The Return of Testing Chat Thread

[Darth Tedious]

Really though, I think that any magic FTL civ is going to have an insurmountable advantage if they go on the offensive.
You attack a system, and you have several years to prepare your attack against the next one. And you'll still get there before the distress call from the place you just hit.
That's like a whole couple of years to learn about your enemy, their tech base, what their defences might be, hell, you could scout the shit out of the next system before you attack.
And the STL civ has absolutely no way to coordinate itself, it's literally a collection of seperate colonies for all intents and purposes.

[adr]

yeah but they don't have to coordinate themselves to continue resistance, and the wankciv's massive scale is still a significant advantage just because of how long everything takes


but let me go to that op

"What is the strongest science fiction faction a socially, politically, intellectual and morally enlightened civilization, that has passed all significant threats of extinction, defeat?"

the big question is always "what does defeat mean?"


i haven't quoted scripture for a while so allow me to indulge myself

105 EXT. INTERNMENT CENTER - YARD - NIGHT

Worf is thrown to the ground by Ikat'ika. For a beat,
he just lays there and it looks like he won't be
getting up. But then he begins dragging himself toward
the post.

Ikat'ika leans over and puts a restraining hand on his
shoulder.

DEEP SPACE NINE: "Inferno's Light" - REV. 12/17/96 - ACT FIVE 49A.

105 CONTINUED:

IKAT'IKA
Enough, Klingon. You have proven
your worth.


But Worf ignores him and crawls out of his grasp,
headed toward the post.

MARTOK
Worf, you heard him. Enough.

WORF
I will not yield.

Worf touches the post and slowly gets to his feet.
Ikat'ika can't believe it. Worf takes a weak swing at
Ikat'ika, who doesn't even bother to parry. He just
steps back and lets it miss. But he doesn't retaliate.

DEEP SPACE NINE: "Inferno's Light" - REV. 12/17/96 - ACT FIVE 50.

105 CONTINUED:

DEYOS
What are you waiting for? End this.

IKAT'IKA
It's over.

WORF
It's not over.

Worf stumbles over to Ikat'ika and gets in his face, as
if daring him to kill him.

DEYOS
(to Ikat'ika)
You heard him.

Ikat'ika locks eyes with Worf, who's bloodied, bruised,
and clearly in no condition to stand, let alone fight.
The hint of a smile appears on Ikat'ika's face.

IKAT'IKA
(softly, just for Worf)
I yield.

Now it's Worf's turn to look confused at Ikat'ika.

DEYOS
You what?

IKAT'IKA
(louder, for all)
I yield. I cannot defeat this
Klingon. All I can do is kill
him. And that no longer holds my
interest.

" I yield. I cannot defeat this Klingon. All I can do is kill him. And that no longer holds my interest."

[RogueIce]

Seems silly though. I mean with galaxy-spanning STL civilization I guess you could call them a civilization, but are they an actual faction or unified government or anything of the sort? Or just a fuckton of basically independent "colony-states" that may or may not listen to and/or support in some form whatever passes for a central leadership, depending on their mood at the time the centuries old instructions from the capital finally arrive?

It seems you're basically defining things for the specific intent to give every possible advantage to the STL Civ - or at least render any "victory" by FTL Empire as more-or-less impossible. I mean what is victory? Or as a practical matter: since it's hard sci-fi anyway, who's to say each of those colonies will be equal to the others anyway? Does victory for FTL Empire really require they conquer each and every little colony out there? I'm sure there are plenty of colonies that would be essentially the same as some podunk house in the middle of the North Dakota forest. Would somebody invading the US really give a shit if said podunk house didn't declare allegiance when they control New York, LA, DC, Chicago etc?

[Shroom Man 777]

what kind of victory would this be anyway?

by virtue of being much much much faster in physical movement, communications, trade, etc. the FTL civilization will replace the STL civilization bit by bit

to the point that the STL civilization will end up BEING the FTL civilization

[Oxymoron]

On the case of the US, it'd depend I say if said house is close to an important logistical axis, or some of your bases, or any strategical position - which if not by the house inhabitants, could be used by some third party to stage attacks against you.

And if the third party possess FTL and has a base "inside" your borders, this could be problematic.

I don't know...


I'd say it's more a question of overall strategy than really dependent on the importance of the planet in particular.


Also what shroom said.

[adr]

Seems silly though. I mean with galaxy-spanning STL civilization I guess you could call them a civilization, but are they an actual faction or unified government or anything of the sort?

It could be, though it wouldn't respond quickly to outside things. Imagine they all believe in the same (stable) system, follow the same (prewritten) laws, etc.; the empire is ruled by soft power rather than hard power. If you went between the worlds, the experience would be pretty similar; it'd feel like you're in the same country.

I mean what is victory?

That's the key question, isn't it? What do they want? To rule them?

If the victim is fearless, conquering them is impossible. It doesn't matter how much force or speed you have. If they don't fear you, you can't rule them.

Replace or kill them all? This might /still/ actually be impossible, if they can grow faster than you can kill them.


Just take some specific target you want for some period of time? This is probably doable and pretty easy.

[RogueIce]

On the case of the US, it'd depend I say if said house is close to an important logistical axis, or some of your bases, or any strategical position - which if not by the house inhabitants, could be used by some third party to stage attacks against you.

If it was in an important strategic location, one would think the invaders would have taken it. Or else simply blow up the house. Because if they just up and decided to invade somebody purely for the sake of conquest (and let's face it, that's what all of these VS scenarios boil down to) they likely won't give a shit about a single household worth of people. They may not want to nuke New York, but a single house in the boonies is getting bombed.

And if the third party possess FTL and has a base "inside" your borders, this could be problematic.

True, but let's face it: tossing a third party FTL Civ into the mix more-or-less invalidates the original scenario and makes things entirely different. It's like taking the old SW vs ST matchup and tossing the Culture in the middle for shits and giggles. It's not exactly going to just be about SW vs ST anymore, is it?

I'd say it's more a question of overall strategy than really dependent on the importance of the planet in particular.

True. But let's face it: if FTL Empire has control of all the Earth-type colonies, will they care about Colony 12983-B2 that STL Civ set up around some dead star with a few barren rocks of minimal importance just because they wanted to? FTL Empire doesn't need to conquer every possible colony to claim 'victory' unless of course you're intentionally setting up an unwinnable scenario for them.

Also what shroom said.

That honestly is a big thing. I know we concentrate on Let's You And Them Fight because that's how SDN VS debates roll. But let's be honest: you've got the hard sci-fi civilization that's colonized the entire galaxy (or two or three) and has researched everything possible to know, right? And then some ship from the SW Empire or ST Federation shows up and basically invalidates everything they thought they knew about physics instantly. How many of those colonies are going to just join up with them then and there for the promise of learning everything from the beginning all over again? Seriously. And "Earth" or whoever the central government is will only be getting the initial word about these new FTL people by the time a quarter (or more) of their colonies have already declared allegiance to the FTL Empire.

Although, funnily enough, the ST Federation probably would just skip on by and ignore them, because the hard sci-fi colonies are still "pre-warp" and thus the Prime Directive says to leave them be.

[Shroom Man 777]

for the STL civilization to do even the most microscopic inter-solar system task will take at least a year, and most likely a whole lot of years, and this is even for the most basic stuff

by the time the STL civilization does an action affecting even a puny handful of star systems, several years will have passed

by that time, the FTL civilization will have done all sorts of things to way more many star systems several times over


its like, they're literally operating on two entirely different realities

by the time the STL civilization reacts, its reaction will be hopelessly outdated

I'm not even talking about direct military conflict here

i'm talking about the fact that by the time the STL civilization capitol or king or leader or whatever learns of the "first encounter" with the FTL civilization

years would've passed, at the least a handful of years, at the most centuries

worse case scenario is that by the time the STL civilization gains knowledge of a happening in some Location X

centuries would've gone pass, and in that Location X, the happening is already like something in the history books and all the original people who encountered the happening would have grandkids and like shit

when the first STL survey ship arrives after who knows how long, like, that faraway system will be fully integrated into the FTL nation, everyone will be travelling around in FTL ships for years, and people will barely remember what the STL nation is like




It's like, Magellan arrives in the Philippines, his voyage takes forever. He leaves (actually he died and his men left), goes back to Spain after another long ass voyage. Then a second explorer arrives to the Philippines. Except when he arrives on the dinky ship, when he reaches there, everyone in the islands are all with cellphones and riding Concordes flying around the world.

It's not even funny.

[Shroom Man 777]

I think Star Trek Prime Directives on pre-warp civilization doesn't actually stipulate that UNLESS they SPECIFICALLY build a device that makes a warp bubbel, no interaction must never be interacted.

It's only taken that way because, generally, a civilization usually never gets to do interstellar interaction without a warp device.

But if a civilization does do interstellar shits without a warp device, through horribly difficult STL shits, then I think the Prime Directive wouldn't apply.

Because it's not about SPECIFICALLY the possession of the warp device, but rather the societal effects of becoming an interstellar civilization (which comes naturally and is convenienced by FTL tech).

If a STL civilization somehow manages to fill in the criterias of an interstellar civ, the Prime Directive wouldn't blearghrasdkjaskdjsflsfd

[RogueIce]

I think Star Trek Prime Directives on pre-warp civilization doesn't actually stipulate that UNLESS they SPECIFICALLY build a device that makes a warp bubbel, no interaction must never be interacted.

It's only taken that way because, generally, a civilization usually never gets to do interstellar interaction without a warp device.

But if a civilization does do interstellar shits without a warp device, through horribly difficult STL shits, then I think the Prime Directive wouldn't apply.

Because it's not about SPECIFICALLY the possession of the warp device, but rather the societal effects of becoming an interstellar civilization (which comes naturally and is convenienced by FTL tech).

If a STL civilization somehow manages to fill in the criterias of an interstellar civ, the Prime Directive wouldn't blearghrasdkjaskdjsflsfd

Probably. TBH I just tossed in that last sentence to be snarky.

I don't think any of the shows ever really addressed it though because I think the writers seemed to operate under the assumption that any society operating on an interstellar level would have discovered "warp" as a matter of course anyway.

[Shroom Man 777]

anyway yeah

sure the FTL civilization will have limits on just how many systems it can initially influence

but the time factor is actually for it

the STL civilization is going to be really really sloooooow

but as the FTL civilization "converts" more star systems, its next waves will spread to more systems and at a faster pace too

so as this "engagement" goes longer, the STL civilization is only going to be obsolescent and fade away more

in fact, this won't look like a military engagement, because it might not even get to that point lol pew pew gigajoulatonnes

this engagement will instead look more like... the historical development of... civilization and the progression of technology and society and shit, that broader more intangible and holistic.... thing of everything as a whole

because the STL civilization is going to be wiped away in ALL aspects, pretty much, because... it's not eve going to be in the same ballpark as the FTL peoples

[RogueIce]

Yeah. Basically the FTL civilization will "conquer" the STL one without even having to fire a shot.

I mean shit, look at the Alien Invasion movies. What do the Earth governments usually try to do first? Why talk to the aliens, of course! And unless you assume the FTL people are just there for the evulz, I'm pretty sure the STL government and majority of the populace would join them quite willingly. Especially when even the lowliest of FTL scout ships will turn everything the STL people thought they knew about the universe on its head.

Sure there may be the usual crazies who might resist, but the STL government and (most likely) majority of the populace will be on your side anyway, so it's not like the FTL government has to deal with that on their own.

Basically, it's be Flawless Victory for the FTL civilization.

[adr]

for the STL civilization to do even the most microscopic inter-solar system task will take at least a year, and most likely a whole lot of years, and this is even for the most basic stuff

by the time the STL civilization does an action affecting even a puny handful of star systems, several years will have passed

by that time, the FTL civilization will have done all sorts of things to way more many star systems several times over

not necessarily

suppose you have one guy with a millineusm falcosn

he could visit like 3 planets per day. super super fast right?



but then imagine you have a trillion people with stl slowboats. any one individual is going to take 10000 years to visit a new planet

BUT there's a trillion of them.... so every single second, three of them are going to arrive at new planets (thee's about 300 billion seconds in 10000 years)


you did three planets per day

they do three planets per /second/


they could perhaps even crank out babies faster than you can death star planets

you could use your FTL stuff to change the shape of the STL civ, but its growth rate is faster than you could ever catch up with because of the vast difference of initial numbes

It's like, Magellan arrives in the Philippines, his voyage takes forever. He leaves (actually he died and his men left), goes back to Spain after another long ass voyage. Then a second explorer arrives to the Philippines. Except when he arrives on the dinky ship, when he reaches there, everyone in the islands are all with cellphones and riding Concordes flying around the world.

i actually used this idear in my worldbuilding!!!!!!

[Shroom Man 777]

uh the STL civilization will also be behind the knowledge curb in situational awareness and information proliferation

[RogueIce]

Yeah. Basically it doesn't matter. I mean sure, they may reach millions of new systems every second or whatever. But it's not like all those new settlements will have any idea about the FTL people. And when the FTL people catch up to them, why wouldn't they be as eager as everyone else to join with the civilization that just turned physics and science upside down overnight?

And frankly, if the assumption is that the STL civilization will (somehow) have the unity of purpose, laws, will and so on as to be called a singular government...why wouldn't the FTL civilization be able to have or attain the same for themselves? Which if you go with that assumption (and why the fuck not, since you already made it for the STL group) means the FTL civilization will overtake the STL one, eventually.

[RogueIce]

I mean fuck adr, it gets a little silly. Sure if STL Civ has colonized 5000 galaxies and FTL Civ (for whatever reason) has only one by the time of first contact, I suppose you can claim "victory" by saying FTL will never catch up with STL.

But you've basically gone out of your way to stack the deck against the FTL group. If you're going to set up the scenario such that Side B starts off with insane advantages over Side A and define conditions for victory such that Side A could never hope to achieve them, no shit Side B is going to "win" in your little game.

[Shroom Man 777]

pretty much shows how awsum side a is

[Oxymoron]

Test your might



gigatons win

flawless victory



High score : ___

[Darth Tedious]

The big thing everybody seems to be forgetting here is that side b (who has the advantage of FTL) also has until the end of time itself to defeat side a.

[adr]

Basically it doesn't matter.

Speed completely doesn't matter when you're talking about long term growth; speed is a short term advantage only.

You can't make one full baby in a month with nine women... but you can still average one baby a month with nine women, and the effect on population growth over the whole year is the same either way.

And this same thing applies to information: your FTL thing might be able to send updates to three planets a day... but when the ignorant are arriving at three planets per second, in the big picture, ignorance is going dominate.


What you have to do is convert the ignorant into becoming missionaries for your side, and this is an issue of psychology, not technology. If upon seeing FTL, a trillion people decide to go out and spread the word.... if they do it on FTL ships or slow ships is only of short term significance; it will spread to the whole galaxy in say ten years instead of 10,010 years. But the end result in the long run is exactly the same.


But, what if the people aren't interested in new ideas? Then it won't convert anyone, and will only spread as fast as you can make believer babies... which is much slower than they can make ignorant babies.

[adr]

But you've basically gone out of your way to stack the deck against the FTL group.

yeah this is why i call it a wankciv

i'm wanking it

right now

[RogueIce]

The big thing everybody seems to be forgetting here is that side b (who has the advantage of FTL) also has until the end of time itself to defeat side a.

Actually Side A was the FTL one, Side B was the STL group. Essentially the "insane advantage" of Side B was that they started out 5,000 times larger than Side A and were always forever expanding, and Side A could only get "victory" by basically taking over every last little bit of Side B. In which case Side B may or may not be able to simply deny Side A victory for a long-ass time (or forever), especially if you're going to rig the scenario such that Side B (despite having slower tech) can somehow still expand faster than Side A because...quantum? IOW, adr's "STL is finding three new worlds every second while FTL can only find three worlds per day because I said so" and this situation somehow never ever changing in favor of the FTL group.

Sure you can do it, but it's not exactly an honest comparison anymore, is it?

[Darth Tedious]

Being able to travel at millions of c is a long term growth advantage.
They can settle a whole MW-sized galaxy (starting from one end and working across) in under 100K years.
That's faster than a STL civ can possibly do it.
How is that not faster long term growth?

[adr]

100,000 years is nothing when you're talking about galactic colonization. this is why the fermi paradox doesn't concern itself with ftl:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi_paradox
At any practical pace of interstellar travel, the galaxy can be completely colonized in just a few tens of millions of years.

Ten million years is irrelevant because the galaxy is billions of years old. That SDN thread also said "The only time limit on its development is the natural age of the universe. " so I'm running with it to wank out the size.


edit: and in the future, again, the galaxy has billions of years left in it, so 100,000 years again just doesn't matter much. The only way for the FTL to win is to a) create converts (which means speed becomes irrelevant in about 100,000 years, since STL missionaries could do it by then too) or depending on the specifics of the scenario b) kill wankbabies faster than they are born

[RogueIce]

100,000 years is nothing when you're talking about galactic colonization. this is why the fermi paradox doesn't concern itself with ftl:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi_paradox
At any practical pace of interstellar travel, the galaxy can be completely colonized in just a few tens of millions of years.

Ten million years is irrelevant because the galaxy is billions of years old. That SDN thread also said "The only time limit on its development is the natural age of the universe. " so I'm running with it to wank out the size.

But you're still assuming the STL civilization was doing all this endless expanding and got to this "unreachable" point by the time they meet the FTL civ. And that the FTL civ...wasn't just doing the same thing in their corner of the universe? So could then overtake the STL because hey, they got a shitload of explorers and colonists of their own but they'll get there faster.

Honestly it's silly to assume the FTL civ won't be the far, far larger one because odds are the faster travelling group will be the one to meet the slower group, and they've probably explored and colonized way the fuck more than STL has and will simply overtake them in the normal course of their expansion anyway.