Search found 53 matches
- 2011-05-16 01:43pm
- Forum: Off-Topic
- Topic: Orion Drives
- Replies: 37
- Views: 5288
Re: Orion Drives
[...] Oh, and if you want a Sci-Fi series that uses an Orion Drive, check out the Troy Rising series, by John Ringo. [...] Having recently finished the trilogy, I'd strongly support Sithking Zero's suggestion, with a caveat: book 3, "The Hot Gates", most definitely does not exist. Books 1...
- 2011-05-16 10:15am
- Forum: User Fiction
- Topic: A Squelch of Empires (crossover)
- Replies: 480
- Views: 282009
Re: A Squelch of Empires (crossover)
You've never seen half-a-decade gaps in fanfiction, then. I dimly recall one being restarted after either 4 or 6 years of down-time (it was restarted in 2010, and had been dead since either 04 or 06, hence the confusion). But I was talking about an average accepted time gap, in which 6 months nicel...
- 2011-05-16 06:19am
- Forum: Science Fiction
- Topic: Cooling a planet
- Replies: 22
- Views: 2570
Re: Cooling a planet
A ring system would mess up all other space activities. Imagine launching a sattelite or launching anything when most orbits pass through the rings with resulting high chance of high speed collisions. The problem this thread has is that there are too many different cases lumped together. I see two ...
- 2011-05-16 05:57am
- Forum: Science Fiction
- Topic: Cooling a planet
- Replies: 22
- Views: 2570
Re: Cooling a planet
In the realm of we-might-just-theoretically-achieve-with-this-century-tech, I'd go with an irregular ring of ice and dust, at and around the equatorial band. Push some icy asteroids in orbit with tugs, then blast them with solar mirrors, over a long, long time. Water vapor and whatever solid chunks ...
- 2011-05-16 03:16am
- Forum: User Fiction
- Topic: A Squelch of Empires (crossover)
- Replies: 480
- Views: 282009
Re: A Squelch of Empires (crossover)
Yes! Yes! Yes!!! It's back! This is on of my top 3, Very-High-Importance 'fics I follow, you really made me happy. "Enormous apologies for the lateness of this- just, argh." Don't bother. From reading fanfiction over the past decade, I gather a half year gap between chapters is completely ...
- 2011-04-27 05:32am
- Forum: Gaming, Electronics and Computers
- Topic: Who Here Uses Linux?
- Replies: 57
- Views: 7335
Re: Who Here Uses Linux?
Win 7 at work, Win XP at home. I don't use Linux, not from any religious conviction, but because I'm a developer on the .Net platform, and I don't have much use for it (yes, I know about Mono).
- 2011-04-27 05:02am
- Forum: Off-Topic
- Topic: What are you reading right now?
- Replies: 1293
- Views: 209154
Re: What are you reading right now?
"Hell's Gate" by David Weber and Linda Evans and it's such a goddamn awful book. *Shudder*, when I read the title it made me think of John Ringo's "Hell's Gate", the third in his Troy trilogy. Holy fuck, that book is the absolute gold standard on how to take a promising story li...
- 2011-04-26 09:37am
- Forum: User Fiction
- Topic: Fanfiction.net: the good bits
- Replies: 383
- Views: 457662
Re: Fanfiction.net: the good bits
1) Harry Potter and the Nightmares of Future Past (ongoing, 38 chapters and barely reached year 3; nearly 400k words; fair warning, them chapters are long) A fanfic which was started before Book 7, and as such discounts it. I got the link off the infamous Tv Tropes, where it was recommended as an ex...
- 2011-04-26 08:39am
- Forum: Off-Topic
- Topic: What are you reading right now?
- Replies: 1293
- Views: 209154
Re: What are you reading right now?
John Birmingham - Axis of Time ; started the third and final book this week-end. After getting thoroughly disgusted of alternate-history by Eric Flint's Sue-mericans, I did enjoy a storyline in which time travelers mess up more things than they fix. On the other hand, I still wonder if my appreciat...
- 2011-02-22 08:24am
- Forum: News and Politics
- Topic: Uprising in Libya
- Replies: 1086
- Views: 162358
Re: Gaddafi orders crackdown, leaves many dead
I love the part about the pilots landing in Malta. I wonder what will happen to those Mirages? I'm still kind of thinking that the uprising won't succeed. But then again I'm fairly uninformed about Libyan politics. I dunno. Libya's governmental structure has already fallen into far more chaos than ...
- 2011-02-22 07:33am
- Forum: Science Fiction
- Topic: Hyperspace Tactics
- Replies: 33
- Views: 5494
Re: Hyperspace Tactics
(double post; sorry about it.
I wanted to edit my above post to replace "corvette" with "Republic battle cruiser" as the quote says, and didn't notice the edit window had closed.)
I wanted to edit my above post to replace "corvette" with "Republic battle cruiser" as the quote says, and didn't notice the edit window had closed.)
- 2011-02-22 05:34am
- Forum: Science Fiction
- Topic: Hyperspace Tactics
- Replies: 33
- Views: 5494
Re: Hyperspace Tactics
I've never seen this, but maybe if a ship in hyperspace somehow rammed a second ship...? It would presumably do a rather large amount of damage. In the ROTS ICS, the Quaestor, a Republic battle cruiser accidentally rammed the Seperatist world of Pammant while in hyperspace, fracturing it to its cor...
- 2011-02-22 03:58am
- Forum: User Fiction
- Topic: Godforsaken Future - updated 10/31/2015
- Replies: 309
- Views: 131194
Re: Godforsaken Future
I've read this last chapter 3 times, and I'm still not sure what to make of it, I suck at spy stuff. So I'm taking the opportunity to post an answer to the (non)Euclidean sidetalk without causing a necro. I'm pretty sure we were talking right past each other there, but I can't figure out about what....
- 2011-02-04 02:37am
- Forum: User Fiction
- Topic: Godforsaken Future - updated 10/31/2015
- Replies: 309
- Views: 131194
Re: Godforsaken Future
non-parallel lines are only one aspect of the geometry, I believe that I specifically mentioned that there were plenty of curved lines too(particularly with the tablets), the stairs at the city entrance just happened to be straight. As a rule of thumb: if the city in Antarctica can be modeled in Sk...
- 2011-02-03 09:36am
- Forum: User Fiction
- Topic: Godforsaken Future - updated 10/31/2015
- Replies: 309
- Views: 131194
Re: Godforsaken Future
I knew I had a nitpick to pick, guest, and I finally remembered what it was. In the Antarctic subplot, you use "Non-Euclidean geometry" to refer to the avoidance of parallel lines, and that's not what non-Euclidean means; non-parallel would have been just fine. I suppose you already know t...
- 2011-02-02 08:56am
- Forum: Off-Topic
- Topic: Worst. Class. Ever.
- Replies: 56
- Views: 8702
Re: Worst. Class. Ever.
My absolute worst was a semester-long class in ninth grade; a mix of Social Studies, Philosophy and Economy. I don't even remember what it was called. We already had such classes every semester since 7th grade, and they were firmly bracketed under "pointless waste of time"; they had no dir...
- 2011-02-02 07:37am
- Forum: User Fiction
- Topic: Godforsaken Future - updated 10/31/2015
- Replies: 309
- Views: 131194
Re: Godforsaken Future
Also are we gonna see these things go full on aquatic? Plenty of biomass in the oceans... Only to cause havoc, if I get Scourge capabilities right. From what I understood so far, Scourge needs its "nest" to actually convert biomass into new units. Yes, it could go into the ocean and kill ...
- 2011-02-02 07:05am
- Forum: User Fiction
- Topic: Godforsaken Future - updated 10/31/2015
- Replies: 309
- Views: 131194
Re: Godforsaken Future
we received our orders by courier about a week and a half ago This is on June 14; Manaua fell on April 23; so there was a week and a half between that disaster and Colonel SoonDead receiving his orders. Even with couriers, that's an awfully long time. What I'm trying to figure out here, is whether ...
- 2011-01-18 10:16am
- Forum: Science Fiction
- Topic: Contact Science Fiction
- Replies: 24
- Views: 3269
Re: Contact Science Fiction
My view of technobabble is drivel like this and this and this . A biologist using biology jargon to make fictional biological monsters have the most superficial semblance of making sense is a breath of daisies in the reeking pit of science fiction. Hey, look: I can google before posting: “An inform...
- 2011-01-12 05:00pm
- Forum: Off-Topic
- Topic: Goddamn it, 1632 is bad
- Replies: 124
- Views: 18376
Re: Goddamn it, 1632 is bad
Chapter 30 - Ducos, the villain of the story, apparently sees nothing wrong in explaining his whole part to a captive. Well, that's par for the course for any villain worthy of the Evil Overlord List :D Whaaaat? I take offense at that, the Evil Overlord List specifically and insistently forbids any...
- 2011-01-12 04:44pm
- Forum: Off-Topic
- Topic: Goddamn it, 1632 is bad
- Replies: 124
- Views: 18376
Re: Goddamn it, 1632 is bad
[...]Chapter 30 - Ducos, the villain of the story, apparently sees nothing wrong in explaining his whole part to a captive. Chapter 34 - Eric Flint sure likes the Spanish Hidalgos. I am not going to declare the guy a Mary Sue yet, but he comes close.[..][plus Princess Bride quote] Well, nuts; I act...
- 2011-01-06 04:43pm
- Forum: Off-Topic
- Topic: Goddamn it, 1632 is bad
- Replies: 124
- Views: 18376
Re: Goddamn it, 1632 is bad
Point the third: history is liberally bent around. Can't pronounce on Gustav or the 30 years' war, but "The Galileo Affair" goes out of its way to paint Galileo badly, papacy and Catholics good (and Protestants as nutty religious whackos. Granted, hey were nutty religious whackos, but so ...
- 2011-01-06 01:16pm
- Forum: Off-Topic
- Topic: Goddamn it, 1632 is bad
- Replies: 124
- Views: 18376
Re: Goddamn it, 1632 is bad
He does not, and that is in fact the reason why the later books are better (From a certain quality of better) than the earlier books because the later books have historians after him to correct his many historical revisionisms. Or rather they are after to him to include real history in order to mak...
- 2011-01-06 12:56pm
- Forum: Off-Topic
- Topic: Goddamn it, 1632 is bad
- Replies: 124
- Views: 18376
Re: Goddamn it, 1632 is bad
So somebody recommended Eric Flint's book to me. Whoever it was will get an earful as soon as I remember who it was. Disturbingly, it might have been on this very board, the thread "SDN in the Sea of Time" - at least that's where I got acquainted with them. It was compared to Stirling's &...
- 2011-01-04 05:59am
- Forum: Science Fiction
- Topic: Contact Science Fiction
- Replies: 24
- Views: 3269
Re: Contact Science Fiction
For the sake of completeness, I'll add John Ringo's "Troy Rising" trilogy. I wouldn't go as far as recommending it, the writing struck me as rather crappy, and I'm certain I've read fanfiction of higher quality. The premise is, however, rather interesting, and it might make a good universe...