Drakon vs Lensman

[Imperial Overlord]

Of course, it's light armour in comparison: but it is modern.

On the other hand, Gwen makes something equipped with such an engine that's a mere twenty meters, and presumably they can do much better with something smaller. But there's no indication they have it for personal scale, and a distinct indication that they (or at least the Samothracians) do not.

The Samothracian suit is a stealth infiltration, not only light armour but designed for minimum energy signature and nondetection. Lafarge was equipped to infiltrate the Draka homeworld, not fight an infantry battle. It's not at all representative of their battlefield capabilities. We have very little indication about what they're capable of on a personal scale. We do know they have high powered beam weapons (Gwen's handgun is an underpowered antique by modern standards), exotic materials, and anti-matter explosives.

[NecronLord]

The Samothracian suit is a stealth infiltration, not only light armour but designed for minimum energy signature and nondetection. Lafarge was equipped to infiltrate the Draka homeworld, not fight an infantry battle. It's not at all representative of their battlefield capabilities. We have very little indication about what they're capable of on a personal scale. We do know they have high powered beam weapons (Gwen's handgun is an underpowered antique by modern standards), exotic materials, and anti-matter explosives.

As I said 'light' armour.

It is not expected to be effective against a modern handgun - but it is called armour, and it is modern. That means it is built to serve a protective function against modern draka weapons.

If their guns have recoil-proof stabilisers and firepower to match, and Lafarge's armour does not, it's as good as a suit made out of paper to him - it would not be at all worthy of the word armour, it would be a camoflage suit.

[Imperial Overlord]

Wrong. The Draka are perpetually armed. All it has to do is defend him against the ubiquitous Draka sidearms to be worth while, not the high powered weapons they have built into their power armour.

[NecronLord]

Wrong. The Draka are perpetually armed. All it has to do is defend him against the ubiquitous Draka sidearms to be worth while, not the high powered weapons they have built into their power armour.

You're not getting what I just said: they'd not build the same 'killing recoil' technology into their sidearms because?

In any case, to get back to the point, two competing theories are at work here:

• The Draka can replicate starship drives small enough to protect their combat armour, and use on rifles, but not handguns. It's also not present on LeFarge's armour, for some reason.
• Starship drives, which are only described as such, are only present on vehicles. Combat armour is vulnerable to momentum transfer, just as soft armour is.

Which of these is the simpler theory, that invokes least undemonstrated abilities?

I raised Lafarge because it's a demonstration that only example of any kind of armour other than an implant described in any detail is explicitly vulnerable to brute force. I am not saying it's the same thing - the reason I say that the draka's armour shouldn't be momentum-proof is that it is simply an over-complex idea compared to the alternative.

[Imperial Overlord]

You're the one who isn't getting it. We have 3, not 2 tiers.

1) handguns and light stealth suits.

2) powered armour and intermediate sized applications

3) vehicles.

We know they can do 3. We have seen no evidence of 1. We know 2 has impressive power storage capabilities and high powered beam weapons and antimatter. 1 is hand held devices and armour designed not to have an energy signature.

2 is not ruled out or confirmed.

[NecronLord]

You're the one who isn't getting it. We have 3, not 2 tiers.

1) handguns and light stealth suits.

2) powered armour and intermediate sized applications

3) vehicles.

We know they can do 3. We have seen no evidence of 1. We know 2 has impressive power storage capabilities and high powered beam weapons and antimatter. 1 is hand held devices and armour designed not to have an energy signature.

2 is not ruled out or confirmed.

Razor. There's no evidence of momentum-drives on anything below 3, therefore we cannot say they have it, especially as the only other kind of armour shown lacks it. To say that they're using it on a personal scale is making up something we've not seen, and falls to the hypothesis that does not include that.

[NecronLord]

Actually, scratch that. Looking at it again:

The Archon was in a suit of powered infantry armor; it mimicked his form a few millimeters out, flexible as liquid and as strong as anything in the universe, set to a shiny jet-black at the moment. Molded lumps and protrusions told of engines concealed within, and weapons deadly enough to savage whole cities. It slid from face and hands as he tilted his head back slightly to take in Gwen, then glanced around at the interior of the warehouse. Behind him she could see others, and the hulking hyena-ape forms of ghouloons. The background was Reichart Station, but the forest beyond it had been cleared and the surface smoothed. Machines rested on it, waiting, and more hovered in the sky. The heavy iron was ready.

This probably does, on balance, mean actual propulsion devices, rather than 'war engines.'

[Connor MacLeod]

I'm just going to point out that that doesn't tell us much by itself, we could be nitpicking the definition of engine or even the kind of propulsion it may or may not be, ,and the thread is already degenerating that way. Even being a "non-reaction" kinda propulsion isn't going to help - iits got to provide a counterforce, yes, but it also has to do so in a wy that it avoids issues like ground pressure, it has to smooth out the recoil of the beam throughout the suit's mass (and whatever its dumping the mass into, the ground.) There's issues with mobility there too, the effects on the huuman body, etc.

What it usually comes down to is that you're using some sort of inertial damper and/or gravitic drive analoguem, and if you had that, especially for a terawatt powered beam weapon, you're pretty MUCH going to say "flying suit".

But the whole "beam weapon firepower" issue is also probably redundant for two reasons. Looking at Necronlord's links, ,we note a few interesting points:

You couldn't pierce it with anything short of a fusion-bomb pumped X-ray laser; though of course, damaging the person inside is easier!

This pretty much tells us that momentum DOES matter, which in my mind is going to say that "inerital dampers" or SIFS or anything like that are pretty unlikely to be on the suits.

We dont know the output/warhead/construction of the bomb pumped weapon in question, but to qualify the above it definitely need not be in the terawatt range.

The other (and more relevant) point was noted before:

antimatter-powered energy beams, and antimatter grenades in ranges up to a quarter-kilotonne or so.

the grenades (muntions) are quarter kiloton (1 TJ, or around 250 tons of TNT) not the beam weapons. Bit of a difference, but its likely the beams are FAR less powerful than that, else there'd be no point. Quite likely orders of magnitude less powerful (omnidirectional blast vs highly focused beam)

For that matter, a bomb pumped x-ray laser isnt likely to be putting out terajoules of energy per shot without some sort of magic I think (or an insanely huge warhead.)

In anyy case, until we get something stronger about the outputs of the beams, the whole issue of recoil damping is pointless.

[Connor MacLeod]

Err. His armour in Galactic Patrol has an intertialess drive. Which renders him quite immune to such concerns (until he switches it off, at any rate, there's quite a lot of detail about how inertialess drive conserves momentum in one of the books, and the precautions they have to do when transferring from one Free ship to another), but would result in him being catapulted backwards; but he'd be undamaged.

Yeah but if that happened when inertialess he'd go flying back at a huge fraction of lightspeed. We're talking a probable momentum matching or exceeding the "full-power' thrust of a starship. I'm pretty sure that flinging him out of the solar system would be, excessive (and noticable) Its also unlikely he would actually need his screens and armour itself to stand up to Battleship grade punishment.

Besides, in the instance where this "Battleship" stuff is stated he was inert, so the whole "resistance to collisions" bit when free doesn't apply. The thing only massed about a ton or so. At best we're probably talking resistance equal to triple digit GJ (though he could outlast it for quite awhile.)

[Darth Hoth]

Of course, it's light armour in comparison: but it is modern.

On the other hand, Gwen makes something equipped with such an engine that's a mere twenty meters, and presumably they can do much better with something smaller. But there's no indication they have it for personal scale, and a distinct indication that they (or at least the Samothracians) do not.

The Samothracian suit is a stealth infiltration, not only light armour but designed for minimum energy signature and nondetection. Lafarge was equipped to infiltrate the Draka homeworld, not fight an infantry battle. It's not at all representative of their battlefield capabilities. We have very little indication about what they're capable of on a personal scale. We do know they have high powered beam weapons (Gwen's handgun is an underpowered antique by modern standards), exotic materials, and anti-matter explosives.

A .45 is an antique by our standards, yet modern guns are not orders of magnitude better. That it is old does not necessarily say it is totally outclassed.

Besides, in the instance where this "Battleship" stuff is stated he was inert, so the whole "resistance to collisions" bit when free doesn't apply. The thing only massed about a ton or so. At best we're probably talking resistance equal to triple digit GJ (though he could outlast it for quite awhile.)

No one is arguing that it has demonstrated such durabilities. The description was referring to an upper end we did not see tested in the story (which, together with the absurdity of such powerful shielding on such a small base in relation to everything else we see in the series, makes me too think it was hyperbole). What it did take, over a sustained timespan, was fire from a semi-portable.

[Imperial Overlord]

A .45 is an antique by our standards, yet modern guns are not orders of magnitude better. That it is old does not necessarily say it is totally outclassed.

Gwen was regretted that she hadn't been wearing a modern weapon that would have been more effective against the Samothracian's armour and that's just talking about choice of hand gun, not the weapons built in the power armour.

As for the power armour, it being easier to kill the pilot than destroy the armour doesn't tell us much. Momentum turning the wearer to goo is just one way and that's only ruled out if we consider their inertia transfer tech to be no limits, which I don't think anyone is serious proposing. Heat transfer and radiation, for example, could leave the suit unharmed while cooking the Draka inside.

Now I'm not trying to argue that the beam weapons are equal in yield to the AM explosives. They should be considerably less powerful. I'm just saying that momentum issues do not necessarily rule out high powered beam weapons.

[Darth Hoth]

The power armour guns are almost certainly better than the sidearm; I meant that as far as pistols go, it might not be that much weaker. I commented on the sidetrack about personal weapons, sorry for being unclear.

[Imperial Overlord]

The power armour guns are almost certainly better than the sidearm; I meant that as far as pistols go, it might not be that much weaker. I commented on the sidetrack about personal weapons, sorry for being unclear.

We don't know how much stronger it would be, just that modern versions are more substantially more capable otherwise Gwen wouldn't believe it would have had better performance against Lafarge's stealth suit.

[Vultur]

I haven't read Drakon; how smart is Gwen? Kinnison is well beyond super-genius; it's actually stated in one of the later books that he has a higher 'mental rating' (I can't remember what the exact term was) than anyone else known. Hopwever, he's a generalist, in fact basically 'specialized in being a generalist'; he can't keep up with the Council of Scientists people.

Lens-verse medicine is more advanced than ours in at least some respects; they can manipulate hormones to cause spontaneous regeneration of lost limbs or organs, and at least Kinnison was expected to remain healthy and active well into his nineties (whether this is typical can of course be debated). .

I assumed that the age thing was mostly due to Kinnison essentually having every good gene possible and no detrimental ones, since he was essentially at the absolute top of human potential. (Well, his children were more, but they weren't exactly the same species...)

[Vultur]

Is Kinnison's mind-control that strong? I thought the high-end examples were single or low double digit people at any one time. Clarrissa might have exceeded that on Lyrane in CotL, though, come to think of it.

In Galactic Patrol, he seems limited to two or three people, but I think it kept increasing.

[

True, but that wouldn't be any big deal; even in Galactic Patrol Kinnison and VanBuskirk do 4x lightspeed in spacesuits while trying to hide.

[Darth Hoth]

I haven't read Drakon; how smart is Gwen? Kinnison is well beyond super-genius; it's actually stated in one of the later books that he has a higher 'mental rating' (I can't remember what the exact term was) than anyone else known. Hopwever, he's a generalist, in fact basically 'specialized in being a generalist'; he can't keep up with the Council of Scientists people.

Was it the "stage of stress" thing? Because that is not particularly quantifiable in objective terms. But yes, he displays impressive deductive and engineering skills in the books. It is also mentioned as an aside that Lensman training requires understanding of fairly impressive mathematics (which was the reason Bus did not graduate).

Homo Drakensis possess eidetic memories and enhanced cognitive abilities (I forget whether Stirling gave anything quantifiable), but supposedly there is a trade-off in that they become rigid and narrow in their thinking (a flaw which long life-spans should probably aggravate). Their hormones also make them all psychopaths.

I assumed that the age thing was mostly due to Kinnison essentually having every good gene possible and no detrimental ones, since he was essentially at the absolute top of human potential. (Well, his children were more, but they weren't exactly the same species...)

Except that the Eddorians, who calculated on it (if I recall GURPS Lensmen correctly, he was 49 by CotL, and they expected him to live in good health for at least fifty years more), had no idea that he was anything but a human ordinary; they thought he was merely being aided by the Arisians and Star A Star. They would know all Lensmen are peak condition and have access to the best medicine, though.

[Darth Hoth]

In Galactic Patrol, he seems limited to two or three people, but I think it kept increasing.

Those were trained Lensmen who were warned in advance and instructed to resist with all their power, if you were thinking of when he tested it out. Given how comparatively difficult it was for him to subdue Melasnikov, Lensmen are rather more resistant to telepathic attack than ordinary humans (or humanoids). I am fairly certain that he controlled more people than that when he infiltrated Grand Base.

True, but that wouldn't be any big deal; even in Galactic Patrol Kinnison and VanBuskirk do 4x lightspeed in spacesuits while trying to hide.

Is the speed directly mentioned?

[kinnison]

Darth, yes it is. The exact wording was "quadruple the speed of light".

[eyl]

Was it the "stage of stress" thing? Because that is not particularly quantifiable in objective terms. But yes, he displays impressive deductive and engineering skills in the books. It is also mentioned as an aside that Lensman training requires understanding of fairly impressive mathematics (which was the reason Bus did not graduate).

It wasn't the "stage of stress" (though I don't remember the exact term they used either), or at least not exculsively. It was mentioned when they were assembling the Council of Scientists (which, IIRC, resulted in the negasphere) - they were choosing participants based on their "mental rating" or some such, which was a numerical value. It was mentioned that there were only two known beings with ratings above a certain value, one of them being Kinnison and the other (slightly lower) being Worsel.

[Connor MacLeod]

Was it the "stage of stress" thing? Because that is not particularly quantifiable in objective terms. But yes, he displays impressive deductive and engineering skills in the books. It is also mentioned as an aside that Lensman training requires understanding of fairly impressive mathematics (which was the reason Bus did not graduate).

It wasn't the "stage of stress" (though I don't remember the exact term they used either), or at least not exculsively. It was mentioned when they were assembling the Council of Scientists (which, IIRC, resulted in the negasphere) - they were choosing participants based on their "mental rating" or some such, which was a numerical value. It was mentioned that there were only two known beings with ratings above a certain value, one of them being Kinnison and the other (slightly lower) being Worsel.

It was in Gray Lensman. He was assembling a group of scientists to help him work out the mathematics to build the first negasphere. I dont remember theexact way the intelligence thingy worked, but the upper limit number I think was like 750. Worsel was like (IIRC) 800 and Kinnison was 875, and those were conservative, tenative figures that could have been highe.

[Murazor]

I think that the relevant section is this one:

"Such a group can be selected, I think." The girl stood for a moment, lower lip held
lightly between white teeth. "That is not a standard index, but each scientist has a rating. I can
set the acceptor . . . no, the rejector would be better—to throw out all the cards above any given
rating. If we take out all ratings over seven hundred we will have only the highest of the
geniuses."
"How many, do you suppose?"
"I have only a vague idea—a couple of hundred, perhaps. If too many, we can run them
again at a higher level, say seven ten. But there won't be very many, since there are only two
galactic ratings higher than seven fifty. There will be duplications, too—such people as Sir
Austin Cardynge will have two or three cards in the final rejects."
"QX—we'll want to hand-pick the fifty, anyway. Let's go!"
Then for hours bale after bale of cards went through the machine; thousands of records
per minute. Occasionally one card would flip out into a rack, rejected. Finally:
"That's all, I think. Mathematicians, physicists," the librarian ticked off upon pink
fingers, "Astronomers, philosophers, and this new classification, which hasn't been named yet."
"The H.T.T.'s." Kinnison glanced at the label, lightly lettered in pencil, fronting the slim
packet of cards. "Aren't you going to run them through, too?"
"No. These are the two I mentioned a minute ago—the only ones higher than seven
hundred fifty."
"A choice pair, eh? Sort of a creme de la creme? Let's look 'em over," and he extended
his hand. "What do the initials stand for?"
"I'm awfully sorry, sir, really," the girl flushed in embarrassment as she relinquished the
cards in high reluctance. "If I'd had any idea we wouldn't have dared—we call you, among
ourselves, the 'High-Tension Thinkers.'"
"Us!" It was the Lensman's turn to flush. Nevertheless, he took the packet and read
sketchily the facer: "Class XIX—Unclassifiable at present . . . lack of adequate methods . . .
minds of range and scope far beyond any available indices . . . Ratings above high genius (750) .
. . yet no instability . . . power beyond any heretofore known . . . assigned ratings tentative and
definitely minimum."
He then read the cards.
"Worsel, Velantia, eight hundred."
And:
"Kimball Kinnison, Tellus, eight hundred seventy-five."

[Darth Hoth]

Ah, thank you, everyone, for the information there.

(Note to self: Re-read Gray Lensman . . . )