Possible way to take out the OBS

Nick wrote:My guess is that Shan-Wei had several hundred (or thousand) AI personalities stored at Alexandria. It's been mentioned in other books that many of Earth's best minds had been stored as AIs, and it's probably a lot easier to hide a bunch of electrons than it is cryo capsules.

Wait a sec. Why would Shan-Wei have a database of stored PICA minds at Alexandria? For something so precious, why not store such a database (or a copy of it) in Nimue's Cave which is a MUCH more secure location that Langhorne didn't know about?

evilauthor wrote:

Nick wrote:My guess is that Shan-Wei had several hundred (or thousand) AI personalities stored at Alexandria. It's been mentioned in other books that many of Earth's best minds had been stored as AIs, and it's probably a lot easier to hide a bunch of electrons than it is cryo capsules.

Wait a sec. Why would Shan-Wei have a database of stored PICA minds at Alexandria? For something so precious, why not store such a database (or a copy of it) in Nimue's Cave which is a MUCH more secure location that Langhorne didn't know about?

Supposedly to be taken out of storage after the low-tech waiting period before rebuilding the techbase?

Nobody expected the strike on Alexandria.

Joat42 wrote:

runsforcelery wrote:...snip...
There was one other aspect to the destruction of Alexandria which has not yet been discussed in the books because even Nimue didn't know about it. Let's just say that the rakurai strike on Alexandria actually killed a lot more people than Nimue thinks it did.

I mean, a lot more people.

Merlin will not be happy when he learns about it.

Hmm.. A couple of possibilities comes to mind who they where.

• A large amount of colonists in cryo (with memories intact perhaps)
• A contingent of military personnel (friends/colleagues of Nimue?)
• Many children/students attending schools/universities (which will make Nimue go ballistic when she finds out)

All very valid possibilities Joat.

As for me, however, I think it's a couple hundred million (or more) frozen, fertilized ova... Potentially an entire generation of "children" for the Adams and Eves to nurture... An entire bootstrapping of Earth's population and all its genetic diversity to the new world... And now, incinerated by the Rakurai...

David has told us that for adults, staying in cryo too long wasn't good. For children, it was even worse. But ova? We just don't have any textev - ergo my premise.

Guess we'll see in a couple months.

I have lost track, so maybe someone can refresh my memory. Do we know how big the OBS is? And do we know how big the "shell" that it throws is? What I'm wondering is how many "shells" does the OBS have available, is it like a 6 shooter, or more or less? I'm thinking that maybe we could get it to fire all of it's ammo thus rendering it inoperable. Now obviously we wouldn't want it to fire at occupied territory, so as I've previously posted, why not advance the tech on that remote island (where Merlin has introduced trains and such) as much and as fast as possible. It is in such a remote area that I don't think anyone (other than Merlin) would even notice a strike if/when it occurs. I'm not so certain that the OBS is even smart enough to launch on its own. It seems to me that it requires targeting coordinates provided by people (such as St. Kohdy's abby). But if it is smart enough, and it did launch something at the small island, that would provide an immense amount of info too. Merlin/Owl could watch it launch, and perhaps find a way to destroy the missile (whatever it is - I assume a rock) soon after. Maybe they can find a way to disrupt the re-loading mechanism however that works. I know that there is trepidation about "What Is Under The Temple". But Merlin has already put tech on that island so he obviously wasn't too concerned. I say push it to the max and see if and when you get a reaction. The boogeyman you imagine is usually far worse than the boogeyman you know.

TBird50 wrote:I have lost track, so maybe someone can refresh my memory. Do we know how big the OBS is? And do we know how big the "shell" that it throws is? What I'm wondering is how many "shells" does the OBS have available, is it like a 6 shooter, or more or less? I'm thinking that maybe we could get it to fire all of it's ammo thus rendering it inoperable. Now obviously we wouldn't want it to fire at occupied territory, so as I've previously posted, why not advance the tech on that remote island (where Merlin has introduced trains and such) as much and as fast as possible. It is in such a remote area that I don't think anyone (other than Merlin) would even notice a strike if/when it occurs. I'm not so certain that the OBS is even smart enough to launch on its own. It seems to me that it requires targeting coordinates provided by people (such as St. Kohdy's abby). But if it is smart enough, and it did launch something at the small island, that would provide an immense amount of info too. Merlin/Owl could watch it launch, and perhaps find a way to destroy the missile (whatever it is - I assume a rock) soon after. Maybe they can find a way to disrupt the re-loading mechanism however that works. I know that there is trepidation about "What Is Under The Temple". But Merlin has already put tech on that island so he obviously wasn't too concerned. I say push it to the max and see if and when you get a reaction. The boogeyman you imagine is usually far worse than the boogeyman you know.

The OBS is a weapons array consisting of multiple launchers placed around Safehold to provide coverage almost anywhere on the surface.

The size of magazines, reload capability, size of the "shells" and trigger mechanisms are unknown.

The idea to force a reaction out of the OBS is not a very good one, the test Merlin did was because he had to. To be able to win the war against the church Charis would need the use of steam engines and the risk of triggering the OBS was worth it.

Since no one knows what resources and capabilities the archangels left behind it's not a good idea to force a response from the OBS. The likely scenario is that Merlins plan is to defeat the church and then check whats in the temple and if it's possible, disable the OBS from there.

Also, trying to build a high tech enclave without first defeating the church is a very bad idea. It's the perfect tool for keeping what's left of humankind on Safehold divided for a very long time. That's bad.

TBird50 wrote:I have lost track, so maybe someone can refresh my memory. Do we know how big the OBS is? And do we know how big the "shell" that it throws is? What I'm wondering is how many "shells" does the OBS have available, is it like a 6 shooter, or more or less? I'm thinking that maybe we could get it to fire all of it's ammo thus rendering it inoperable. Now obviously we wouldn't want it to fire at occupied territory, so as I've previously posted, why not advance the tech on that remote island (where Merlin has introduced trains and such) as much and as fast as possible. It is in such a remote area that I don't think anyone (other than Merlin) would even notice a strike if/when it occurs. I'm not so certain that the OBS is even smart enough to launch on its own. It seems to me that it requires targeting coordinates provided by people (such as St. Kohdy's abby). But if it is smart enough, and it did launch something at the small island, that would provide an immense amount of info too. Merlin/Owl could watch it launch, and perhaps find a way to destroy the missile (whatever it is - I assume a rock) soon after. Maybe they can find a way to disrupt the re-loading mechanism however that works. I know that there is trepidation about "What Is Under The Temple". But Merlin has already put tech on that island so he obviously wasn't too concerned. I say push it to the max and see if and when you get a reaction. The boogeyman you imagine is usually far worse than the boogeyman you know.

Did the calculations sometime back. 1 tonne at 0.15c gives round 250Mt yield, increasing mass decreases required velocity. (Four times the mass requires half the velocity). Frontal area has a bearing on this as the air in front will be compressed and add to the mass of the impactor and reduce the velocity at ground level proportionally. At 1kg per cm2 a 10cm by 10cm bar will have 100kg added to its mass so around 25Mt will be dissipated as an air blast prior to impact. As the velocity is much much higher than the speed of sound the back of the bar probably wouldn't notice the atmosphere at all other than the gamma rays coming off the front but it would not have time to evaporate much before impact. Note this also limits the minimum size of the impactor to not much less than a tonne - heavier works, lighter doesn't.

TBird50 wrote:I have lost track, so maybe someone can refresh my memory. Do we know how big the OBS is? And do we know how big the "shell" that it throws is? What I'm wondering is how many "shells" does the OBS have available, is it like a 6 shooter, or more or less? I'm thinking that maybe we could get it to fire all of it's ammo thus rendering it inoperable.

We knew, that previous version of Rakurai array - primitive, jury-rigged, single-shot weapon - was capable to basically exterminate the area comparable to Indian subcontinent.

Current array may have enough slugs in reserve to obliterate all life on Safehold.

To provoke the weapon of mass destruction to fire...

Now obviously we wouldn't want it to fire at occupied territory, so as I've previously posted, why not advance the tech on that remote island (where Merlin has introduced trains and such) as much and as fast as possible.

Because they did not knew exactly WHAT would happens. The Rakurai array didn't reacted on steam engines AT ALL. Which basically means that they still knew nothing about its working algorithms. What if triggered Rakurai array would activate the Temple and order some Archangel to came and analyse the situation?

It is in such a remote area that I don't think anyone (other than Merlin) would even notice a strike if/when it occurs.

Hardly. Unless it would be Armageddon's reefs again, the trails of hypervelocity projectiles ripping through atmosphere would be pretty visible. And the ammount of destruction would be enormous. Just another Alexandria-size salvo could perfectly start a new Ice Age over Safehold.

I'm not so certain that the OBS is even smart enough to launch on its own.

Problem is, that we knew nothing about actual programming of the Array, besides that it let some unauthorised SNARC activity slip.

Merlin/Owl could watch it launch, and perhaps find a way to destroy the missile (whatever it is - I assume a rock) soon after.

It's a rock (c)

How could you destroy something like simple kinetic projectile, launched on sufficient velocity? Hit it with another projectile on head-on course? I really doubt that Owl could produce such complicated kinetic interceptors.

Maybe they can find a way to disrupt the re-loading mechanism however that works. I know that there is trepidation about "What Is Under The Temple". But Merlin has already put tech on that island so he obviously wasn't too concerned. I say push it to the max and see if and when you get a reaction. The boogeyman you imagine is usually far worse than the boogeyman you know.

Merlin tests basically shown that the Rakurai array aren't trigger-happy. But the question - are its simply passive (i.e it's just a machine), or its cleverly passive (i.e. there is some AI on Rakurai array that decided what may slide).

Joat42 wrote:The OBS is a weapons array consisting of multiple launchers placed around Safehold to provide coverage almost anywhere on the surface.

Er, not exactly.

The launcher platforms were stated as positioned inside the sphere of defense platforms and sensors arrays. I.e. they aren't disperced around the planet. They are concentrated in single point.

My guess - they positioned in some Lagrange poing in Safehold&moons systems. This make a lot of sense:

1) The distance involved would make planetary attack against Rakurai array almost impossible due.

2) The array would not need a lot of external power just to mantain orbit - the Lagrange points are stable.

3) It would gave the coverage of all planet on a few days cycle (considering the relative movement of Safehold and its moons)

Dilandu wrote:

Joat42 wrote:The OBS is a weapons array consisting of multiple launchers placed around Safehold to provide coverage almost anywhere on the surface.

Er, not exactly.

The launcher platforms were stated as positioned inside the sphere of defense platforms and sensors arrays. I.e. they aren't disperced around the planet. They are concentrated in single point.

My guess - they positioned in some Lagrange poing in Safehold&moons systems. This make a lot of sense:

1) The distance involved would make planetary attack against Rakurai array almost impossible due.

2) The array would not need a lot of external power just to mantain orbit - the Lagrange points are stable.

3) It would gave the coverage of all planet on a few days cycle (considering the relative movement of Safehold and its moons)

See this post.

Joat42 wrote:See this post.

And?