The Secrets' Crusade
- Thread starter Snowfire
- Start date
- Original Sci-Fi
Snowfire
Polyglot of Chimera
- Location
- Wordcats
She's not going to have time to learn it. She'll be gone. As to the Makers, it's partially what the experience of watching Amanda create so much did. It's hard to put into words, as can probably be seen by the update itself being rather hazy in places. But they weren't really sure if they were going to succeed regardless, and given how important his was, well. Success matters.
I take it then that the second roll was one of your infamous hidden rolls we will never see hide nor hair of? Pooh, that's no fun!
Oh, um. No, that's not it at all. In the case of a nat 100, I roll again. There was no nat 100 this time, so no second roll to stack on top of it.
Vortex279
Changer of Fate, Seeker of Donuts
- Location
- Del Rio, Texas
[X] Shakedown: In the mission to come, you will need to know your crew. Join Amanda for a brief introduction to the Adamant and those who will aid you in the mission to come.
I want to see this as I feel the ship and crew are the big focus of the story. I know that the last goodbye's between Mary, Amanda and Iris and the rest of their family are important, but the focus of this story seems to mainly be on the journey that our protagonists are leaving for. I feel that we already know how the trio feel about their families, so that scene feels unnecessary in my opinion.
The other option, the FTL test, seems to be a good thing to view, but I honestly feel that a chronological order to the story would better help with understanding for the readers. Besides, if taken literally, wouldn't the FTL drive test be part of the shakedown as I understand it in naval parlance? It feels awkward to have the two separated, unless there is something missing that only @Snowfire or his crew can see, being the writers of this here shindig.
I want to see this as I feel the ship and crew are the big focus of the story. I know that the last goodbye's between Mary, Amanda and Iris and the rest of their family are important, but the focus of this story seems to mainly be on the journey that our protagonists are leaving for. I feel that we already know how the trio feel about their families, so that scene feels unnecessary in my opinion.
The other option, the FTL test, seems to be a good thing to view, but I honestly feel that a chronological order to the story would better help with understanding for the readers. Besides, if taken literally, wouldn't the FTL drive test be part of the shakedown as I understand it in naval parlance? It feels awkward to have the two separated, unless there is something missing that only @Snowfire or his crew can see, being the writers of this here shindig.
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
@Vortex279
The long-range FTL drive might be tested by being plugged into a test-rig or a ship whose parameters are better known and understood, before being tested aboard the Adamant. Especially now that we could theoretically ask Tahkel to make us another one using a second Void Crystal if something went horribly wrong with the drive.
Testing a totally unfamiliar piece of advanced tech separately from the ship it's designed to operate in is usually a good idea, when possible.
The long-range FTL drive might be tested by being plugged into a test-rig or a ship whose parameters are better known and understood, before being tested aboard the Adamant. Especially now that we could theoretically ask Tahkel to make us another one using a second Void Crystal if something went horribly wrong with the drive.
Testing a totally unfamiliar piece of advanced tech separately from the ship it's designed to operate in is usually a good idea, when possible.
To expand on what @Snowfire said, it's hard to emphasize how incredibly game-changing having a reserve of Void Crystals can be to the greater tactical and strategic picture of the war with the Shiplords.
Remember, first, that a Void Crystal, with Uninvolved backing, can empower a First Secret drive to be a match for a Shiplord War Fleet drive. Remember that, at the moment, our great hope for survival against the coming War Fleet is to use a vast, highly experimental sensor net to hopefully see the incoming Fleet in transit, and then attempt to counter-ambush it with First Secret vessels of our own, ones with vastly slower-to-recharge Drives. This is a huge gamble, and if we miss the first shot, all too likely with a relatively new and still highly experimental system, we'll be scrambling to play catch up with an enemy playing with faster drives and nova bombs. Having a bunch of Void Crystal-empowered drives changes the tactical picture in that battle immeasurably.
But, on the greater strategic level, having a bunch of Void Crystals around could be even more important for the opportunity it gives for more contact with the Uninvolved in general. Remember that, at the moment, the only reliable point of contact that Humanity has with the Uninvolved is through Amanda; all other points of contact either require a costly, time-consuming and potentially dangerous Thoughtcast involving dozens of Insight Focused or using a Void Crystal. When the only Void Crystal in Humanity's possession was about to go off on safari that meant a major reduction in general contact between Humanity and the Uninvolved, but now that we have a whole garden of them I expect that Amanda will return from her trek to find that the Uninvolved have an actual embassy on Earth. Heck, with a bunch of Crystals and the ability to make more we might have more contact with the no-longer-Uninvolved than we do with our alien allies, since that point of contact relies on a chain of FTL comm buoys chained through contested space. Wouldn't that be an interesting situation?
My vote depends on how many of these scenes we're going to get. If we're only getting one I'd prefer A Family Farewell, but if we're getting more than one or all I'd prefer to start with On Wings of Starlight, move on to A Family Farewell, maybe a write-in about how Humanity is preparing to combat the coming War Fleet and how the bumper crop of Void Crystals is affecting those preparations, and use Shakedown to transition to the next part of the Quest.
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Snowfire
Polyglot of Chimera
- Location
- Wordcats
There's...some hyperbole that I think I need to address here, just to keep reasonable expectations in line. First off, a Void Crystal would not be used to empower anything. A Void Crystal can be used by an Uninvolved to build you something. Something to be clear on though, is that the drive built for the Adamant absolutely is not a match to a War Fleet drive. It's better. It'll allow the ship to cross the galaxy in a single jump. How the Uninvolved are breaking the First Secret range limit - something that not even the Shiplords can do - you have no idea.
As to the Orrery, whilst it is an untested system, it's something that Insight and various other entities have said should work. In fact, the Uninvolved could now build you a FTL-switching computer using a crystal that would be so advanced as to give the War Fleet fits. The main bottleneck on the Orrery was making sure that the computer systems could keep up. That's not going to be a problem anymore. Trying to fight a War Fleet on their own ground, one that the Shiplords have had longer than humanity has existed as a species to perfect, is asking to die. Not least because even with Amanda's creations, you'd be fighting massively outnumbered.
As to the Void Crystal acting as a communications device, well. It's an interface point for an Uninvolved to act in realspace, yes. That...does not mean that it's something that an Uninvolved can talk through. Or, necessarily, receive information back from in a way that would be useful. It would also require massive amounts of research, given that you still don't know how they work on a scientific level, and to get them working for communications you'd need that. Given all this, expecting an embassy is probably...a bit much. Current lines of usage for the Void Crystals if production proved possible revolved around fortifying Sol to the point of insanity, and then building truly enormous carrier craft to ferry fleets across the galaxy to support your allies.
Of note, and before anyone asks, the Uninvolved are not going to build you weapons. Their idea of what constitutes a weapon starts at Gridfire and then rapidly goes off the scale of what is feasible to use in an interstellar conflict. They'd like the Shiplords gone, yes. But they'd also rather not reduce the galaxy to cinders.
I'm afraid I won't be answering the question implicit in this.
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- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
Hm.
Once this mission is over and assuming some form of conflict persists after it, the Adamant will be extremely useful as a fast courier ship, being as how it can make an inter-system jump in a matter of hours or a day (if planet-to-planet transit is involved and not just 'show up and drop off a buoy full of hard drives to deliver data'), whereas normally such flights take months to get between species homeworlds as I understand it.
Even one such ship potentially gives us a significant coordination advantage over the Shiplords if they don't have instantaneous galactic-range comms in their installations. Do we know whether or not they have instantaneous galactic-range comms?
Well, we don't have full series production yet, but we can at least get a start on building 'miracle-grade' Uninvolved-made computer cores for Orreries on the core worlds of the Group of Six?
[Deadpans]
No weapons. You know what, that's all right, I think I'll settle for party favors.
Snowfire
Polyglot of Chimera
- Location
- Wordcats
They have a galactic relay network that essentially gives them this, yes. Lots and lots of Lagless arrays. Funnily enough, Tahkel gave you the coordinates of all their connection chains...
That is rather high up the list of things to use Void Crystals for. Keeping your allies alive is seen as rather important.
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
Hm.
We have a virtually invulnerable ship. One that can go anywhere in the galaxy, faster than anyone else in the galaxy would believe possible.
We have the locations of long, necessarily exposed and relatively lightly defended chains of communications relays that the Shiplords depend upon to coordinate their galaxy-spanning forces.
If we can retrofit this ship with a torpedo tube or giant gravity cannon or Kalilah making obscene gestures in the enemy's general direction after this mission, that suggests another possible use for the Adamant.
Snowfire
Polyglot of Chimera
- Location
- Wordcats
[X] Shakedown: In the mission to come, you will need to know your crew. Join Amanda for a brief introduction to the Adamant and those who will aid you in the mission to come.
Look forward to the future.
Look forward to the future.
[X] Shakedown: In the mission to come, you will need to know your crew. Join Amanda for a brief introduction to the Adamant and those who will aid you in the mission to come.
- Location
- Minnesota
[X] Shakedown: In the mission to come, you will need to know your crew. Join Amanda for a brief introduction to the Adamant and those who will aid you in the mission to come.
- Location
- Somewhere other than where I am.
Tahkel:Oh, sh...
Tahkel: Hi guys. So good of you to come.
Uninvolved: Tahkel, just what is going on here?
Tahkel: Listen, how to put this; We're gonna need a bigger boat.
Let me take a stab at that one:
1) Secrets involve exploiting instability or fractures in the barrier between our reality and Soulspace. This is why they can't be derived using normal scientific methods: what is done on this side is only half of the puzzle, and the critical component can't be initiated from this side, but once a fracture or connection is made, it can be extended and/or replicated from a working example.
2) Exploiting these fractures through Secret use creates disturbances that the Shiplords can detect at range, which is how they enforce their Secret bans. These disturbances also impose limits on the extent that Secrets can be used, both in energy expenditure and Bad Things™ happening due to that energy needing to go somewhere if you overdo things*.
3) The Void Crystals smooth over and heal local fractures in reality caused by interfacing with Soulspace. Tahkel understands how this effect works and the drive takes advantage of it to cushion the effects that otherwise limit FTL range.
If this is even remotely correct, then this super-drive is only usable with Void Crystal hulled ships. As the Shiplords can't make such hulls then even if they fully understand how the drive works and can mass produce such engines, they still have no ability to actually use them.
*From your description of Uninvolved weapons, they probably involve fully realized breaches, not just cracks. If so, the Shiplords are fully justified in giving them a high threat rating. It also says something about them that they restrain themselves, though I do wonder how much of that is survivor bias.
Edited for clarity.
[X] A Family Farewell: Amanda, Mary and Iris bid their family and closest friends goodbye, as they prepare for the journey ahead.
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- Location
- Germany
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Now, what matters that, it's not like there's a stealthed ship around that could visit a larger number of relays in a very short time and take them out of commission ... oh.
- Location
- Random place
[X] A Family Farewell: Amanda, Mary and Iris bid their family and closest friends goodbye, as they prepare for the journey ahead.
Tayta Malikai
200% Space Whale
- Location
- Australia
[X] Shakedown: In the mission to come, you will need to know your crew. Join Amanda for a brief introduction to the Adamant and those who will aid you in the mission to come.
- Location
- Queensland, Australia
[X] A Family Farewell: Amanda, Mary and Iris bid their family and closest friends goodbye, as they prepare for the journey ahead.
I very much like the personal touch Amanda's built up over her history. Though I don't have any problem with Shakedown winning either because it's touching on that from another direction.
As for what the abundance of Void Crystals means... @Snowfire one of our big things we offered the Unbound was to do what we could to record their existence, so if they perish all that they were, are and will be isn't lost. What could using a Void Crystal to create the artefact that records the information mean? Would it accelerate how soon we can start doing it? Would it have other more esoteric effects? Because I'm thinking it's definitely something we'd want to investigate. Seeing as the Uninvolved are a Soulspace being created from the sacrifice of a race's presence in material space and the Void Crystals revolve around connecting the two... I don't think a record produced by doing so would be something able to be described as 'mundane'...
I very much like the personal touch Amanda's built up over her history. Though I don't have any problem with Shakedown winning either because it's touching on that from another direction.
As for what the abundance of Void Crystals means... @Snowfire one of our big things we offered the Unbound was to do what we could to record their existence, so if they perish all that they were, are and will be isn't lost. What could using a Void Crystal to create the artefact that records the information mean? Would it accelerate how soon we can start doing it? Would it have other more esoteric effects? Because I'm thinking it's definitely something we'd want to investigate. Seeing as the Uninvolved are a Soulspace being created from the sacrifice of a race's presence in material space and the Void Crystals revolve around connecting the two... I don't think a record produced by doing so would be something able to be described as 'mundane'...
- Location
- Somewhere out there
The only word in this analysis that I can directly criticize is "hulled." The Void Crystal is the core of the drive; the hull is something else entirely. (And I think the Shiplords might know about Inviolate Matter? Not 100% sure on this but I think it was suggested at least that they have ways of dealing with it if they have to.)
But aside from that... your reasoning is sound, and your conclusion is probably right, even if the details might not be.
- Location
- Somewhere other than where I am.
Point, though IIRC the hull was made from the crystal. Assuming that the Shiplords know about and have counters for any exotic abilities or tech we gain, even if they can't or won't use such themselves, seems prudent. They have yet to disappoint.