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TFT out of order snippet

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Re: TFT out of order snippet
Post by Louis R   » Sun Jun 24, 2018 12:52 am

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You're [almost certainly] wrong.

There's no evidence to suggest that TF star ships were built to survive de-orbiting intact, and some reason to think they weren't. To whit: if they could have brought Hamilcar down, they probably would have [just think how impressive _that_ would have been to the locals], and if there was any way that the Peis could lose a small warship in a deep trench they _certainly_ would have - and trotted it out years earlier when it became clear that a mutiny was justified.


Michael Everett wrote:Random thought.
We know that the archangels had a Manufactory Ship (whose name I've forgotten! Aargh!) that they used and that it is no longer in orbit.
How far down did they dig for the Temple?
Could the Temple be perched on the nose (or possibly the dorsal ridge) of the ship?
It could explain the launching-bay-sized door and tunnel... it leads down to the ship's boat bay...
Alternatively, the Lake would provide a wonderful way of hiding the ship if it were deep enough. Just sink the ship to the bottom, set up a couple of tunnels to the shore and then dump some mud and rocks to cover the upper hull.

Please, someone tell me I'm wrong and the Church doesn't have a full-scale Manufactory waiting to be discovered...
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Re: TFT out of order snippet
Post by phillies   » Sun Jun 24, 2018 12:52 pm

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AClone wrote:I appreciate some of the speculation here. I suppose that in the original thread, someone stopped to wonder just who had implants? :geek:


Interesting editing feature

"...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?
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Re: TFT out of order snippet
Post by Dilandu   » Sun Jun 24, 2018 1:22 pm

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phillies wrote:
What is the gender of the observer? Who is it?


Probably Nimue/Merlin PICA. Frankly, with the exception of the very first book, RFC generally put the whole question of gender changes & subsequent psychological problems aside. Nimue seems to act in Merlin's body pretty naturally, without any problems that would plague such... involuntary transgender person. On the other hands, we may assume that PICA may have some deep-rooted psychological dampeners, exactly to avoid such possible problems for user...
------------------------------

Oh well, if shortening the front is what the Germans crave,
Let's shorten it to very end - the length of Fuhrer's grave.

(Red Army lyrics from 1945)
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Re: TFT out of order snippet
Post by Fireflair   » Sun Jun 24, 2018 11:54 pm

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In the other thread where this out of order snippet is posted his Celery-ness commented that he had modified the snippet to hide or obfuscate if it was a remote or Merlin/Nimue who'd gotten close to/into the temple. He doesn't want to give that point away.
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Re: TFT out of order snippet
Post by Randomiser   » Mon Jun 25, 2018 7:01 am

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One of the things about the "spread technology so widely they can't get the genie back in the bottle" strategy is that it bets the farm on the capacity and sanity of whatever returns. Capacity in the sense it has to recognise that it's in a no-win situation and have discretion to not just keep on trying to restore the original aims, and sanity in the sense that it won't just go ahead and destroy everyone anyway.

So we are back to "what might come back?" I typed a longish post and lost it due to a glitch. So short version - probably a freshly set up VR containing Chihiro or one of the other Archangels. (OK could be Scheuler.) With holographics, and various machines to control, it doesn't need a physical body and there is no problem about storing a personality pattern for 1000 years, cf Nimue Chweriau. The computers running the Temple could easily be set to do that, and it would fit the Archangels massive egos that one of them would want to come back "himself" to oversee things.

Thing is, I'm just not too sanguine about Chihiro's sanity. He might decide the millions in North Harchong who "aren't candidates for industrialisation" were enough to start over with and destroy everyone else. :cry:
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Re: TFT out of order snippet
Post by n7axw   » Tue Jun 26, 2018 12:49 pm

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Nimue's cave had a nitrogen atmosphere to prevent normal deterioration.

Don

-
When any group seeks political power in God's name, both religion and politics are instantly corrupted.
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Re: TFT out of order snippet
Post by DirkF   » Wed Jun 27, 2018 10:50 am

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Two thoughts:
1) given the critic problem of detection of a PICA body or an actively moving robot, the most likely explanation (that also minimises all risks involved) this is a completely passive and stealthed recorder that is carried by a normal human who is visiting the temple as part of his religious obligations (or a diplomat send for that purpose by charis).

2) given rfc's deviousness and story telling so far, I'm betting that this "out of order" snippet is really the final epilogue of the book, letting us wonder to the next one what really is there...
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Re: TFT out of order snippet
Post by Dilandu   » Wed Jun 27, 2018 11:09 am

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Randomiser wrote:
Thing is, I'm just not too sanguine about Chihiro's sanity. He might decide the millions in North Harchong who "aren't candidates for industrialisation" were enough to start over with and destroy everyone else. :cry:


Planetary-scale bombardment would NOT spare North Harchong from aftereffects. Nuclear winter, the tremendous ecological damage, maybe even collapse of planetary climate system. And Chichiro actually seems to be more like completely immoral shadow mastermind, than outright mad fanatic.
------------------------------

Oh well, if shortening the front is what the Germans crave,
Let's shorten it to very end - the length of Fuhrer's grave.

(Red Army lyrics from 1945)
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Re: TFT out of order snippet
Post by Annachie   » Wed Jun 27, 2018 5:50 pm

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Maybe a passive planted on someone.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You are so going to die. :p ~~~~ runsforcelery
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
still not dead. :)
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Re: TFT out of order snippet
Post by thanatos   » Wed Jun 27, 2018 6:57 pm

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I think that we're also forgetting that Chihiro and Schueler simply could not have predicted that the "Fallen" had a PICA stashed (mostly because they knew nothing about) or that any contingency plans would wait 750 Terran years to come into play. Indeed, remember that Pei Shan-wei and Pei Kau-yung were officially separated over their "disagreement", thus insulating him from her activities against Langhorne & Co. He probably knew nothing about the sleeper agents Shan-wei had started to plant even if he knew about Nimue's PICA and the cave. And HFQ indicated that the "Fallen" were members of the military and law enforcement that were loyal to Kau-yung who probably knew nothing about the Cave or the sleepers. They fought their war against Chihiro and Schueler without knowing about them and it's clear that Chihiro and Schueler didn't know about them either.

So if you are thinking in terms of possible future threats to your regime, what is the most likely threat? Probably some remaining "Fallen" personnel and any technology and hi-tech manufacturing capability you missed. Someone and something like that could be hidden for a while and wait until the "Archangels" die and then come out of hiding or hand over control of that technology to his kids or local allies who are charged with keeping it secret until the time is right. That's probably what they could have prepared for. But I think that they were probably think in terms of 50 years tops (or may be until all the Adams and Eves died) before something like that happened, not 800 years. Nor could they prepare entirely for the social and religious impact Shan-wei's sleeper cells might have had, if she had the time to create more than the 200 or so she did have time for. Remember that Bedard was the psychology expert and she died in Kau-yung's nuclear attack. Chihiro and Schueler lacked her expertise and therefore compensated for it by creating the top-heavy church and the Seijins (some of whom remembered their old lives).
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