Dead Horses - Discussion

phillies wrote:

TFLYTSNBN wrote:With a phased array graser, you could adjust the beam width to ensure hitting the target while maintaining enough energy density to damage the target. Think of focusing the beam on a MagLite flashlight.

It depends what power density you need. If max focus us required, you can't do what you are proposing.

It depends on how much power you have verses how much power you need to destroy the target.

lightningstar519 wrote:However, I think it would be clever if the application of grav lance tech helped make a breakthrough with impeller systems, for eg with the spider drive. Aren't they applications of similar technology ie focussing impeller wedges into varied shapes? I hope with Foraker and Hemphill in Bolthole, the Grand Alliance might see the new applications of grav lance tech, with both having the missing pieces of the puzzle to crack the spider drive.

That would be a clever plot twist that the abandoned research on TWTSNBN actually results in some advantage on constructing a Manticoran spider drive or detecting the MAlign's. But this can only come after capturing some intel or samples, as I don't think the principles are really so similar as you made it. The spider was a radical reinvention of space propulsion.

Even if this case isn't feasible, hopefully the 20-year time skip until the next novel (can't wait for it!) will mean more tech breakthroughs on the scale of Apollo and which will not be nerfed like Mycroft was just to create an artificial vulnerability that the Mesan Alignment again managed to exploit. (I thought Mycroft didn't have the vulnerabilities of Moriarty where the missile control platforms could be identified while starting up. The Mesans did basically the same thing that Manticore did in Suarez and Lovat for Operation Sanskrit, only in the Beowulf System).

Personally, I'm hoping that we won't have a jump. We do know that there's a new CS novel coming and my bet is that there will be another Saganami novel too (which David has merged to the main series anyway). The GA will not stand down while looking for the MAlign. So we will have an insight into the next few years anyway. Plus, we know that David did give some other characters like Abigail Hearns and Helen Zilwicki portions of the roles he had intended to Raoul and Katherine, so this may continue.

Don't get me started on Silver Bullet... That could only have happened after a major operational security breach.

kzt wrote:

Loren Pechtel wrote:Disagree. Plenty of precision to head where you need to go, nowhere near enough precision to fire a graser from outside the hyper limit.

With Honorverse tech you can make telescopes that are arbitrarily powerful. So verifying your calculations is easy enough. You figure out where you are and then you aim a telescope where you expect to see your target right now. If it isn't sitting in the middle of your FoV your solution is bad in some way.

How do you make those super telescopes?

kzt wrote:

Loren Pechtel wrote:Disagree. Plenty of precision to head where you need to go, nowhere near enough precision to fire a graser from outside the hyper limit.

With Honorverse tech you can make telescopes that are arbitrarily powerful. So verifying your calculations is easy enough. You figure out where you are and then you aim a telescope where you expect to see your target right now. If it isn't sitting in the middle of your FoV your solution is bad in some way.

Loren Pechtel wrote:How do you make those super telescopes?

VLB interferometry for example. It's trivial to deploy a bunch of drones to create a telescope with an incredible large baseline. Or use several ships and their sensors.

Joat42 wrote:

Loren Pechtel wrote:How do you make those super telescopes?

VLB interferometry for example. It's trivial to deploy a bunch of drones to create a telescope with an incredible large baseline. Or use several ships and their sensors.

In-universe I'd expect it to be a variation of gravitic lensing, using a projected field arbitrarily large to focus light onto your instrument. Kinda the reverse of the focusing mechanism used on energy mounts.

Galactic Sapper wrote:In-universe I'd expect it to be a variation of gravitic lensing, using a projected field arbitrarily large to focus light onto your instrument. Kinda the reverse of the focusing mechanism used on energy mounts.

Me too.

lightningstar519 wrote:hopefully the 20-year time skip until the next novel (can't wait for it!) will mean more tech breakthroughs on the scale of Apollo and which will not be nerfed like Mycroft was just to create an artificial vulnerability that the Mesan Alignment again managed to exploit. (I thought Mycroft didn't have the vulnerabilities of Moriarty where the missile control platforms could be identified while starting up. The Mesans did basically the same thing that Manticore did in Suarez and Lovat for Operation Sanskrit, only in the Beowulf System).

Mycroft platforms have point defenses, ECM, can move, and I assume have bubble sidewalls. So they're far better at standing off an attack, once identified, than the unarmed, immobile, Moriarty platforms were.
And they were supposed to be harder to find - but it seems like the Silver Bullet drones were hanging around a lot longer than even Ghost Rider drones normally managed -- gives them lots more time to ID their targets before the ball goes up.

And an overpowered graser firing undetected from basically point blank range was more than the Mycroft defenses could cope with.

Still nerfing Mycroft didn't exactly save all the attacking SLN ships. And even without Silver Bullet I'm not actually sure the Beowulf system defenses could have gotten noticeably more of the SLN ships before they escaped into hyper.

Joat42 wrote:

Loren Pechtel wrote:How do you make those super telescopes?

VLB interferometry for example. It's trivial to deploy a bunch of drones to create a telescope with an incredible large baseline. Or use several ships and their sensors.

VLB requires knowing the positions of your sensors I believe to a fraction of a wavelength. I don't think you can know your position relative to other ships that accurately. Note that on Earth it's done in the radio band, not visible light.

Galactic Sapper wrote:In-universe I'd expect it to be a variation of gravitic lensing, using a projected field arbitrarily large to focus light onto your instrument. Kinda the reverse of the focusing mechanism used on energy mounts.

But every gravitic lens we see is contained in something. You can whistle up a perfect lens that's totally achromatic but you're limited by the size of the device. You want a 1000m lens, you need a 1000m housing on your projector.

Jonathan_S wrote:Still nerfing Mycroft didn't exactly save all the attacking SLN ships. And even without Silver Bullet I'm not actually sure the Beowulf system defenses could have gotten noticeably more of the SLN ships before they escaped into hyper.

The missiles would have headed out sooner (the loss of Mycroft meant the launch command went out at lightspeed) and thus more pods could have engaged, ensuring nothing escaped.