Space Catitude 🚀
Space Catitude 🚀  ·  6 days ago

Content Warning

This is a fun list of bad books to begin with if you're getting into science fiction literature.

Some great books here, actually, but yes, hard ones. I've started 5 of these, and finished, um... 3. ( I do have plans to finish reading the other two, but I have a large to-be-read pile).

https://screenrant.com/sci-fi-books-series-bad-for-beginners-list/

#ScienceFiction#Books

Winchell Chung ⚛🚀
Winchell Chung ⚛🚀  ·  2 weeks ago
@steaphan

The current standard is the Langston Field that originated in Niven and Pournelle's The Mote in God's Eye. It was invented by Dr. Dan Alderson as per spec the limits desired by Niven & Pournelle. It was specifically designed in order to allow dramatic space opera combat scenes in scifi stories, but with interesting rules making interesting limitations.

For that reason it is also used in some scifi war games.

https://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/spacewardefense.php#langston

ToddZ
ToddZ  ·  2 weeks ago

Content Warning

@nyrath @steaphan

Fascinating... this is making me want to re-read Mote, as I didn't recall this element of the story.

I did remember the term "Alderson Drive" though!

Apparently Dan Alderson appears in-world as the discoverer of the "Alderson force" that enables the interstellar drive:

https://fanon.fandom.com/wiki/Alderson_Drive

#scifi #sciencefiction

Author Steaphan Kay
Author Steaphan Kay  ·  2 weeks ago

Content Warning

In SciFi great ship tech, what is the general lore behind why shields start at 100% and lower when confronted with any type of weapon or physical blow? Most shields deflect objects (not electrify/torch them) in SciFi. This infers more of a mag field or gravity. If that were so, a mag field wouldn't weaken when a non-mag force is applied.

It's fiction...I know...but so many ships have been needlessly blown up.

#SciFi#ScienceFiction #lore

Mark Stewart
Mark Stewart  ·  3 weeks ago

Content Warning

From the Odyssey archives: in April 2011 we began our voyage through the BIS archives, uncovering this photo of a man who knew a little bit about space shuttles, real and imagined. #Odyssey #ArthurCClarke #BIS_Odyssey #scifi #Space #sciencefiction@victrix75@rob_coppinger
Michael Whelan
Michael Whelan  ·  2 weeks ago

Content Warning

THE ULTIMATE ENEMY (1979)
Acrylic and Gouache on Illustration Board - 28" x 18"

Sometimes the simplest statements have the strongest force. The image is ostensibly a representation of the struggle to preserve life against the onslaught of the Berserker war machines described by Fred Saberhagen. 1/3

#sciencefiction#scifi #scifiart #sff #illustration #fredsaberhagen

A monstrously large robot looms on the horizon while a simple plant sprouts defiantly from barren, rocky soil in the near foreground. The arms of the robot lurch forward with fingers tensed to grip, implying a sense of forward motion, marching toward the plant. While it's body resembles a stocky biped, it's head is an asymmetrical jumble, which on close examination looks like futuristic buildings set off-center right upon its shoulders. Stiff antennae protrude upward from head and shoulders. Red and orange eye-like lights are set akimbo, an uneven diagonal that adds to the sense of uneasiness about the mechanical monstrosity.
A monstrously large robot looms on the horizon while a simple plant sprouts defiantly from barren, rocky soil in the near foreground. The arms of the robot lurch forward with fingers tensed to grip, implying a sense of forward motion, marching toward the plant. While it's body resembles a stocky biped, it's head is an asymmetrical jumble, which on close examination looks like futuristic buildings set off-center right upon its shoulders. Stiff antennae protrude upward from head and shoulders. Red and orange eye-like lights are set akimbo, an uneven diagonal that adds to the sense of uneasiness about the mechanical monstrosity.
A monstrously large robot looms on the horizon while a simple plant sprouts defiantly from barren, rocky soil in the near foreground. The arms of the robot lurch forward with fingers tensed to grip, implying a sense of forward motion, marching toward the plant. While it's body resembles a stocky biped, it's head is an asymmetrical jumble, which on close examination looks like futuristic buildings set off-center right upon its shoulders. Stiff antennae protrude upward from head and shoulders. Red and orange eye-like lights are set akimbo, an uneven diagonal that adds to the sense of uneasiness about the mechanical monstrosity.
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