Originally published at: Some Ancient Questions | The Eldraeverse
Have a random selection of answers to old questions and comments that came up while I was clearing out my e-mail: In our world, there is a Spanish proverb that runs: Ladrón que roba a ladrón tiene cien años de perdón (memorably quoted in translation by the villian of The Magnificent Seven as “A thief who steals from a thief is pardoned for a hundred years,” or more conventionally glossed as “It’s no crime to steal from a thief.”)How would the eldrae analyze such a situation? Would they consider it wrong to take something without its possessor’s consent if that…
The Swiss/Nieuw Friesland model does run the risk of the state losing a major chunk of its’ revenue if the region becomes politically stable though.
On one hand, at least they wouldn’t need to pay for such a large military under those circumstances.
On the other hand, they probably aren’t thinking of a time horizon much beyond the next election or similar anyway.
The horrifying thing about the Mouse Utopia, which nearly everyone misses, is that the problem was not “overpopulation” or “crowding”. When I noticed that, I dig up the original papers, and confirmed that.
The problem was something much much worse…
Is it that there is a maximum population density before a civilisation starts going insane? I guess the fittler drive just solved that problem for the Eldraeverse, even if they didn’t just psychdesign that problem away.
“the mass drivers spin their projectiles purely through EM fields” Why is needed to spin the projectiles, flechettes, at all? The term flechette means ‘little arrow’ (in French).
Flechettes are fin stabilized not spin stabilized, true some experimental flechette rifles did had very shallow rifling (low twist rate) but that was primarily to break the sabot once the flechette cleared out of the barrel. Does the mass drivers of your setting need sabots?
The spin stabilization in this case is a later addition (or re-addition, I suppose) to the system to correct for personal point-defense systems, which tend to use high-power laser ablation to shove projectiles off course. Spinning them reduces the effect of the laser by spreading out otherwise localized heating and outgassing.
Fins help keep the pointing direction of the arrow aligned with the direction of airflow relative to the projectile. If the air is not stationary, the stable direction may not be what you expected. Firing the fletchettes at hypervelocity helps, of course, but only reduces the problem.
Also, fin-stabilization obviously doesn’t work in a vacuum.