Intersystem Drives

Dragon1

Dragon1

Rear Admiral
Are there any references in the Wing Commander novels of capital ships having some sort of inter-system sub-light drive that would allow them to cross from jump point to jump point at realitivistic speed (Ion drive or something)? The average Confed fleet carrier has a maximum sustainable speed of 100-150 kps and a cruising speed of 50-80 kps. At these speeds, it would take YEARS for a Confed carrier group to cross from Earth to Pluto!
 
Not really. It's roughly 3.5 million miles from Earth to Pluto, or about 5.6 million kilometers. At 80 kilometers per second, it'd take about 19 hours to get from Earth to Pluto.

On a wholly unrelated note, "C'mon C'mon" by the Von Bondies is a really good song.
 
Actually, the distance between the Earth and the Sun is one Astronomical Unit (AU) which is equal to 149,597,870.691 kilometers. There are many AUs from Earth to Pluto.
 
I stand corrected. The website I went to for information was wholly inaccurate. Using the right information, it'd take almost three years to get from Earth to Pluto. Yike.
 
No problem, but I'm sure you now see the problem. In WC4, the whole Black Lance incident supposedly lasted only two weeks (not counting any preliminary actions not shown in the game). When the Intrepid, Vesuvius and Mt.St.Helens come out of Jumpspace (to coin a WC1 term) they are close to Saturn, yet within two quick missions you are relatively close to Earth. What gives?

Also, in WC2, the Concordia made a double-jump. From my understanding of the WC hyperspace system, ships cannot create their own jump points. They must travel to naturally occuring phenomenon. What is meant by double-jumping? It was recognized to be a very dangerous maneuver, only to be executed in an emergency.
 
Well unfortunately I think everything in the Wing Commander Universe has probably been discussed by one group of people or another. New members bring fresh ideas to the scene. Sorry if it may offend some of the more experienced members of the forum to read things that they feel are closed subjects, but maybe a new member may present information not previously discussed. And remember, just because you may have been writing on the forum for years doesn't mean that those that haven't are any less fans of the Wing Commander Universe. I myself have been a fan since 1990. We are all creative, bright people. If we weren't, we wouldn't be writing on a forum with our ideas. So while us newbees learn from you seniors, remember, sometimes the student teaches the master.
 
Read the novels. You'll notice quickly that they can crank up to 10000kps acceleration when the normal maneuvering/fuel scoops are closed.

This means that, at the minimum distance from Earth to Pluto (4,283,023,020km), it would take about 428,302 seconds to cross that distance assuming the 10000kps velocity is maintained. In other words, this is 7138 minutes, or 119 hours - 5 days. Most travel in the system is done between planets to jump points, which can be either located in relatively convenient distances (as in just past Mars, if you're heading towards Enigma), or else relatively isolated such as at the edges of the solar system.

If we assume that the nearest jump point is just past Mars, which at its most distant is 400 million km away from Earth, then to travel from Earth to the jump point would be about 668 minutes, or just over 11 hours. Given that it seemed to take the Kilrathi only a few hours at most to engage the Confed fleet some distance from Earth's orbit, and almost that much time to send the cruiser squadron towards Earth, I'd guess that they were closer to 60-100 million kilometers from the jump line to Earth. With that same 10000 kps speed, we're talking travel times of 90-120 minutes, which seems to fit in with the timeline of the battle.

By the way, searching for 'travel' and 'system' found me this link, which had a variation of this question, posted last year:

http://www.crius.net/zone/showthread.php?t=7443&highlight=travel+system
 
Dragon1 said:
So while us newbees learn from you seniors, remember, sometimes the student teaches the master.
Click to expand...

Pretty high opinion you have of yourself, there. Especially since the student should have read his End Run and Fleet Action before commenting on '150 kps as the maximum speed of a Confed ship' in class. No search function required there.
 
Haesslich,

I appreciate the discussion page you have located. I also admit that I have not been able to find the novels in stores lately to read them.

But you did take my quote out of context. I don't pretend to have any more or less knowledge in the Wing Commander Universe than anyone else on the forum. That is why we are here, to learn from eachothers opinions and fill in the gaps in all of our information. My previous post was not an attack. I am not trying to take the high ground. I am just saying in general; Your conclusions may not be conclusions of the newer members, and the newer members have a right to discuss even things that have been considered solved. I do have a high opinion of myself by the way, as we all should. I also admit that my knowledge on all things Wing Commander is probably less than yours, that is why I appreciate all members on this forum and the work that they have done to continue this great game series.
 
Dragon1 said:
Haesslich,

I appreciate the discussion page you have located. I also admit that I have not been able to find the novels in stores lately to read them.

But you did take my quote out of context. I don't pretend to have any more or less knowledge in the Wing Commander Universe than anyone else on the forum. That is why we are here, to learn from eachothers opinions and fill in the gaps in all of our information. My previous post was not an attack. I am not trying to take the high ground. I am just saying in general; Your conclusions may not be conclusions of the newer members, and the newer members have a right to discuss even things that have been considered solved. I do have a high opinion of myself by the way, as we all should. I also admit that my knowledge on all things Wing Commander is probably less than yours, that is why I appreciate all members on this forum and the work that they have done to continue this great game series.
Click to expand...

Those subjects have been brought up before - and it's a good idea to at least get a feel for 'what has been mentioned in the past' - see a post from last month concerning Aerodynamic sleekness - this one in particular brings up the 10000kps speed figure. Granted, this post was a bit before your time, but I would have thought you'd have skimmed it, given the interests you've displayed to date.

As psych's pointed out, it can be a bit of a pain to answer the same questions again and again, which is why you'll often encounter 'use the search' or 'read the novel' as responses to some of these questions. Being honest, I'd suggest at least doing a quick search to skim over what's been posted, if only to get a new angle on the same question or issue. Especially given comments like this:

Dragon1 said:
Sorry if it may offend some of the more experienced members of the forum to read things that they feel are closed subjects, but maybe a new member may present information not previously discussed.
Click to expand...

The information WAS presented already, repeatedly debated, and hashed through till the cows came home. :D
 
Dragon1 said:
Thanks for the advice. Again, I was trying to attack anyone.
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By the way, Amazon and Half.com have some End Run and Fleet Action novels kicking around - I'm picking up a copy of Action Stations this way. I'd suggest doing that too, to begin with - the other novels you'll want to get eventually, especially Freedom Flight and False Colors, but the first two are especially hard to find.
 
word,

I ave to agree with the other newbie chap on some points. Most of us don't have the time to trawl through stuff using the search button. In the same way that you would not scoff at a new-born baby learning to speak and tell it to use the search button to further it's power of speech (silence, I do realise that a baby trying to learn to talk would probably not be able to read or know what a search button is, but not withstanding I am sure there are probably some who can).

Us new people need to be treated with some degree of patience and with a little snese of humour. We know not what has been discussed and like to ask questions, it is nice to ask questions rather than play with the search button. I certainly dont have tme
 
Then here's some advice - if you're new to a board, try reading through the last month or two's worth of messages, just to get a sense of what sorts of posts are made, what has been discussed before, and what has probably been beat to death. Doing so would have brought up that 10000 kps figure, as per the post linked to from July. A search will also save you time later, especially since some of the crustier forum members may decide to give you a simple 'use the search' response, since they've seen the question often enough to be tired of it.

Trust me - the search DOES help, and reading the last month or two's worth of messages as a lurker helps more. I suspect you'd rather be greeted like this than like this.
 
well, either way around I dont have time and therefore shall not do so. this is simply some pleasure for me when I get bored with work and want to read something else other than reports, financial statements and benal e-mails from my clients.

Its good for that, and it is important to remember not to take it too seriously, at the end of the day none of it really exists.
 
This is going to turn into a newbie vs veteran showdown really quick and we don't need that.

If you haven't read the novels it's a good question, a lot of people haven't read them and I myself hadn't until recently.

If a question that's been beaten to death or is common knowledge is answered then the thread will die out a lot quicker than debating if you should've used the search feature, which, I agree, you should make use of when you can.
 
The "newbie" is correct - we discuss the same topics as often as anyone is willing to contribute here... this should not ever become one of those "search for everything before you post" forums.

This is also a good discussion to have. People have already pointed out the 'scoops closed' concept from the novel... but it goes one step further: do the math for the Concordia battlegroup's transit from a Pluto/Neptune area jump point to Venus in the end of the movie novel. It was travelling faster than the speed of light... somehow.
 
Bandit LOAF said:
The "newbie" is correct - we discuss the same topics as often as anyone is willing to contribute here... this should not ever become one of those "search for everything before you post" forums.

This is also a good discussion to have. People have already pointed out the 'scoops closed' concept from the novel... but it goes one step further: do the math for the Concordia battlegroup's transit from a Pluto/Neptune area jump point to Venus in the end of the movie novel. It was travelling faster than the speed of light... somehow.
Click to expand...

Given the assumption that the fleet began from Neptune's orbit, or just a bit beyond, and that Neptune and Venus are on the same side of the sun....

We'll say 4.5 billion km from the sun to Neptune at closest approach (4,458,765,000), and then assume that Venus is as distant as it ever gets from the sun, which makes it 109 million km distant (108,934,900). Taking those two together, we get 4,349,830,100 km, or about 4.35 billion kilometers. At 10000 kps, that'd be 120 hours, or about 5 days. To get the time that they achieved in the movie, we're talking about a fleet travelling at the equivalent of Warp 2.7 or so on the logarithmic warp scale of TNG, to get the 8,055,000 kps speed that would be required, if they're moving from Neptune towards Venus.

The movie novel states that it takes about 9 minutes to move from the Oort cloud to the Sol system perimeter, where the Kilrathi fleet is emerging from the jump point. The WC movie shows this point as being near Venus but does not give the time interval for the Concordia battle group to have emerged in Sol system to await the arrival of the Kilrathi. Either we've got a lot of mini-jumping going on, like one can do in the Firekka system, or else the Confed fleet managed to discover warp drive sometime during the movie and promptly forgot about it afterwards. Or, third possibility, is that the Kilrathi emerged from a jump point that was past Neptune's orbit and then were finally destroyed around Venus... which is unlikely. Or the novels and the movie are contradicting one another. I'm glad I'm not the one trying to sort out any conflict of that sort.

Either way, they're all apparently a lot faster than 150-200kps, which was the 'combat speed' under scoops that the carriers we fly off usually attain.
 
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