Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

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wasp609
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by wasp609 »

how quickly does human technology advanced compared to other species in outsider.

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saint of m
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by saint of m »

I beleive Isac Asonove or some other Sci Fi writer said that any technology at a high enough level becomes magic.

Translation: A Jew might think the superior weapon smithing of the Philistines was magic; the native peoples of the Americas would think guns and metal armor and weapons would be magic when they first saw them; and now a species that can out class us has magic. The question is how quickly can we revers engineer it.

But is there something humans by being curios little monkeys can say or do that might get a eureka moment? There has to be something the Umiak can overlook, or something that might distract them (legend has it you could escape a vampire by dumping rice on the ground, and the vampire being OCD by nature, would have to pick up every last one). Is there something that we could use against them like that?"

Terran infiltrates a ship:

Jardin: Oh shiny!
Umiak: Don't touch that...or that...or that...That was the fail safe system you idiot!

Southern Cross
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by Southern Cross »

You're probably thinking of Isaac Asimov, and it was Arthur. C Clarke who actually came up with that law....

Voitan
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by Voitan »

When humanity comes into full contact with the Loroi empire, will transhuman sentiments rise up in response to the disparity of power between them, and the Loroi empire species?

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GeoModder
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by GeoModder »

Voitan wrote:When humanity comes into full contact with the Loroi empire, will transhuman sentiments rise up in response to the disparity of power between them, and the Loroi empire species?
Looking at how 'sentiment' segments of humanity have always rocked the boat when they disagree with the state things are, it's a good possibility.
Of course, if the 'rise up' takes over the policy making regarding interstellar affairs, humanity might be in trouble.
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saint of m
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by saint of m »

This is coming from me just thinking of an old Farscape episode. Long story short, the human character Criton, is the only one who can save the day as his senses are not as developed as the other crew members so won't be effected by the alien passenger's hypnotic abilities (granted its one of those times the ex soldier character says "We are all going to die" but what can you expect?).

While we may not be as advance in tech or biology as the blue space elves, is there a way to exploit this, or will our monkey brains come up with something so crazy it might work because neither the space bugs or space elves would have thought of that with their own tech levels?

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Grayhome
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by Grayhome »

So what technologies does humanity have that the Loroi would be willing to trade for and what would the humans be willing to trade? Any ideas?

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Mr.Tucker
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by Mr.Tucker »

Terraforming technologies (or rather techniques). Most of their worlds were already habitable, so it's plausible they may not have as much experience in this field. Social studies, economic studies (their telepathic society may lack in these sciences compared to the other races). Of course, that's IF they're interested...

Just off the top of my head.

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Arioch
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by Arioch »

There are variety of cultural or societal elements which humans practice but Loroi do not (such as ballot initiatives, reality TV, and singing), but I'm not sure those could be described as technologies.

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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by Username »

Grayhome wrote:So what technologies does humanity have that the Loroi would be willing to trade for and what would the humans be willing to trade? Any ideas?
Besides our possible knowledge of a back door into Umiak space humanity doesn't have a lot to offer to the Loroi. I think technology-wise the trade would be pretty one-sided with the Loroi gifting us some of their more primitive particle tech and maybe a dumbed down anti-matter drive. You have to consider that we are a whole tech level below them, our ships can only handle 6g acceleration for pete's sake. They have scouts zipping around at 34g!!

On the flip side i think we can do quite a bit for them culturally and logistically, If i recall our capacity to tech up is astronomical, and our different methods in that regard could be a great asset for Union scientists. Humans would make great bean counters as well, put in a support capacity we could shoulder a great brunt of the supplies and transport necessary for some of the fast attack groups. I'm not saying we could make a huge difference right away, but in time...

Zakharra
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by Zakharra »

Yes. As large as the Umiak Hegemony is, even if the Lorie do get into their internal areas, it's going to take decades to finish them off because of the round about way they'd have to take to get ships to the new front, and the years of fighting to get into the newer systems and reduce the Umiak worlds to ruin. During this time, Humanity could upgrade itself to an impressive degree. It might make Humans a considerable secondary Power in the Lorie Union since the Humans worlds would be the only really developed area in our region of space and having developed areas that can repair, s7upply and eventually build warships for the Union's war effort in the new front might be a distinct advantage.

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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by Username »

yes, but that is if the Loroi don't sweep us under the rug for political reasons. :lol:

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saint of m
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by saint of m »

Using Earth's history as a basis, it seems when a superior force arrives it can be defeated by a local population if they use then unconventional methods. American Revaluation, Vietnam, Afghanistan during the cold war to today, and even Israiel.


Using the enemy's style of warfare head on will only aid the enemy, but using unorthodox and using several smaller excursions with bigger ones here and there to whittle down resolve and you could make it too uncomfortable for the invader to stay.


Using a simalar principle to Terrans in this setting, would they have to relly on unorthodox tactics against either empire to survive this war?

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icekatze
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by icekatze »

hi hi

I think part of the problem of a guerilla war is that the invaders might just decide that keeping the population alive is not worth the effort. Orbital bombardment with relativistic weapons is a scary, scary thing.

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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by discord »

saint: the thing about space warfare is that basically you want to keep your ships together, not in penny packets, there are exactly two situations when as a aggressor you want to split up your fleet, harassing raids that avoids actual engagements and only nibbles, and if you have overwhelming superiority to make the war end faster.

as a defender splitting up your fleets too much makes them mere speed bumps, slowing the attacking fleet down because it has to be more careful on approach, or if you can pull it off a small force can be detached and just hang around in the outskirts of the system, forcing the enemy to slow down, either hunt you down or detach a group to hunt you down, which is splitting up your forces and inviting defeat by a thousand paper cuts.....again, speed bumps.

on the ground guerrilla warfare works much better, lower infrastructure requirements for one, but orbital bombardment might happen if you are too annoying, and in this war it seems they might not even bother with ground invasion, just start off with bombardment of most infrastructure, and then quarantine the damn planet for later decision. makes guerrilla warfare kinda pointless.

Zakharra
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by Zakharra »

Username wrote:yes, but that is if the Loroi don't sweep us under the rug for political reasons. :lol:
It would look very bad for them to do that without damned good reason. The Loroi, even with their formidable military strength, need the services of the Historians, Neridi, and the Barsam. Those races would not necessarily look favorably on the Loroi if the Loroi tried to just wipe out Humanity without good reason. Right now, the Human worlds are the only settled worlds in this area of space. As far as I know, there are no Loroi alliance worlds capable of supporting a Loroi fleet large enough to invade the Umiak backwater areas. And so far, they do play fair with reasonable races/allies. If we treat them well, then in all likelihood they will treat humans well as well and honor their word.Just because we might be a threat at some point in the future, doesn't mean we should be treated like crap now. I'd think the Loroi are smart enough to realize that treating humans well and honoring the treaty that will be signed will do far more to make us good allies, than treating humans like some sort of freaky thing that should be shunned or as you put it, swept under the rug (however that is done).

Philly
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by Philly »

I am curious about a few things in your constructed universe Arioch. Hopefully, you'll be able to answer my questions. :D

1) If a veteran Terran platoon were to fight the Loroi or Umiak, both of which are veterans, in a ground war who would win?

2) Sorry if this has been repeated before, but from what I understand Humanity is completely and utterly boned in this galactic war because from what I can see we are trounced in all comparable aspects with the Loroi and Umiak. Aside from having our civilization turned into either slave labor or being completely devoted to an industrial planet I can't think of anything the Terrans can or could do. Do they have anything to offer besides inferiority?

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RedDwarfIV
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by RedDwarfIV »

Philly wrote:I am curious about a few things in your constructed universe Arioch. Hopefully, you'll be able to answer my questions. :D

1) If a veteran Terran platoon were to fight the Loroi or Umiak, both of which are veterans, in a ground war who would win?
A veteran of what? At most a colony war maybe, but that's small fry compared to what a veteran Loroi/Umiak unit would have been through.
Philly wrote:2) Sorry if this has been repeated before, but from what I understand Humanity is completely and utterly boned in this galactic war because from what I can see we are trounced in all comparable aspects with the Loroi and Umiak. Aside from having our civilization turned into either slave labor or being completely devoted to an industrial planet I can't think of anything the Terrans can or could do. Do they have anything to offer besides inferiority?
That's not what's been said. Humanity isn't boned. We advance much faster technologically than the Loroi or Umiak, and we are a long distance from the warzone. Right now, the Umiak don't care about us because they don't know about us. That'll give us the time needed to develop warfighting capability on their level, as well as production and repair facilities to allow the Loroi to open up a new front of the war.

Plus, the space around Terran territory is pretty much empty. We could expand massively, increasing both out materials production and interstellar economy in the process. Again, the distance from the fight and the fact that the Umiak haven't found out about us means we'd have the time to do that.

What has been said is that Humanity will not provide the Loroi Union with an immediate game-changing advantage. There is no object or knowledge the Terrans could currently give the Loroi that would help bring about a swift defeat of the Umiak.
If every cloud had a silver lining, there would be a lot more plane crashes.

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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by TrashMan »

Ground combat?

There we are more evenly matched.
The fancy beam weapons have no advantage in atmosphere and at short ranges. ESPECIALLY at short ranges.
Good-old slug throwers may be primitive, but they are effective, reliable and cheap.

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Arioch
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Re: Miscellaneous Terran question-and-answer thread

Post by Arioch »

Philly wrote:1) If a veteran Terran platoon were to fight the Loroi or Umiak, both of which are veterans, in a ground war who would win?
If a small unit of Terran Colonial Marines were to face off against a similar-sized unit of Loroi marines or Umiak hardtroops, the Terran troops would be at a disadvantage in terms of weapon and armor technology, and would face a significant challenge in dealing with fact that the Loroi Unsheathed squad leaders are telekinetic death machines, or that all the Umiak troops are cyborg death machines. That said, the Terran weapons are capable of defeating Loroi or Umiak armor, and so victory would be possible. Who would win would depend on the situation, the quality of leadership, the skill of the individual soldiers, and luck.
Philly wrote:2) Sorry if this has been repeated before, but from what I understand Humanity is completely and utterly boned in this galactic war because from what I can see we are trounced in all comparable aspects with the Loroi and Umiak. Aside from having our civilization turned into either slave labor or being completely devoted to an industrial planet I can't think of anything the Terrans can or could do. Do they have anything to offer besides inferiority?
This is a common question, but it's a little bit like asking, "What do the Hobbits offer in the war against Sauron?" The question can't be answered without telling the story.

Which I will get back to shortly. :D

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