Why can't Sa'Vasku ships eat each other for Bio Mass?
One Sa'Vasku ship can launch drone pods which can then be reintegrated into
another Sa'Vasku ship with a drone womb. Why not cut out the "middle man" and
allow Sa'Vasku ships to eat each other? Suggested rule would be that both
ships would have to be within 6", on the same course and speed, and both
expend 1 point of power per hull consumed. There could also be weapons
restrictions, such as no attacks while one Sa'Vasku ship eats another...
> Why can't Sa'Vasku ships eat each other for Bio Mass?
They have no mouth.
(Sounds like a Harlan Ellison story, eh?)
I've been thinking about the Machine People having the ability to consume
other people's ships, but it wouldn't necessarily be in game time.
> --- "Imre A. Szabo" <ias@sprintmail.com> wrote:
The simplest method of 'S' growth, is to say that the 'S' grow in stratigic
time. All 'S' ships may eat and grow in this time frame.
Fighter production/assimilation occures in
tactical time (during a battle) and is only able to be used during this time.
Any other use would just be a way to min/max
the system.
Bye for now,
> Imre A. Szabo wrote:
> Why can't Sa'Vasku ships eat each other for Bio Mass?
They most likely can, at least on the strategic scale. In order to do so
during a battle however (which is the only situation the FB2 rules handle),
the "eating" ship would need a "mouth" (or "womb") using up at least 50% the
Mass of the entire smaller ship; ie., in order to "eat" a Sa'An'Tha or
Sa'Kess'Tha (3 biomass each, TMF 11 and 12 respectively)
the "eating" ship would need a 6-mass "womb".
Growing a new ship in such a "womb" would only be possible on the strategic
scale, though.
Regards,
And don't forget the laws of Thermodynamics. Eating another ship would not be
100% efficient. There would be some waste. So, eating a mass 12 ship might
only give you 6 mass toward a new ship. (I'm pulling numbers out to the air
here, but you get the general idea.)
--Greg
> Imre A. Szabo wrote:
G'day guys,
> And don't forget the laws of Thermodynamics. Eating another ship
Actually it be closer to about 2-3 mass if they're anything like
terrestrial life which only have efficiencies of about 20-25%.
While I don't mind the principle of Imre's idea, I do think its more a
strategic time-scale thing (so the only time you'd see it in a battle
would be if you stumbled across it mid process say). This is not only for
ecological reasons (ingestion and breakdown on such grand scales isn't going
to be fast), but also because I have a gut feeling (haven't run any numbers)
that it could break the system otherwise. As it stands wombs
curb/avoid the situation where a SDN sized SV sits there shrugging off
turn after turn of damage as it cannibalises its sister ships (you can only
produce/consume so many drones a turn and thus the damage can mount up).
Cheers
Beth
> Imre wrote:
Beth wrote
> Actually it be closer to about 2-3 mass if they're anything like
> a strategic time-scale thing (so the only time you'd see it in a
Overall, I consider the concept of bio-organic spaceships (especially
if they are supposed to have evolved naturally) to be so far out that
discussing them in the same paragraph as the laws of thermodynamics doesn't
really make sense.
Still, FWIW: 1) IIRC the efficiency in converting food into body mass of
terrestrial
life is markedly different for warm-blooded and cold-blooded animals.
Which class do the Savasku belong to? 2) The laws of thermodynamics don't deal
with the conversion of materials, but with the conversion of energy. The main
source of waste in biological is the need for energy, which is obtained by
chemically converting
high-energy-molecules (sugars, fats etc.) into low-energy 'waste'
molecules (carbon dioxide, water) which are of no use and excreted. If the
Savasku have available 'unlimited' energy (from a biological
fusion-reactor, say), they may be able to make use of all the target
ships' mass.
Greetings Karl Heinz
G'day Karl,
> Overall, I consider the concept of bio-organic spaceships (especially
I'd have to agree with you, multicellular animals actively living in a vacuum
is more unlikely than FTL.;)
> Still, FWIW:
Well there's actually two sides to it, if you mean straight assimilation
(amount of ingested food used in the body vs dumped as detritus) then you're
looking at about 80% being assimilated. If you're actually looking at how much
of the consumption makes it to production (growth) once you've taken out all
the other metabolic activities then you get down to about
5 -
30%. With very large slow growing animals having a growth efficiency of
round about 5% (or less for the really big marine mammals), whereas the super
fast growing larvae have growth efficiencies of about 30% or a bit
more. All up 20% comes out as about average though.
> Which class do the Savasku belong to ?
Ohh I'd love to see the mission details for that assignment...;)
> 2) The laws of thermodynamics don't deal with the conversion of
While I may very well accept the complete use of consumed mass for growth
game-wise (its simple to remember), I wouldn't support it on biological
grounds. First up, biology does follow the laws of thermodynamics and so I
can't see catabolism (material breakdown) liberating 100% of energy used in
anabolism to create that organic structure in the first place. Thus you'd see
some deterioration in the amount of mass produced for the amount consumed (as
you don't get 100% of the energy out so you can't build the
exact same amount again). However, more importantly <given your biological
fusion-reactor idea... which I guess is no weirder than a biological
entity in space in the first place;)> each organism has an internal ratio of
nutrients and so some are going to be in excess when others are limiting. As a
consequence you're always going to have some waste material (the excess)
regardless. So biologically you're just not going to see 100% conversion, but
like I said this doesn't stop its adoption in a game (under the KISS
principle).
Cheers
Beth
[quoted original message omitted]
Interesting.
I could see a new pod to accomplish this:
Feeding Pod Biomass: 1 Energy: 3
This pod has a range of 6tu. Like the Interceptor Pod, it is not limited by
arc, but is actually closer to the leach pod in design. It is used to gather
material for the Sa'Vasku construct to "eat". Like an interceptor pod, the
Feeding Pod may attack any ship (including Phalon and Sa'Vasku constructs)
within 6tu of the Sa'Vasku (regardless of arc). It hits the target on a
4+.
Like the Leech Pod, Feeding Pods do 2 points of damage each turn. Of this they
store 1 biomass for every 2 damage they inflict. They have an endurance of 3
turns. They may be destroyed by DCP in the same manner as Leech Pods. On the
3rd turn (not before), they MUST return to a Sa'Vasku construct. If there is
no construct in range, the pod (and biomass) is lost. On returning to a
Sa'Vasku construct it may give the biomass that it stored (but not the biomass
that was used to construct the pod) to the Sa'Vasku construct. Sa'Vasku
constructs may NOT gain more biomass than they started with (only
replace spent/damaged biomass). Because of the limited range, and time
involved for the pod to "eat", this pod is not normally used in combat.
Editor's Note: Trade offs from Leech Pod: Cons: 1/4 range, poorer odds
to hit (at 6tu and less), limited endurance, must spend full endurance, Pros:
restore biomass, all arc fire.
-----
Brian Bell bkb@beol.net
http://members.xoom.com/rlyehable/ft/
Hi Beth
> I'd have to agree with you, multicellular animals actively living in
> a vacuum is more unlikely than FTL. ;)
Guess the 'more unlikely than FTL' depends on whether you are a biologists or
a physicist by training. I got my PhD in physics;)
Greetings Karl Heinz
The amount of energy used by the bioships for maneuver alone indicates that
they would have to have some way of converting matter to energy. Anybody want
to speculate on an organism that incorporates cold fusion into its metabolism?
Andy A
[quoted original message omitted]
What does the Sa'Vasku ship posing as lunch think about this?
In a message dated 6/26/00 9:31:24 PM Central Daylight Time,
> ias@sprintmail.com writes:
<< Why can't Sa'Vasku ships eat each other for Bio Mass?
> [quoted text omitted]
A logical extension of this would be to also use human ships as lunch:
"Captain, we better defeat them quickly. Otherwise they'll eat our whole fleet
and get even stronger."
> What does the Sa'Vasku ship posing as lunch think about this?
> Greg Wong wrote:
> And don't forget the laws of Thermodynamics. Eating another ship
This would be represented by the "eating" ship being unable to reabsorb
anything else than biomass from the "food" ship. Engines, weapon organs,
carapace etc are "wasted".
BTW, Karl - the Sa'Vasku bio-constructs are just that:
bio-*constructs*. They haven't evolved naturally any more than today's
computers have :-/
Regards,
> On 27-Jun-00 at 13:18, Oerjan Ohlson (oerjan.ohlson@telia.com) wrote:
Kind of makes you wonder if the original Sa'Vasku race even exists, they may
well have evolved themselves into something completely different. Sometimes I
wonder if we aren't going to do that to ourselves. First all children will be
beautiful, then intelligence will creep up, then...
I stated pretty clearly in my original idea that they could only eat each
others hull mass. This means all weapons, engines, etc., are wasted... This
was an attempt at balance. The theory behind it was that bio mass hull can be
easily reformed into other componets, while nodes (power generation, drives,
weapons, etc.) can't. I'm not sure if I my original idea would allow them to
eat other ships or not. It would deffinately put Full Thrust in new light. The
Space Combat Game where you don't just have to worry about your ship's being
blown up, but eaten as well...
Either way this would mean that Sa'Vasku fleet repair docks and fleet support
ships would be one and the same. A big fat (lots of hull, little power
generation, and few if any weapons) Sa'Vasku ship. This would have several
implications in a campaign. The Sa'Vasku would not build fleet repair docks.
They don't need them. They don't have to worry about specific replacements (if
your campaign is that detailed).