Opinions, please, before I write something that tramples the setting's unspoken assumptions...
1) If your ship tows something, how does the towed item count toward your ship's mass, and thus its maximum speed?
(If the towed item doesn't count toward the ship's mass and top speed, then the Virgil Samms could put every other courier out of business by towing cargo containers around at 0.2c...)
2) How closely can ships stay in formation? Do the drives interfere with each other so ships have to have a noticeable minimum separation, can two ships touch while under full power, or something in between?
2a) How easily can two ships tow the same object? Is it simply a matter of hooking two tow cables to the object, or do the ships' engines need to be specially tuned to within 0.000000001% of each other's performance, or something in between? Or is it possible at all?
3) Is the standard ship's "speed" drive a gravity-effect drive of some sort?
(I know we were discussing this, but I don't recall coming to any consensus... The two extremes: If all the "speed" drives work on the same principle, then the 'Danes should be working on replicating the operating principles with hardtech. If they're all different, then ship repairs may be nearly impossible for lack of parts. Where on the sliding scale do we want to sit?)
-Rob Kelk
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."
- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
1) If your ship tows something, how does the towed item count toward your ship's mass, and thus its maximum speed?
(If the towed item doesn't count toward the ship's mass and top speed, then the Virgil Samms could put every other courier out of business by towing cargo containers around at 0.2c...)
2) How closely can ships stay in formation? Do the drives interfere with each other so ships have to have a noticeable minimum separation, can two ships touch while under full power, or something in between?
2a) How easily can two ships tow the same object? Is it simply a matter of hooking two tow cables to the object, or do the ships' engines need to be specially tuned to within 0.000000001% of each other's performance, or something in between? Or is it possible at all?
3) Is the standard ship's "speed" drive a gravity-effect drive of some sort?
(I know we were discussing this, but I don't recall coming to any consensus... The two extremes: If all the "speed" drives work on the same principle, then the 'Danes should be working on replicating the operating principles with hardtech. If they're all different, then ship repairs may be nearly impossible for lack of parts. Where on the sliding scale do we want to sit?)
-Rob Kelk
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."
- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012