/-/S'pht-Translator-Active/-/


Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1
Posted By: DispatcherDate: 5/28/13 10:03 p.m.

In Response To: Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1 (jonny)

: Hi there. First time poster here. I was looking for info about the Pfhor's
: FTL tech, specifically if it's instantaneous or is it some multiple of
: light speed, and found this thread. Pardon me for resurrecting it if
: that's bad form, but I thought I could add something here. Why the Pfhor
: didn't find Earth before Durandal contacted them is actually not too hard
: to explain. A few points: - The Milky Way galaxy is on the order of
: 100,000 light years across. Just eyeballing that diagram from Waterloo
: Waterpark, I'd say the distance between Sol and the Pfhor home world is at
: least 1/50th of that diameter, and certainly more than 1/200th (500 light
: years). It's a fairly safe assumption (based on that diagram alone) that
: radio signals from Earth would not have reached the Pfhor homeworld by
: 2794.

: - Even if we assumed that Sol is with 5-600 light years of the Pfhor home
: world, there is the issue of signal strength, which decreases dramatically
: with distance. At a distance of 500 light years, it's a safe assumption
: that any signals generated to be received within the Sol system would be
: extremely hard to detect at a distance of 500 light years or more.

The Inverse Square Law; but I suppose it all depends on how sensitive Pfhor scanning equipment is.

: - The Pfhor ship that attacks the Marathon is a scout ship. It must be
: scouting somewhere very near Tau Ceti when it receives Durandal's signal
: since Durandal is limited by the tech available on board the Marathon,
: which does not include FTL communication. In fact, the Pfhor ship must be
: somewhere within 21 light years (assuming Durandal starts signaling
: shortly after arriving at Tau Ceti, which was always my interpretation).

: - Given the sheer size of the galaxy in terms of space and numbers of stars,
: it might make sense for an imperial star faring race to move towards the
: galactic center first. I am troubled by the idea that the Pfhor not only
: reached the galactic core, but were conquering species as sophisticated as
: the S'pht 1000 years prior to Marathon without finding the relatively
: closer worlds in Sol's neighborhood, but I suppose one could make an
: argument loosely based on the Fermi Paradox to help explain that.

Astronomers seem to know more about the galaxy now than when Marathon was produced, and thus more about the rest of the galaxy. From Solstation: ... the Sun is orbiting very close to the "co-rotation radius" of the galaxy, where the angular speed of the galaxy's spiral arms matches that of the stars within. As a result, Sol avoids crossing the spiral arms very often, which would expose Earth to supernovae that are more common there. These exceptional circumstances may have made it more likely for complex life and human intelligence to emerge on Earth ... fewer than five percent of all stars in the galaxy enjoy such a life-enhancing galactic orbit. Other astronomers point out, however, that many nearby stars move with Sol in a similar galactic orbit."

And as for the central region, Solstation calls it the hot and violent center. And"... roughly 10 million stars are known to orbit within just a single light-year of the galactic center in a region known as the central bulge." That's getting close to the central black hole Sgr A*. So it seems to be a trade off between quantity and "quality".

: I hope that helps. I'm no expert on Marathon canon, but I think it all fits.

: As for my original search (which has so far been unsuccessful), does anyone
: have any "data" on the speed of the Pfhor FTL drives? My guess
: is that the travel time in FTL mode is instantaneous, as the ships are
: generally described as "folding", which in SF trope terms has
: always implied instant movement between two points in spacetime. (Should I
: move this question to a separate new topic?)

Interesting question. I have no idea what specs Bungie would have required.

[ Post a Reply | Message Index | Read Prev Msg | Read Next Msg ]
Pre-2004 Posts

Replies:

Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Yossarian 8/28/12 2:05 p.m.
     Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Godot 8/28/12 11:04 p.m.
           Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1PerseusSpartacus 8/29/12 5:16 a.m.
                 Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Jabberwok 8/29/12 5:35 a.m.
                       Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Yossarian 8/29/12 10:36 a.m.
                 Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Yossarian 8/29/12 10:42 a.m.
           Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Yossarian 8/29/12 10:15 a.m.
                 Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Jabberwok 8/30/12 5:50 a.m.
                       Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Philtron 8/31/12 9:11 p.m.
                             Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1chiasaur11 8/31/12 11:07 p.m.
                             Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Godot 9/1/12 2:45 a.m.
                             Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Bob-B-Q 9/1/12 7:23 a.m.
                                   Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1PerseusSpartacus 9/1/12 1:34 p.m.
                 Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1jonny 5/28/13 9:05 p.m.
                       Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Dispatcher 5/28/13 10:03 p.m.
                             Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1jonny 5/30/13 7:30 a.m.
                       Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Godot 5/29/13 11:55 a.m.
                             Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Bob-B-Q 5/30/13 5:09 a.m.
                                   Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1PerseusSpartacus 5/30/13 7:18 a.m.
                                         Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Godot 5/31/13 11:18 a.m.
                                               Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1PerseusSpartacus 5/31/13 2:07 p.m.
                                   Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Godot 5/31/13 11:31 a.m.
                                         Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Bob-B-Q 6/1/13 6:21 a.m.
                                               Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Godot 6/2/13 2:14 a.m.
                                                     Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Bob-B-Q 6/2/13 7:02 a.m.
                             Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1jonny 5/30/13 7:22 a.m.
                             Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Simon Araque 5/30/13 9:50 p.m.
                                   Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Bob-B-Q 5/31/13 8:12 a.m.
                                   Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1PerseusSpartacus 5/31/13 10:03 a.m.
                                         Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Simon Araque 6/1/13 9:24 p.m.
                                   Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Godot 5/31/13 10:46 a.m.
                                         Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Hopper 5/31/13 11:20 a.m.
                                               Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Godot 5/31/13 12:09 p.m.
                                                     Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Hopper 6/1/13 11:50 a.m.
                                                           Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1PerseusSpartacus 6/1/13 12:43 p.m.
                                                           Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Godot 6/1/13 1:05 p.m.
                                                                 Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1PerseusSpartacus 6/1/13 3:46 p.m.
                                                                       Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Simon Araque 6/1/13 9:19 p.m.
                                                                             Re: the Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Dispatcher 6/1/13 10:44 p.m.
                                                                                   Part 2: Lh'owonDispatcher 6/2/13 5:30 a.m.
                                                                             Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1PerseusSpartacus 6/1/13 10:52 p.m.
                                                                       Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Godot 6/1/13 11:03 p.m.
                                                                             Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1PerseusSpartacus 6/2/13 10:17 a.m.
                       Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Yossarian 5/30/13 9:46 a.m.
                             Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1PerseusSpartacus 5/30/13 9:53 a.m.
                                   Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1Bob-B-Q 5/30/13 6:27 p.m.
                                         Re: Come and Take Your Medicine Term 1.1PerseusSpartacus 6/1/13 11:01 p.m.

[ Post a Reply | Message Index | Read Prev Msg | Read Next Msg ]
Pre-2004 Posts

 

 

Your Name:
Your E-Mail Address:
Subject:
Message:

If you'd like to include a link to another page with your message,
please provide both the URL address and the title of the page:

Optional Link URL:
Optional Link Title:

If necessary, enter your password below:

Password:
 

 

Problems? Suggestions? Comments? Email maintainer@bungie.org

Marathon's Story Forum is maintained with WebBBS 5.12.