive medieval issues that are not a consideration when sufficiently advanced technology or magic come into play. The North, however, is virtually untouched, with mineral wealth that hasn't even been discovered and massive old growth forests just waiting to be harvested. Since the place is almost empty, we'll be doing infrastructure upgrades from scratch, allowing us to plan the locations of roads, canals, population centers, etc., and build them properly rather than allowing them to develop in a more organic, but ultimately slow and inefficient manner.

Also, when the Others are defeated, the jacked up seasons experienced by most of Planetos might return to something more natural. The North would benefit greatly from having a more cyclic seasonal progression, while much of the South is likely to experience issues due to an interruption of their unusual crop cycles.
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Ultimately the question kinda boils down to whether the powers of magitech industrialization and urbanization are more powerful than the traditions and current cottage-industry style economy. If industrialization and urbanization end up winning out, then resources will be extracted and shipped to manufacturing/production centers and huge population centers will occur almost entirely at ports or on rivers with only small settlements and towns located around resources. If not, then we are more likely to see what you are predicting. However, with the ease of magical transportation and multiplication of food production through easily performed rituals, I tend to believe that all of the barriers to urbanization have been removed.

Honestly, I doubt it will really matter in this quest. But I find it to be an interesting thought exercise. I really appreciate you guys going back and forth with me on the topic.
 
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sayeftyfirst said:
Ultimately the question kinda boils down to whether the powers of magitech industrialization and urbanization are more powerful than the traditions and current cottage-industry style economy. If industrialization and urbanization end up winning out, then resources will be extracted and shipped to manufacturing/production centers and huge population centers will occur almost entirely at ports or on rivers with only small settlements and towns located around resources. If not, then we are more likely to see what you are predicting. However, with the ease of magical transportation and multiplication of food production through easily performed rituals, I tend to believe that all of the barriers to urbanization have been removed.

Honestly, I doubt it will really matter in this quest. But I find it to be an interesting thought exercise. I really appreciate you guys going back and forth with me on the topic.
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Well, the cottage industry is definitely going the way of the dodo, there is no if's and but's there. However, the urbanization process on Planetos will play out very differently then in the real world due to Planar Termini allowing mass-transit over literally infinite distances. An isochrone map of the Imperium of the future will likely show that you can reach, from any arbitrary place in the Imperium, any other arbitrary place in the Imperium within a day. This gravely shifts the dynamics.
 
Azel said:
Well, the cottage industry is definitely going the way of the dodo, there is no if's and but's there. However, the urbanization process on Planetos will play out very differently then in the real world due to Planar Termini allowing mass-transit over literally infinite distances. An isochrone map of the Imperium of the future will likely show that you can reach, from any arbitrary place in the Imperium, any other arbitrary place in the Imperium within a day. This gravely shifts the dynamics.
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It does, but like all transportation tech in the real world, this is likely to cause further concentration of population as they don't need to be near an iron mine to work iron. That would indicate to me that current cities will only get larger and more important which would mean a growth in the industry and population of the South and make the North's role the same as real world Russia or Canada or even Brazil, which is largely exporting large quantities of raw materials. Not that they won't get their own major cities, but there is much more inertia to overcome there and it will take huge amounts of time. They will eventually overcome it, but its going to take hundreds and hundreds of years unless we start paying people to move North much like happened in the days of colonization.

Honestly some of why we disagree may just be that I don't think its likely to be worthwhile to transplant huge parts of our citizenry North or dedicate large chunks of our treasury to building cities or manufacturing there when I think it is unnecessary.
 
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TalonofAnathrax said:
That's why I'm not voting for you.

People, can we please propose to Lya in front of an extraordinary extraplanar vista?
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No. That misses the entire point. She's not the type of girl to be swept off her feet like that - and honestly, trying to do so just feels wrong. A proposal to her should be intimate, and this lets us call back to when we first met her, and also celebrate what we've built together. In so many different ways.
 
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