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From: owner-traveller-digest@mpgn.com (Traveller-digest)
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Subject: Traveller-digest V1996 #722
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Traveller-digest      Friday, December 6 1996      Volume 1996 : Number 722



(R)1996. Traveller is a registered trademark of FarFuture Enterprises.
All rights reserved.

The following topics are covered in this digest:

RE: On Nuclear Dampers...
Re: Starships: Available Yet?
Re: Death of Fools
Re: Rebellion
Landing ships.
Re: Landing Ships
Re: Starships: Available Yet?
Re: I can hear You knocking.
MegaTraveller Auction #7
Space 1889 gizmo (Was: RE: Vaccuum fluctuations and Zero-G)
Noble Toast was Ambassadors
Re: "Basic Traveller"
Re: Nuclear Dampers
Re: punishment and Zaleucus
Re: Disintegrators & democracy
Re: Vaccuum fluctuations and Zero-G
Re: Nuclear Dampers
Re: Nuclear Dampers
Re: Disintegrators & democracy
The Scale of Space
Re: I can hear You knocking.
Re: Norris's elevation

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 21:57:47 -0500
From: Eric Freitas <edf@atlantic.net>
Subject: RE: On Nuclear Dampers...

Roderick Darroch Elliott wrote:

>        Perhaps it's because I used to play SFB a lot, but one thing =
that
>has struck me about Trav is a relative paucity of different =
ship-mounted
>weapons...  which got me thinking:
>
>        OK: it's possible to dampen the Strong Nuclear Force... what =
about
>a weapon system that has the _opposite_ effect?  Things go boom?

This has been written about in a novel, don't remember which one =
however.  The Particle decay rate increased (ie - more nuetron radiation =
per given time period), causing fissionable materials to go boom, and =
causing fusion reactors to also go boom.  Don't remember much else.

Eric Freitas

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 05 Dec 1996 22:52:06 -0500
From: Constant Hazard <hazard@potomac.net>
Subject: Re: Starships: Available Yet?

Shalom Zaidfeld wrote:
> 
> Yes.  I got it two days ago in the mail  (A bit of damaged in the
> spine).. Overall a nice SF resource book but not Traveller.   :-(
> Contains all the old ship designs + new military ships...   and SSDS.
> The deckplans are useless.  :(

Well, could you elaborate on your opinions?
- -- 
                          David  Kent  
                             -aka-
                        Constant Hazard
                    \----------------------/
                     \ hazard@potomac.net /
                      \------------------/

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Dec 1996 00:45:46 -0500
From: HDHale@aol.com
Subject: Re: Death of Fools

Steven Bonneville writes: 

>>    Actually Strephon's best bet would have been to surrender himself to
the
>> Solomani.
>
><BLINK>  Harold, the *Solomani*?  Even if they were within fifty parsecs of
>him, and Daibei and Ilelish weren't in the way, his own nobles would march
>him out and lynch him! 

   I'm thinking in terms of "what would Machiavelli do?", not in terms of a
man who may have had principles, but was not emperor material.  

   Let's face it, emperors don't go off secretly many light years away to
inspect what amounts to a glorified spy satellite--they have people (trusted
aides) who do that sort of thing for them.  Also, a true Emperor would have
rushed back to the Capital at the first sign of trouble, and told any advisor
who said different to get bent.  His place is own the throne or laying dead
beside it.

   As for Strephon's band of supporters in his stronghold c.1120, he's better
off without them, and they are better off without him.

   No, Machiavelli, seeing that he could no longer trust the vast majority of
nobles who supposedly gave allegience to him, would have recruited outsiders
to come in and restore him to the throne.  Seeing as how the Vargr can't be
controlled (they would loot first, then think about military objects), the
Aslan would require too much land as reward, and the Zhodani, Hiver and
K'kree were too far away or would want to turn him into a puppet afterward,
that leaves the Solomani.  The Solomani can be controlled, would only want
few sectors as reward (territory that was originally theirs anyway), and
would leave him in charge after everything was over.  More importantly, by
the early 1120s, they have enough military might to do the job, were someone
charismatic in charge.

   Of course the sight of Strephon riding back into the Imperium at the head
of a large Solomani fleet might cause people like Dulinor, Margaret, et. al.
to temporarily forget their differences and unite to defeat him.  If so, he
still wins, because now the Imperium is united in common cause once
again--even if it is for the purpose of beheading him and sending the
Solomani back where they came from.

Regards,

Harold

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Dec 1996 00:46:36 -0500
From: Thad Coons <104765.503@compuserve.com>
Subject: Re: Rebellion

> How representative is the US Congress? Not terribly. As the number of
> people represented goes up, the degree to which any *real*
> representation can take place goes down.

> Frankly, I expect that even the Moot, as described in existing
> materials, is unworkable. 

> What I'd expect to be workable would be a multi-level setup. Subsector
> to sector sized groupings of planets to deal with matters affecting
> their area. Such regions would be what had Imperial level
> representation.

In addition, the larger the governing body, the less influence individual
members have. Again in the US Congress, most of the power is in the hands
of committee chairmen and party leader. Most bills are written by only a
few specialists, discussed only in committee, and rubber-stamped by the
majority. Only the most controversial bills are debated, and most of the
congressmen aren't listening to the debates: they're in committee working
on their own bills. That's even less representative.
A moot consisting of thousands of members would be either impotent or even
more dominated by its own government.

 

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Dec 1996 00:46:41 -0500
From: Thad Coons <104765.503@compuserve.com>
Subject: Landing ships.

A landing surface that is known to be clear of obstacles and reasonably
level is always more attractive than the possibilities of landing on a
steep hillside, parking half on level ground and half on top of a boulder
or sunk in the mud, and having the exit port lead into a bramble bush or
off a cliff. If your craft uses any kind of jets to land, you would also
prefer not to start a fire or blow clouds of dust into the air if you can
avoid it.
If you're in an unpopulated area, a good landing site can be hard to find
on the spur of the moment. If you're in a populated area, you won't win
friends and influence people by squashing the local's crops or blocking
traffic. If you're a merchant, you want to land where the locals expect a
starship to come to trade, rather than 2 or 20 or 200 km away.
So, the minimum requirements for a class E port are a spot that is a) known
to the interstellar community to be b) solid, clear, and level, and c)
reserved by the locals (if any) for the exclusive use of starships or
spacecraft. Obviously, not all worlds have such a spot. Not so obviously,
they may have several, and if there is more than one spaceport, the UWP
will give the best.

 

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 22:46:14 -0800
From: "David P. Summers" <DSummers@Mail.ARC.NASA.gov>
Subject: Re: Landing Ships

- -Thu, 5 Dec 1996, Robert Flammang:
> My take has been that the obstacles to landing outside of a starport
> are (usually) purely bureaucratic. The interstellar government wants
> to keep control over interstellar trade. See the sub-adventure "Zilan
> Wine" in the Traveller Adventure for example.

My thoughts were based around situations like the one in "Safari
Ship".  The adventure clear expects the PC's to land the ship
at the Class E "starport" and use just launch to get around when
they need to travel outside the range of the airraft.  However,
my PC's reactions was to want to just move the ship and have
both craft available.

I think it is likely that a government is going to impose additional
restrictions but my questions were cropping up on frontier worlds
(maybe because I didn't have the governmental restrictions to
fall back on).  I see similar situations arise, including the
fact that, even if they are "cleared off" the ISS has designated
bedrock  landing spots on even uninhabited worlds.

____________________________
(Disclaimer: Would NASA have ME speak for them?)
DSummers@Mail.ARC.NASA.gov

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 21:57:09 -0800
From: "Rich Ostorero" <stormhvn@inreach.com>
Subject: Re: Starships: Available Yet?

- ----------
> From: Phillip McGregor <aspqrz@curie.dialix.com.au>

> 
> Hi, has anyone received the Starships book (supposedly available from
> November 18)? Is there a delay on it? I haven't seen any glad little
cries
> on the group!

My FLGS tellls me that he will have it tomorrow (6 Dec, Friday), based on
what his distributor has told him.

- --Rich Ostorero
stormhvn@inreach.com

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 22:43:33 -0800
From: "Rich Ostorero" <stormhvn@inreach.com>
Subject: Re: I can hear You knocking.

- ----------
> From: Charlie <Brreclus@spectra.net>
> To: traveller@MPGN.COM
> Subject: I can hear You knocking.
> Date: Sunday, November 03, 1996 3:53 PM
> 
> I am working on a Corsair, It all works out but I just cant pin down
> boarding. Is it lock to lock, through hull breaches or what. I worked up
> a 30 Ton specialty boat for boarding but it is just seems to make
> Corsairs too large for many occasions. What You think Folks.
>                                                                 Charlie

My game -- the Sunday Follies -- concerns the antics^h^h^h^h^h adventures
of the crew of a 300-ton ex- Vargr corsair. 

My characters have figured out that docking ship-to-ship just doesn't work
without the ships' being able to match vectors, so what they do is "shoot a
line over" -- toss a magnetic or adhesive grapple line from the boarding
ship to the victi -- oops, _potential prize_, and hand-over-hand between
ships. Next, the boarding team either manually cycles the airlock or enters
through a hull breach large enough to board through (I assume that PA and
explosive missile hits that penetrate armor enough to cause  a
decompressive "man overboard" per the RPSCS have created a hull breach
large enough to board through . . . as can a creative use of a demolition
charge!).

The ship's boat is used to bring the marines close to the enemy vessel.
Smart boarders _do not_ bring their ship close to an unsecured enemy -- too
many _bad_ things can happen!

Use a 30t ship's boat to transport the marines (y'know, you could use
grapples to lock the boat to the outside of the hull if space is a
problem).

- --Rich Ostorero
stormhvn@inreach.com

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 06 Dec 1996 07:59:02 GMT
From: sdollar@goodnet.com (Stuart L. Dollar)
Subject: MegaTraveller Auction #7

Hey gang!  I have the following Traveller/MegaTraveller books
available:

I have the following items available for auction.
(Condition:  5-Mint to 1-Poor)

GDW:
MegaTraveller:  Astrogators' Guide to the Diaspora Sector
Sector Map, UWP stats (MT & Hard Times Era) for Diaspora Sector
Condition: 3  (Wear on Spine) 
Minimum Bid: $3

MegaTraveller:  Fighting Ships of the Shattered Imperium
Condition: 4  (Slight Wear on Spine)
Current high bids:
$14 lynchblo@waikato.ac.nz
$13 hbill@primenet.com

MegaTraveller: Referee's Companion
Condition: 3 (Slight Wear on Spine, Bend on Front Cover) 
Minimum Bid: $8

MegaTraveller: Rebellion Sourcebook
Condition: 4 (Slight Wear on Spine)
$12 hbill@primenet.com

DGP:
Travellers' Digest #19:
Contains 2 Adventures, UWP Stats, Library Data & Sector Maps for Deneb
& Riftspan Reaches Sectors
Condition: 4 (Some Wear on Cover)
$5 earthshaker@datatek.com
$4 truestar@pipeline.com

The following are the auction rules:

1) Open bids will be accepted until Midnight MST on Saturday December
7, 1996.  

2)  Two (2) highest bidders as of above deadline will be contacted
individually on Sunday December 8th, and asked to submit a final bid.
They will have until December 10, 1996 Midnight (Tuesday) to submit
this final bid.

3)  Bids will be accepted in minimum increments of $1.  Please note
minimum bids being taken for all items.  Bids of $XX more than highest
bidder will be accepted only during the open bidding period, and will
only be effective for the current day's bidding.

4) Auction updates will be posted daily.

5) All costs do not include freight.

6)  IMPORTANT:  Save bandwidth, please send all bids by e-mail to:
sdollar@goodnet.com.

Stu

Stuart L. Dollar                         sdollar@goodnet.com
Official USENet Spokesperson for Imperium Games
- ------------------------------------------------------------
"Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God."  -Thomas Jefferson

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Dec 1996 08:49:28 +0000
From: anders.backman@macademic.se (Anders Backman)
Subject: Space 1889 gizmo (Was: RE: Vaccuum fluctuations and Zero-G)

>It was very impressive in my own opinion.  I have reason to believe that
>this was not a hoax (course I could tell you, but...I'd have to kill you).
>He goes on to explain how this could be used in a vehicle to provide low
>level flight.  Really neat, however I don't think anyone is required to
>believe what I just wrote ;)  If anyone cares to check, there is another
>article with pictures in the _Illustrated London Times_ of about the same
>time, and also makes a note about the film.  I haven't read it because I
>don't have access to that periodical.
>
>Enjoy!
>
>Eric Freitas

Tongue firmly in cheek or I suppose?


/Backman

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Dec 1996 10:45:42 GMT
From: Stewart Eyres <spe@astro.keele.ac.uk>
Subject: Noble Toast was Ambassadors

Tim Peters wrote

>I bet the a duke or duchess could use it to write an "Imperial decree"
>in the name of the emperor when absolutely necessary, for the credence
>lent by the name.  Obviously, if this was abused, the emperor would
>not be pleased and would likely remove the noble from office, but it's
>possible (and probably necessary to effectively run the Imperium) for
>the dukes to wield that power.

Yes, there are references to this in Survival Margin: Norris writes
his Archduke patent on official Imperial Stationary, provided to him
by Strephon, saying "...why did he give it me if he didn't want me to
use it?" as part justification. He also notes that it feels a little
strange, nknowing that "...this time..." if ne screws up, Strephon
won't be there to fry him - I take the last time implied in this
statement to refer to his use of the Imperial Warrant during the 5FW.
In fact, as far as I can tell, an Imperial Warrant gives you
effectively all the powers of the Emperor, with the important
difference being that it is in the name of the Emperor, rather than
being simply the word and deed of the Emperor.  Whenever a noble acts
independently, s/he had better be damn sure that they get it right,
because the next person up the chain will act to stop you without
hesitation or restraint (if they are any good.)

Stewart Eyres <spe@astro.keele.ac.uk>

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Dec 1996 05:56:24 -0500
From: CardSharks@aol.com
Subject: Re: "Basic Traveller"

In a message dated 96-12-05 01:09:54 EST, you write:

> 
>  Now my question is did anything come with Starter Traveller besides the
two
>  books?  Also I've got the first printing, and it has simple black covers,
>  like the little books.  Was there also a version with picture covers?  Did
>  it come in any kind of box or anything?  I found them a couple years ago
>  sold separatly in a used games box at a store, and have been wondering.
>  
Starter Traveller books were black and read and white; there were no picture
covers for them. It seems to me there was a scenario/adventure in the pack as
well.

Marc Miller

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 21:14:42 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: Nuclear Dampers

In mail you write:

>>> So, is there any way to save the weak force damper other than (to me)
>>> unrealistic rulings that non-fission pumped fusion warheads are
>>> impossible.
>
>>Such rulings *aren't* "unrealistic". Any such setup could be used to
>>make smaller "pulsed fusion" powerplants. So you can't build a
>>non-fission triggered fusion device that is *smaller* than a fusion
>>powerplant of fairly high output.
>
> If the min size of a fusion plant is say 14 Kl then a fusion trigger at
> same TL should be much smaller as you'll need no neutron shielding, no
> power generator, no cooling, no allowance for wear and tear of parts et c.
>
> I'm saying that min size for non fission initiated fusion warheads is
> related to min size of fusion p-plant but generally much smaller, say 10%
> or something.

You forget that a bomb type reaction needs a rather high power reaction
to set it off. A fusion trigger *has* to generate power levels in the
megawatt range. Maybe even the Gigawatt range. It doesn't have to
generate them for *long*, nor do they have to be very controlled on a
long term scale. But you need that high power level.

That sort of power level requires much larger than "minimum" size. But
since it only has to operate for a sort period, you get to make it a
lot smaller than normal. 

To put it another way, you *can't* set off high explosives with a
match. They need a pretty fair explosion (M-80 equivalent or better) in
the for on a blasting cap or other detonator to set them off. Fusion
bombs require a *lot* of energy to set them off. Whether it comes from
a fission bomb, or from a modified fusion reactor, the energy
requirements are the same.

- -- 
Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
 shadow@krypton.rain.com        <--preferred
leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com     <--last resort

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 22:56:14 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: punishment and Zaleucus

In mail you write:

>>I could refer you to the section in "Starship Troopers" where "cruel
>
> I'll have to look that up.  Can you give me a clue roughly where to look?

It right around the point where they hang the deserter/rapist. Or maybe
the whipping.

>>document of about as much interest as Hammurabi's Laws.
>
> Actually, for some of us, these two *are* of "as much interest".  (And 
> before I'm told off for not caring about the US Constitution, I mean just 
> the opposite.  I'm fascinated by both [1].  I even have a copy of the 
> Magna Carta kicking around my hard drive and would be interested in 
> *anything* anyone can tell me about Zaleucus (an ancient Greek 
> king/lawmaker if my limited info is correct).

Personally, I'm looking for an electronic copy of the "Universal
Declaration of Human Rights". I've got a hardcopy, but it's a pain to
quote from. And I'd *love* to be able to quote from it during some
discussions online. I have yet to hear a complaint about "human
rights" violations by another country by a country that wasn't
violating *other* parts of it (for one thing, it lists a *right* to a
job at reasonable pay!)

- -- 
Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
 shadow@krypton.rain.com        <--preferred
leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com     <--last resort

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 23:18:10 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: Disintegrators & democracy

In mail you write:

> Isn't an offensive weapons grade Nuclear Damper a Disintegrator? About
> TL 17 I think, in MT/CT.  Of course, this isn't the same as
> strengthening the SNF, which I guess would lead to the implosion of
> matter and little black holes.  It wouldn't go boom in a vacuum
> though!  Would probably also have severe effects on the locality of
> any battle - not that that has ever stopped the military.  A combat
> zone marked off limits because of the chance of being sucked up by a
> black hole - punishment duty for the navy is to be in the repulsor
> fitted starships charged with keeping the black holes from straying
> ("...the trouble with black holes, you see is that they are black, and
> space is black, so seeing the black holes is difficult...").

Don't forget that once you turn *off* the enhancer, the black hole is
subject to the old rules and, being of truly *puny* mass explodes in a
massive burst of Hawking radiation. 

Remember though, you'd have to enhance the force enough to overcome
both the repulsion of the electron cloud, but also the charge of other
nearby nuclei.

But since fission works because the strong force isn't strong *enough*
to hold heavy nuclei together indefinitely, increasing the strong force
would stop fission. Decreasing it would cause *immediate* fission of
fissionables (drasticly decrease the half-life foe spontaneous
fission), and cause some stable nuclei to become less stable. 

Note that with regards to fusion, decreasing the strong force makes it
harder, increasing it makes it easier. 

As for the hypothetical weak force damper, at a high level it would
cause all the neutrons in atoms in its area of effect to beta decay,
resulting in a nucleus consisting of nothing but protons! The decay
would also release electrons and anti-neutrinos. But the apparent
effect would be the near instantaneous conversion of matter in the
effect area into hydrogen (protium only! no deuterium or tritium). 

A strong pulse of weak force damper would result in a sort of
fission/fusion explosion of the affected matter. 

Another possibility with weak force control in increasing it to force
matter to undergo inverse beta decay (protons converting to neutrons by
emitting a positron and a neutrino). Result? A bunch of neutronium. 

Hmmm. I wonder if it'd be possible to stabilize neutronium enough to
use it for shielding on orbital forts? It'd stop even meson gun fire. 

- -- 
Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
 shadow@krypton.rain.com        <--preferred
leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com     <--last resort

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Dec 1996 00:03:23 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: Vaccuum fluctuations and Zero-G

In mail you write:

> I found an article from an old magazine that described a gravitic
> propulsion device similar to Thruster Plates (The American Mecury.
> June, 1958, 86:77-82, "Another Step Toward Anti-Gravity", By G.
> Burridge).  The article gives a description of the device invented by
> one Thomas Townsend Brown.  I'll sum up the description as best I can.
>
>       Background data:  Apparently one Dr. Paul Alfred Biefeld noticed that
> plate capacitors have a tendency to move toward the positively charged
> plate, when highly charged (say above 100,000volts dc).  Mr. Brown
> evidently took this idea and studied it for some thirty years, producing
> operating propulsion devices in the process.

<rest of description snipped>

There have been numerous variations on this over the years. What's
going on is that the gizmo is ionizing air and the electrostatic field
is accelerating the air! In other words, it's jet propelled, only the
jet is electrically produced. Think of the plate as a propeller.

Nice gimmick, but useless in a real vacuum (well, *almost* useless. It
will generate a small amount of thrust simply because there isn't a
perfect vacuum). 

This is an example of the sort of thing that could drive players *nuts*
trying to figure out how things built by a newly contacted alien race
work! Great for those little mysteries that keep players wondering.

- -- 
Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
 shadow@krypton.rain.com        <--preferred
leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com     <--last resort

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 06 Dec 1996 09:17:14 -0400 (EDT)
From: Robert Flammang <FLAMMANG@vms.cis.pitt.edu>
Subject: Re: Nuclear Dampers

Hi.

> From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)

> You forget that a bomb type reaction needs a rather high power reaction
> to set it off. A fusion trigger *has* to generate power levels in the
> megawatt range. Maybe even the Gigawatt range. It doesn't have to
> generate them for *long*, nor do they have to be very controlled on a
> long term scale. But you need that high power level.

You're right. A fusion /bomb/ needs a lot more power to start than a
mere fusion /reaction/. I don't know the yield of the primer explosives
used to set of fusion bombs, but I do know that even a fairly "modest"
1 kton fission bomb has a power output on the order of a million
gigawatts. Yes, that's right, 10^15 watts.

I don't know how you would ignite a fusion explosive without a power
source of this type. I can't see lasers doing it. If you tried to build
up a fusion reactor (of some small size) to this power level, it would
melt long before it was finished.

- -Rob

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 06 Dec 1996 09:45:10 -0400 (EDT)
From: Robert Flammang <FLAMMANG@vms.cis.pitt.edu>
Subject: Re: Nuclear Dampers

Hi, 

A few days ago, someone asked what the effect would be of suppressing
the strong nuclear force in some material would be.

If you suppressed it, then nuclei would disintigrate into hydrogen (and
very slow neutrons, which would then decay into hydrogen after a few
minutes). The energy given off by this reaction would be from the Coulomb
force of the protons, which will be enough to make the hydrogen into a
fairly hot plasma, but not hot enough to cause nuclear reactions in the
nearby material. (If there was enough Coulomb energy in a nucleus to
cause a nuclear reaction, then the nucleus would have disintegrated long
ago.)

What you would have is a fairly neat disintigrator, a la Star Trek
phasers. Keep in mind that the energy requirements of such a beast would
be enormous. Phasers were supposedly powered by antimatter, which
sounds about right.

If you could actually /reverse/ the polarity of the strong force, then
all bets are off. You could make as violent an explosion as you have
energy for, and such an explosion could generate high energy particles
which could induce radioactivity on nearby matter.

If you could /increase/ the strong force in a very hot plasma, then you
could induce fusion reactions at lower-than-normal temperatures. You'd
have to increase the strength a whole lot to induce fusion at room
temperature, but if you could do this, then you could make a weapon that
would slag just about any material lighter than iron for almost no
energy cost. It would be particularly effective against materials that
have lots of hydrogen in them, like people.

You could also make cold fusion power plants that will run on anything
lighter than iron ("Mr. Fusion" in "Back to the Future.")

- -Rob


- -Rob

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 06 Dec 1996 10:20:28 -0400 (EDT)
From: Robert Flammang <FLAMMANG@vms.cis.pitt.edu>
Subject: Re: Disintegrators & democracy

> From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)

> As for the hypothetical weak force damper, at a high level it would
> cause all the neutrons in atoms in its area of effect to beta decay,
> resulting in a nucleus consisting of nothing but protons! The decay
> would also release electrons and anti-neutrinos. But the apparent
> effect would be the near instantaneous conversion of matter in the
> effect area into hydrogen (protium only! no deuterium or tritium). 

Yow, you'd have to increase the weak force 10^35 times to get it to
overcome the strong force (which is what holds the neutrons in their
Iz = -1/2 state)!

For what it's worth, I never figured my weak force dampers to have that
kind of ability. 8^) They have just enough oomph to push some marginal
nuclei over the edge, by pumping up the weak force coupling constant to
near that of electomagnetism.


- -Rob

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Dec 1996 09:32:37 -0600 (CST)
From: Steven Bonneville <bonnevil@itlabs.umn.edu>
Subject: The Scale of Space

Joseph "Chepe" Lockett <jlockett@io.com> wrote:

> For that matter, Traveller's "Great Rift", "Windhorn Rift," et al. are a
> bit dodgy under current astronomical knowledge.  The original explanation,
> I believe, was that the Great Rift was an extension of the gap between
> local spiral arms.  Then somebody realized just how big the galaxy really
> is (I believe Goeran Damberg's web site has a nice graphic giving the
> correct sense of scale), and it was explained as just a "region of low
> stellar density."

http://enterprise.shv.hb.se/~goeran/traveller/library/galaxy.html

I drew that graphic back in 1993.  It gets the basic point across, but it's
fairly rough.  There is a scale error on it, which I must have been asleep
to miss.  As I recall, the 3000 ring marking the central bulge is too small;
it's only a 1500 ring or so.  This also means the Zhodani Core expeditions
go a little too deep into the galaxy.  Otherwise it's pretty good at getting
the point across -- Charted Space may be big, but our galaxy is a *heck* of
a lot bigger.  Oh, and the Core Expeditions are *scary*.

I keep thinking in the back of my head, that maybe one of these days I'll
redo that diagram, and put in the galactic arms now that I have some idea
of where they should go....

  Steve Bonneville
  <bonnevil@itlabs.umn.edu>

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Dec 1996 16:58:09 +0000
From: anders.backman@macademic.se (Anders Backman)
Subject: Re: I can hear You knocking.

>My characters have figured out that docking ship-to-ship just doesn't work
>without the ships' being able to match vectors, so what they do is "shoot a
>line over" -- toss a magnetic or adhesive grapple line from the boarding
>ship to the victi -- oops, _potential prize_, and hand-over-hand between
>ships.

My pirates as well as my criminally inclined PCs use rocket backpacks
instead. Remember to dodge when closing in on enemy ships this way, my
players have been known to stand in an unlit airlock with buckshot loaded
shotguns and in my campaign combat armour and battle dress is "never" seen
among civilians/pirates.


/Backman

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Dec 1996 09:40:04 -0700 (MST)
From: Bruce Johnson <johnson@pill.pharm.Arizona.EDU>
Subject: Re: Norris's elevation

On Thu, 5 Dec 1996, Don Berry wrote:

> 
> >Okay, we're completely agreed here. Of course, I don't think Strephon would 
> >have to tell anyone "Don't let the Aslan run all over the place." I think 
> >that would be assumed. And as well, if Strephon decides that Norris or 
> >anyone doesn't follow any of his objectives as well as he would like, 
> >they're gone.
> 
> Minor point:  up until early 1117, the Duchess of Mora was Sector Duke..
> Norris was "elevated to Archduke in recognition of his leader ship during
> the FFW (yeah, sure!).

	Read Survival Margin, and the Encyclopedia entry on 'Imperial
Letterhead' again, guys...Norris appointed himself Archduke, based on his
advanced knowledge of Strephon's assasination, thanks to those
astonishingly ubuitiquos Imperiallines J6 couriers that were, nonetheless,
still secret...(yeah, sure!)

	What's more interesting, in light of the Zhodani Grand strategy,
as outlined in the rebellion Sourcebook, is how much of Norris' success in
the FFW was actually due to Norris' abilities as a naval commanderr, and
how much was due to Zhodani plotting?  Norris is clearly a pragmatist, and
with a telepath as a seneschal (Survival Margin) is hardly going to be
anti-psi.  Norris is exactly what the Zho's want sitting on their Imperial
flank, a strong, competent leader who isn't willing to invade Zhodani
space.

	Also, since clairvoyance is a psionic power that is available, how
do we know that the Zhodani don't have some clue about what is going to
happen in the future?

	Things that make you go 'Hmmmmm'.

Bruce Johnson
University of Arizona
College of Pharmacy
Information Technology Group

Institutions do not have opinions, merely customs

------------------------------

End of Traveller-digest V1996 #722
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