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Phobophilia posted:A story aspect that I didn't really like was the mysterious 4th faction that was trying to get everyone to kill one another. Like I can buy that someone can hide a space station somewhere and funnel in refined metals and stealth materials and advanced schematics, but who are they? What motivates them to fight and die? Because corporate troops and mercenaries are cowards, they have no motivation to fight and die against highly armed and moraled Martians. Because while the attack on the Donnagher was well planned and executed, they must have gone in with the expectation of losses (especially the boarders). I won't spoil anything but this is all addressed later, your patience is rewarded.
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Sep 6, 2016 07:40
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Phobophilia posted:Because while the attack on the Donnagher was well planned and executed, they must have gone in with the expectation of losses (especially the boarders). So we have five super secret next-generation stealth light-attack ships, what's the best way to use our STEALTH ships? Oh I know, let's burn directly at the enemy battleship in a big rear end group to make sure they see us coming from hours away, so we can get rolled by the enemy's superior firepower and armor.
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Sep 7, 2016 02:10
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INTJ Mastermind posted:So we have five super secret next-generation stealth light-attack ships, what's the best way to use our STEALTH ships? Oh I know, let's burn directly at the enemy battleship in a big rear end group to make sure they see us coming from hours away, so we can get rolled by the enemy's superior firepower and armor. And yet they still took out the Donnager, so...
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Sep 7, 2016 02:37
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INTJ Mastermind posted:So we have five super secret next-generation stealth light-attack ships, what's the best way to use our STEALTH ships? Oh I know, let's burn directly at the enemy battleship in a big rear end group to make sure they see us coming from hours away, so we can get rolled by the enemy's superior firepower and armor. if you have any better ideas....?
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Sep 7, 2016 02:50
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Captain Fargle posted:It's really funny going back through the books again in preparation for Babylon's Ashes. After watching the show my mental image of some characters has shifted completely. Everything Miller does is done by Thomas Jane in a bad haircut now. With that in mind, re-reading Nemesis Games gave me so much more respect for the authors because it feels like they've heard the wacky wishes that most fans of any series have (Oh poo poo how awesome would it be if all the badasses in this series teamed up?), and pulled it off without it being pandering and lame.
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Sep 7, 2016 02:57
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The Donager was escaping with witnesses to the attack on the Canterbury. The whole idea was to start a war between Mars and Earth remember, they didn't have much of a choice but to chase and destroy the Donager. As it happens it was for nothing, but they couldn't know the witnesses would escape again.
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Sep 7, 2016 02:58
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Also, I'm pretty sure the stealth tech won't hide a ship under thrust, so if the ships were clustered together when the Donnager arrived, their options were pretty much either to hide or to rush in.
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Sep 7, 2016 04:01
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Yeah, you can't hide a torch ship using its drive. People were watching the battle unfold from one end of the solar system to the other.
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Sep 7, 2016 04:22
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One thing the show doesn't get across, probably because it's more dramatic, is that they could see the ships coming at them for days, not hours. Space is big, and travel is slow and noisy. You can burn hard at the start and go ballistic to make yourself look like a piece of junk (or even less, with the stealth tech) but the burn itself will always be visible to basically everyone in the solar system. And if you go ballistic and your target decides to change course by a single degree before you get there you might miss them by a million miles. Also, quote:With that in mind, re-reading Nemesis Game... There's a book thread now! It needs more posts. I think talking about stuff that has already happened in the books is fine but stuff like that from book 5, even if you don't say anything specific, is kinda bad form in this one. NmareBfly fucked around with this message at 05:03 on Sep 7, 2016 |
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Sep 7, 2016 05:01
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Something they completely failed to address: the Roci nuked the Anubis, that would have shown up on the sensors.
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Sep 7, 2016 05:02
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Phobophilia posted:Something they completely failed to address: the Roci nuked the Anubis, that would have shown up on the sensors. Did they specifically say nukes? I'm pretty sure the Roci doesn't have nukes.
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Sep 7, 2016 05:06
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They either overload the Anubis' reactor or use its own missiles, I think? Good point about the explosion being noticed but I guess the question is who'd want to do anything about it? No one knows what got exploded or why, and half the solar system thinks they're probably terrorists already. Also, to know it was the Roci specifically you'd also need to look at the timing of arrival and departure logs from the station they've been to and sync up with the drive signature that went to an asteroid then ran away from an exploding one -- but that station was Eros so good luck with that. 
NmareBfly fucked around with this message at 05:25 on Sep 7, 2016 |
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Sep 7, 2016 05:23
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Considering the processing and pattern-recognition powers of Expanse-era computers, it should be trivial to track every single drive signature across the entire system and cross-reference them against transponders and registered flight paths. And flagging them if they behave suspiciously (like turn off their freaking transponders). Setting up such a panopticon should be due diligence for any Earth (considering the planet-killing potential of just a single ship). But that itself would preclude the plot of the entire series, as there would be no way for the Anubis to hide after nuking the Cant.
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Sep 7, 2016 05:49
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And who was around to hear him say "Rosebud" anyway? (You're right, I think, but it's just one of those things you just have to go with...)
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Sep 7, 2016 06:33
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Phobophilia posted:Considering the processing and pattern-recognition powers of Expanse-era computers, it should be trivial to track every single drive signature across the entire system and cross-reference them against transponders and registered flight paths. And flagging them if they behave suspiciously (like turn off their freaking transponders). Setting up such a panopticon should be due diligence for any Earth (considering the planet-killing potential of just a single ship). I don't think so. Since the setting doesn't have Star Wars like sensors, you need optical scopes to track ship drive plumes, and that's a physical asset that's more limited than a hypothetical panopticon computer connected to a system wide radar that can track transponders and drive plumes without direct observation. Presumably you can track a very large number of ships, but space is really really big, and there are an absurd number of ships in the system, so you need other intel to know what suspicious or important ships to track with scopes if their transponder goes dead. Before the nuking of the Cant, the stealth fleet was a total unknown, and a relatively anonymous ice hauler probably wasn't under direct observation. That would also explain why nobody noticed an asteroid explode near the flight path of a random gas freighter. ATP_Power fucked around with this message at 07:00 on Sep 7, 2016 |
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Sep 7, 2016 06:58
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Considering we can get some information on the orbital mechanics of planets in other star systems, it really isn't a problem to see ship drives within Sol system. Any deficiencies can be solved by scaling up: more sensor stations, more sensors, more processing power. And while there are alot of ships, there aren't that many, and unlike humans, ships move predictably. So let's just say the earth government had a system like this going for a while, but due to bureaucratic infighting and cost overruns and neglect, as everyone's settled into a comfy status quo.
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Sep 7, 2016 07:50
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INTJ Mastermind posted:So we have five super secret next-generation stealth light-attack ships, what's the best way to use our STEALTH ships? Oh I know, let's burn directly at the enemy battleship in a big rear end group to make sure they see us coming from hours away, so we can get rolled by the enemy's superior firepower and armor. Stealth ships aren’t magic. You can’t hide a rocket engine, so unless your target’s path enables you to ambush them, you have no choice. Deceiving the Donnager about the size and firepower of their force was the best they could do.
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Sep 8, 2016 00:27
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Platystemon posted:Stealth ships aren’t magic. You can’t hide a rocket engine, so unless your target’s path enables you to ambush them, you have no choice. That's what they want you to think  Wizards destroyed the Donnager!
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Sep 8, 2016 02:03
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Toast Museum posted:Also, I'm pretty sure the stealth tech won't hide a ship under thrust, so if the ships were clustered together when the Donnager arrived, their options were pretty much either to hide or to rush in. Yep, they're explicit about this in the books. You can hide if you turn your poo poo off but firing an Epstein drive is visible to anyone anywhere in the Solar System. Normal ship tracking is done by transponders and radar, like commercial flights today. If you gently caress with/disconnect your transponder (which is difficult but not impossible) then you can hide from casual searching.
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Sep 8, 2016 02:23
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EM DRIVE MOTHERFUCKERS UNTRACABLE loving PROPULSION gently caress YES no stealth in spacep eeps can suck it
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Sep 8, 2016 03:01
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Baloogan posted:EM DRIVE MOTHERFUCKERS UNTRACABLE loving PROPULSION gently caress YES no stealth in spacep eeps can suck it The space ship that is radiating heat to keep the people inside from roasting to death is still warmer than the background of space. Sorry, no stealth.
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Sep 8, 2016 04:01
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Hughlander posted:The space ship that is radiating heat to keep the people inside from roasting to death is still warmer than the background of space. Sorry, no stealth. Yes, but you can at least try to store it internally for a time, then radiate it in a direction no one is looking when the store has reached capacity.
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Sep 8, 2016 04:30
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Platystemon posted:Yes, but you can at least try to store it internally for a time, then radiate it in a direction no one is looking when the store has reached capacity. I believe that's exactly how the Normandy (and other stealth ships) in Mass Effect works
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Sep 8, 2016 04:32
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poo poo out pods filled with molten metals to dump heat god I hate the no stealth in space circle jerk
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Sep 8, 2016 04:45
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a million alien races hide their existance in the milky way and the stealth in space crowd crow like motherfuckers every single day
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Sep 8, 2016 04:46
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they're not hiding they're just ekeing out existence in irradiated wastelands after a sewer inspector got too drunk and got to the button
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Sep 8, 2016 04:51
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closest u ever will get to space workers is sewer inspectors technology + robots + pipes etc + hate + SCBAs etc
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Sep 8, 2016 04:54
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404notfound posted:I believe that's exactly how the Normandy (and other stealth ships) in Mass Effect works Yep. Expanse stealth is more about radar-absorbing/scattering coatings, if I recall correctly. It's been a minute since I read the books, though.
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Sep 8, 2016 05:26
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Toast Museum posted:Yep. Expanse stealth is more about radar-absorbing/scattering coatings, if I recall correctly. It's been a minute since I read the books, though. In the books they do see them thermally first because the stealth composites were absorbing the Cant's LADAR and dumping it out as a faint heat signature even though the ships were otherwise powered down. I feel like a lot of the questions about long distance monitoring might under-appreciate how big space is, and at least in the books it's made clear that there are a ton of ships out there and that keeping track of everything isn't just about crunching numbers - and that it's difficult to do even for the major governments. I'd also add that a major theme of the series is that Humanity is a chaotic mess, and nobody is in control, as much as they may think they are. A panopticon offering absolute knowledge doesn't fit into that kind of a story, and I think they do enough of a job in the books of at least providing some reasonable technical explanations as to why it's hard even with incredibly advanced technology (space is really big yo.)
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Sep 8, 2016 06:37
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Also I think people often forget that stealth doesn't have to be perfect to be effective. So yeah maybe you can detect the stealth ships if you're specifically looking for them but you probably aren't, and if it's good enough you miss them until it's too late. Another thing is the technology is fairly new and has only been developed by Mars, so people haven't been able to develop effective countermeasures yet.
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Sep 8, 2016 06:45
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ATP_Power posted:In the books they do see them thermally first because the stealth composites were absorbing the Cant's LADAR and dumping it out as a faint heat signature even though the ships were otherwise powered down. Space is really big but it's very easy to see things in it if they're different to the background noise. There's a web site that basically debunks all kinds of pulp sci-fi ideas and explains how, if a ship entered our solar system under thrust, we'd stand an incredibly good chance of detecting it with our contemporary technology.
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Sep 8, 2016 06:49
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Also, in a lot of ways, computers in this setting are less capable than one might expect by extrapolating out even a decade or two into the future, let alone however far from now the story takes place. Humans still drive/pilot vehicles, aim weapons, etc. The only specific example I can recall at the moment of a futuristic computer technology (as opposed to all the futuristic power generation, spaceflight, and military technology) is the auto-doc on the Roci that can perform independent diagnosis and treatment. An anomalous heat source might ping on a detector somewhere without raising any red flags.
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Sep 8, 2016 06:56
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The setting seems to presume AI is impossible, there's no evidence of it. There's better versions of the stuff we have today but nothing revolutionary.
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Sep 8, 2016 07:00
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There is the "expert system" that handles all the medicine. That is hella AI right there
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Sep 8, 2016 07:02
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Baloogan posted:There is the "expert system" that handles all the medicine. That is hella AI right there There isn't any suggestion the expert systems are capable of thought though.
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Sep 8, 2016 07:05
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There's some really capable artificial intelligences in Expanse, but they're not the typical Cortana-esque kind of AI you come to expect from sci-fi. The Roci has an AI. But I think the authors have said that it exists but its an invisible presence. And, really, why would you invent an AI that can think (in the sense that it's self-aware)? There are very few jobs where that'd be helpful. If you want a great forklift driving cargo transfer AI, you don't program it to ponder existential things, y'know?
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Sep 8, 2016 07:12
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Grand Fromage posted:There isn't any suggestion the expert systems are capable of thought though. thar aint any suggestion that ur capable of thourght either tho food 4 thought
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Sep 8, 2016 07:16
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Baloogan posted:thar aint any suggestion that ur capable of thourght either tho 
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Sep 8, 2016 07:24
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Toast Museum posted:Also, in a lot of ways, computers in this setting are less capable than one might expect by extrapolating out even a decade or two into the future, let alone however far from now the story takes place. Humans still drive/pilot vehicles, aim weapons, etc. The only specific example I can recall at the moment of a futuristic computer technology (as opposed to all the futuristic power generation, spaceflight, and military technology) is the auto-doc on the Roci that can perform independent diagnosis and treatment. An anomalous heat source might ping on a detector somewhere without raising any red flags. It's kinda quibbling but the Roci actually does do its own aiming of its weapons, it just requires human instruction to fire. A lot of things in the setting are automated, but without internal agency beyond what they were programmed by people to do. Milky Moor posted:Space is really big but it's very easy to see things in it if they're different to the background noise. There's a web site that basically debunks all kinds of pulp sci-fi ideas and explains how, if a ship entered our solar system under thrust, we'd stand an incredibly good chance of detecting it with our contemporary technology. I think I know the site you're referring to, and that line raises valid points generally, but in the context of the setting of the Expanse, each government having a limited number of super high quality optical scopes stationed throughout the system to visually monitor drive signatures - but being able to track basically everything by transponder signals makes plenty of sense. I don't know enough about radio astronomy to comment on if you can see the thrust from a spacecraft drive in a meaningful way to track a ship that way easily and cheaply, and how such systems might cope with a massive number of signatures. It doesn't seem impossible to me that while you theoretically could be able to track every ship in the system by drive plume, to build and maintain that capacity costs money and resources nobody's willing to spend when transponders work just fine most of the time.
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Sep 8, 2016 07:27
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Grand Fromage posted:The setting seems to presume AI is impossible, there's no evidence of it. There's better versions of the stuff we have today but nothing revolutionary. There’s no evidence of human‐created AI.
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Sep 8, 2016 07:29
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