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Felix junction, key aspect of the story (possible spoilers?)

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Re: Felix junction, key aspect of the story (possible spoile
Post by Theemile   » Tue May 08, 2018 2:31 pm

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George J. Smith wrote:A Question followed by a Daft idea and another question:

Why can't a ship's computer be programmed to raise aft sails based on velocity? The foresail would be raised by remote from Astro Control, (or another ship), once shipboard sensors determine there is sufficient velocity from the foresail the aft wedge would be reconfigured and the aft sail raised.

If that could be made possible, and I see no reason why a computer could not be so programmed, a large ship full of the most powerful explosives in the Honorverse could be sent through.

When the defenders open fire on the ship with their grazers the ship blows up. Now would the explosion be big enough to reach the defenders ships, or at least fry the sensors long enough for another ship to go through after?

I know there would be a problem with maybe the 2nd ship ramming the 1st if there weren't any defenders and the 1st ship was not destroyed, but could the computers also be programmed to reconfigure sails and accelerate after returning to normal space once the ship passes through the wormhole?



Answer:
The Power.... Of Plot....

David keeps the level of human control high and expert systems low in the Honorverse stories in order to keep them relatable and interesting. But otherwise there is no stated reason why an expert system cannot do it.
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RFC said "refitting a Beowulfan SD to Manticoran standards would be just as difficult as refitting a standard SLN SD to those standards. In other words, it would be cheaper and faster to build new ships."
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Re: Felix junction, key aspect of the story (possible spoile
Post by JohnRoth   » Tue May 08, 2018 2:53 pm

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Peregrinator wrote:
Theemile wrote:To date, the best solution mentioned has been target saturation - throw so any small ships through at once that some have to get survive the emergence lane and escape to hyperspace. It's not so much an assault as a mission to identify the locus of the far end.

Heck of a lot of lives to waste though merely to identify the wormhole's terminus.

My thought (which I've shared before) is that someone will discover that all known "killer" wormholes have certain characteristics, observable from the outside, lacking in the Torch wormhole. At that point someone will put 2 and 2 together and realize that the Mesan Alignment has a "Bolthole" and that it's somehow connected to the Torch wormhole.


There is only one other known "killer" wormhole. That's a mighty small sample.

The GA is quite well aware that the MAlign has an equivalent to Bolthole. The GA's intelligence services also have "enemy action" on their lists of possibilities for the Torch wormhole terminus.
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Re: Felix junction, key aspect of the story (possible spoile
Post by Weird Harold   » Tue May 08, 2018 3:13 pm

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George J. Smith wrote:A Question followed by a Daft idea and another question:

Why can't a ship's computer be programmed to raise aft sails based on velocity? The foresail would be raised by remote from Astro Control, ...


Authorial Fiat. Wormholes cannot be transited by unmanned vehicles/probes.
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Answers! I got lots of answers!

(Now if I could just find the right questions.)
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Re: Felix junction, key aspect of the story (possible spoile
Post by Peregrinator   » Tue May 08, 2018 3:36 pm

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JohnRoth wrote:There is only one other known "killer" wormhole. That's a mighty small sample.

What's the other known killer wormhole? Genuinely curious - I know that such things are supposed to exist, but I don't know of any.
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Re: Felix junction, key aspect of the story (possible spoile
Post by JohnRoth   » Tue May 08, 2018 3:57 pm

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Peregrinator wrote:
JohnRoth wrote:There is only one other known "killer" wormhole. That's a mighty small sample.

What's the other known killer wormhole? Genuinely curious - I know that such things are supposed to exist, but I don't know of any.


Torch of Freedom, Chapter 28 wrote:After she left, Wix let out his breath slowly. "Well," he said, "it is the most likely explanation."
Kare made a face. He had not, in fact, lied to the queen. As Wix had just stated, the most likely explanation was that the Harvest Joy couldn't return through the wormhole, for whatever reason, and was now slowly making its way back to Torch via hyperspace.
But . . . 
It wasn't the only possible explanation. He'd been honest enough when he stressed how uncommon it was—these days, at least—for ships to be lost during wormhole surveys. Statistically, the odds were very much against anything of the sort having happened to Harvest Joy. On the other hand, though, there was a reason he'd deliberately avoided getting into any details concerning the disasters that could happen to survey ships. However unlikely they might be, they could happen, and some of them were . . . gruesome. The fate of the Dublin and her crew was still something no one involved in survey work wanted to contemplate or talk about, even a century and a half later.
And there was that one wormhole no one had ever come back from . . . at all.
"Yes, it is," he said. "The most likely explanation, by far."


That's the only discussion I remember.
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Re: Felix junction, key aspect of the story (possible spoile
Post by n7axw   » Tue May 08, 2018 3:59 pm

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Weird Harold wrote:
George J. Smith wrote:A Question followed by a Daft idea and another question:

Why can't a ship's computer be programmed to raise aft sails based on velocity? The foresail would be raised by remote from Astro Control, ...


Authorial Fiat. Wormholes cannot be transited by unmanned vehicles/probes.


Obiously David is the ruler of the Honorverse... but do you remember when and where this authorial fiat was proclaimed (ex-cathedra).. :lol:

Don

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When any group seeks political power in God's name, both religion and politics are instantly corrupted.
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Re: Felix junction, key aspect of the story (possible spoile
Post by Weird Harold   » Tue May 08, 2018 4:24 pm

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n7axw wrote:
Weird Harold wrote:
Authorial Fiat. Wormholes cannot be transited by unmanned vehicles/probes.


Obiously David is the ruler of the Honorverse... but do you remember when and where this authorial fiat was proclaimed (ex-cathedra).. :lol:

Don

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It is in a couple of places, IIRC. The "Pearls of Weber" is probably one place, but there may be a forum post or two also.
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Answers! I got lots of answers!

(Now if I could just find the right questions.)
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Re: Felix junction, key aspect of the story (possible spoile
Post by pappilon   » Tue May 08, 2018 4:50 pm

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Weird Harold wrote:
It is in a couple of places, IIRC. The "Pearls of Weber" is probably one place, but there may be a forum post or two also.


There was one on this forum back a year or two. Don't remember the thread, and what with topic drift knowing that it got around to "why doesn't David do...?! something about AI running the ships and ... just about everything else, like it does in his other series' doesn't probably help a lot.
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The imagination has to be trained into foresight and empathy.
Ursula K. LeGuinn

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Re: Felix junction, key aspect of the story (possible spoile
Post by SYED   » Tue May 08, 2018 6:45 pm

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Could a carrier survive transition long enough to deploy LAC? I could see a. Bunch of them capable of dealing with the mannerheim ships guarding the wormhole.
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Re: Felix junction, key aspect of the story (possible spoile
Post by kzt   » Tue May 08, 2018 6:53 pm

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SYED wrote:Could a carrier survive transition long enough to deploy LAC? I could see a. Bunch of them capable of dealing with the mannerheim ships guarding the wormhole.

No. You are in a grav wave. It’s instant destruction for the LACS
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