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You can block enclosed spaces like rooms just fine with the tin foil.
Besides, portals require the relatively rare nephilim and equipment that isn't really available to the public, so there's no real risk of civilians thinking with portals

What about the dial-a-portal network we've seen being developed? If I understood right, it was, at least at some point in the future, intended to replace conventional transportation completely.

CSJM wrote:What about the dial-a-portal network we've seen being developed? If I understood right, it was, at least at some point in the future, intended to replace conventional transportation completely.

It would replace conventional transportation up to a point. You still need some means of moving goods in bulk through the portal itself, and that's were truck and trains would still have relevant roles.

Also, below a certain level it ceases to be efficient. There's no reason for me to use a portal to go over to my bathroom or into my kitchen.

Personally, I think you'd get a sort of "switching nexus" where you have a lot of trunk lines for railroads shoot into and out of permanent portals, moving through a hub area (so you don't have a hit-or-miss mess in Hell). 'course, you'd probably get an equivalent area on Earth in a relatively useless area (some part of the Sahara or in Saudi Arabia, for example).

Nematocyst wrote:You can block enclosed spaces like rooms just fine with the tin foil.
Besides, portals require the relatively rare nephilim and equipment that isn't really available to the public, so there's no real risk of civilians thinking with portals

How hard do you think it would be for a mob boss to get a hold of a nephilim and a naga/portal-generating equipment if he really wanted it? Hell, the Russian mafia probably already has several working pairs of the necessary equipment, knowing their level of reach.

Considering the goverments track them very closely, I'd say it would be hard.
Then again, goverments also track nuclear weapons, and they still sell in the black market like hot cakes...

Nematocyst wrote:Considering the goverments track them very closely, I'd say it would be hard.
Then again, goverments also track nuclear weapons, and they still sell in the black market like hot cakes...

My point exactly. The bigger mob families have probably already gotten a hold of this stuff. All they need to do is pay off the right man in DIMO(N) for equipment, or pay a naga, and then pay a nephilim.

Yes, but the difference is we have schedules of when portals are opening, so if unauthorized portals start opening, well the HEA will probably send some troops to investigate and it won't end well for the unauthorized portal users...

And then you get into the familiar pattern of tech versus countermeasure. The mob then starts jamming cell towers (that is still how they detect portals, correct?) at random and occasionally putting through a portal when they want to do a job.

Nematocyst wrote:Considering the goverments track them very closely, I'd say it would be hard.
Then again, goverments also track nuclear weapons, and they still sell in the black market like hot cakes...

Oh, really?

I guess Al Queda just lucks out on the sales then? Or maybe North Korea just bought a few well past their Past Due date, so they had defective samples to work from?

I certainly hope that Stuart speaks out on this, because AFAIK not a single working nuke has ever been up for sale.

Nematocyst wrote: Then again, goverments also track nuclear weapons, and they still sell in the black market like hot cakes...

No, sorry, they do not. No nuclear weapon has ever been sold on the black market or anywhere else. There have been a number of frauds where somebody (usually the Iranians who seem to be particularly gullible) have bought a variety of weapons-shaped boxes marked with trefoils and the announcement "This is a nuclear weapon. Really. Why should we lie to you?" painted on the outside. The usual content was a handful of old wristwatches. But no real nuclear device has ever been sold and all are accounted for.

A.Q. Khan developed a design for a nuclear device in Pakistan and gave (not sold) details to North Korea, Iran, Iraq, Libya and Myanmar. Probably a few others as well. Unfortunately, there is a basic flaw in those plans which explains the incredible number of fizzles from people who built devices using them.

It is actually quite easy to track device technology. There are a few things in this world which, if you try and buy them, will result in some very interesting conversations.

Atlan wrote:

Nematocyst wrote:Considering the goverments track them very closely, I'd say it would be hard.
Then again, goverments also track nuclear weapons, and they still sell in the black market like hot cakes...

Oh, really?

I guess Al Queda just lucks out on the sales then? Or maybe North Korea just bought a few well past their Past Due date, so they had defective samples to work from?

I certainly hope that Stuart speaks out on this, because AFAIK not a single working nuke has ever been up for sale.

How do you explain all the suitcase nukes the KGB ordered and had built... of which the majority are missing? They didn't DISAPPEAR. They're out there somewhere.

impatrick4life wrote: How do you explain all the suitcase nukes the KGB ordered and had built... of which the majority are missing? They didn't DISAPPEAR. They're out there somewhere.

Do you have a source for this besides wild speculation and Tom Clancy plot points?

impatrick4life wrote:How do you explain all the suitcase nukes the KGB ordered and had built... of which the majority are missing? They didn't DISAPPEAR. They're out there somewhere.

They are accounted for. Incidentally, the description "suitcase nuke" is highly misleading.

I don't really buy it, but here's where that rumor came from.

http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/News/Lebedbomb.html

Alexander Lebed, former Russian National Security Adviser, claimed Russia had lost track of approx. 100 suitcase nukes.

Of course, while Lebed was a good man, he was probably overestimating his authority when he said that the military would tell them all about the nukes. It was probably the result of some garbled conversation that went like a game of telephone: Strategic Forces officer: One hundred 'suitcase nukes' need some level of rebuilding, more senior Strategic Force officer: Not worse it, let's take them out of comission, FSB guy: that's one hundred less nukes, FSB over hearing conversation: That's will be one hundred less nukes, pretend we still have them to bargain during disarmament talks, Lebed: We've lost track of nukes.

Then my bad for being uninformed.

Stuart wrote:

Nematocyst wrote: Then again, goverments also track nuclear weapons, and they still sell in the black market like hot cakes...

No, sorry, they do not. No nuclear weapon has ever been sold on the black market or anywhere else. There have been a number of frauds where somebody (usually the Iranians who seem to be particularly gullible) have bought a variety of weapons-shaped boxes marked with trefoils and the announcement "This is a nuclear weapon. Really. Why should we lie to you?" painted on the outside. The usual content was a handful of old wristwatches. But no real nuclear device has ever been sold and all are accounted for.

A.Q. Khan developed a design for a nuclear device in Pakistan and gave (not sold) details to North Korea, Iran, Iraq, Libya and Myanmar. Probably a few others as well. Unfortunately, there is a basic flaw in those plans which explains the incredible number of fizzles from people who built devices using them.

It is actually quite easy to track device technology. There are a few things in this world which, if you try and buy them, will result in some very interesting conversations.

Wow. You learn something new every day. Out of curiosity, if there's never been a sale of this stuff, where did all the talk of it come from?

GrayAnderson wrote:Wow. You learn something new every day. Out of curiosity, if there's never been a sale of this stuff, where did all the talk of it come from?

Most likely? The same people that believe 9/11 was an inside job, think that fluoridation is a form of mind control and consider it a proven fact that immunisation causes autism.

Or more plainly, crackpots and paranoid crackpots.

When people say 'suitcase nuke' they mean 'nuclear device in a large trunk that two men can probably move with a hand cart'. You won't see one on a commuter train.

Stuart wrote:

Nematocyst wrote: Then again, goverments also track nuclear weapons, and they still sell in the black market like hot cakes...

No, sorry, they do not. No nuclear weapon has ever been sold on the black market or anywhere else. There have been a number of frauds where somebody (usually the Iranians who seem to be particularly gullible) have bought a variety of weapons-shaped boxes marked with trefoils and the announcement "This is a nuclear weapon. Really. Why should we lie to you?" painted on the outside. The usual content was a handful of old wristwatches. But no real nuclear device has ever been sold and all are accounted for.

They wanted me to build them a bomb, so I took their plutonium and in turn, gave them a shiny bomb-casing full of used pinball machine parts!



Well somebody had to say it....

Please get the climax up by friday? I have to go to summer camp for three weeks and I don't want to miss it.

Friday 16th? It'll be up by then. Probably. Unless something terrible happens.

Stuart wrote:A.Q. Khan developed a design for a nuclear device in Pakistan and gave (not sold) details to North Korea, Iran, Iraq, Libya and Myanmar. Probably a few others as well. Unfortunately, there is a basic flaw in those plans which explains the incredible number of fizzles from people who built devices using them.

Nitpick: I fail to see how this is unfortunate:

"Bad news: Guy gives nuclear device design to numerous rogue nations. Good news: Guy in question is bad at designing nuclear devices."

Because the bad guys have now spent a huge amount of time, money, effort and resources to build something that is guaranteed to not work. And in the process have probably left a trail of evidence as clear as day to anyone paying attention as they did so.