Hotrod wrote:Sambot wrote: We are reading the same book, aren't we? In English?
There's no burden of proof fallacy or invention. It's there in the book. They watched the Earth tear itself apart. The Earth they knew is gone. The nations of origin are gone. It doesn't matter that Friendlies existed before the Rifts. What matters is what exists after the Rifts. What exists now is know one they'd know. Not that any of them would care because 300 years have passed and the people now have no connection to the nations of the past.
The Orbitals assumed that there are no friendlies down below when it's obvious that there are people down below and they have made no effort whatsoever to determine if those people are friendly or hostile.
Some how I don't think we're reading the same book. We're certainly not reading the same things.
This is what they saw when the Rifts erupted.
From their distant vantage point, it was obvious that the Earth was tearing itself apart. Tidal waves, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, massive storms, and the eruptions of blue energy tore across the planet; no place was left unscathed. Many believed these terrifying events to be the end of the world.
This was the situation after a year.
Probes sent to Earth showed a planet still in the throes of upheaval. Tremendous storms and earthquakes still rocked the land. Strange energy readings, radiation and scores of anomalies were noted everywhere. Even the space-time continuum seemed to be torn apart. The chance of survival on Earth was slim and none. Some elected to try and perished.
No where does it say that they saw survivors but even if they had there was no way to help them. Those that went to earth died. It's right there in print.
Finally, they came to grips with their situation. If Earth was denied them, so be it, their new life was to be among the stars.
Earth is gone. History. There's no going back. The only thing to do is move forward.
Sambot wrote:Are the PCs in space? Why would they want to risk going to Earth to be come some thing's lunch or plaything? Even if they managed to get to Earth how would they get anyone to believe them? Unless of course they're seen landing in which case they'll probably be met with gunfire.
How do the Orbitals reconcile their conclusion that everyone below is dead with city lights in plain sight below, radio traffic that includes unencrypted human voices speaking human languages, and active man-made structures and vehicles one can easily see from orbit? MiO doesn't even try to address this, and that is a major failing of the book. I acknowledge that it's possible to add material and explanations to make the scenario less implausible, but that shouldn't be necessary. This is a fundamental flaw in MiO as a Rifts setting.
This is the Earth from 10,000 miles. Where are the lights, and man made structures?
https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/eart ... 0000-milesThe nearest Space Station is 100,000 miles and the sky is full of ash, energy lines, storms, etc. What lights are they supposed to be able to see? What signals are they supposed to hear?
The biggest flaw, MiO has is that it doesn't have enough details for you. But that's on you.
Sambot wrote:You seem unwilling to accept that technology not only changes but is abandoned and lost. You also seem unwilling to accept that not everything is compatible. Even when I give examples, you say I don't understand. I don't have to be able to build a radio or TV or computer or anything else to know that not everything is compatible. I can't even use my hair dryer in Europe without an adapter. But that old vacuum tube radio can receive every channel on every frequency, analog and digital, and decode scrambled transmissions. And every computer has a 5.25 in floppy drive and can operate DOS programs. Sorry but even Palladium doesn't go that far. In fact there's rules for dealing with unfamiliar and alien technology.
Most energy weapons on Rifts Earth accept a common type of E-clip. Sure, there are exceptions, but that was a standard established back in the Golden Age that people have stuck with. 25 years ago, there were no common cable types to speak of, and now we have USBs and universal adapters. Computers and technology in general trends toward compatibility as time goes on, and Golden Age tech is pretty interoperable in general. In terms of radio, there are international standards that people follow even when they're not legally required to in foreign countries, because that makes the radio communications gear they sell better able to communicate. Morse Code hasn't changed and still exists in Rifts Earth (and is part of the Radio: Basic skill). There are common frequency bands and standards that people use all over the world today.
As you said there's exceptions. And you've got 3 different types of USB connections. That I know of. If you don't have an adapter they won't work. And yes there's some commonality and bands and so on. That doesn't mean an AM radio will pick up FM signals. It doesn't mean they'll reach zillions of miles or they'd be talking over each other and no one would be able to tell what was being said.
Much of that Golden Age tech is still around, in use, and still in production, both on Earth and in orbit. Radios in Rifts have ranges, but they don't have compatibility rules, which suggests to me that humanity worked out some common standards during the Golden Age and stuck with them through the dark ages. Suggesting that radios made during or based on those made during the Golden Age would be incompatible would require inventing new content and modifying the setting.
That doesn't mean it hasn't changed. You also don't need compatibility rules to know you can't get FM with an AM radio. I don't have to invent anything for that to remain true. And there are rules for different/alien technology.
I also don't have to invent anything to know that technology gets abandoned. There's only 1 mention of videotape in Rifts Unlimited Ed and they're in a library. Audio Tapes were likewise mentioned once in the Machine Ghost ability. Everything else is disk. Audiodisks can have how many different types of audio files? Files that aren't always compatible with every player? Videodisks? LD, VCD, SVCD, DVD, HD-DVD, Blue Ray, and all kinds of other video files that can be put on disk but not played on all players. Plus there's regional encoding so they can only be played in certain regions. And ever try to play a video and not have the right codec? Don't tell me things are 100% compatible because they're not.
Sambot wrote:That's kind of like everyone's heard of Clark Gable but only a few have seen his movies. Or everyone's heard of Elvis but only a few have heard him sing. Fewer have seen his movies.
Again, you're ignoring context. The next sentence states why only 3%
admit to this; it'd be like being North Korean and admitting to watching Captain America.
If you saw a study that claimed "only 3% of high school boys publicly admit to having masturbated," would you interpret that to mean 97% of those boys truthfully hadn't?
No you're ignoring the context.
In reality, an estimated 69% of the educated elite are believed to have read one or more of Miss Tarn's books, and an estimated 23% of the uneducated masses cloistered away in the fortified Coalition cities
are believed to have read or heard excerpts from her books. Double or triple that number in the Burbs and outlying territories
Those are the estimated numbers of those believed to have read her books or have been read too. Three numbers for three different groups. You're lumping different groups. You want all the population?
96.5% of all CS citizens knew about Erin Tarn and her writings.
100% of all Coalition citizens know of and recognize Emperor Karl Prosek,
Please note "knew about" and "know of and recognize" are different things.
Sambot wrote:At least you agree language will drift. That doesn't mean it'd be understood. Have you ever tried to talk to someone with a thick accent? We can't even communicate yet you think that two people separated by thousands of miles and hundreds of years are not going to have a problem? And you didn't answer my question. What do I mean when I say, "Put the hammer down"?
Sure! I've lived in Spain, England, and Iraq. It takes a little longer to work out what people with thick accents are saying, but it's doable.
"Put the hammer down" is an expression meaning to drive as fast as possible. Or it can mean to take the hammer in your hand and set it down. Kind of hard to figure out which you mean without some context.
Must have been interesting, and hot being there. And you recognize that it can be difficult to understand someone even if they're speaking the same language.
And thank you. I meant speed up. Literally putting the hammer down is another answer. So is lowering the hammer of a gun. There's probably more. Context would help but not always. Words have different meanings and that could lead to a misunderstanding can lead to blows. When you take language drift, slang, different meanings, accents, second language, etc it'd be easy to miss communicate.
I'm not saying its impossible. I'm not saying it'd totally easy. I am saying that there will be differences. It's also probably vary from person to person.
Sambot wrote:So allowing your home to be destroyed and your family and friends killed or enslaved is to be celebrated?
Nothin in published Rifts canon, including MiO, indicates that anyone from Earth has killed or enslaved anyone in orbit.
Nothing in published Rifts canon, including MiO, indicates that anyone from Earth has destroyed anything in orbit.
And yet killer satellites exist for a reason. Do we really need a list of victims?
Sambot wrote:You've also missed that 64% are mutants which aren't looked favorably on. Also 50% may not even be able to survive .6 gravity without medical assistance. How would they be able to get to Earth and back? They'd never survive lift off without some kind of really advanced technology that isn't available to them. So half the crew dies on landing, and the rest of the crew are in danger of being killed as space aliens. If they manage to survive that, 2/3 of the remaining crew are likely to be killed or imprisoned for being aliens or escaped mutants. And none of them would be able to survive lift off again. So why would they go to Earth?
Lots to unpack here.
First, I'm not ignoring your MiO quotes, I'm saying that those quotes don't justify or explain the basics of the setting MiO sets out. You accept them at face value; I don't. You either ignore the plot holes, inconsistencies, and leaps of logic they require or create whatever you need to make them work. I don't.
I don't need the level of detail that you seem to.
Second, your point about the C.S. is irrelevant. Even if the C.S. was all-powerful, they wouldn't indiscriminately kill everyone they meet. Debees, yes. Magic users, yes. Political enemies, sure. Not everyone. Only the Orbitals do that.
You're ignoring where it says they would do just that.
Your point about people on Earth being able to see the killer satellites is my point as well. You choose to accept this at face value and assume there's some explanation. I don't.
I take it to mean that those with telescopes have a hard time seeing satellites with all the light from ley lines, aurora borealis, and space debris. After all Rifts Earth is not the Earth we have now. Things aren't going to be the same.
Same with the "Earth has lots of resources" argument against the Orbitals' blockade; you assume that the setting makes sense and handwave any potential issues. I don't.
The Bank has lots of money. That doesn't mean I can access it. Handwavium isn't going to change that.
Finally, according to MiO, the actual survival odds of someone from orbit surviving on Earth for a single day are on the order of 1 in a few million when you do the math. According to MiO, the odds of someone who's been living in microgravity for six months or so surviving their return to Earth are about 50%. This is demonstrably false, but I'll set that aside. There is no need for Orbitals themselves to go to the surface; they can send autonomous or remote-controlled robots down (both are a thing in MiO). The reasons for going down? Resources! Air, water, food, raw materials, et cetera are very simple to acquire on Earth, far more so than in space. Sure, getting back up into Orbit takes some serious delta-V, but that's doable with their level of technology.
Actually, I think they're being generous at 50%. It is a fact that those in space suffer bone and muscle loss among other problems. I'm going to presume after several hundred years humans adapted so those problems aren't. At least as long as they're in space. They're not going to have a good time on Earth. They'll be even less happy trying to leave it. Just being on Earth is going to be an incredible stress on their bodies. Trying to leave...
https://www.universetoday.com/20338/wei ... 3%20pounds.
Your weight on the Moon is 16.5% what you would experience on Earth. In other words, if you weighed 100 kg on Earth, you would weigh a mere 16.5 kg on the Moon. For you imperial folks, imagine you tipped the scales at 200 pounds. Your weight on the Moon would only be 33 pounds.
https://books.google.com/books?id=LqZcS ... DXoECBQQAQAstronauts experiencing 4g during launch would feel five times heavier due to the
So a Moon Colonist will be more than 6 times heavier on Earth and then that weight increases 5 times getting into orbit. So they'd be 11 times heavier trying to get into space? Why take that risk? And yes, they could try robotics, but are the Orbitals capable of escape velocity? I'm not sure any of the 5 Drive Types available can go that fast. And why go when the resources are there in space?
Sambot wrote:You're moving the goal posts. You don't need a satellite to survive. You need a means to provide and cook food and shelter. A satellite might help but given a choice between a satellite or a can opener I think most would choose a can opener.
I also never said that they weren't in PA, BA, vehicles or just available on their own. What I have said is that not all radios are equal nor can they pick up the signals from another.
There's more out there than hypothermia and starvation that can kill you:
"Timmy died of his injuries weeks before we finally found his body. If only he'd had an EPIRB!"
"If only we could have called that guy on a satellite phone, we could have explained the situation and averted a war!"
"The Edmund Fitzgerald II got caught in a hurricane way out at sea and sank. If only we could see those with a weather satellite!"I would say that the people whose lives these technologies would save need them to survive.
And if Columbus had GPS he wouldn't have gotten lost and found the "New World"
All that presumes there are satellites. Most of the satellites that Earth could talk to were destroyed. Out of those that were left it'd be surprising if there were a lot still functioning. ARCHIE 3's managed to use one satellite. Yet it seems like you think everyone should have satellite communications. That skill isn't even offered in Rifts.
Sambot wrote:Not every radio is going to be able to pick up that signal. The ISS is currently about 251 miles above the Earth. The closest orbital I can find is Yuro Station, 100,000 miles above the Earth. The range of radios on Earth is 500 miles.
Cool link! I especially like the part where it says
"Anybody with a receiver or scanner able to tune into that frequency can listen to the space station when it's overhead."
Aside from the fact that MiO includes communications satellites in it, we already addressed the concepts of radio range in free space vs on Earth's surface.
Thanks. You will not that you'd need a radio that can receive those frequencies. Not every radio is. You'll also note that the time was also limited to 10 minuets and that they only tried 45 times a year. Probably more by appointment. That really narrows down those that can hear those in space to those that get lucky or have an appointment.
Sambot wrote:And no, that isn't how I play the CS. My CS characters aren't quite that trigger happy. But that doesn't mean they'll let others kill them either.
I'm glad we agree that the C.S. doesn't shoot everyone else on sight like the Orbitals do. I've pressed this point because there have been several points at which you've seemed to indicate otherwise, such as the bolded text above or your first reply to this thread, when you said:
Sambot wrote:As for Earth and Orbit not working together, there's been 200+ years of separation.(snip) Considering both sides tend to shoot first and ask questions later I think anyone who got through the debris field would be shot at for being aliens and monsters.
It is the CS policy to shoot first. They've temporarily set that aside as they're in a war and very stretched. Before then it was individual troopers who decided not to shoot. And if they had a "shoot first" person in their mist, especially above them in rank, they could be in trouble.
Sambot wrote:I'm not the one ignoring the text and inventing my own setting. It's there in the books. You just don't want to see it.
I'm happy to reject MiO's precepts and invent my own setting. You're happy to accept MiO's precepts and invent whatever's required to justify it.
If I were to distill our entire discussion down, I would characterize it this way:
Because you have to create stuff to justify MiO's setting precepts, I think MiO's setting precepts are nonsense.
Because you can create stuff to justify MiO's setting precepts, you think those setting precepts make sense.
I don't have to justify the setting precepts or create stuff. There's enough there to play and that lack of "details" given allows each game to be different. I wouldn't mind some more but I know that the more details there are the more they narrow what I can do in canon.
On the other hand, you have a problem with the lack of details. You've complained about them loud and clear. You also ignore what you don't like. I've shown you the CS policy and why they've suspended it. Yet you've changed the suspension as "always was.". Which is fine for your games. I do the same. But that isn't how it is in canon. For the CS the enemy of my enemy is my enemy. As soon as they are no longer useful, they'll be eliminated.
Sambot wrote:
I'm not sure I have a favorite part really. I do think it's the most overlooked setting though.
If we accept that argument, then MiO provides examples of a bunch of killer satellites but leave out the actual satellites that would have to do 99%+ of the actual shooting. That's like giving C.S. Grunts 12 vibro-knife options but forgetting to mention that they also have laser rifles.
Not really. It's more like giving the NGR a navy but no OCCs for it.
Sambot wrote:And USB is USB until you need a MicroUSB cable. And then it doesn't fit because you need an old MicroUSB-C cable. It's folly to assume "standard" is going to work everywhere. One person's standard is someone else's alien technology.
And universal adapters are a thing. Golden Age tech is pretty standardized in Rifts, as is tech based on it. Your radio compatibility argument requires the introduction of incompatibility issues across the entire setting, not just from ground to orbit. This issue doesn't show up anywhere in canon, so your argument is invalid.
If everyone used the same thing, there wouldn't need to be adapters.
Sambot wrote:In other words, they extend the range of a signal by bouncing it around corners.
You could put it that way, sure.
Thank you.
Sambot wrote:It's possible for ARCHIE. That doesn't mean it's possible for everyone. That's like saying because there's books everyone can read.
It's like saying that more than one person should be able to read a published book.
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Are you saying they should share? It would be nice if they did. Not everyone is that nice though.
Hotrod wrote:Oh pish. Without people like me, zombie movies would be boring.
Zombies are quite exciting enough without having someone going and opening the door to them.