Cap ship speed

K

karneevor

1st Lieutenant
Greetings Wingnuts.

I'm new to this crius.net, so bear with me.

I'm working on a software project called ConWC. It's in early alpha and not yet playable. During my research into math and physics, I've been thinking about the speed of which cap ships are moving. There are several sources in the books.

If the laws of physics is applyed to the WC universe, then light speed is possible:

- The attach on McAuliffe is done at extreme high speed by the kilrathi figthers and bombers. they came through the jump point at higher speed than usual and they accellerated towards McAuliffe. The fighters and bombers arrived in such a short time that no real defence was up.
- During the last journey from Landreich to Earth, Krügers fleet achives near light speed, but looses some of the fleet.
- When Tarawa leaves Earth, where it was decommissioned, the journey towards the jumppoint took "several hours".

If I compare the normal travel times for interplanetary travel performed by NASA, there's a HUGE difference. NASA takes months to travel at speeds like 35000 meters per second.

Of course, it's Wing Commander and it is sci-fi. But the speeds by which WC cap ships and smaller vessels travels, should be near half the speed of light. I also need to consider issues like fuel, engine time, acceleration and deceleration.

What are your thoughts on the subject?

If I am to create a simulation as realistic as possible, I need to get some things in perspective.

What are the laws of physics in the game and the books?

Thanks in advance.

/Karneevor
 
the problem here is that space is huge.. I mean really huge.. and big.. hugely huge and big! I would forget about creating a realistic simulation of speed in a game where the fighters travel 'kilometers per second' and yet you can still dogfight.

You'd be much better off if you stick with 'capital ships travel at the speed of plot.'
 
Back when I first discovered WC in the late 1990s, I was going through that "wow, NASA!" phase that probably most teenagers go through - so naturally, I gave a lot of thought to how it all works.

...It doesn't :).

I think one of the worst disservices inflicted upon WC by various contributors to the universe over the years is trying to explain this kind of stuff. Wing Commander is not the story of what the future might plausibly look like - it's a fantasy universe where we get to go through WWII in space fighting against evil space cats. The laws of physics are determined by plot and gameplay, and change from product to product depending on what's needed.
 
Hi again.

I see your points. Its easy to sink into the realism and not focus on the plot.

I kind of imagined that playing my game would involve lots of waiting while flying around space. I remember the story about Paladin and Hunter traveling for weeks to reach the far, far away Hari system to discover the hidden Kilrathi ship yard and fleet. I want that in a game. Not just the arcade part. The game will never end. Allways new Kilrathi to fight.

I want my game/simulation to be played online. You program your carrier and taskforce to do certain things and react diffently according to the level of threat. When your fleet is in danger or attacked, you get an email from the game server or an sms so you can interfere and give new orders. But that's future stuff.

At the moment I only have a game enginge that calculates gravity as in the laws of Newton and Kepler. I don't think I'll ever get to the part of flying a figther or bomber. I just control a fleet or task force. But it would be nice to do the cockpit part.

I hope to write programs which uses radars, normal and translight communication, stealth, black holes, and lots of other stuff. I hope I'm done before I die.

Maybe it's not as much the game it self that I like, but more the journey to understand math and physics, aviation, military strategies and tactics. The joy of creation, I guess.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts. :)

/Karneevor
 
I think Quarto has the right idea about how we should enjoy the Wing Commander universe without thinking too much about the technicalities of astrophysics.

I used to get upset that encounters with enemy craft at any given navpoint would invariably be set up so that at the start of the dogfight the ships you've just met are approaching you at the same 'attitude' - i.e. in reality they might be relatively 'upside down' when you first meet them. Does that make sense? Can anybody word this better than me? What I'm trying to get at is that surely in space, the approaching craft would be flying towards you, but at a different angle, rather than at the exact same altitude as you and 'upright'...

I wish I was better with words so that I could explain what I'm getting at, but the premise doesn't bother me any more anyway :)
 
I understand what you're saying. Strangely enough, one of the recent news posts talks about flying 'upside-down' relative to the Tiger's Claw and Victory when returning home from a mission.
 
The same "problem" applies to most Sci-fi.
It is really strange that ships always never arrive from above or beyond and such things.
The big Sci-Fi films and series always have them flying "on the same surface" like ships.
(although I think I remember some exceptions in Bab5. )
 
It is really strange that ships always never arrive from above or beyond and such things.
The big Sci-Fi films and series always have them flying "on the same surface" like ships.
Click to expand...

Is it? It makes perfect sense that when you are approaching one another you steer your bows in eachothers direction. As for flying upsidedown, now that is a good one.
 
Aginor said:
The same "problem" applies to most Sci-fi.
never arrive from above or beyond and such things.
Click to expand...

You've obviously never watched "Space: Above and Beyond." The chigs absolutely always approach exactly from... you guessed it! Above and beyond! :rolleyes:
 
I did.
And I liked it. But that was years ago, I simply didn't remember.

I said MOST SciFi.

EDIT: I'm sure we can find some where ships move differently. But in MOST SciFi it is certainly like in WC.
 
heh - I don't actually think they did. I was just playing off the title and being an idiot for the fun of it.

I have pretty crappy humor, especially when it's experienced in 5.1 Digital Forum.
 
Ok, now I get the joke. :D
Here in Germany the series was called: "Space 2063", so I just overread your joke.
 
If the laws of physics is applyed to the WC universe, then light speed is possible:

- The attach on McAuliffe is done at extreme high speed by the kilrathi figthers and bombers. they came through the jump point at higher speed than usual and they accellerated towards McAuliffe. The fighters and bombers arrived in such a short time that no real defence was up.
- During the last journey from Landreich to Earth, Krügers fleet achives near light speed, but looses some of the fleet.
- When Tarawa leaves Earth, where it was decommissioned, the journey towards the jumppoint took "several hours".
Click to expand...

I don't think the first two examples are ships traveling faster-than-light (indeed, I believe both are explicitly slower-than-light travel). Rather, they're both dealing with another bit of Wing Commander physics -- that it's very dangerous to enter a jump point at full speed. The idea in both cases is that the commanders have taken a tactical risk for some benefit... launching the surprise attack before defenses are up and getting to Earth as quickly as possible, respectively.

The third is something that isn't discussed much - straight transit speeds. It *was* all 'banged out' in the early 1990s, though -- there are references to the fiction in the novels and a modified version of the bible material on the subject is printed in the Confederation Handbook.

The idea is that ships *can* accelerate to close to the speed of light when they're transiting from one point to another. They travel with "scoops closed" (gathering no fuel from space, using their onboard stock) to do this and must, of course, spend as much time speeding up as they do slowing down (and can't maneuver at all). Dr. Forstchen played with this occasionally, especially during the Tarawa's various maneuvers in End Run.

(Now, you will find an error or two out there -- a good example is Wing Commander IV's dramatic travel through the solar system in a cutscene... which takes under a minute. That's much, much faster than the speed of light...)


I think one of the worst disservices inflicted upon WC by various contributors to the universe over the years is trying to explain this kind of stuff. Wing Commander is not the story of what the future might plausibly look like - it's a fantasy universe where we get to go through WWII in space fighting against evil space cats. The laws of physics are determined by plot and gameplay, and change from product to product depending on what's needed.
Click to expand...

I've thought about this for some time now, and I have to disagree.

Yes, it's very easy for you and I rattle on about how it's the gameplay and we know because we've seen it all... but that earlier stage is an essential (and I'll argue respectable) part of fandom. It's a step in the right direction on the trip from playing a game to living in its world to appreciating how narrative and gameplay and influence on modern design all come together... and who are we to say that because we've thought about this before no one else should? You had fun when you "first discovered WC" -- why stop now?
 
Bandit LOAF said:
I've thought about this for some time now, and I have to disagree.

Yes, it's very easy for you and I rattle on about how it's the gameplay and we know because we've seen it all... but that earlier stage is an essential (and I'll argue respectable) part of fandom. It's a step in the right direction on the trip from playing a game to living in its world to appreciating how narrative and gameplay and influence on modern design all come together... and who are we to say that because we've thought about this before no one else should? You had fun when you "first discovered WC" -- why stop now?
Click to expand...
Hmm.


Hmmmmmm.

I do sometimes forget that not everyone has been here for as long as some of us have. Yes, you're right - if someone finds that aspect of WC interesting, then they certainly should be able to have fun with it. I would hope, though, that sooner or later they'll move on to the other aspects - SpaceBattles, I believe, is what happens when long-time fans don't eventually learn to notice that all that tech stuff is not the story, it's just there to tell a story.
 
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