How "big" is the Macross setting?

[slade the sniper]

This is basically to determine the physical size of the Macross (and all the subsequent setting such as Robotech and everything else with Macross in the title) in terms of:
Light Years from Earth to the various places (any maps?)
Number of planets under human control, as well as any other alien races.

Stuff like that. Just an attempt to slide Macross into the 3 Galaxies if possible.

Thanks in advance.

-STS

[ShadowLogan]

SDF:Macross Universe and its followups take place throughout the Milky Way Galaxy IINM. Seto would probably know more on the specifics.

SDC: Southern Cross universe IIRC takes place with-in a 15Light Year radius from Earth (minimum given the Star System it takes place in).

Mospeada takes place exclusively within the Solar System (IIRC the farthest mention location of human presence is Jupiter), though the Inbit are extra-Solar IIRC.

As for Robotech. That is a bit harder to pin down. We know from the Narrator that there are a few scenes that are supposed to take place/reference in "another galaxy". We also know that in 2013 human ships have expanded out at least 20 Light Years (C&P footage). I don't think Sentinels arc worlds are ever quantified in terms of distance (I know general direction of the "Southern Cross" Constellation), nor is SSL (after moving out of the solar system at the end of the 2RW) or the Omicron Sector that was the test site of the Neutron-S missile. Unfortunately you likely aren't going to be able to work out distance/travel time based on the 2E RPG's Fold Jump Distance and elapsed time of known jumps with known ships (we know TMS jump between Earth and Dolza's Fortress takes 24hrs), the RPG gives a distance in parsecs, but no indication of elapsed time.

[Seto Kaiba]

This is basically to determine the physical size of the Macross (and all the subsequent setting such as Robotech and everything else with Macross in the title) in terms of:
Light Years from Earth to the various places (any maps?)

There is, of course, no relation between Robotech's setting and that of Macross's sequels.

Due to the way travelling interstellar distances by space fold works, it's pretty rare for characters to discuss interstellar travel purely in terms of distance. A lot of the time they're more concerned about the amount of time it'll take to travel from one location to another, since the amount of time to travel a fixed distance by space fold depends on the prevailing conditions in higher-dimensional spacetime (by which I mean "how bad are the fold faults between point A and point B?").

This becomes an important plot point several times in Macross Frontier, most notably right around the middle of the series when Sheryl is called upon to perform at a New UN Spacy Marine Corps garrison on the (relatively) close-by planet of Gallia IV. The trip is noted to be almost instantaneous in favorable conditions, but because of heavy fold fault activity between the Macross Frontier fleet's position and Gallia IV the difference between subjective and objective time during the fold jump blew up from near-zero to 7 days, 4 hours, and 15 minutes. That same heavy fold fault activity made it difficult for the Macross Frontier fleet to send reinforcements to Gallia IV during the ensuing hostage situation too because they would've arrived days too late to be any use. The introduction of a fold-quartz based fold system allowed for travel across fold faults without any disruptions, a breakthrough indicated to potentially cut travel times to a tenth of what they presently were. This new tech has not seen widespread adoption due to the scarcity of fold quartz, though.

The other major limiting factor on interstellar travel by space fold is energy storage. Folding consumes a lot of energy, and the drive has to be charged to jump the entire distance before the fold jump starts. For this reason, emigrant ships and the like that are making extremely long-distance journeys usually travel in fold jumps of a few hundred to a few thousand light years at a time. Some of the most distant emigrant fleets and settlements are a good ten years away from Earth traveling this way.


In terms of actual distance, there are relatively few mentions.

• Eden, the setting for the first half of the Macross Plus OVA, is the first Earthlike planet discovered by an emigrant fleet a mere 11.7 light years from Earth.
• The 5th Generation emigrant fleets Macross Frontier (#55), Macross Galaxy (#51), and Macross Olympia (#??) are approximately 25,000 light years from Earth c.2059, near the galactic core. The three fleets were some 500 light years apart from each other when all the trouble began.
• The Brisingr globular cluster, the setting of Macross Delta, is all the way on the far side of the galaxy on the trailing edge of the Saggitarius arm, ~50,000 light years from Earth. The cluster has an unusually high concentration of Earthlike planets, almost two dozen inhabitable worlds in a region of space approximately 1,000 light years across. Al Shahal and Ragna, the first two planets visited in the series, are noted to be 30 light years apart. Windermere IV, the home planet of the series' antagonists, is noted to be approximately 800 light years from Ragna. Windermere IV is more or less indicated to be the most distant inhabitable world yet discovered, and its astrographic isolation plays a big role in the backstory of the series.

Number of planets under human control, as well as any other alien races.

So, thus far, in over 55 years of launching emigrant fleets to explore the galaxy and preserve the human species by locating and settling on inhabitable worlds across the galaxy there have been dozens of worlds mentioned. The New UN Government has launched over 100 short-distance emigrant fleets to explore the volume of space in close proximity to Earth and 59+ large-scale long-distance fleets to explore the rest of the galaxy. Those missions ranged in size from the approximately 80,000 people in the earliest fleets to over 10 million in modern ones. I say 59+ because the 59th Large Scale Long-Distance Emigrant Fleet is the highest sequentially numbered fleet to yet appear in a Macross story (Macross the Musiculture).

Dozens of inhabitable planets have been located, settled, and visited in various Macross stories. The Sol system has Earth, of course, but also boasts permanent settlements on Luna and Mars, and space colonies orbiting at the Earth-Moon Lagrange points and also orbiting other planets like Venus, Earth, Saturn, Jupiter, and Neptune, and minor settlements on several of Saturn's moons and inside the asteroid belt. Planets mentioned or visited include:

• Alfheim
• Airberl
• Anthem III
• Avelon
• Avemaria
• Banipal
• Bellfan
• Beneb
• Cristrania
• Dahan
• Divide
• Eden
• Eden 3 (not in the same system as Eden)
• Endevald
• Elysium
• Gallia IV (destroyed, 2059)
• Hydra
• Ionideth
• Iota
• Listania
• Lux (destroyed, 2046)
• Messiah 025
• Neo York
• Never
• New Asia
• Pipure
• Pukirases
• Ragna
• Randor
• Salvation
• Sephira
• Sewell
• Spica III[sup]1[/sup]
• Susia
• Unnamed Vajra homeworld
• Uroboros
• Varauta 3198XE
• Voldor
• Vulcan
• Windermere IV
• Zola

Because the Macross setting is essentially the emergence of the galaxy's second major interstellar civilization after its first - the ancient Protoculture's Stellar Republic - collapsed some 500,000+ years ago due to a massive civil war that sent the Protoculture spiraling into extinction and destroyed countless planets, most of the currently-living intelligent life in the galaxy are species the ancient Protoculture created during the height of their power. Humans and the Zentradi probably need no introduction, though it's worth noting that the fleet that attacked Earth in 2010 was only one among thousands of such fleets of millions of ships and that the Zentradi and Human-Zentradi hybrids are commonplace throughout humanity's sphere of influence. Humanity has also made peaceful contact with several other humanoid species including:

• Zolans, the natives of planet Zola who first appeared in Macross Dynamite 7. They are a Protoculture-created humanoid species that were genetically engineered from a marsupial-like lifeform native to Zola. Consequently, they look outwardly almost identical to humans except for their two-tone hair, marsupial-like pouches, and the fur lining the outside of the forearms of the males. They're a minor presence in the New UN Government's territory, but gradually expanding since their homeworld had achieved a level of development similar to the first half of the 20th century before humanity made contact.
• Ragnans, the natives of planet Ragna in the Brisingr globular cluster who first appeared in Macross Delta. They're also a Protoculture-created humanoid species whose origins, pre-engineering, seem to have been as fish. They have gills in the sides of their necks, webbed feet and hands, and some rudimentary fins on their bodies. Their planet has a huge tourist economy due to its beaches and tropical climate.
• Voldorans, the natives of planet Voldor in the Brisingr globular cluster who first appeared in Macross Delta. They're more or less your standard anime cat people, albeit without the cutesy traits and possessing retractable claws in the tips of their fingers.
• Windermereans, the natives of planet Windermere IV on the far side of the Brisingr globular cluster who first appeared in Macross Delta. We have no idea what they evolved from, but they're probably the most obvious example of the Protoculture's handiwork with their essentially human appearance apart from a pair of prehensile tentacles on their head that contain an additional sensory organ called a rune that enables limited empathic abilities among Windermereans and responds to their emotional state with bioluminescense. They have superhuman strength and speed, and can tap into a natural symbiotic relationship with fold bacteria to further enhance those powers at the expense of shortening their already short lifespans. Their average lifespan is just 30 years, with modern medical technology (their civilization was feudal before first contact) they're able to live to 35 or so.
• Vajra, an extragalactic insectoid species that was spacefaring long before the Protoculture. The Vajra possess no individual intelligence or consciousness, the entire species forms a single collective mind because they have evolved a symbiosis with a bacterium that contains fold quartz and interfaces with their enteric nervous system, linking them all with lagless FTL communication that creates a single consciousness governing the entire species in fold space. They also have direct control over their own evolution, and have created various forms of biotechnology that equal or surpass even the most advanced technologies of the ancient Protoculture.
• Dyaus, an insectoid bioweapon species created by the ancient Protoculture on Uroboros as an EXTREMELY aggressive Keep Out sign to prevent anyone from tampering with what they buried in the planet's polar regions. They're kind of the Protoculture's imitation of the Vajra, with their biotechnological design and living ersatz warships, but designed to be aggressively territorial.
• Protodeviln, an extradimensional energy lifeform from higher dimensional spacetime. Seven of them were accidentally drawn into four-dimensional space and trapped in the bodies of experimental bioweapons by the ancient Protoculture, and proceeded to go on a panic-driven rampage to obtain the necessary energy to avoid starving to death. They created the Supervision Army and ultimately triggered the destruction of the Protoculture's civilization with their efforts to harness enough spiritia to continue existing. They were imprisoned in the Varauta system by the Protoculture but were accidentally released by the New UN Government's exploration of the Protoculture ruin they were sealed in in 2043, leading to the events of Macross 7.
• Vahla Ena AKA Galactic Whales, a naturally occurring higher-dimension lifeform that exhibits both mineral and botanical traits. They travel in schools like whales, flying between stars to feed on charged particles. Their bodies contain materials that can be used to manufacture very high quality fold systems. They reproduce via pollen. Their actual level of intelligence is debated, but Basara Nekki and others believed them to be an intelligent species c.2047. Planet Zola has a whale graveyard where elderly members of the species go to die.
• Bio-androids. Whether these constitute a "species" is debatable, but we've had at least one example of them so far that were outwardly indistinguishable from a living being.

This doesn't include the Mardook of Macross II: Lovers Again, who are strongly implied to be the descendants of the ancient Protoculture who escaped the collapse of their civilization. They only exist in Macross II's timeline.


1. Since some folks have, in the past, mistaken this for a racial slur... I should note that "Spica" is the name of very real star between 240 and 260 light years from Earth, and the name is Latin for "ear" in a context commonly used to refer to an ear of wheat. The star's other name is Alpha Virginis.

[Seto Kaiba]

Robotech's setting lacks essentially any useful detail.

The only extrasolar worlds discussed at all are the ones in Sentinels, and technically in 2044 the only world under human control is Mars.



The original Super Dimension Cavalry Southern Cross is set on the recently terraformed planet Glorie in the Epsilon Eridani system, some 10.5 light years from Earth. Earth was abandoned in this show's timeline, following widespread use of nuclear weapons in a world war. Glorie was one of two planets the survivors emigrated to. The other, the older colony on Liberte, is in the Proxima system about 4.25ly away from Earth. FTL technology is crude and dangerous in this setting, so interstellar travel is risky and infrequent... and the entire plot of the cancelled series was to involve the enemy "aliens" called the Zor turning out to be humans from the original mission to Glorie who'd been sent back in time by a warp accident.

The original Genesis Climber MOSPEADA is set entirely within the Sol system, with humanity possessing only rudimentary interplanetary travel capabilities via nuclear propulsion. Humanity set up permanent settlements on Mars and orbiting Jupiter, and fought a war of independence against Earth before the Inbit invaded in 2050 and Mars was inundated with refugees.

[Peacebringer]

This is basically to determine the physical size of the Macross (and all the subsequent setting such as Robotech and everything else with Macross in the title) in terms of:
Light Years from Earth to the various places (any maps?)
Number of planets under human control, as well as any other alien races.

Stuff like that. Just an attempt to slide Macross into the 3 Galaxies if possible.

Thanks in advance.

-STS

With fold-tech, you can add the concept of worm-holes with set locations anywhere in the universe.

[Seto Kaiba]

With fold-tech, you can add the concept of worm-holes with set locations anywhere in the universe.

Not with Macross's fold technology, anyway.

In practical terms, the space fold technology of the Macross setting is a form of folded-space teleportation or tesseract. It operates by linking a volume of space around/containing the object to be transported with an equivalent volume of space at the intended destination through higher-dimensional spacetime and then collapsing the distance between them so the two volumes of space effectively switch places. Anything that was in the volume of space at Point A is transported to Point B's location and vice versa. When the SDF-1 Macross accidentally transported South Ataria island to near the orbit of Pluto, the space it vacated was replaced with an equivalent volume of the interstellar vacuum from where South Ataria island ended up, hence the massive destruction it left behind. It takes very large amounts of energy to tie space in knots like that, so fold systems require a lot of time to recharge between fold jumps and the maximum distance for a fold jump is determined by the energy storage capacity of the fold system.

The ancient Protoculture's mastery of fold technology did eventually reach the point where they started constructing things like permanent fold networks for short-ranged teleportation across a planet's surface and a larger network with interstellar range to link at least a few of their worlds in the Brisingr cluster together as part of a larger system with a different purpose... but those required massive energy networks that spread throughout the crust of an entire planet and their range was limited to planets a few hundred light years apart.

[Peacebringer]

Folding worm-holes are possible:

http://chalkdustmagazine.com/features/interstellar-travel-the-mathematics-of-wormholes/

[Seto Kaiba]

Folding worm-holes are possible:

No, they're theoretically possible... in terms of pure mathematics, and only assuming the existence of technology that can produce extremely potent negative mass effects.

While the fold technology and gravity control technology in the Macross setting are capable of producing negative mass effects, it's not on a level powerful enough to create a wormhole. They fold higher dimensional space to achieve teleportation-like interstellar travel.

Similarly, the Robotech setting's fold technology (which is actually warp drive technology) and gravity control technology can produce negative mass effects, but also not on anywhere close to the required level to create a wormhole.

As I understand it, fold technology in the Three Galaxies is either on the Dune/Macross model (folding higher-dimensional space to teleport), Star Wars-style hyperdrives by any other name, or A Wrinkle in Time-style tesseract drives that fold realspace gravitationally but only for an instant.

[Peacebringer]

No; they're possible. That's what folding is.

[Seto Kaiba]

No; they're possible. That's what folding is.

No, it isn't... and if you read both the article you posted and the previous posts in this topic, you would understand the difference.

A wormhole is a topographical anomaly in spacetime where a region of space separating two points is compressed and separated from the rest of the fabric of space such that only its two termini are path-connected to the rest of space. It's an extra-dimensional tunnel made of distorted spacetime linking two points in spacetime but standing separate from the general fabric of spacetime. Traveling using a wormhole, you're still traveling from Point A to Point B by moving through spacetime... you're just taking a shortcut.

Space folding involves compressing spacetime until two points in it briefly become coterminous. Point A and Point B briefly become the same space, sharing the same coordinates and boundaries. You'd exist in Point A and Point B at the same time, until the compression of spacetime was released and you exist at only one of those points once they stop overlapping. In some takes on the concept like the one in Macross, Point A and Point B literally switch places. Either way, you've circumvented distance without actually moving at all.

(Robotech's "space fold" isn't actually folding space at all, it's a standard warp drive that's pushing a bubble of spacetime through space using the compression and expansion of space around the bubble.)



Moreover, even if the space fold technology in Macross did work like that its range is explicitly limited... it wouldn't be capable of opening wormholes anywhere in the universe or sustaining them indefinitely. Most fold systems available to humanity are only good for fold jumps of a few thousand light years at a time, tops.

[Peacebringer]

You've given two same definitions of a worm-hole.

[Seto Kaiba]

You've given two same definitions of a worm-hole.

No, I did not... you just don't understand the material in the link you yourself posted.

Let's think of space as a city block. You live on the middle of one side, and your friend's house is right in the middle of the opposite side. Whether you go to the corner of the block on either side, the distance from the house you live in to your friend's house is the same if you're walking on the sidewalk or driving in the street.

A wormhole would be like cutting through people's yards in a straight line across the block to your friend's home instead of following the streets or sidewalks. You're still traveling, you're just taking a shorter route that's separate from the legal ways to travel across the distance separating your house and your friend's house.

Getting there by space fold would be the equivalent of pinching the block until your friend's house and your house are overlapping in the same space for an instant. During that instant, you in your living room switch places with a you-shaped volume of air in your friend's living room and when the block springs back to its normal shape you are now sitting in your friend's living room without having physically moved an inch. His dog's last fart is now dissipating over the sofa in your living room on the other side of the block because it was in the air you just switched places with.

Put even more simply, a wormhole is a shortcut... an express tunnel between two places. Space folding is switching places with where you want to be without ever moving. They are not even close to being the same thing. The interior of a wormhole is space. There is still distance between Points A and B. A space fold is the total negation of distance... a temporary rearrangement of space such that Point A and Point B have zero distance between them.

[Peacebringer]

That's a wormhole; folding=wormhole; both bend space and time.

[Peacebringer]

https://robotech.fandom.com/wiki/Space_Fold

[Seto Kaiba]

That's a wormhole; folding=wormhole; both bend space and time.

No, folding space is not the same as a wormhole. We've been over this several times before.

A wormhole is a "tunnel" of spacetime, disjoint from the normal geometry of three/four-dimensional space, which acts as a "shortcut" between Point A and Point B that you have to fly through.

Folding space involves collapsing the distance between Point A and Point B until the two points share the same coordinates - becoming coterminous for a short period of time - and then releasing that collapsed tract of space-time so that the ship simply exchanges the space it occupied at Point A for an equivalent space at Point B without moving.

I think your misconception here likely originates in the 2-dimensional demonstration of a wormhole that involves folded paper... but that is a gross oversimplification meant to demonstrate only a basic principle and projected into n-1 or more dimensions.

https://robotech.fandom.com/wiki/Space_Fold

Golly, that totally-unsourced article from a notoriously unreliable free-hosted Wiki sure showed me!

Get real, man. The one and only time that Robotech's space fold effect was diagrammed onscreen, the diagram was copied from a presentation on the Alcubierre drive... the real world theoretical equivalent of Star Trek's warp drive and the accompanying depiction clearly showed the ship moving through realspace in exactly the same manner as a Star Trek warp drive, even using the same visual effects. The description in the official artbook for same - AotSC - also describes a warp drive not a wormhole or a Macross/Dune-style fold drive.

[xunk16]

Get real, man. The one and only time that Robotech's space fold effect was diagrammed onscreen, the diagram was copied from a presentation on the Alcubierre drive...

They did? When?

[Seto Kaiba]

Get real, man. The one and only time that Robotech's space fold effect was diagrammed onscreen, the diagram was copied from a presentation on the Alcubierre drive...

They did? When?

In Robotech: the Shadow Chronicles... and the (admittedly hilariously terrible) artbook for same.

[ShadowLogan]

Get real, man. The one and only time that Robotech's space fold effect was diagrammed onscreen, the diagram was copied from a presentation on the Alcubierre drive...

They did? When?

In Robotech: the Shadow Chronicles... and the (admittedly hilariously terrible) artbook for same.

Yes Shadow Chronicles is the source.

[Seto Kaiba]

So... to bring it back around to the actual topic:

With fold-tech, you can add the concept of worm-holes with set locations anywhere in the universe.

This statement is demonstrably false.

Fold technology in the Macross setting allows for a ship or small craft to near-instantaneously circumvent vast distances by folding higher-dimensional space, but the range of a space fold is limited due to various factors. The quality of the fold system, the capacity of its energy storage, the volume of space to be folded, and the presence of fold faults can all impact the maximum available distance that fold system can circumvent in one go. Small fold systems like VF-mounted fold boosters can traverse a few dozen light years at most, while the fold systems of large warships and emigrant ships in the New UN Government's fleets can jump distances of hundreds or thousands of light years at a time. With humanity only colonizing planets that are already Earthlike or very close to it, they're spread out across much of the galaxy but the distance between inhabited planets varies wildly. The nearest emigrant planet is less than a dozen light years away and can be reached in under two hours by fold aboard a galaxy starliner. The farthest-flung settlements like the Brisingr globular cluster can take ten years or more to reach by space fold... it did for Megaroad-04 when it found Windermere.

The galaxy's still a big place in Macross, though the introduction of advanced fold systems based on fold quartz is said to be expected to reduce travel times to a tenth of what they are with current fold technology. The only thing standing in the way of that technology's proliferation is that humanity can't currently synthesize fold quartz, and thus are relegated to obtaining it from Vajra carcasses or ancient Protoculture settlements like the ones on Uroboros and the worlds of the Brisingr cluster.

[glitterboy2098]

i have that book.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/13X8ude ... sp=sharing

this is literally the only thing in it about the fold drive:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1KHvEbg ... sp=sharing

here is a scan that shows it better: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1mD8PmK ... sp=sharing


that is not a diagram of an Alcubierre drive. that looks like this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Alcubierre.png

the diagram on the page is in fact closer to that of hyperspatial theory in relation to einstein-rosen bridges. (the idea of creating a bridge through hyperspace (spacetime with more than 3 dimensions) in order to take a shortcut between two locations.
https://www.researchgate.net/publicatio ... -which.png

also interestingly enough the diagram looks virtually identical (except for minor stylistic differences) to this diagram of an analysis of the "bird man" from Macross Zero. the following dialog indicates that the "bird man" robot, had a fold drive. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1VSnrO- ... sp=sharing
so unless you are wanting to claim that Macross continuity also uses an Alcubierre drive, which would contradict most of the major plot points in several series, but especially Frontier, that diagram can't represent that.

given that we are told multiple times by both the narrator and characters in robotech that fold drives operate by taking a ship into hyperspace, robotech fold drives clearly do not operate on the Alcubierre drive principle. and there is no visual difference in Shadow chronicles to make us think a retcon has occurred either. as in macross era we see an energy sphere form around a ship as well ( https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/rob ... 1_fold.png) although zentreadi ones are more like ovoids (possibly due to their size or other such factor). in southern cross when the Tristar uses its fold drive to perform a dangerous "hyperdimensional blast" it also manifests the spherical energy shell ( https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/rob ... ce_fold.jp ) and the dialog from that sequence makes it clear that hyperspace is involved. this visual remain identical in Shadow Chronicles ( https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/rob ... usfold.jpg and https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/rob ... l-fold.jpg ) the follow on visuals are largely the same as well.. the ship appearing to accelerate rapidly followed by the ship passing through a glowing environment. shadow chronicles however has higher resolution to its visuals so instead of a shifting ever exposed glow effect it has a tubular energy field.


so i am afraid Seto that your claims do not hold up to scrutiny. the book does not state anything of the sort you are claiming, your interpretation of the diagram is entirely incorrect (and rather hypocritical given that it and similar diagrams is a common visual for hyperspace fold related stuff on the macross side of the franchise divide) and the visuals did not change beyond minor stylistic differences between the series and film. (or even between the different parts of the series)

and i've pointed this out to you multiple times
so please stop presenting information that you know is false.

[jaymz]

-waits-

[Seto Kaiba]

-waits-

Really, it's hardly worth my effort to reply to an argument that doesn't acknowledge its own sources.

that is not a diagram of an Alcubierre drive. that looks like this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Alcubierre.png

The difference between a rough diagram in two dimensions vs. a rough diagram in three is a mystery to you?

also interestingly enough the diagram looks virtually identical (except for minor stylistic differences) to this diagram of an analysis of the "bird man" from Macross Zero.

They really don't look similar at all... except in the most general sense.

given that we are told multiple times by both the narrator and characters in robotech [...]

... and right away you've missed the bloody point and gone off on an unrelated and irrelevant tangent.

We're talking about the one and only time that an ORIGINAL Robotech work has diagrammed and discussed the mechanics of that setting's version of fold technology. Harmony Gold's own creative staff have, on no uncertain terms, indicated that the dialog in Robotech's TV series is a hasty hodgepodge of random BSing and carryover content from the original shows and not an entirely reliable source of information.

The Hyperspace Fold phenomenon is one of the advancements of Robotechnology that has permitted humankind to expand its reach to the stars. A Hyperspace Fold drive distorts the space-time continuum to generate a spherical fold "bubble" that can be transported at speeds that circumvent the limitations of the speed of light through space.

In 1994, Miguel Alcubierre proposed a method for changing the geometry of space by creating a wave that would cause the fabric of space ahead of a spacecraft to contract and the space behind it to expand.[4][1][2] The ship would then ride this wave inside a region of flat space, known as a warp bubble, and would not move within this bubble but instead be carried along as the region itself moves due to the actions of the drive.

Warp drive was a technology that allowed space travel at faster-than-light speeds. It worked by generating warp fields to form a subspace bubble that enveloped the starship, distorting the local spacetime continuum and moving the starship at velocities that could greatly exceed the speed of light.

Now, golly... these all sound rather alike don't they? Why could that be?

Well, I'll tell you! It's because each of those three explanations is describing the same concept... the drive system distorts the spacetime around the ship to create a "bubble" in which the ship rides as the drive distorts spacetime around the bubble to move it at faster-than-light speeds. What does the diagram on Louie's screen, copied in the artbook, show? The fold drive contracting the space that was in front of the bubble and expanding the space behind the bubble. Hey, that's how an Alcubierre drive - AKA a Warp Drive - works!

The Icarus doesn't glow and vanish or pass through a portal and disappear... we see it zoom off into the distance at speed in a shot that closely apes the visual effect of a ship jumping to warp in the Star Trek franchise from TNG and the movies onward (11:10 & 32:14). We even see a shot of the starlines decelerating into normal points of light like a ship dropping out of warp when the Icarus shows up at the black hole near the SDF-3 (20:54). That's consistent with it being exactly what the text and diagram say it is... a warp drive. That's NOT consistent with the creation of a wormhole, disappearing into another dimension, or folding space-time.

so i am afraid Seto that your claims do not hold up to scrutiny. the book does not state anything of the sort you are claiming, your interpretation of the diagram is entirely incorrect (and rather hypocritical given that it and similar diagrams is a common visual for hyperspace fold related stuff on the macross side of the franchise divide) and the visuals did not change beyond minor stylistic differences between the series and film. (or even between the different parts of the series)

and i've pointed this out to you multiple times
so please stop presenting information that you know is false.

As ever, your argument is long on vitriolic rhetoric and short on important things like facts and evidence.

[jaymz]

Aaaaaand there it is.

[glitterboy2098]

except Seto that the description in the art of shadow chronicles is literally just describing the visuals from the show (it generates a spherical shell of energy and then moves FTL) without describing the actual mechanics. the only place where mechanics are described is *gasp* the show, where it is explicitly called a hyperspace system. which fits the description tAoSC just as well, given that hyperspace is the universe's spacetime at higher dimensions than our normal three.

and no that diagram is not a "three dimensional alcubierre metric" an alcubierre metric operates by isolating a bubble of spacetime then contracting space ahead of the bubble while the space behind it is expanded. a three dimensional depiction of that would be a spherical center with two disc shaped zones ahead and behind.

the diagram shown in shadow chronicles (and in the bottom right corner of that that macross screencap, as anyone can see) is a depiction of an einstein-rosen bridge. sometimes called (erroneously) a "wormhole". a tube of altered space between two points where spacetime has been shaped so that it meets and merges in hyperdimensional space, allowing passage along the passage. the ring around the point where the two halves meet and merge is a structure of negative energy that holds the two halves of the passage together. negative energy is also required in the center of the structure if you want to make it traversal by matter (to hold the 'throat' of the passage open wide enough. which by inference is probably what the spherical energy shell of robotech fold drives would be.. a protective shell of negative energy (or more specifically, anti-gravity warped space) that allows it to pass through the spacetime bridge between the two points.
the most common "layman's" description of this type of wormhole FTL is referred to as "folded space" using the (rather inaccurate) simplified description of "imagine a sheet of paper with two dots on each end. now imagine folding that paper in half until the dots are next to each other, and then imagine punching a pencil through the folded paper"


this fits the depictions in the show and film closer than an alcubierre metric, it fits the diagram closer than an alcubierre metric, and since we're told many many times in the show that the drives operate using hyperspace, and the film does not state one way or the other, all evidence as well as occam's razor brings us to the only logical conclusion: that robotech is using a hyperspatial style FTL rather than an alcubierre metric.

[Seto Kaiba]

*sigh* Once again, you're long on rhetoric and painfully short on anything resembling factual knowledge, evidence, or a cogent argument.

except Seto that the description in the art of shadow chronicles is literally just describing the visuals from the show (it generates a spherical shell of energy and then moves FTL) without describing the actual mechanics.

The description in The Art of Robotech: the Shadow Chronicles is more than sufficient to identify the mechanic being used. There is no mention whatsoever of a wormhole or any wormhole-like mechanics, and no mention of transitioning into higher-dimensional space. It describes a system that distorts spacetime to form a protective bubble around the ship, then propels that bubble at faster than light speeds. That's the textbook definition of a warp drive. Just because you don't like the facts doesn't make them untrue.

the only place where mechanics are described is *gasp* the show, where it is explicitly called a hyperspace system.

The mechanics aren't really described at all in the show, which is at best painfully inconsistent and at worst completely incoherent on the subject... which really isn't surprising given that Macross's FTL technology is folded space teleportation similar to Dune's Holtzman drive, while Southern Cross's FTL technology is called "warp" but is more along the lines of a Star Wars-style hyperdrive (because it's shamelessly copied from Space Battleship Yamato).

Robotech: the Shadow Chronicles is the one and only time that Harmony Gold's Robotech creative staff were able to establish for themselves how the tech should work and look, and what they settled on was essentially a Star Trek warp drive by another name.

which fits the description tAoSC just as well, given that hyperspace is the universe's spacetime at higher dimensions than our normal three.

Ironically, the description you keep pointing to doesn't actually mention hyperspace at all in connection with how the drive works.

Of course, since the whole thing's a lift from Star Trek with "hyperspace" substituted for "subspace" we can take a pretty good guess. They even use the bubble in a similar way to the subspace fields in Star Trek to escape the gravitational pull of a black hole.

and no that diagram is not a "three dimensional alcubierre metric" an alcubierre metric operates by isolating a bubble of spacetime then contracting space ahead of the bubble while the space behind it is expanded. a three dimensional depiction of that would be a spherical center with two disc shaped zones ahead and behind.

*sigh* Do you even understand the difference between a two-dimensional abstraction and three-dimensional abstraction?

the diagram shown in shadow chronicles (and in the bottom right corner of that that macross screencap, as anyone can see) is a depiction of an einstein-rosen bridge.

Except that it isn't... not in either case. This claim of yours borders on a critical research failure. Robotech's "fold drive" tech is a Star Trek-style warp drive that is clearly depicted as moving the ship through realspace, and Macross's fold systems are a form of teleportation not a wormhole. If you had paid attention, that little detail is mentioned in the very same scene as the screen capture from Macross Zero in your post, all of about five seconds later.

Mind you, what they're looking at on the Birdman isn't a fold system per se... it's the Birdman's powerplant, a fold quartz-based fold dimensional energy conversion organ. Its primary role is to provide the Birdman with a limitless power source by directly drawing energy out of super dimension space, though in conjunction with other parts of the Birdman it is also directly or indirectly responsible for it being able to fly using gravity control, teleport interstellar distances via space fold without being impeded by fold faults, and discharge a heavy super dimension energy cannon for defense. (It is not outside the realm of possibility that it could in fact time travel too as conjectured in the OVA, as a similar biotechnological mecha uncovered on Uroboros in Macross 30: Voices Across the Galaxy explicitly did possess that ability.)

[glitterboy2098]

extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. i think i have made my case for the status quo assumption that the FTL is consistent with the depiction in the show of hyperspace based Fold systems.

you on the otherhand are making the extraordinary claim that it instead represents a retcon to a totally different means of FTL. one that invalidates all previous dialog and references.
yet your evidence is one sentence in an art book that does not even establish the specific mechanism by which the ship travels at FTL, and a diagram which you claim depicts an alcubierre metric, yet which you have as of yet failed to provide visual proof of which from a valid source.

thus far your claim remains unsubstantiated. until you actually provide the proof to back up your claim, as i have done, it is false. once you have actually provided evidence that is not based on your subjective interpretation, then perhaps your claim will be worth discussing.

[Rabid Southern Cross Fan]

thus far your claim remains unsubstantiated. until you actually provide the proof to back up your claim, as i have done, it is false. once you have actually provided evidence that is not based on your subjective interpretation, then perhaps your claim will be worth discussing.

I literally cannot thumbs up this post enough.

The fact is that space-fold in Robotech (and even The Shadow Chronicles) is not in any way, shape or form similar to the "warp" of Star Trek. Its hyperspace, as per dialogue from Mind Games:

NARRATOR: The Earth forces were enhanced by reinforcements from hyperspace, responding to a mayday from the original attack on Space Station Liberty.

[Seto Kaiba]

extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

Claims, in general, require evidence... your "claims" thus far has been devoid of any kind of supporting evidence.

You've made several baseless assertions, and several more demonstrably false claims that revealed entertaining critical failures of basic research, but that's about all. Your headcanon is not a substitute for official information.

Thus far, Robotech's official setting offers one and only one explanation of how the setting's fold drives work: the explanation found in The Art of Robotech: the Shadow Chronicles and in the Encyclopedia section of the official franchise website.

That explanation, and the only original Robotech animation to depict a fold drive operating, conforms to the definition of an Alcubierre drive... popularly known as a warp drive. Neither the official explanation nor the animation support the idea that this drive system is creating a wormhole or that the ship is traveling through hyperspace in any way, shape, or form. Hyperspace isn't mentioned at all in that explanation, funnily enough.

Interestingly - or amusingly - your claim would ALSO be incorrect in the context of pre-reboot Robotech.

As it happens, Robotech Art 1's glossary has a definition of space fold that mirrors the Macross OSM's... that of teleportation via folding higher-dimensional space. Not a hyperdrive and not a wormhole.

Do come back when you have some actual supporting evidence, OK?

[xunk16]

To be fair though, I kinda see what he's getting at.
These pictures can be interpreted in lots of ways. The Alcubierre thing being as subjective as any other.
Yes, there are the art book explanations, but that is authorial comprehension not used in dialogues. So that could change as science bust the audience's conceptions.

Wouldn't it be possible that Fold technologies would have "evolved" toward a lesser energetic consumption for future human ships?
After all, SDF stands for Super Dimensional Fortress. Maybe Shadow Chronicles' fold drives are just taking a slightly lesser dimensional shift to "jump". This would in turn leave the possibility of an "image" ship still appearing in normal 3D. If this is correct, then while it would look like a "warp speed" acceleration, it would still be a dimensionally shifted ship's "teleportation" from "A" to "B" by bypassing c - light speed - using a diminished dimensional presence.

In other words... For something to get from the Macross Fold (still in canon) to the Shadow Chronicle Fold (also still in canon), wouldn't it be more credible to have a technology evolve rather than being entirely replaced? After all, even in Macross, the "teleportation" isn't instantaneous. Like in DOOM, or Event Horizon, there seem to be a "place" where the transit does take effect.
The references to hyperspace does also seem to support this hypothesis.

[Seto Kaiba]

To be fair though, I kinda see what he's getting at.
These pictures can be interpreted in lots of ways. The Alcubierre thing being as subjective as any other.

There's a difference between "open to interpretation" and "reflex denial"... the counterargument against the official description is pretty clearly the latter.

A Hyperspace Fold drive distorts the space-time continuum to generate a spherical fold "bubble" that can be transported at speeds that circumvent the limitations of the speed of light through space.

The above is the official post-reboot explanation direct from Robotech.com and the official Shadow Chronicles artbook. Taken at face value, this describes a drive that distorts space-time to create a bubble of space around the ship that can be moved through space at faster-than-light speeds. That's how an Alcubierre drive - AKA a warp drive - works. Notice that there's absolutely no mention at all of hyperspace in there except in the drive's name, there's nothing said about entering higher dimensions, folding space, or creating a compressed region of space (a wormhole). Those other means of FTL aren't circumventing the speed of light, they're circumventing distance while either not moving or moving slower than light (folding and wormholes respectively) or leaving space entirely to work in a domain where those rules don't exist.

Not only is it animated like a warp drive and described like a warp drive, the OVA's first and only episode even borrows several warp drive-specific gimmicks from Star Trek in the course of its story. (Which is less surprising when you realize they rewrote Louie into a white Geordi LaForge, even giving him an ersatz VISOR and making his best friend an android who can't use contractions in speech played by a former Star Trek actress. )

Is it a retcon? Yes, absolutely it is... as I noted previously the official explanation for Robotech's hyperspace fold drives prior to the 2001 reboot was the Macross one about the drive folding higher-dimensional spacetime to effectively teleport. But as a retcon, it's still the official answer. People might not like it, but the facts don't really care about people's opinions of them. It was probably a very deliberate choice to minimize Robotech's similarities to Macross going forward for legal reasons.

Yes, there are the art book explanations, but that is authorial comprehension not used in dialogues. So that could change as science bust the audience's conceptions.

Artbooks in general tend to go into far more detail than the show itself... that's pretty standard for anime. In Japan, the expectation is that anyone who actually gives a flip about how Technology X in the show works will be buying the artbook anyway, so there's no need to spend screen time on a highly detailed explanation.

It's unlikely to change at any point, since animated Robotech is effectively dead (again) in the wake of Robotech Academy's crash-and-burn failure and the Shadow Chronicles OVA was cancelled almost thirteen years ago. There's no development of the official setting going on anymore.

Wouldn't it be possible that Fold technologies would have "evolved" toward a lesser energetic consumption for future human ships?

No such luck, based on the available official materials. The very next paragraph indicates that the only real progress humanity made with respect to fold drives was that, around the end of the Second Robotech War, they had finally reached a point where they could build a drive of their own that was at least as reliable as the salvaged drive systems they'd been working with up to that point.

[slade the sniper]

Planets; well, go to SolStation; it will tell you the age of the star and it's metallicity, which you can determine what actually planets may be in those systems; for instand, E. Eridandi is a K-class and only about 900MYO; think how the Earth-system was at they time; T. Ceti is almost 10BYO; any lifeforms that evolved on any worlds there would have gone extinct already (that, and T.Ceti is flooded with cometary-derbies disk.

Super resource I have never heard of. Thanks.

-STS

[Peacebringer]

Super resource I have never heard of. Thanks.

-STS

There's also another great resource out there, that's down, but there might be a mirror: Extrasolarvisions.com; I used this back in the late '90's; it can generate the night-sky constellations from another star-system and I could explain/show it to my players! It was awesome back in the infancy of the internet but I can't find it today.