System and Battle Maps

Brigade XO wrote:I suppose it is possible that the nominal bow of the ship had a different and more varied sensor array for scanning forward, after all you are heading in that direction really really fast. Certainly it makes reasonable sense that the wedge's are shaped to both smooth the movement (dealing with gravity gradients) and amplify it's ability to move the ship in one direction over others if that improves it's speed. And that is the way RFC has written it (big smile).

From a practical matter of the crew and operations, you need an orientation both within the ship and relative to the ship. That applies to ships (on water or under it) trains, aircraft, current spacecraft, missiles, even cars and trucks.
Since we are dealing with ships, RFC is using naval language conventions:

bow (the front, usualy shaped to cut the water smoothly to make for easier passage,

stern (other end from the bow,

portside (on your left when facing the bow),

starboard (on your right when facing the bow)

dorsal (top- look up away from the water to the sky -like the classic above the water of a
shark on the surface) and

ventral- the bottom of of a ship sitting on water- where the "vents" are on fish for discharging biological waste )

You really have to know where you are in the ship and where things other than the ship (like enemy aircraft or missiles or ship) things are in relation to the ship to work effectively. It does take time to learn but can soon become internalized and normal. It also orients you to where your are and where you need to be or pay attention too.
Where things are located inside or outside your ship depends on physics (and plot) but you normally have to balance out weight and pay attention to how big stuff is inside so where it is places is important as well as being able do things like use weapons....which we have following the classic 18the and 19th century "broadside" arrangement in varioius arrangement along the port and starboard sides of the hull rather than the turrent arrangemetn you see with things like the USS Monitor in the Civil War or most 20th and 21st century warships. I'll stop now...too much detail.
Everyting is in relation to YOUR ship unless otherwise specificaly stated.

Now that I've thought it over, it is possible that the bow and stern hammerheads have different armor designs. After all the opening at the throat of a wedge is much larger than the one at the kilt.

However, while this seems feasible, I'm not aware of any textev that supports it.

Walks Alone wrote:Just because you didn't notice something doesn't make you inadequate. Didn't Honor say something about seeing something and thinking it's something else? And I might have gotten it wrong after all Or we might both be right.

Hmm... distinguishing between the bow and the stern... is there any reason there has to be a difference? Aren't the fore and aft impeller rings the same?

They seem to be, except (as Dca alluded to) ships don't have a reverse gear. The wedge is always wider at the bow, narrowing towards the stern, and provides a forward momentum. That's why ships have to flip over (or otherwise turn around), aka turnover, before they can counteract the velocity they've built up. Hench why you have navigators in the books sometimes giving times or distances to turnover to make a zero-zero intercept.

As for the mechanical reasons there's no reverse gear I'd guess RFC would say it's something to do with the molecular circuitry within the node that causes it. But that's coming up with a tech reason after deciding it shouldn't. He wanted (initially) ship combat based loosely on Napoleonic age of sail and you don't slam HMS Victory into reverse - I don't think the mast and rigging is laid out or stressed for it.


But for Honorvsere ships, except for podlayers a warship's stern is going to look basically identical to its bow. However, again other than podlayers, all warships we've seen have symmetrical armaments - the fore and aft chase weapons are the same (and the 2 broadsides also mirror each other)

Brigade XO wrote:I suppose it is possible that the nominal bow of the ship had a different and more varied sensor array for scanning forward, after all you are heading in that direction really really fast.

Except that since ships do turnover to decelerate you need those exact same level of sensors and shielding at the stern for keeping you from running into things as you're slowing down from whatever relativistic speed you build up to before turnover.

Jonathan_S wrote: He wanted (initially) ship combat based loosely on Napoleonic age of sail and you don't slam HMS Victory into reverse - I don't think the mast and rigging is laid out or stressed for it.

Except that a square rigged ship can go in reverse, just not do it very well. It is true that you cannot slam into reverse, or out of reverse.

Hornblower does it (I think in Captain Hornblower) to free a fouled anchor. Once the ship is moving backwards, Hornblower has all sail taken in before the anchor chain jerks on the anchor.

Imagine the wind is coming from the side, if you shift the yards so the ends on that side are slanted ahead of the mast then the sails will push the ship forward; but if you slant the yards the other way then the thrust is toward the stern and the ship backs up.
This is something a fore and aft sail plan can not do, but fore and aft can sail closer into the wind than a square rigger.

Except that since ships do turnover to decelerate you need those exact same level of sensors and shielding at the stern for keeping you from running into things as you're slowing down from whatever relativistic speed you build up to before turnover.

Essentially they flip over and accelerate in the opposit direction from former line of travel.

Your in Space. If you have been coating in one direction you are going to keep heading in that same direction subject to whatever gravitational forces (strong or weak) play on your ship from things like the star or planets.
Add acceleration and you go faster. On the other hand, there is typicaly nothing to slow you down in any meaningfull way or change your course except effects of local masses that have a gravitational effect on you.

You can't throw your propultion into reverse. What you can do is reverse direction (flip end for end) and accelerate back the way you came. You still moving in the original direction but your velocity in that direction is lowering. At some future point, you will have stopped moving in the original direction and start gaining velocity in the direction you originaly came from.

Backing a sailboat using wind ranges from just difficult and vastly inefficent (at very low speed) to catastrophicaly dangerous (at about any other speed).

You COULD use a powerfull engine (think something like the Civil War era USS HARTFORD (Sailing ship with steamengine running two large sidewheeles as alternative power for running and maneuvering) to try to back the ship while under full sail but the stress and strain on all the the stuff (masts, rigging, hull & frame) with the ship litteraly trying to power itself in two directions is going to "break something"....and just ruin your day.

Low speed from a standing start, with very light wind would be real iffy and lousy (very very lousy) control.
Everyting on a sailboat is optimized to facilitate movement in the direction of the bow (hydrodynamics, balance of weight in hull and keel, arrangement and amount of sail, ability to use wind for aerodynamic effect to move the hull and everything else) with a lot of attention to be able to use the wind energy from as many diections as will work. From straight ahead does not work.
There is also the matter of the steering (including the ability to change direction by adjustments of sail) which is concentrated on a rudder of some sort at or near the stern which is designed to have water flow from the bow in the direction of the stern. Water comming at the rudder from the stern is VERY bad.

You really don't want to sail backwards. Hornblower is shown doing a very specific thing with a VERY delecate touch and sence of judgement without trying to badly overstress that ship. He could have seriously damaged her.

Brigade XO wrote:Low speed from a standing start, with very light wind would be real iffy and lousy (very very lousy) control.
Everyting on a sailboat is optimized to facilitate movement in the direction of the bow (hydrodynamics, balance of weight in hull and keel, arrangement and amount of sail, ability to use wind for aerodynamic effect to move the hull and everything else) with a lot of attention to be able to use the wind energy from as many diections as will work. From straight ahead does not work.
There is also the matter of the steering (including the ability to change direction by adjustments of sail) which is concentrated on a rudder of some sort at or near the stern which is designed to have water flow from the bow in the direction of the stern. Water comming at the rudder from the stern is VERY bad.

You really don't want to sail backwards. Hornblower is shown doing a very specific thing with a VERY delecate touch and sense of judgement without trying to badly overstress that ship. He could have seriously damaged her.

I accept all that as true, it just bugs me when it is said that a square rigger could not go backward using wind power at all.
I suppose technically a ship in Honorverse could go backwards under thruster power, which might be equivalent in ability.

The series does mirror wet navy practice in many ways, but we must remember that the ship doesn't go backwards, just starts accellerating in the opposite direction. They are in all probability going very fast in the original direction for quite some time.

tlb wrote:

Brigade XO wrote:Low speed from a standing start, with very light wind would be real iffy and lousy (very very lousy) control.
Everyting on a sailboat is optimized to facilitate movement in the direction of the bow (hydrodynamics, balance of weight in hull and keel, arrangement and amount of sail, ability to use wind for aerodynamic effect to move the hull and everything else) with a lot of attention to be able to use the wind energy from as many diections as will work. From straight ahead does not work.
There is also the matter of the steering (including the ability to change direction by adjustments of sail) which is concentrated on a rudder of some sort at or near the stern which is designed to have water flow from the bow in the direction of the stern. Water comming at the rudder from the stern is VERY bad.

You really don't want to sail backwards. Hornblower is shown doing a very specific thing with a VERY delecate touch and sense of judgement without trying to badly overstress that ship. He could have seriously damaged her.

I accept all that as true, it just bugs me when it is said that a square rigger could not go backward using wind power at all.
I suppose technically a ship in Honorverse could go backwards under thruster power, which might be equivalent in ability.

Daryl wrote:The series does mirror wet navy practice in many ways, but we must remember that the ship doesn't go backwards, just starts accellerating in the opposite direction. They are in all probability going very fast in the original direction for quite some time.

Technically after they flip, the ships are going backwards until the de-acceleration brings their velocity to zero.

There is nothing in the wet navy comparable to the ship flipping bow to stern in order to slow down and stop. The square riggers of the wet navy had the resistance of the water to accomplish that. Of course vacuum does not impart a resistance.

Walks Alone wrote:

Dca wrote:I've also felt an integrated timeline would help me keep track of events.

Do you mean a battle timeline, rather than a series timeline? This could tie in with the maps...

I meant a timeline that spans scales, so I can see battles, storylines, and overall evolution of governments. I wasn't aware of the Downloads timelines, so I can use some of that to build an example of what I'm thinking of. Thing is, there's so much content I'd need to crowdsource a lot. But if the approach works, that would be easy.

Walks Alone wrote:

3. Do not use verbal abuse in an argument; people have been kicked out of the forum for that.

That's a difficult one when dealing with some people... I've come across people who are offended if you sneeze.

Ad hominem attacks are rarely in good taste. There are better ways.

3. Do not use verbal abuse in an argument; people have been kicked out of the forum for that.

Walks Alone wrote:That's a difficult one when dealing with some people... I've come across people who are offended if you sneeze.

Dca wrote:Ad hominem attacks are rarely in good taste. There are better ways.

One interpretation of what Walks Alone said is that some people will take a comment as verbal abuse that most people would not.
Fortunately the standard to be met is set by Duckk, not by overly sensitive people.

Walks Alone wrote:..snip

5. Do not try to think of uses for all the captured Solarian ships.

Paperweights?

I wouldn't like to have your desk, I can't imagine how long it would take to walk around it...