To travel in space, you need a ship. Well, usually you need a ship, at least to do it safely or quickly.
If your character might have one, feel free to present it and tell us about it here! Remember that it needs to be a somewhat long-range vessel which can be run by and has stations for the type of crew requested in the contract (so not too big, but a proper cargo vessel), and which has the right facilities to safely and securely store a small payload of cargo which has special handling requirements. Details left vague for now. Armaments beyond anti-debris point defense and conventional shielding not required, but welcome.
Additionally, lets talk about our favorite forms of FtL! We'll need some of that tech, too!
Decisions on which ship and drive system to use are up for general discussion or, if needed, will be chosen by whichever one gives me the most zoomies to think about.
If your character might have one, feel free to present it and tell us about it here! Remember that it needs to be a somewhat long-range vessel which can be run by and has stations for the type of crew requested in the contract (so not too big, but a proper cargo vessel), and which has the right facilities to safely and securely store a small payload of cargo which has special handling requirements. Details left vague for now. Armaments beyond anti-debris point defense and conventional shielding not required, but welcome.
Additionally, lets talk about our favorite forms of FtL! We'll need some of that tech, too!
Decisions on which ship and drive system to use are up for general discussion or, if needed, will be chosen by whichever one gives me the most zoomies to think about.
My character doesn't have his own ship but I have a few suggestions for the ship that gets used.
For propulsion we could mimic real life and use chemical rockets for when going through the atmosphere and electric/ion engines for when in space to save on fuel costs. Although we could choose a different option and use nuclear engines, either going for an engine powered by the heat of a nuclear reactor (this was a real thing) or an 'engine' that uses the force of the explosion of a nuclear bomb to propel the craft (this was planned but never used thankfully)
As for defence against debris we could have an icebreaker like ram/shield on the front of the craft or use small flares/rockets to blast away anything that comes too close
For propulsion we could mimic real life and use chemical rockets for when going through the atmosphere and electric/ion engines for when in space to save on fuel costs. Although we could choose a different option and use nuclear engines, either going for an engine powered by the heat of a nuclear reactor (this was a real thing) or an 'engine' that uses the force of the explosion of a nuclear bomb to propel the craft (this was planned but never used thankfully)
As for defence against debris we could have an icebreaker like ram/shield on the front of the craft or use small flares/rockets to blast away anything that comes too close
Edward wrote:
My character doesn't have his own ship but I have a few suggestions for the ship that gets used.
For propulsion we could mimic real life and use chemical rockets for when going through the atmosphere and electric/ion engines for when in space to save on fuel costs. Although we could choose a different option and use nuclear engines, either going for an engine powered by the heat of a nuclear reactor (this was a real thing) or an 'engine' that uses the force of the explosion of a nuclear bomb to propel the craft (this was planned but never used thankfully)
As for defence against debris we could have an icebreaker like ram/shield on the front of the craft or use small flares/rockets to blast away anything that comes too close
For propulsion we could mimic real life and use chemical rockets for when going through the atmosphere and electric/ion engines for when in space to save on fuel costs. Although we could choose a different option and use nuclear engines, either going for an engine powered by the heat of a nuclear reactor (this was a real thing) or an 'engine' that uses the force of the explosion of a nuclear bomb to propel the craft (this was planned but never used thankfully)
As for defence against debris we could have an icebreaker like ram/shield on the front of the craft or use small flares/rockets to blast away anything that comes too close
These are interesting options, but may not be what we'll need for interstellar FTL travel. Still, very worth keeping in mind for sublight travel. Probably at minimum using fusion-based systems rather than conventional fission reaction systems, but the concepts still carry over for the most part. Flashy kind of tech.
Oh Shoot! I totally missed this section! Feel free to delete my ship related comments from the introduction chat! Sorry! First time really using this site!
I love the realistic propulsion suggestions, but i must say i don't think chemical rockets would work. They would limit our DeltaV extremely, and likely require a launch in stages from any world that is at least earth gravity.
I mean we can leave a larger ship in orbit but any suborbital flight on chemical rockets would still be an extreme drain on the fuel reserves. Basically we will be mostly hauling fuel.
Since we have a 14 day travel estimate to deliver a package to another star system I imagine we will need at least Fusion power. I am assuming we need to be out of atmosphere and probably not in close orbit of a plant to engage Faster than light system whatever we decide to use otherwise there will be little reason for conventional space ships.
Here are suggestions for conventional propulsion, let me know if anyone likes any of them
Simple fusion or antimatter catalyzed fusion.
Fuel: Hydrogen or it's isotopes (Deuterium or Tritium) Possibly a tiny amount of antimatter as a catalyst. (This is simple and easy, has that advantage of fuel being ether super abundant or rare and more expensive if we want to go that route.)
Pulse fusion. Also called "bomb drive" Basically ship launches hydrogen bombs that detonate behind the ship behind a special protective plate. That pushes on the ship.
Fuel: Thermonuclear bombs. (this has advantage of being fun and using "nukes" disadvantage is atmospheric flight is going to be messy)
Antimatter Photon torch Basically same principle but we use antimatter instead of nukes. Actual explosions can be made smaller, it's more efficient. And could possibly work in the atmosphere without causing significant "fallout"
Fuel: Antimatter (must be contained somehow) Also has consequences of exhaust being basically a beam weapon, and overall Antimatter would probably be useful in variety of situations.
Solar sails/Beam Sails Advantage, no fuel needed. Look cool or ridiculous... Huge and give the ship an aura of Grotesque, while being somewhat low tech..
Disadvantage kind of the same as chemical rockets but outside of atmosphere. Limited direction, limited thrust. Also cannot at all be used in atmosphere. Beam sails require a megastructure installation that provides the "beam"
Now FTL (Faster than light) propulsion suggestions:
Conventional "Hyperspace drive" Basically we don't worry about it, engage when we are out of "gravitational well" of a planet, maybe calculate the jump and it takes us near our destination.
Advantage: Simple, we don't have to worry about it too much, possibly hard or impossible to intercept.
Disadvantage: Kind of boring.
Stargates: Think Mass effect, we reach a point in the system (better be relatively close to inner planets) And it takes us to another gate somewhere. Same idea as wormhole drive and the like. Kind of requires structures to be present in space already but can be swapped for "natural wormholes" or used in combination with hyperdrive or jump drive, basically maybe bigger or more advanced ships can jump themselves but smaller and simpler drives can use gate.. Anyone I'm sure everyone here understands the concept.
Warhammer 40k ~ ish warp. A ship basically travels trough literal "Space hell" to get to destination. There things that live there. Demons and worse who basically want to kill, possess, eat, and drive mad, and possibly do other unnatural things to any one who flies trough, not necessarily in that order. They can be kept at bay by combination of special forcefields special psionics and luck...
Advantage: Fun.
Disadvantage, doesn't really suit the mood of every story, also if critical members of crew required to navigate or protect the ship during warp is out of commission for any reason, we can be eaten by demons.. Or worse.
Other things we might consider:
Artificial gravity. MY char is fine to be in 0g or close for any amount of time but since we got "humanoids" We might want to have some gravity. Ship acceleration or rotation or combination of this can work.
Dampeners: If we need to fly far in normal space with accelerations exceeding 1g (mostly due to time constraints) we need to figure out how we dealing with that. Now if we have some sort of devices that work like inertial dampeners etc. we can as well have "artificial gravity" as long as equipment functions.
(Ok I apologize for giant info dump and realize that we don't necessarily have to deal with all the space faring concerns at once but i thought that some things are kind of important to mention. Also I'll post my ship idea probably later today.)
I mean we can leave a larger ship in orbit but any suborbital flight on chemical rockets would still be an extreme drain on the fuel reserves. Basically we will be mostly hauling fuel.
Since we have a 14 day travel estimate to deliver a package to another star system I imagine we will need at least Fusion power. I am assuming we need to be out of atmosphere and probably not in close orbit of a plant to engage Faster than light system whatever we decide to use otherwise there will be little reason for conventional space ships.
Here are suggestions for conventional propulsion, let me know if anyone likes any of them
Simple fusion or antimatter catalyzed fusion.
Fuel: Hydrogen or it's isotopes (Deuterium or Tritium) Possibly a tiny amount of antimatter as a catalyst. (This is simple and easy, has that advantage of fuel being ether super abundant or rare and more expensive if we want to go that route.)
Pulse fusion. Also called "bomb drive" Basically ship launches hydrogen bombs that detonate behind the ship behind a special protective plate. That pushes on the ship.
Fuel: Thermonuclear bombs. (this has advantage of being fun and using "nukes" disadvantage is atmospheric flight is going to be messy)
Antimatter Photon torch Basically same principle but we use antimatter instead of nukes. Actual explosions can be made smaller, it's more efficient. And could possibly work in the atmosphere without causing significant "fallout"
Fuel: Antimatter (must be contained somehow) Also has consequences of exhaust being basically a beam weapon, and overall Antimatter would probably be useful in variety of situations.
Solar sails/Beam Sails Advantage, no fuel needed. Look cool or ridiculous... Huge and give the ship an aura of Grotesque, while being somewhat low tech..
Disadvantage kind of the same as chemical rockets but outside of atmosphere. Limited direction, limited thrust. Also cannot at all be used in atmosphere. Beam sails require a megastructure installation that provides the "beam"
Now FTL (Faster than light) propulsion suggestions:
Conventional "Hyperspace drive" Basically we don't worry about it, engage when we are out of "gravitational well" of a planet, maybe calculate the jump and it takes us near our destination.
Advantage: Simple, we don't have to worry about it too much, possibly hard or impossible to intercept.
Disadvantage: Kind of boring.
Stargates: Think Mass effect, we reach a point in the system (better be relatively close to inner planets) And it takes us to another gate somewhere. Same idea as wormhole drive and the like. Kind of requires structures to be present in space already but can be swapped for "natural wormholes" or used in combination with hyperdrive or jump drive, basically maybe bigger or more advanced ships can jump themselves but smaller and simpler drives can use gate.. Anyone I'm sure everyone here understands the concept.
Warhammer 40k ~ ish warp. A ship basically travels trough literal "Space hell" to get to destination. There things that live there. Demons and worse who basically want to kill, possess, eat, and drive mad, and possibly do other unnatural things to any one who flies trough, not necessarily in that order. They can be kept at bay by combination of special forcefields special psionics and luck...
Advantage: Fun.
Disadvantage, doesn't really suit the mood of every story, also if critical members of crew required to navigate or protect the ship during warp is out of commission for any reason, we can be eaten by demons.. Or worse.
Other things we might consider:
Artificial gravity. MY char is fine to be in 0g or close for any amount of time but since we got "humanoids" We might want to have some gravity. Ship acceleration or rotation or combination of this can work.
Dampeners: If we need to fly far in normal space with accelerations exceeding 1g (mostly due to time constraints) we need to figure out how we dealing with that. Now if we have some sort of devices that work like inertial dampeners etc. we can as well have "artificial gravity" as long as equipment functions.
(Ok I apologize for giant info dump and realize that we don't necessarily have to deal with all the space faring concerns at once but i thought that some things are kind of important to mention. Also I'll post my ship idea probably later today.)
The ship "Horizon Tentacle" Is a massive craft, it's black surface has oily, iridescent sheen, yet seemed not to reflect any starlight, instead bending it in impossible ways. Jagged angles and curves, create a geometry that the mind struggled to grasp—edges that shouldn't connect, curves that seemed to twist inward upon themselves. It's surface bears many marks from micro meteorite impacts and strange corrosion it looks like it flown in real space for untold centuries. It's leaking atmosphere and possibly fuel but in minimal amounts. On the bottom is a large crudely welded section - crew accommodations designed for humanoid crew to live in relative comfort with some equipment that allows sentient beings with sight to work on and possibly navigate the craft should the need arises. This portion actually have illuminators and is meant to provide gravity if the ship is rotating around it's center of mass.
I love the info dump here, we could possibly go for a combination of a fusion engine for normal flight, solar sails to get higher mpg and maybe the pulse fusion for FTL travel or PF and gates like in Star Trucker/Mass Effect. The ship could have a gravity ring for habitation for the humanoid characters so that we have a combination of areas with and areas without gravity.
I may be biased from previous sci-fi experiences of stories getting bogged down trying to jive with realism, but I am definitely up for fleshing out a simple scifi-y fusion generator/thrusters + hyper/warpdrive! To be clear I am definitely not opposed to anything shared above but that would be my preference!
FloraBora wrote:
I may be biased from previous sci-fi experiences of stories getting bogged down trying to jive with realism, but I am definitely up for fleshing out a simple scifi-y fusion generator/thrusters + hyper/warpdrive!
I kind of agree, i love realism but if we are going for a lightharted "firefly" ish space adventures maybe simple is better.
We can have beam sails as auxillary for the sake of being funny/grotesque.
Budenniy wrote:
I kind of agree, i love realism but if we are going for a lightharted "firefly" ish space adventures maybe simple is better.
We can have beam sails as auxillary for the sake of being funny/grotesque.
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