440 réponses à ce sujet

[OhoniX]

Ummm, ok, apparently the devs are retconning their own ending, because the relays are only disabled now.....I think.....

Mike Gamble Twitter

Double check it, he was talking about the "control" ending only. In the control ending they don't seem to explode like the other two, which apparently means they weren't destroyed, only shut down.

[FlyingCow371]

As far as relays being the optimum form of travel...that doesn't feel like it needs to be true. Reasons cited being that the reapers would've made something better if it were possible. But, what do the reapers care about travel speed? They come by, do their reaping, and then go away and chill for 50,000 YEARS!!! That's a pretty long time. So they don't seem rushed in their traveling; instead they plot a leisurely course towards the galaxy. The relays are plenty fast enough, with the added benefit of controlling the space exploration of species in the next cycle.

[Exeider]

OhoniX wrote...

1) 5-7 years as the crow flies and assuming they can travel at constant speed. But keep in mind they have to follow the path of discharge sites, which means they would have to travel up one spiral arm and then across teh common connection point, and then down that spiral arm to the destination, also they have to stop to discharge, which can take almost as long as they are traveling, several hours to days, increasing any estimates by alot./quote]

An interesting point about the spiral arms, I'd like to see a more accurate galactic map with the ME planets on it, to see what arms each are in.

Let's consider a worst case navigational scenario, that it might take a year or more to cross the dead space between arms. That wouldn't work with the existing ships. For that scenario to work, they would need several things. 1. They'd need to solve the discharge thing. Personally I don't see why they can't redirect that static charge into their own energy reserves, it seems to me like a highly valuable energy source, not a waste product. 2. They'd need to conserve fuel, which means that instead of boosting half way and then braking half way, they'd need to just boost at the start and then coast most of the way, which would lengthen the overall travel time. 3. They'd need an efficient form of power during that trip to maintain their fields and such. 4. They'd need to keep the crew alive in transit, perhaps cold sleeping them for most of the trip. All that seems feasible within ME, but it would definitely add to the travel time considerably.

2) They DO NOT have instantaneous communication, the entangled pairs were headquatered and were destroyed at Arcturus Station in the Arcturus star cluster, you can visit the debris in game to see what I mean. the only entangled pairs that still exist, assuming the structures they are contained in are intact are, TIM's Office-Normandy pair, Citadel-Normandy Pair, Earth-Normandy pair. (This assumes that the space magic wave didn't destroy all technology, like star child sometimes says depending on your ending.)

We know Alliance communication is pretty shot, but we don't know what communications the other races might have with their own worlds.

Comm buoys are used in tandem with the already present Relays that are there.

Yes, so they likely wouldn't function as-is, but the fact that they were able to build the comm bouys used in the chain means that they understood the basic principles of building a Mass Relay, they just never got around to scaling them up before. As I said, the tools seem to be there to build at the very least a primitively functional mass relay, capable of sending relatively small vessels across reasonable distances.

they cannot use drive charge to power anything, its static electricity, it would blow out the ship systems if they did that, if not torch the people in it. It would be like unleashing lightning into the ship systems just to clearify the point.

also, the fuel mechanic in the game is not represenative of what the codex says is going on in relation to how travel actually works, Fusion reactors only need to be refueled every coupld of years, and running of ion engines, anti-proton drive, etc, doesn't use fuel per se.

they already DO coast, the 12LY/day limit, is because they accelerate to 12 LY and stop accelerating because any faster and it would saturate the core faster. THERE IS NO SPEED LIMIT IN SPACE, its about acceleration not speed.

They already have cold sleep tech, as seen in both normandy's so that is plausible.

FTL drive cores can only operate for 50 hours, and then must be discharged, which can take several hours to days depending on the discharge site.

Cerberus was the only one's to have QECs then the alliance got them after they took the Normandy 2 apart and put it back together, so it stands to reason the alliance manufactures them, so the other races wouldn't have access to them because of such the short time between ME 2 and 3 to make them. I'm actually surprised they got one for the citadel.

There is a huge difference between making a micro mass effect relay for a nearly massless photon vs a whole ship, in fact it says "The amount of element zero and power required for a drive increases
exponentially to the mass being moved and the degree it is being
lightened. Very massive ships or very high speeds are prohibitively
expensive.
"

while they may have an understanding of the physics involved, scaling it up as you say, well that's the billion credit question..

-AE

Modifié par Exeider, 11 avril 2012 - 03:53 .

[Exeider]

OhoniX wrote...

Ummm, ok, apparently the devs are retconning their own ending, because the relays are only disabled now.....I think.....

Mike Gamble Twitter

Double check it, he was talking about the "control" ending only. In the control ending they don't seem to explode like the other two, which apparently means they weren't destroyed, only shut down.

yeah, i saw that he was talking about the control ending. And yeah they do explode the same EXACT way.

Mass Effect 3 Ending Comparison.

it's the Citadel that doesnt get torched.

-AE

[justafan]

FlyingCow371 wrote...

As far as relays being the optimum form of travel...that doesn't feel like it needs to be true. Reasons cited being that the reapers would've made something better if it were possible. But, what do the reapers care about travel speed? They come by, do their reaping, and then go away and chill for 50,000 YEARS!!! That's a pretty long time. So they don't seem rushed in their traveling; instead they plot a leisurely course towards the galaxy. The relays are plenty fast enough, with the added benefit of controlling the space exploration of species in the next cycle.

I never thought of it this way.  It is important to remember the relays were not made for the Reaper's travel convenience, they were made for the Reaper's reaping convenience.  As is, the relays are convenient enough for organics so that they don't bother developing alternatives, and it has the added benefits of dictating where organics colonize and being easy to control via the citadel, aka ground zero in every reaper cycle.

If a better way exists, I can see the reapers not bothering with it if it would make the reaping cycle harder.

[Malanek]

Exeider wrote...
2) They DO NOT have instantaneous communication, the entangled pairs were headquatered and were destroyed at Arcturus Station in the Arcturus star cluster, you can visit the debris in game to see what I mean. the only entangled pairs that still exist, assuming the structures they are contained in are intact are, TIM's Office-Normandy pair,  Citadel-Normandy Pair, Earth-Normandy pair. (This assumes that the space magic wave didn't destroy all technology, like star child sometimes says depending on your ending.)

Where is your source for this? Have you talked to your quantum specialist, Traynor? I seem to recall a conversation in which she talks about the difficulties of wiring together many multiple quantum threads together for large scale conversations. If so that implies they are relatively widespread. I was under the impression that the Normandy had quantum coms set up almost everywhere important. The technology may be newish but it is so amazing that there would have been many pairs setup between different homeworlds.

[Exeider]

Malanek999 wrote...

Exeider wrote...
2) They DO NOT have instantaneous communication, the entangled pairs were headquatered and were destroyed at Arcturus Station in the Arcturus star cluster, you can visit the debris in game to see what I mean. the only entangled pairs that still exist, assuming the structures they are contained in are intact are, TIM's Office-Normandy pair,  Citadel-Normandy Pair, Earth-Normandy pair. (This assumes that the space magic wave didn't destroy all technology, like star child sometimes says depending on your ending.)

Where is your source for this? Have you talked to your quantum specialist, Traynor? I seem to recall a conversation in which she talks about the difficulties of wiring together many multiple quantum threads together for large scale conversations. If so that implies they are relatively widespread. I was under the impression that the Normandy had quantum coms set up almost everywhere important. The technology may be newish but it is so amazing that there would have been many pairs setup between different homeworlds.

Fly to the Arcturus system on your way to Earth and look at the debris from Arcturus station and read the info card for it, it says it was the HQ for the QEC network, and it was destroyed by the reapers.

-AE

[Malanek]

Exeider wrote...

Malanek999 wrote...

Exeider wrote...
2) They DO NOT have instantaneous communication, the entangled pairs were headquatered and were destroyed at Arcturus Station in the Arcturus star cluster, you can visit the debris in game to see what I mean. the only entangled pairs that still exist, assuming the structures they are contained in are intact are, TIM's Office-Normandy pair,  Citadel-Normandy Pair, Earth-Normandy pair. (This assumes that the space magic wave didn't destroy all technology, like star child sometimes says depending on your ending.)

Where is your source for this? Have you talked to your quantum specialist, Traynor? I seem to recall a conversation in which she talks about the difficulties of wiring together many multiple quantum threads together for large scale conversations. If so that implies they are relatively widespread. I was under the impression that the Normandy had quantum coms set up almost everywhere important. The technology may be newish but it is so amazing that there would have been many pairs setup between different homeworlds.

Fly to the Arcturus system on your way to Earth and look at the debris from Arcturus station and read the info card for it, it says it was the HQ for the QEC network, and it was destroyed by the reapers.

-AE

It doesn't matter if it said that at all. You said "
the only entangled pairs that still exist, assuming the structures they are contained in are intact are, TIM's Office-Normandy pair,  Citadel-Normandy Pair, Earth-Normandy pair. " That statement cannot be substantiated from that. And if it was the "only" network center then how does the Normandys comm system work throughout the game? Why would the Asari, the Salarians, the Turians etc etc want to route all their top level communications through a human space station anyway?

[Exeider]

Malanek999 wrote...

Exeider wrote...

Malanek999 wrote...

Exeider wrote...
2) They DO NOT have instantaneous communication, the entangled pairs were headquatered and were destroyed at Arcturus Station in the Arcturus star cluster, you can visit the debris in game to see what I mean. the only entangled pairs that still exist, assuming the structures they are contained in are intact are, TIM's Office-Normandy pair,  Citadel-Normandy Pair, Earth-Normandy pair. (This assumes that the space magic wave didn't destroy all technology, like star child sometimes says depending on your ending.)

Where is your source for this? Have you talked to your quantum specialist, Traynor? I seem to recall a conversation in which she talks about the difficulties of wiring together many multiple quantum threads together for large scale conversations. If so that implies they are relatively widespread. I was under the impression that the Normandy had quantum coms set up almost everywhere important. The technology may be newish but it is so amazing that there would have been many pairs setup between different homeworlds.

Fly to the Arcturus system on your way to Earth and look at the debris from Arcturus station and read the info card for it, it says it was the HQ for the QEC network, and it was destroyed by the reapers.

-AE

It doesn't matter if it said that at all. You said "
the only entangled pairs that still exist, assuming the structures they are contained in are intact are, TIM's Office-Normandy pair,  Citadel-Normandy Pair, Earth-Normandy pair. " That statement cannot be substantiated from that. And if it was the "only" network center then how does the Normandys comm system work throughout the game? Why would the Asari, the Salarians, the Turians etc etc want to route all their top level communications through a human space station anyway?

TIM's office/station wasn't destroyed, the Citadel isnt destroyed, if you picked control ending, and Earth because you see Hackett and Anderson use it AFTER the citadel gets to Earth.

as far as why, probably due to time constraints and because the normandy went back to human hands and taken apart and put back together. the QEC technology was invented by Cerberus, so its safe to say that the alliance started manufacturing them as fast as they could once they figured it out. and Arcturus is the HQ for the alliance government, as well as the closest extra solar station, probably why they installed it there in the first place.

Also, your assuming it was destroyed at the begining of the game, and not the end when they brought the citadel.

-AE

[Tov01]

Exeider wrote...
C) You cannot plot linear courses, you have to be with in range of discharge sites, meaning no crossing into the void of galactic arms. In fact you would have to plot courses in the shape of the galactic arms, you would have to travel up one, cross at the points they are connected, and travel down another to reach you final destination.
-AE

I'm 90% sure that the space between the galactic arms still has a lot of stars. It's just that the arms have most of the dust, and is where most of the new star formation occures, making them appear brighter.

Edit: Link to evidence: www.badastronomy.com/bitesize/spiral.html

"So the spiral arms really don't have that many more stars than the space between the arms; it's just that there are more bright stars there. The brighter ones are easier to see!"
- Phil Plait, Astronomer

Modifié par Tov01, 11 avril 2012 - 04:27 .

[Malanek]

Exeider , From Fall of Earth Codex
After destroying Earth's comm buoys, smaller Reaper destroyers wiped out all GPS and communications satellites in Earth's orbit and cut the undersea fiber-optic cables that linked the continents. Earth's resistance now relies on outdated radio towers and a few quantum entanglement communicators. whose matched pairs happen to be on other continents or outside the Sol system. Communication is so limited that the fate of entire nations remains unknown.

There ARE other quantum pairs existing.

Modifié par Malanek999, 11 avril 2012 - 04:24 .

[CapnManx]

Exeider wrote...


they cannot use drive charge to power anything, its static electricity, it would blow out the ship systems if they did that, if not torch the people in it. It would be like unleashing lightning into the ship systems just to clearify the point.

also, the fuel mechanic in the game is not represenative of what the codex says is going on in relation to how travel actually works, Fusion reactors only need to be refueled every coupld of years, and running of ion engines, anti-proton drive, etc, doesn't use fuel per se.

they already DO coast, the 12LY/day limit, is because they accelerate to 12 LY and stop accelerating because any faster and it would saturate the core faster. THERE IS NO SPEED LIMIT IN SPACE, its about acceleration not speed.

They already have cold sleep tech, as seen in both normandy's so that is plausible.

FTL drive cores can only operate for 50 hours, and then must be discharged, which can take several hours to days depending on the discharge site.

Cerberus was the only one's to have QECs then the alliance got them after they took the Normandy 2 apart and put it back together, so it stands to reason the alliance manufactures them, so the other races wouldn't have access to them because of such the short time between ME 2 and 3 to make them. I'm actually surprised they got one for the citadel.

There is a huge difference between making a micro mass effect relay for a nearly massless photon vs a whole ship, in fact it says "The amount of element zero and power required for a drive increases
exponentially to the mass being moved and the degree it is being
lightened. Very massive ships or very high speeds are prohibitively
expensive.
"

while they may have an understanding of the physics involved, scaling it up as you say, well that's the billion credit question..

-AE

I've already posted this elsewhere; but since the subject of core charge has come up...

I have cracked the core charge problem!

Static electricity is caused normally (or in other words, by accident) by two non conductive surfaces coming into contact with each other.  Electrons pass from one object to the other, then get stuck when the objects are separated.  This results in one object having a 'positive' charge (not enough electrons), and the other having a 'negative' charge (too many electrons).  Static discharge occurs when equilibrium is restored ('neutral' being the natural state of matter, and the state it generally tries to return to); with surplus electrons jumping to lonely protons via any handy conductive path (if you've ever got a shock off something, that conductive path was probably you).

Core charge skips the 'electron swapping via contact' bit, because it happens on purpose; the core is exposed to a positive charge to increase mass, or a negative charge to decrease it.  Since the point of the core is to lower the mass of the ship, the charge used for FTL flight will be negative.

So that's how we end up with the need to discharge the core; it's swimming in surplus electrons, due to the negative charge.  It can be assumed that eezo is less than idealy conductive, and that electrons get stuck in or on it.

To neutralise the charge, a ship grounds itself by either making physical contact with a planet, or by interacting with a planet's magnetic field; failure to do so results in the core discharging into the ship's hull.

However, this holds true if the only place it could discharge into is the ship itself.  The solution then, is provide an
alternative place for the core to discharge.  Which brings me to ion thrusters.

There is a particular type, called an 'electrostatic ion thruster', that is particularly relevant; it converts small quantities of fuel (usually xenon gas) into ions, and propells them in a beam out the back of the space craft.  These ions all carry a positive charge; creating the risks of charge build up, and of the ions returning to the space craft (thus canceling the thrust).  The problem is dealt with by firing a stream of electrons into the ion beam; thus neutralising the charge.

See where I'm going here?

The solution then, is to have electrostatic ion thrusters supplementing whatever other propulsion system the ship uses; and make sure that the paths from the element zero core to the ion beams are more conductive than the paths from the core to the hull.  The negative charge in the core will naturally discharge continuously into the positive ions emerging from the thrusters; both enabling the thrusters to function, and preventing static build up within the ship.

Modifié par CapnManx, 11 avril 2012 - 05:12 .

[Exeider]

Tov01 wrote...

Exeider wrote...
C) You cannot
plot linear courses, you have to be with in range of discharge sites,
meaning no crossing into the void of galactic arms. In fact you would
have to plot courses in the shape of the galactic arms, you would have
to travel up one, cross at the points they are connected, and travel
down another to reach you final destination.
-AE

I'm
90% sure that the space between the galactic arms still has a lot of
stars. It's just that the arms have most of the dust, and is where most
of the new star formation occures, making them appear brighter.

Edit: Link to evidence: www.badastronomy.com/bitesize/spiral.html

"So the spiral arms really don't have that many more stars than the space between the arms; it's just that there are more bright stars there. The brighter ones are easier to see!"
- Phil Plait, Astronomer

In respect to looking at the galaxy that is true, there are a lot of stars, but there are huge voids between them ranging from several hundred to deveral thousand light years between them.

If there is a gap of 25 LY anywhere, which is 12LY/day times the 50 hour time limit a core can operate, then your screwed.

Malanek999 wrote...

Exeider , From Fall of Earth Codex
After destroying Earth's comm buoys, smaller Reaper destroyers wiped out all GPS and communications satellites in Earth's orbit and cut the undersea fiber-optic cables that linked the continents. Earth's resistance now relies on outdated radio towers and a few quantum entanglement communicators. whose matched pairs happen to be on other continents or outside the Sol system. Communication is so limited that the fate of entire nations remains unknown.

There ARE other quantum pairs existing.

Yeah, I was thinking about it on the way home from work, I remember reading that, ok so i stand corrected.

But they are still rare and not EVERYONE has them, And if certain places are destroyed then the pairs that location had are worthless.

so communications is still a barrier to exploration and reconnecting with the rest of the galaxy. maybe a couple of high level places but not everyone or everywhere.


-Æ

[Leafs43]

Read the mass relays were just "disabled"...

Lmao, what the fuuuuu....?



Is that them retconning the huge ass explosions we saw?

[OhoniX]

they cannot use drive charge to power anything, its static
electricity, it would blow out the ship systems if they did that, if not
torch the people in it. It would be like unleashing lightning into the
ship systems just to clearify the point.

Yes, but lightning can be harnessed, if you have a key and some string. Seriously, wiht all the tech they have, I can't imagine they couldn't figure out some way to safely draw off a static charge, at the very least discarding it, but ideally storing and/or burning it as fuel.

also, the fuel mechanic in the game is not represenative of what the
codex says is going on in relation to how travel actually works, Fusion
reactors only need to be refueled every coupld of years, and running of
ion engines, anti-proton drive, etc, doesn't use fuel per se.

The way it's depicted in gameplay doesn't relate to what the Codex says, but that could just be a display issue. I mean, to accurately reflect the codex entries, you'd need to chart a course from one system to another, similar to relay hopping, and then it would just show the ormandy accelerating to the midpoint and then decelerating to the destination in a smooth motion. In practice you just "putter around," but for the point of argument this might just be a simulation for the player's benefit that does not accurately reflect what's happening. In either case, the fuel use would be the same either way, if we assume that they are trying to maintain maximum speed and not conserve fuel by coasting.

they already DO coast, the 12LY/day limit, is because they
accelerate to 12 LY and stop accelerating because any faster and it
would saturate the core faster. THERE IS NO SPEED LIMIT IN SPACE, its
about acceleration not speed.

An interesting point, but perhaps the "12 ly/d" thing is meant in the sense that since they DO need to stop for discharging every few days, if you take the maximum distance they could achieve in that time, and then average it out, it would be 12yr/s. Presumably they could reach a higher top speed along the way. Perhaps if discharge limitations could be removed then they could accelerate well beyond that listed speed.

FTL drive cores can only operate for 50 hours, and then must be
discharged, which can take several hours to days depending on the
discharge site.

This also wouldn't make sense. If it's an electrical charge then moving it from place to place should be fairly instantaneous.

while they may have an understanding of the physics involved,
scaling it up as you say, well that's the billion credit question..

But not impossible. My point is not that it would be super easy, or they would have done it already, it was just that they aren't complete black box technology, they grasp the fundamentals. Also, since the destroyed relays were still relatively intact, and they've never had the opportunity to study even broken relay bits before, they can get a real head start on making new ones.

yeah, i saw that he was talking about the control ending. And yeah they do explode the same EXACT way.

Mass Effect 3 Ending Comparison.

it's the Citadel that doesnt get torched.

Perhaps he just mis-spoke then, I wouldn't take that comment as confirmation that they're actually ret-conning the relay's destruction just yet.

I never thought of it this way.  It is important to remember the
relays were not made for the Reaper's travel convenience, they were made
for the Reaper's reaping convenience.  As is, the relays are convenient
enough for organics so that they don't bother developing alternatives,
and it has the added benefits of dictating where organics colonize and
being easy to control via the citadel, aka ground zero in every reaper
cycle.

If a better way exists, I can see the reapers not bothering with it if it would make the reaping cycle harder.

And if the Reapers had better tech, they wouldn't let the organics know about it, because the entire point of the relays is that the Reapers can shut them down at will, bottling in a previously galactic society and making them easy for the picking. For all we know, some prior civilizations did develop better FTL, but if so the Reapers would have done their best to erradicate that knowledge.

The solution then, is to have electrostatic ion thrusters
supplementing whatever other propulsion system the ship uses; and make
sure that the paths from the element zero core to the ion beams are more
conductive than the paths from the core to the hull.  The negative
charge in the core will naturally discharge continuously into the
positive ions emerging from the thrusters; both enabling the thrusters
to function, and preventing static build up within the ship.

Definitely an interesting idea. I remember watchng a show about the ion drive on the Hayabusa probe, so that's something we actually have already.

[TheArcader]

DaeJi wrote...

Allan Schumacher wrote...


What's the prevent the current cycle from replicating (or near replicating) the Mass Relays themselves?

Nothing, and in fact if the Relays remained destroyed after the Extended Cut DLC that's probably what BioWare will have the galaxy do next. Which, again, makes destroying them pointless.

So what? What's wrong with a little hardship?

"If they have to build them again, why bother destoying them in the first place?" 

Because life is a beyoch, that is why...

Maybe they will appreciate what they already have when they have to recreate it after galactic civilization was almost wiped out  by a fleet of giant machine squids because the star child deemed the current galactic civilization a chaotic stain on the galaxy.

Modifié par TheArcader, 12 avril 2012 - 10:53 .