StarDestroyer.Net BBS

Darmalus wrote:I thought she was doing it personally, with a laptop. With the whole "insidious spell" comment.

Darth Wong wrote:I'm curious what Euryale now knows, or thinks she knows, about human military capabilities.

As much as one might scorn Wikipedia as a serious research source, its information is certainly good enough to get a general idea of what kinds of weapons humans have at their disposal, as long as you confine your searches to the term "weapons" and don't get too far off track.

Darth Wong wrote:If her spy found her way to entries about James Bond and Sonic the Hedgehog, she's obviously wandered deep into the off-topic material.

Starglider wrote:That said Lakeenah has been holed up in an assortment of abandoned buildings and stolen vehicles for the last few days with little else to keep her occupied, so some lapses in focus are to be expected.

The Vortex Empire wrote:I wonder what the baldricks have learned from wikipedia. If they've been straying into James Bond and Sonic, then they're not doing a very good job of researching our weapons. Hell, she could think that our main infantry weapon is the E-11 Blaster Rifle.

Starglider wrote:This is actually typical for rank beginners used to traditional libraries encountering large hypertext systems for the first time. The ease with which links can be followed (compared to looking up references) is seductive and people tend to get lost quickly and then wander aimlessly.

Peptuck wrote:This chapter rocked so hard. Lakeenah getting mired in Wikipedia made me laugh for a minute straight, and Ceaser bluffing his way into being in command of four entire legions of Hell is just one more gem in his Crown Of Awesome.

Were those A-10s that took down the Lord of the Flies?

Over his columns of retreating legions, two white sky-chariots made their pass, a stream of objects falling from their bellies and under their winds...

...Overhead, four more sky-chariots were already closing in, ugly, ungainly looking beasts compared with the sleek white creations than had just passed.

Starglider wrote:
The obvious model of hell is a massive flat slab of rock, wide enough to encompass the entire 'universe' (and thus having no land border) but relatively thin. I'm not sure how this structure would form in the first place, but once formed there would be no tendency to collapse into a sphere the way a planet would, because the gravity 'wraps around' and thus the net lateral force would always be zero (ignoring minor variations in the thickness and density of the plate). This rules out perpetual motion machines.

However if this was correct the plate should have two surfaces, both with normal gravity. If you looked up into the sky of hell (and were high enough to avoid the clouds) you should see another pangea-sized landmass high above you. If you fired a rocket directly up, it would experience progressively less gravity until it was weightless at the midpoint between the two surfaces, then progressively more in the opposite direction until it impacted. The result of boring a deep well would be exactly the same as earth; you'd get progressively lighter until you were weightless at a point half way through the plate, then you'd get progressively heavier again as you ascended to the other side. Presumably it's mostly molten with a thin crust on each side, judging by all the volcanic activity.

There are two obvious problems with this model. The demons don't observe another land in the sky above hell; maybe they couldn't fly there if there's a stretch of vacuum inbetween, but you'd think they'd see it and maybe try and portal there. It could be that the other side of the plate is very dark for some reason and looks like black sky. The other is that (if I'm doing the maths right) it would have to be at least as thick as it is wide to generate 1G (assuming earthlike density) - so the space it's in would have to be of an oblate shape or it would have to be much denser than earth.

Another possibility that came up in chat earlier is that the space is torodial in the X and Y dimensions, but tapers to a singularity at each end in the Z dimension.

Oh, bugger. What am I going to do with this pulse rifle now? Or my Strohl Munitions BH-209I plasma gun? I mean, I just bought that from some guy in a merc company... How the hell will I get my money back?!

Wyrm wrote:The A-10 makes all other flying machines look pretty. They call the damn thing the 'Warthog' for a fucking reason.

BadassOfTheWeek.com wrote:The A-10 is like the grizzled old-school Linebacker of the United States Air Force. It's not flashy, it's not super-fast, it's not going to do like twenty barrel rolls just to try and prove to you how huge it's cock is... it just shows up, fucks everyone's shit up, and goes home.

CaptainChewbacca wrote:I'm sorry, did Julius Caesar just bluff his way into the command of four demonic legions?

Wyrm wrote:I think you overextended yourself there, Ed.

Stuart Mackey wrote:I especially liked how Caesar used those demon legions, rank by rank.

JBG wrote:

Stuart Mackey wrote:I especially liked how Caesar used those demon legions, rank by rank.

He's accurately assessed the nature of the trident as a distance weapon and applied the appropriate tactics - those developed for early fire arms with their enforced pauses for reloading/recharging. Or someone else has suggested it and he has the nous to understand the proposal. Like his new found enthusiasm for radios! He's very smart and "god" only knows what else he understands and has planned at this point.

Stuart Mackey wrote:Indeed, shows that the 'dead' are not intellectually static, moreover you can bet that he is vastly aware of what he does not know.

EdBecerra wrote:In the USA alone, Robert E. Lee, Jeb Stuart, Nathan Forrest, Phillip Sheridan, William Tecumseh Sherman, P. G. T. Beauregard, and Ulysses S. Grant.

Starglider wrote:

EdBecerra wrote:In the USA alone, Robert E. Lee, Jeb Stuart, Nathan Forrest, Phillip Sheridan, William Tecumseh Sherman, P. G. T. Beauregard, and Ulysses S. Grant.

All of whom were quite keen on democracy, while Ceaser is notoriously destroyed the Roman republic in order to maintain and enhance his personal power. I am pretty sure that this will eventually become a serious problem.

Starglider wrote:

EdBecerra wrote:In the USA alone, Robert E. Lee, Jeb Stuart, Nathan Forrest, Phillip Sheridan, William Tecumseh Sherman, P. G. T. Beauregard, and Ulysses S. Grant.

All of whom were quite keen on democracy, while Ceaser is notoriously destroyed the Roman republic in order to maintain and enhance his personal power. I am pretty sure that this will eventually become a serious problem.

Stuart wrote:

Peptuck wrote:This chapter rocked so hard. Lakeenah getting mired in Wikipedia made me laugh for a minute straight, and Ceaser bluffing his way into being in command of four entire legions of Hell is just one more gem in his Crown Of Awesome.

The incredible thing is, if you can get hold of a copy of "The Gallic Wars" and "The Civil Wars" (Both by one Caesar, G.J.) there's accounts of how he actually pulled off quite similar bluffs. not just once but several times. The man would have made a mean, mean poker player.

Darth Wong wrote: Actually, the majority of the world's population throughout history has been accustomed to monarchy, and despite what you may think, most of them thought it was perfectly natural, just, and right that it should be this way. The population of Hell is going to be largely monarchist in terms of its political leanings. The idea of democracy is going to strike them as strange, and they will not have the reverence for dead American Civil War generals that a modern American does. Far more of them will recognize the name of Caesar.