|
Darkrenown posted:And while spaceships of course don't actually exist they are common enough in scifi that the concept should be familiar to a reader of the genre,
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2015 21:57
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 26, 2024 00:18 |
|
|
Unless your ship is extra cool, you can probably get away with just telling me if the engines are on the back or nacelles, plus what kinda shape it resembles. Maybe tell me if it rotates to make gravity, if it makes a difference.
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2015 22:03
|
|
|
Hughlander posted:I just hated growing up and reading the pulp novels where the cover art had nothing in common with the descriptions in the books. Even early HH had these star destroyer looking things where every book mentioned but didn't describe the "double hammerhead" inherent in each ship design Hah! I grew up with cover art looking like it was made from people under drugs. (And later I learned the old guy hammering out all those old covers from my favourite SF-series actually really looked like he was constantly high. I have to look if there's a picture of him in that huge white special commemorative book I have. He was practically a walking old artist cliché.) Ironically though, it always looked at least a bit like what was in the books, sometimes he even got rather close. Darkrenown posted:Do note that the ships are described, mostly in their capabilities and what they are doing, it's just their visual description which is not detailed. We're told their size, weight, types of weapons and armour, details about their roles and design philosophy, important systems, details about when said important systems blow up, etc. See, here I have to disagree completely. But this is probably because of cultural influence -I grew up with SF where visual description and characters were considered more important like irrelevant fluff like all that numerical stuff. We still got super-detailed line-drawings of the spaceships, but that was more a "because we can"-issue. If you wanted to know how many impulse-cannons an Ultraschlachtschiff like the Crest IV had, you could look up the line-drawings, but in the stories itself what the people onboard were doing was more relevant. Meanwhile, the rest of the world got pulp books so lazily made multiple books had their covers recycled from other books. Many SF-books I've only lend from libraries kind of blend together in my head because of this, some of those I never found again later since I only remember bits and pieces from the plot and the cover, but not the title.
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2015 23:11
|
|
|
The Muffinlord posted:Unless your ship is extra cool, you can probably get away with just telling me if the engines are on the back or nacelles, plus what kinda shape it resembles. Maybe tell me if it rotates to make gravity, if it makes a difference. And why should your ships not be extra cool? C'mon, this is sci-fi. Let's bring the sense of wonder.
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2015 23:55
|
|
|
Libluini posted:If you wanted to know how many impulse-cannons an Ultraschlachtschiff like the Crest IV had
|
|
#
?
Sep 15, 2015 05:50
|
|
|
Khizan posted:David Drake's Hammer's Slammers books are pretty excellent in terms of military science fiction, though they're about a ground-based mercenary company and not space opera in any fashion. He's a Baen author, which is usually a bad sign, but he's also a Vietnam veteran who saw actual combat and it shows; his writing is definitely not "rah rah Space America gently caress Yeah Kill all Space Browns!!". Drake is more why Baen has a rep forMilSF than the other way around. He's been in the business since long before pst of Baen's authors and pretty much defined the genre.
|
|
#
?
Sep 15, 2015 07:01
|
|
|
mllaneza posted:Drake is more why Baen has a rep forMilSF than the other way around. He's been in the business since long before pst of Baen's authors and pretty much defined the genre. David drake is probably the best milsf writer, and without being a terrible person like most of the other milsf writers.
|
|
#
?
Sep 15, 2015 07:19
|
|
|
He's always seemed to have this attitude of "I have seen too much terrible poo poo to want to actively go out and make more terrible poo poo" to me.
|
|
#
?
Sep 15, 2015 07:42
|
|
|
I've been reading Vacuum Diagrams and really digging it (even if the science goes way over my head some of the time). I haven't read any of the Xeelee books before but after this it's very tempting to get my hands on books like Ring and Raft after getting an intriguing glance into an element of those stories.
|
|
#
?
Sep 15, 2015 18:15
|
|
|
Miss-Bomarc posted:Only, what, eight more months until "Legend of the Galactic Heroes" comes out? drat, I'm looking forward to it! Nice to know, though I don't know what anime from the 80s has to do with German SF from the 60s?  An example from old Perry Rhodan cover artist Johnny Bruck: He made most of the early covers. And less fashist and more drug-induced looking. From a story-arc several years later, still in the 60s. Later on the publisher re-released the old crap in large silvery hardcovers with old errors corrected and some of the more batshit-crazy stuff like the main protagonist using a magic stola to get superpowers retconned out of existence. Are there giant mice in Legend of the Galactic Heroes? If yes, I may take a look some time. 
|
|
#
?
Sep 15, 2015 23:37
|
|
|
Libluini posted:Nice to know, though I don't know what anime from the 80s has to do with German SF from the 60s?
|
|
#
?
Sep 16, 2015 03:41
|
|
|
I'm halfway through Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie (I know, I know, I'm really late to it) and really enjoying it. The prose is incredibly strong and propulsive, especially for a debut novel, and the underlying theme of identity and individuality is interesting. My only complaint is that the plotline taking place in the past starts out pretty drat slow. Also, there are a lot of Radaachi words being dropped where the context is a little unclear. For example:quote:I had never lost the knowledge of my ancillaries, twenty-bodied One Amaat, One Toren, One Etrepa, One Bo, and Two Esk, hands and feet for serving those officers, voices to speak to them.
|
|
#
?
Sep 17, 2015 18:53
|
|
|
Those are basically like radio alphabet (they're actually names of the Radaachi deities). E.g. 'Easy Company'. Amaat, Toren, Bo, etc. are variables used for the different units in the military structure of a ship. So when you have a "Bo Lieutenant" it means the lieutenant of the Bo unit. It's a matter of taste but I like figuring stuff from context over time as a I read a novel as long as it doesn't get in the way. Where it gets in your way probably varies between readers.
|
|
#
?
Sep 17, 2015 19:09
|
|
|
It has been a while since I read Ancillary Justice, so I may be off on a few details, but I'm pretty sure I have this right. The main character is a ship AI who was capable of running specially modified human bodies in mass quantities, so all the soldiers on her ship are just extensions of her. Those bodies are called ancillaries and their names are basically their squad designation. One Amaat is first soldier of Amaat squad, Two Esk is the second soldier in Esk squad, etc.
|
|
#
?
Sep 17, 2015 19:15
|
|
|
Khizan posted:It has been a while since I read Ancillary Justice, so I may be off on a few details, but I'm pretty sure I have this right. I wasn't sure if there's a difference between One Amaat, One Esk, etc.
|
|
#
?
Sep 17, 2015 20:05
|
|
|
Maybe it was more like One Esk was the first subunit of the Esk unit? It's been a while since I read it.
|
|
#
?
Sep 17, 2015 21:15
|
|
|
Isn't there some flexibility as to how the AI spreads itself out? I was remembering that when One Esk comes back to the ship it mentions something about not needing so many bodies and so they were mostly put back into storage. I got the sense that while One Esk was deployed on the planet it was operating mostly as an autonomous entity consisting of those units in that location rather than as part of the ship's whole but then when returned it became essentially an extension of the ship (maybe due to issues of lag?). I guess it is confusing that it doesn't end up with 10 Esk, 11 Esk, etc and instead they are all 1 Esk.
|
|
#
?
Sep 17, 2015 22:03
|
|
|
So I'm 80 pages into The Dragon Never Sleeps and it's just an unstoppable tide of unexplained jargon... I feel like I'm joy going to understand anything until I finish the book and reread it.
|
|
#
?
Sep 19, 2015 20:03
|
|
|
Khizan posted:One Amaat is first soldier of Amaat squad, Two Esk is the second soldier in Esk squad, etc.
|
|
#
?
Sep 20, 2015 00:44
|
|
|
Expanse #4 isn't perfect but its a return to form. I'd recommend skipping Expanse #3 entirely.
|
|
#
?
Sep 20, 2015 05:56
|
|
|
Miss-Bomarc posted:Actually I think it's more like the whole unit designation, like "First Armored Brigade", "Third Infantry Regiment", that sort of thing. So "twenty-bodied One Amaat" is the first unit of the Amaat type, and there are twenty people in it. (to the extent that any of them could be called "people", of course.) No, Breq is specifically Justice of Toren One Esk, the first of the Esk unit.
|
|
#
?
Sep 20, 2015 06:14
|
|
|
FuzzySlippers posted:Isn't there some flexibility as to how the AI spreads itself out? I was remembering that when One Esk comes back to the ship it mentions something about not needing so many bodies and so they were mostly put back into storage. I'm pretty sure this is because she doesn't have duties that require so many bodies and so most of them go back into stasis to prevent wear and tear.
|
|
#
?
Sep 20, 2015 06:28
|
|
|
Baloogan posted:Expanse #4 isn't perfect but its a return to form. I'd recommend skipping Expanse #3 entirely. What's the complaints on 3? I'm only 25% in but so far it seems like it's as good as the first 25% of 1. Holden just met the Marines on the station.
|
|
#
?
Sep 20, 2015 14:31
|
|
|
I really wouldn't want to spoil it for you if you are enjoying it. The expanse series is awesome 
|
|
#
?
Sep 20, 2015 14:57
|
|
|
Khizan posted:I'm pretty sure this is because she doesn't have duties that require so many bodies and so most of them go back into stasis to prevent wear and tear. Yeah but are the extra bodies Esk 10-20 or are they multiple One Esk? Kinda weird then what One Esk is designating. Is every Esk assigned to a human officer? Is it just a reference to which human officer they are assigned? Hughlander posted:What's the complaints on 3? I'm only 25% in but so far it seems like it's as good as the first 25% of 1. Holden just met the Marines on the station. I dunno I enjoyed 3 more than 4. 3 had some weaker side characters but the plot is solid and I enjoyed the rest of the characters well enough. 4's plot is mostly much weaker and it has a lot of really tedious characters. Haven't read 5 yet but that one has been praised here. Even if 4 is my series low point it's still not a terrible book and the series is pretty great. A big weakness both books share is that the Space Racism is handled worse than the other books and it's only getting less interesting as the books go on.
|
|
#
?
Sep 20, 2015 21:48
|
|
|
FuzzySlippers posted:Yeah but are the extra bodies Esk 10-20 or are they multiple One Esk? Kinda weird then what One Esk is designating. Is every Esk assigned to a human officer? Is it just a reference to which human officer they are assigned? I just started a re-read of this, largely due to this conversation, and I'm pretty sure that "One Esk" is the first squad of the Esk group. Breq even mentions how the Seven Issa group was comprised of regular humans, but that their lieutenant sometimes just called individual members of it by "Seven Issa" instead of their actual names.
|
|
#
?
Sep 20, 2015 22:22
|
|
|
Hughlander posted:What's the complaints on 3? I'm only 25% in but so far it seems like it's as good as the first 25% of 1. Holden just met the Marines on the station. Baloogan may have a perfectly valid complaint (or more), but if my anonymous recommendation means anything then definately read book #3. I liked it as much as the first two 
|
|
#
?
Sep 21, 2015 03:30
|
|
|
Shakugan posted:You should look into the first two books of the Red Rising trilogy. While the first book is military sci-fi, it's not space based. The second book is though. I finished The Dark Forest last week and decided to give Red Rising a try after seeing you recommend it. Burned through it in a couple days and I'm now about 1/3 through Golden Sun. Really awesome books. They definitely don't have the "mystery and awe factor" I usually look for in sci fi but holy poo poo does the author Pierce Brown known how to write a good page turning story. I haven't been this into a series since The Southern Reach earlier in the summer.
|
|
#
?
Sep 22, 2015 22:27
|
|
|
Is there much out there where Humanity is the Villain? I mean most sci fi has human villains, but the race as a whole? Secondly what else out there is similar to The Damned by Alan Dean Foster? I.e. humanity is the most crazy badass alien race in the milieu? Finally I've realized I don't see The Damned mentioned much as a book, it's pulp but its a great example of seeing a perspective of humanity as the warmongers of the universe.
|
|
#
?
Sep 24, 2015 07:54
|
|
|
Washout posted:Is there much out there where Humanity is the Villain? I mean most sci fi has human villains, but the race as a whole? Old Man's War delves further into this as the series goes on, and really dismantles the Colonial Union's 'hard man doing hard things' justification for its atrocities.
|
|
#
?
Sep 24, 2015 10:44
|
|
|
Yeah OMW definitely treads into the same place that Starship Troopers does, more quantity but less nuance.
|
|
#
?
Sep 24, 2015 10:54
|
|
|
Washout posted:Is there much out there where Humanity is the Villain? I mean most sci fi has human villains, but the race as a whole? I vaguely remember a few short stories where the ***shocking twist*** is that the invading aliens crushing everything before them are human (and the viewpoint character(s) are not), but don't recall any names offhand. I can't think of any novels or series that do this, although I recall a few where humans are inadvertently a threat due to their alien mindset and the political implications of contact with them (Cherryh is fond of this in the Chanur and Foreigner books, but those aren't really space opera), or where one particular faction of humans are the villains even if others are friendly to or allied with the protagonists (Cook's Doomstalker trilogy). quote:Secondly what else out there is similar to The Damned by Alan Dean Foster? I.e. humanity is the most crazy badass alien race in the milieu? Ringo's Legacy of the Aldenata, where humanity is recruited by the (pacifistic) Galactic Federation as the only thing badass enough to fight off the invading Posleen. Arguably Laumer's Bolo/Concordiat setting as well, although we only see fragments of that.
|
|
#
?
Sep 24, 2015 13:04
|
|
|
Washout posted:Is there much out there where Humanity is the Villain? I mean most sci fi has human villains, but the race as a whole? Octavia Butler's Xenogenesis series sort of fits the bill, here. I suppose it depends on your point of view. Either way, you should read it. It's good.
|
|
#
?
Sep 24, 2015 17:31
|
|
|
Washout posted:Is there much out there where Humanity is the Villain? I mean most sci fi has human villains, but the race as a whole?
|
|
#
?
Sep 24, 2015 22:17
|
|
|
Washout posted:
Saberhagen's Berserker stories.
|
|
#
?
Sep 25, 2015 17:14
|
|
|
Stars, Won't You Hide Me? by Ben Bova, which for some reason I thought was a Joe Haldeman book.
|
|
#
?
Sep 26, 2015 01:05
|
|
|
Drakhoran posted:Saberhagen's Berserker stories. Eh...I guess you're technically correct but in the novels it's kinda made out to be a good thing as Solarian humans are the only species able to stand up against the machines. With humanity (and all life) being faced with extinction it's not really warmongering at that point but survival.
|
|
#
?
Sep 26, 2015 01:55
|
|
|
In the early Berserker stories, weren't the various human planets each specific analogues to 1500s European countries and the Berserkers analogs for the Ottomans?
|
|
#
?
Sep 26, 2015 04:30
|
|
|
Chairman Capone posted:In the early Berserker stories, weren't the various human planets each specific analogues to 1500s European countries and the Berserkers analogs for the Ottomans? I didn't recognize anything like that, but the timeline is so all over the place and there are so many authors that it would be easy to see something like that.
|
|
#
?
Sep 26, 2015 10:11
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 26, 2024 00:18 |
|
|
I think someone said in either this or the SF/F thread that the newest book from the guy that did the Kresnov series has humanity as villains? I'll go look. There we go. Looks like it's $2 for today and tomorrow? Not sure if that's a good sign.
|
|
#
?
Sep 29, 2015 08:34
|
|
