Simon_Jester wrote:I get the feeling that the natural telepaths are something of an exception- contrast to races like the Nevians or Pellegrinans, or the numerous near-human species (like, say, the natives of Klovia).
Who are the Pellerginans? I cannot recall any such name. Are you referring to the Petrinos from
First Lensman?
I specifically noted that most human and near-human species appear not to be telepathic (although there are exceptions, such as Lyranians, and humanoids such as Posenians are telepaths as well). However, these near-human species do not make up the entirety of Civilization; if one takes the numbers from
Children of the Lens that each sun in Milky Way averages at 1.3 or so inhabited planets, an awful lot of them are likely to be Z-type planets.
Running the numbers on the species shown in the books, we have twelve naturally telepathic (defined as psychic powers being commonplace and/or universal among them): Palainians, Rigellians, Velantians, Delgonians, Ordoviks, Eich, Posenians, Onlonians, Lyranians, Ploorans, Nhalians, and Dhilians). We also have eight (Martians, Venerians, Nevians, Kalonians, Petrinos, Chickladorians, Vegians, and Tomingans) that are not naturally telepathic. I might have missed some mention somewhere, but even granting that there are double that many non-telepathic species in the books, those with mental powers are not a small minority of the given sample. They also include, with one exception,
every non-humanoid species, and without exception also every higher order of Z-type life.
But even assuming that telepathic species are much rarer than this would suppose (it is a small sample to judge millions of species by, after all), and merely make up a thousandth of Civilization, they still number in the millions. If they make up a millionth of its population, then they still consider tens of thousands of planets their native homes. Even at this extremely conservative estimate the Lensmen from these species outnumber the highest canonical numbers for the Jedi Order (given as the tens of thousands in the
Dark Forces novellas) by an order of magnitude or more.
Even races like the Eich (who are a Z-type) don't seem to have much in the way of mental power beyond the parlor trick level. It's good for communications, but that's about all it's good for.
The Eich know about Ploorans and think that they can resist their telepathic control at a distance. Even if they are wrong (and I consider that likely, given how they can be manipulated by Nadreck), they would not think so if they had no telepathy at all. Moreover,
GURPS Lensman, which might be considered non-canon but official and thus valid where it does not contradict the series, describes the Eich as powerful telepaths.
And while that's not an advantage to be despised, it doesn't compare to precognition.
There is a passage in
Gray Lensman that one can read as implying precognition:
[quote=""Overlords of Delgon""]Before his ship was serviced for the flight into the unknown Kinnison changed his mind. He was vaguely troubled about the trip. It was nothing as definite as a "hunch"; hunches are, the Gray Lensman knew, the results of the operation of an extra-sensory perception possessed by all of us in greater or lesser degree. It was probably not an obscure warning to his super-sense from an other, more pervasive dimension. It was, he thought, a repercussion of the doubt in Xylpic's mind that the fading out of the men's bodies had been due to simple invisibility.[/quote]
Kinnison's hunches certainly prove to be true at many times. Though even if we accept this, it is more the kind of vague foreshadowing than tactically useful combat precognition.
When the Grand Fleet's AWACS-equivalent
Directrix is being run by a bank of "computers," where "computers" are defined as Rigelians with slide rules... something is very wrong with the setting's computer technology. My best guess is that the robot ships are being remotely controlled by human (or superhuman) operators; the best analogy I can think of is the
USS Utah, which was capable of maneuvering under remote control using 1930-level electronics.
There is some kind of remote direction, but it does not appear to be simple remote control.
Second Stage Lensmen describes it thus:
[quote=""Chapter 2: Invasion Via Tube""]But not a man died - upon Civilization's side at least - even though practically all the myriad ships composing the inner sphere, the shock-globe, was lost. For they were automatics, manned by robots; what little superintendence was necessary had been furnished by remote control. Indeed it is possible, although perhaps not entirely probable, that the shock-globe of the foe was similarly manned.[/quote]
"Little superintendence" does not, in my ears at last, sound like "remotely controlled drones". And the last sentence clearly implies that robot manning does not incur any noticeable penalties on combat effectiveness - which it should, if they were mere remotes and helpless if their guiding stations were jammed (EW being an established part of Lensmanverse combat). Moreover, they also have "smart bombs" equivalents guided by "robot brains" as of the Battle of Tellus in
First Lensman, and in
Triplanetary Gray Roger has androids that can pass for human to all outward seeming. Some kind of synthetic computer analogue is clearly present in the setting, even if it is unevenly applied by our standards.
As for "warp-strafing", one passage in
Children of the Lens at least implies that Lensman gunners (with unspecified targeting aids) can hit inertialess (i.e., FTL) munitions:
[quote=""The Hell-Hole In Space""]The conquered Patrol cruiser disappeared in a blaze of detonating duodec; the conqueror devoted his every jet to the task of running away; strewing his path as he did so with sundry items of solid and explosive destruction. Such things, however, whether inert or free, were old and simple stuff to the
Velan's war-wise crew. Their spotters and detectors were full out, as was also a forefan of annihilating and disintegrating beams.[/quote]
The L2s? Yeah, they're powerful as hell by Jedi standards... but there are also only four of them.
Yes, but the question I addressed here was referring to them. And they are certainly more powerful than the vast majority of Jedi Masters depicted.
I could have sworn tractor shears didn't come out until later than that.
[quote="
Triplanetary, "Super-Ship In Action,""]Outfought at every turn, the now frantically dodging Nevian leaped away in headlong flight, only to be brought to a staggering, crashing halt as Cleveland nailed her with a tractor beam. But the Tellurians were to learn that the Nevians held in reserve a means of retreat. The tractor beam snapped - sheared off squarely by a sizzling plane of force - and the fish-shaped cruiser faded from Cleveland's sight [. . . ].[/quote]
That's about where I was going with this. A Galactic Empire that had undisputed control of its own galaxy might be a match for Second Stage Lensman era Civilization, but only given plenty of time to build up a military (as in, a small fleet of Death Stars, that sort of thing).
Vastly superior strategic FTL for Lensman by this point really makes it impossible for the Empire to "win" in such a scenario. It loses for the same reason 40k cannot stand up to the Empire in spite of all of Connor's new evidence. Civilization has the permanent strategic initiative and can concentrate its forces at any given
Schwerpunkt at any given time in a way the Empire's staff planners are powerless to work around. The best they can do is build up all they can and make themselves as hard a target as possible in the hope that the Galactic Union will decide they are too tough a catch, similar to Civilization's situation if the same scenario was set a month before
Galactic Patrol.
Note that a Death Star is also the natural counter to planetary-destruction weapons that use mobile planetary masses... the Lensmanverse has no shielding capable of handling weapon outputs that exceed that of a main sequence star.
Not as of
Second Stage Lensmen, at least. But it is true that none are demonstrated.
The Death Star will destroy a free planet if it hits it, but can it? The standard tactic appears to be jumping in free and basically dumping the planet right on top of the target, and I doubt the superlaser can target FTL objects. Then there is the fact that they rarely use only one planet at a time, and the DS-I's recharge time is twenty-four hours. Also, negaspheres of planetary anti-mass will likely not be harmed by the superlaser, given that they appear to convert directed energy into additional negamatter:
[quote="
Second Stage Lensmen, "Chapter 21: The Battle of Klovia,""]The negaspheres also were rendered ineffective by the beam. Their anti-masses were not decreased, of course - in fact, they were probably increased a trifle by the fervor of the treatment - but, with their controlling superstructures volatilized away, they became more of a menace to the Boskonian forces than to those of Civilization.[/quote]
