Willy Vereb

True Vacuum - New Universe Space NRP

@Terminal4 weeks is too brief and expecting people to scout out for 70 kilo-lightyears would be awfully idealistic.
But I get it. So basically we are set straight after the entire mess, right?
Kind of expected that.
Oh well, then I just fall back to one of my other civs.

True Vacuum - New Universe Space NRP

How much time has passed since the "True Vacuum" catastrophe?
What were the effects?
Should we need to account for any damage?

If the catastrophe happened decades or a century ago then I may try to make a "civilization" as an interstellar trade company called the White Interstellar Corporations.

[Ranked] Four Way: Convergence of Power

<Snipped quote by GreivousKhan>

Having armour impervious to anything but a charged attack is a huge advantage, as it does not require any charging or thought at all to work, it essentially gives you a save for any mistake you make while not requiring you to sacrifice anything as it's basically weightless.

@MelonHead

My punches would have only negligible problems to harm him, actually.
Also your analogy to 25 inches of steel is kinda wrong.
Impact mechanics are more complex than that.
Even if it's indeed 50 times tougher than Kevlar and can dissipate some of the force the airy thin material won't be any help against an .50cal BMG shot for example.
And your piercing attacks wouldn't be any weaker than that, I suppose.

True Vacuum

@TerminalPinging only works with the first post.
Edited in users won't receive an alert. I didn't receive one now so I suppose you added the names later.
So maybe you can try it again.

True Vacuum

@TerminalPer case basis allowances to the rules sounds like a good solution.
As for sizes, they kinda also represent the industrial power of a nation.
So a more primitive nation should have inferior industry thus:
A.) Even though the 12-mile ships are classified as destroyers, they aren't nearly as numerous as the common ships of the other
B.) There are other technical details which makes the creation of larger ships difficult, maintaining a stable field for FTL travel, for example.

Such discrepancies will be occurring regularly within the RP. There's no way to completely mend them aside from invasive intervention from the GM, which isn't really advisable.

True Vacuum

@Willy Vereb, I am aware of different forms and permutations of FTL. Regardless, the speed limit applies to all of them - including FTL which uses superpositioning as well as discontinuous wave-function fallthrough (which according to common sense would travel from point A to B instantaneously). That said, your stated advantages and disadvantages to using non-jump drives are valid. Different forms of FTL will have their pros and cons, especially when used in naval battles.

OOC going up in a few hours, incidentally. I'll send everyone who expressed interest a PM once it's done.

@Terminal

Well, like I said, I don't particularly have a problem with the spirit of the limitations.
Not sure if they are explicitly needed but I don't mind them either.
The only issue is that you only defined them by the typical "hyperdrive" mechanism.

Travel speed is easy to get around. It only determines how fast you can get from point A to B.
So perhaps the instant jump drive can only make 1400+ lightyear jumps and require 24 hours recharging after each use.
Warp drives and hyperdrives are fine even without this limit.
Just for balance I suspect the warp type should be somewhat slower or something.
Besides, pushing FTL speed caps to their limits would be unwise. It'd eliminate any chance for growth.

Tactical FTL limitation looks too strict at first but the last sentence clarifies things and makes room for the warp drive uses.

FTL weapon limitation sounds nonsense when attempted to be applied to the warp drive derived methods. On the other hand thus the limitation can be ignored out of common sense for these and apply the same for tactical FTL. No unbeatable super FTL weapons.

The new additions, though...they are kinda bad news.
The Dyson Sphere limit is relatively no problem. There are some creative civ ideas where the entire nation lives in a giant ancient space ship.
10km limit is a serious issue, though. You see big ship doesn't equal powerful.
And certain brainy hard sci-fi measures would require rather large constructs.
A number of fun spaceship ideas are also impossible
Then there's also the issue with race who migrate in space colonies.
I get that you don't want people to move around in ships with the size of moons or planets but this is getting overboard.
Generally the majority of these issues can be solved by GM management and the good'ol common sense.
As things are you may be stepping on the creativity of people.
One thing is to prevent OP civs and crazy arms race.
And another to neuter the chance for diverse ideas.
Pardon me if I come off a bit harsh here, that's just the way I am. No offense meant.
My point is only that the way you word things can be problematic for different FTL mechanics.
Also that your latest addition to the limits is well...too limiting.
Granted, I doubt I will be held back by these but I remember dozens of civs that would be pretty much impossible by these, even though they were pretty balanced otherwise.
Hardlines may be better to be replaced by a comprehensive view.
A race having thousands of ships with the size of the Moon is definitely OP. If they can replace any vessel in real time their industry is beyond insane.
A civilization living on a wandering moon-sized colonyship which made by ancient technology they no longer know or perhaps even understand is a whole other deal.

True Vacuum

Ah, there's always one or two space RPs are active.
The problem is that they are nowadays kinda cursed to end fast. Hope some game can finally escape this fate.

True Vacuum

My only issue with these rules is that they are a bit inflexible but yeah, things like this need to be straightened out.

One issue is that not every FTL travel method works by "jumps". Think of the Warp Drive from Star Trek, for example. It propels the ship in real space on a constant rate and the sensors/crew can observe their surroundings or make course changes the whole time.
Obviously, the most common limiting factor of these to be slower in comparison.
This is no universal rule but dramaturgy wise you can more easily get away with making these "warp engines" slower than you do for jump drives.

Warp-like FTL methods have several differences, including new sets of "ups" and "downs" for its mechanism.
Advantages:
- Activating the "warp drive" is almost negligible in energy cost and, at least when nothing else is in demand, it can be maintained almost idefinitely
- Warp travel steers the vehicle in realspace which means the crew is aware of their surroundings and can make course corrections the whole time
Disadvantages:
- It may be slower (less physics-dodgy method than jump drives and as I said writers can get away with slow warp drives much easier)
- Navigating in realspace means you still need to avoid larger debris and other hazards in your way
- While you can react and make course corrections, at FTL speeds any "turns" you make would usually require tons of space since all those tiny delays in time add up
- Warp engines don't make you disappear from realspace, you only became faster so the enemy may keep targeting you

Warp Drive applications:
- Ships: see above
- Missiles: the warhead travels at FTL speeds practically the whole time so it lacks the weaknesses of the "jumpdrive missile". On the other hand it's in realspace and has all the issues described above.
- Other weapons: You can use something akin to a "warp accelerator" to propel projectiles or even energy beams at superluminal speeds for extended range and perhaps accuracy.
- Communications: you can enhance radiowaves and such to travel faster than light, the so-called subspace comms in Star Trek are like this. Potentially inferior to jumpdrive-derived methods, tho.
- Sensors: You can practically use the same tech to get FTL sensors which will be essential for this NRP anyways. Besides without FTL sensors you would fail to even navigate with a warp drive.
- Computing, electronics: FTL circuits can increase the speed of computers and every electronic system in general.

There are perhaps more but these are the most obvious ones.
Note, you can also get various interesting applications for jump drives but in some areas they're more limited.
For example it's rather difficult to imagine the application of jump drives for sensor technology.

[Ranked] Four Way: Convergence of Power

<Snipped quote by GreivousKhan>

Dude that armour is like T7-8 (maybe earlier was a bit of an exaggeration, but not by much) at least. Look at the advancement humanity has made in armour construction, we've gone from a plate of mail to a Kevlar vest, which is more than five times as effective. That took like 1000 fucking years, imagine how far ahead technology is that's 50x Kevlar.

@MelonHead

20 years, give or take.


Also problem with the multipliers is that they are only really relevant in reality for specific situations.
The only universal protection is density (at least when it comes to impacts, particle radiation is a whole different issue).

[Ranked] Four Way: Convergence of Power

Oddly, The fire shields, and sonic wards were never talked about.

@GreivousKhan

It'd mess with my attacks for sure but I rather find the idea of Alicia's methods fail and she wacking her brains over a solution amusing.
Generally I meet adversity with anticipation. Guess we are similar on this front.