[Spoilers] Why didn't the Shongairi detect Târgoviște sooner

We learn in the second part that the Liatu have phase-space transition detectors, which would detect ships arriving from interstellar space. We know the Inexorable fleet didn't trigger those, which is why Howell's mission to Tairyon wasn't initially detected.

The same applies to Relentless on Shongaru.

But not to Târgoviște: that's an unmodified Shongairi dreadnought. So why didn't the Shongairi detect her arrival?

The Liatu speculated that the humans could have arrived half a light-year out (Standard Year), but would have detected the normal-space particle shield working at high speeds. So did Vlad arrive that much far out? It doesn't look like it, because they revealed themselves to the Shongairi a month later.

Another option is that the Shongairi didn't have as sensitive a detector net as the Liatu did. We do know the Liatu tech was slightly better... but only slightly, maybe by 25%.

Did Relentless hide Târgoviște's appearance? How would it know where Târgoviște would appear before it did?

ThinksMarkedly wrote:We learn in the second part that the Liatu have phase-space transition detectors, which would detect ships arriving from interstellar space. We know the Inexorable fleet didn't trigger those, which is why Howell's mission to Tairyon wasn't initially detected.

The same applies to Relentless on Shongaru.

But not to Târgoviște: that's an unmodified Shongairi dreadnought. So why didn't the Shongairi detect her arrival?

The Liatu speculated that the humans could have arrived half a light-year out (Standard Year), but would have detected the normal-space particle shield working at high speeds. So did Vlad arrive that much far out? It doesn't look like it, because they revealed themselves to the Shongairi a month later.

Another option is that the Shongairi didn't have as sensitive a detector net as the Liatu did. We do know the Liatu tech was slightly better... but only slightly, maybe by 25%.

Did Relentless hide Târgoviște's appearance? How would it know where Târgoviște would appear before it did?

I just finished re reading the first two books prefatory to starting the new one, so I can tell you what happened at the end of ITL

The last chapter of Into the Light it's mentioned in vague terms that Vlad and Co phased in fairly far out and came in very slowly. They didn't say HOW far out but DID say that they were more than five days out of detection range when they were met by Dave Dvorak"s ship.

So, did you enjoy book one of To Challenge Heaven as much as I did? I'm still working through the Liatu book two, chapters. Mostly because I started ITL fairly late in the day and dodn't want to stay up all night to finish the book

Did anyone read David's stand alone book "The Excaliber Alternative"? In it, our plucky monkey boys and girls are going to fight a all encompassing stagnant alien confederation, ofc David has decided that they've developed a few minor improvements in their war fighting tech. Like bigger ships, better missiles, faster drives. Sound familiar? There was one other major tech advantage that I think David will give these humans against the Hegemony FTL communication tech. Oh, and how about shield technology? Can't keep those monkey boys (and girls) down.

Just a guess in the (hopefully) next book in the series

Mycall4me wrote:The last chapter of Into the Light it's mentioned in vague terms that Vlad and Co phased in fairly far out and came in very slowly. They didn't say HOW far out but DID say that they were more than five days out of detection range when they were met by Dave Dvorak"s ship.

Ah, ok, so what you're saying is that the Târgovişte transitioned very far out and had been moving slowly in-system for a while, when Relentless found it. That is, the time between transition and detection would have been many months, nearly a year. That would also explain how Relentless knew where to find Vlad: they had been scanning for a long while and managed to pinpoint it.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

Mycall4me wrote:The last chapter of Into the Light it's mentioned in vague terms that Vlad and Co phased in fairly far out and came in very slowly. They didn't say HOW far out but DID say that they were more than five days out of detection range when they were met by Dave Dvorak"s ship.

Ah, ok, so what you're saying is that the Târgovişte transitioned very far out and had been moving slowly in-system for a while, when Relentless found it. That is, the time between transition and detection would have been many months, nearly a year. That would also explain how Relentless knew where to find Vlad: they had been scanning for a long while and managed to pinpoint it.

They didn't really say how far out they were when they transitioned in, I'm pretty sure that it wasn't far enough out that it would have taken a year. If I had to say I'd guess a month.

So if I were to guess on the next most likely breakthrough from our monkey boys and girls it would have to be a FTL communications technology. After that maybe shield tech.

The possibility of another book would seem to be pretty good. Something along the lines of getting the Shongairi brought up to Alliance tech, working out the star nation aspect of the Alliance, and the initial meeting between the Alliance and the Hegemony.