TFT out of order snippet

ok i've edited the original post to include RFC's prefacing text as well as the snippet.

ericth wrote:Actually, it occurred to me earlier in the series that a transmitter on the top of the mast of one of the CoGA fleet ships designed to provoke the OBS would have been an effective tactic earlier in the war when it was primarily naval. That was also before they knew about the likelihood of "Dad" being under the temple and might not have been so out there as a strat.

With all respect, but Merlin knew about SOMETHING under the Temple since first book. He wasn't sure what exactly here, but suspected that there might be something not good, so provoking the Rakurai strikes was absolutely out of question. Not to mention that he have absolutely no clue about Rakurai working algorithms and level of intelligence. It may very well be equipped by tactical AI of its own - RAPIER-type gunnery AI, like OWL - and thus may start to investigate the situation instead of just starting to shell the potential target.

Dilandu wrote:With all respect, but Merlin knew about SOMETHING under the Temple since first book. He wasn't sure what exactly here, but suspected that there might be something not good, so provoking the Rakurai strikes was absolutely out of question. Not to mention that he have absolutely no clue about Rakurai working algorithms and level of intelligence. It may very well be equipped by tactical AI of its own - RAPIER-type gunnery AI, like OWL - and thus may start to investigate the situation instead of just starting to shell the potential target.

Also as a reminder, Merlin doesn't actually KNOW that the Rakurai will automatically fire on any source of primitive electricity generation. He THINKS it will, but that's purely guesswork on his part.

And has been pointed out, he doesn't know what other contingencies may be set off even if the Rakurai does fire.

And given Paityr's revelation about The Return, there's the distinct possibility that the Rakurai won't fire at all, but instead wake up someone or something actually INTELLIGENT to analyze the situation. Or do that even if does fire. And the last thing Merlin wants is INTELLIGENT opposition with control of the Rakurai.

phillies wrote:
"...his passives had crossed the Plaza of Martyrs.

He'd always thought Chihro's decision to plate the Temple's silver dome in eight centimeters of armorplast had been ridiculous, even for a lunatic like him. There'd been far less . . . exorbitant ways to keep that dome mystically mirror bright for centuries on end. It certainly hadn't been required for any conceivable structural reason! Indeed, when Nimue Alban first observed the Temple, she'd thought she'd seen flimsier planetary-defense command bunkers.

It hadn't occurred to her..."

What is the gender of the observer? Who is it?

Just guessing here, but I think this is another case of trying to keep the Nimue identity and the Merlin identity straight in a certain PICA's brain.

There was a period of time right after Nimue Alban woke up in her PICA that she was still Nimue. She didn't decide to become Merlin (and male) until after taking a survey of Safehold and recognizing that she'd have way too much trouble establishing herself in a world with strong stay-in-the-kitchen tendencies. If the initial scan of the Temple was done before the reconfiguration, then it was done by Nimue and the female pronoun would be appropriate.

Julia Minor wrote:

phillies wrote:
"...his passives had crossed the Plaza of Martyrs.

He'd always thought Chihro's decision to plate the Temple's silver dome in eight centimeters of armorplast had been ridiculous, even for a lunatic like him. There'd been far less . . . exorbitant ways to keep that dome mystically mirror bright for centuries on end. It certainly hadn't been required for any conceivable structural reason! Indeed, when Nimue Alban first observed the Temple, she'd thought she'd seen flimsier planetary-defense command bunkers.

It hadn't occurred to her..."

What is the gender of the observer? Who is it?

Just guessing here, but I think this is another case of trying to keep the Nimue identity and the Merlin identity straight in a certain PICA's brain.

There was a period of time right after Nimue Alban woke up in her PICA that she was still Nimue. She didn't decide to become Merlin (and male) until after taking a survey of Safehold and recognizing that she'd have way too much trouble establishing herself in a world with strong stay-in-the-kitchen tendencies. If the initial scan of the Temple was done before the reconfiguration, then it was done by Nimue and the female pronoun would be appropriate.

Correct. It wasn't just the stay-in-the-kitchen aspects, though. Nimue Alban was 6'3" tall (thus the reference to which side of the family her height comes from) and the one thing she can't change about her PICA's chassis is its height. There are no native Safeholdian women remotely that tall, so if one turned up, claiming to be a seijin, the "You're kidding me. You've gotta be a demon, lady!" problems would've been a lot more severe. This is the entire reason the second PICA was built to be only 5'3".

runsforcelery wrote:Correct. It wasn't just the stay-in-the-kitchen aspects, though. Nimue Alban was 6'3" tall (thus the reference to which side of the family her height comes from) and the one thing she can't change about her PICA's chassis is its height. There are no native Safeholdian women remotely that tall,

Wait... why aren't there any Safeholdian women that tall? IIRC, the primary cause for stunted growth would be bad diet, but doesn't the Writ describe what a HEALTHY diet is? Unless you're a starved Harchongian serf or homeless in Zion, shouldn't most people growing up on Safehold be getting a decent diet? Did everyone over six feet tall in Operation Ark die with Nimue and the distraction fleet? Were all the colonists selected to be under a certain height?

evilauthor wrote:

runsforcelery wrote:Correct. It wasn't just the stay-in-the-kitchen aspects, though. Nimue Alban was 6'3" tall (thus the reference to which side of the family her height comes from) and the one thing she can't change about her PICA's chassis is its height. There are no native Safeholdian women remotely that tall,

Wait... why aren't there any Safeholdian women that tall? IIRC, the primary cause for stunted growth would be bad diet, but doesn't the Writ describe what a HEALTHY diet is? Unless you're a starved Harchongian serf or homeless in Zion, shouldn't most people growing up on Safehold be getting a decent diet? Did everyone over six feet tall in Operation Ark die with Nimue and the distraction fleet? Were all the colonists selected to be under a certain height?

Okay, let me rephrase for the nitpickers. There are, possibly, a teeny-tiny number of 6'3" women on Safehold. The average heights on Safehold are, however, shorter than the averages on Earth. I haven't explained to you why that is, but recall that Cayleb, who is just under 6' tall, is considered very tall by Safehold's standards for a man.

The current average height for a woman in the US is about 5'4" and the current average height for men is about 5'9" and has been for the last 50 years or so. The medical community seems to feel that we've more or less topped out as a nation specifically because we do get good nutrition that avoids the stresses in childhood and adolescence which tend to limit height. Folks on Safehold get diets which are a heck of a lot better than diets of, say, the 18th and 19th centuries, but it is still a primarily muscle-powered culture and there are a lot of dietary stresses which would not apply to a population with 21st century technology for food growth, preservation, and transport. The environment itself stresses the human genome in many ways, as well, some of them as evident as the colder average temperature and some of them far more subtle and tied up in what happens with vitamins and trace nutrients in a terraformed but not a terrestrial enviornment.

So yes, I may have misspoken when I said there were no other 6'3" women on Safehold, but there are damned few. They are certainly so rare that the last thing Nimue would have needed was to appear as a woman of such an unusual height. And so far, you have not met a single woman on Safehld who was remotely close to 6'3" tall.

runsforcelery wrote:
Correct. It wasn't just the stay-in-the-kitchen aspects, though. Nimue Alban was 6'3" tall (thus the reference to which side of the family her height comes from) and the one thing she can't change about her PICA's chassis is its height. There are no native Safeholdian women remotely that tall, so if one turned up, claiming to be a seijin, the "You're kidding me. You've gotta be a demon, lady!" problems would've been a lot more severe. This is the entire reason the second PICA was built to be only 5'3".

Honor's height is always given in centimeters. But if you convert to inches, wouldn't she be about 6' 3"? I'm sensing a trend here!

Henry Brown wrote:

runsforcelery wrote:
Correct. It wasn't just the stay-in-the-kitchen aspects, though. Nimue Alban was 6'3" tall (thus the reference to which side of the family her height comes from) and the one thing she can't change about her PICA's chassis is its height. There are no native Safeholdian women remotely that tall, so if one turned up, claiming to be a seijin, the "You're kidding me. You've gotta be a demon, lady!" problems would've been a lot more severe. This is the entire reason the second PICA was built to be only 5'3".

Honor's height is always given in centimeters. But if you convert to inches, wouldn't she be about 6' 3"? I'm sensing a trend here!

Leeana is about 6' 3" as well.

runsforcelery wrote:The average heights on Safehold are, however, shorter than the averages on Earth. I haven't explained to you why that is

Firmware glitch in the XL-sized cryopods? This is what happens when you don't have time to do a full round of beta testing!