Technology of the Daufesk Universe
This file explains the technology available to Daufesk Hardware, a corporate
entity existing within the state of the People's Systematic Technocratic
Republic of Daufesk, which occupies the planet of Daufesk and orbital
space within the star system of Daufesk where the eponymous planet is
located. In general, GURPS Vehicles (2nd edition) has been used to form
the technological background; in general terms, Daufesk is a TL 9 society
(with some changes and restrictions -- see below). It exists within a
galaxy populated by a large variety of cultures on many tech levels, but
TL 9 is sort of "state of the art" in most happening technological
cultures. And the universe of Daufesk simply does not allow many of the
more "cinematic" ultra-tech advances postulated at "vanilla" GURPS Tech
Levels of 10 and above; it is generally a "hard-science" universe. While
there may be cultures elsewhere with (for instance) materials technology
which might rate as TL 10 or better, or more perfect medical technology,
or somewhat more efficient rockets and power plants and so on, or
significantly better nanotech devices, there are no
reactionless drives or "force fields" or "contragrav generators"
anywhere in the Daufesk universe. Or so it seems, anyway.
Special rules and assumptions
I am using most of the addenda/rules outtakes from the keyboards of GURPS
Vehicles designer David Pulver and realism guru MA Lloyd, as well as some
of my own knowledge of basic physics. For instance, I've got correct figures
for maximal delta-v capacity of spacegoing reaction-drive vehicles (I know
Newtonian mechanics, and I know calculus, so I see no reason to ignore the
fact that the vehicle's total mass decreases as it's using reaction mass).
Also, I'm not overly keen on rounding off just to get neat figures, so I tend
to get somewhat less round numbers for structural surfaces and top speeds and
accelerations and so on than I would if I followed the book slavishly --
usually I retain at least one more significant figure than the book suggests
(at least where the book wants me to only have two significant figures).
Conditions particular to the Daufesk Universe
Daufesk hardware produces state-of-the-art TL 9 weapons and vehicles,
with a few restrictions. Reactionless drives do not exist, nor do the
unrealistically wonderful high-thrust fusion rockets. Also, energy
banks are somewhat less effective than "vanilla" TL 9 power cells: There
are two basic options to choose from. Most folks use "TL 9 advanced
batteries", which are to TL 8 advanced batteries what vanilla TL 9 power
cells are to vanilla TL 8 power cells. Applications where the energy
bank must be light and/or compact use TL9 superconducting power cells,
which are much more expensive for the same energy capacity. Both types
of energy bank are rechargeable; superconducting power cells are capable
of fast discharge (fast enough to dump their entire energy content
into one shot from an energy weapon) while regular batteries can only
dump about one percent of their maximum energy content per second.
TL 9 Advanced battery: Each kWh weighs 2.4 lbs, takes up 0.048 cf, and
costs $72.
TL 9 Superconducting Power Cell: Each kWh weighs 0.72 lbs, takes up
0.0072 cf, and costs $216.
Daufesk Hardware also uses antimatter for some energy-intensive applications
(most significantly in antimatter-thermal rockets); standard TL 9 figures for
antimatter fuel bays are used, but the smallest practical antimatter
containment vessel is for 1 gramme of antimatter and weighs 500 lbs (so
you can't build them small enough to use as warheads -- tacnuke and micronuke
warheads use other technologies to get more bang into smaller warheads at
lower prices, but those technologies don't allow you to bleed off a continual
and controllable trickle of energy like you can with antimatter).
Interstellar travel
Interstellar travel in the universe which the citizens of the P.S.T.R. of
Daufesk are pleased to call home follows certain special rules. All FTL
travel is done by way of jump points (or wormholes, or whatever you want to
call them). These only occur naturally (at least, no method is currently
known by which new jump points may be created), and permanently link two
"points" in space. In their natural state, these points behave like point
masses of negligible mass, and thus may move around in orbit around a star,
for instance -- they do not have electrical charge, and it's practically
impossible to move them around. A typical star system may have several dozen
or several hundred jump points lying around, but most of them don't lead
anywhere very interesting (the majority correspond with some point in
interstellar space). Starships equipped with jump drives (at TL 9, the
best available jump drives are twice as heavy and costly as the standard
jump drive listed in Vehicles -- that is, 16 lbs, 0.32 cf and $280 per
ton of jump-capacity) can traverse jump points on their own, but due to the
less incredible energy bank technology of this particular universe, we see
that 36% of the total mass of any such ship must be energy bank -- and of
the expensive kind, at that. (Per ton of jump-rating, the energy bank will
weigh 720 lbs, take up 7.2 cf, and cost $216,000). Any ship with a jump
drive is able to detect natural jump points at ranges of several AU.
Obviously, the vast majority of jump-drive ships are specialized
scouts. Daufesk Hardware's R&D department is rumored to be attempting
to modify jump drives so they can be powered by a matter-antimatter
reaction; such an advance would have enormous consequences for general
travel and exploration as well as for strategy and politics, since
more and larger jump-drive ships would become affordable.
However, it is possible to permanently dilate a jump point -- this is a major
engineering effort of the kind that only prosperous nations and equivalent
corporate entities can afford, and even for them it is the kind of investment
they need to think about. A dilated jump point is permanently open, and each
end is anchored to a body looking like a giant hula hoop -- fly into one hoop
and come out of the hoop at the other end of the "wormhole", no jump drive
required -- so any interplanetary ship is also an interstellar one, albeit
limited to the total "graph" of all connected star systems (where the locals
will let you pass without blowing you up, etc). It doesn't require a power
supply to stay open, although destroying the hoop will mean that the hole
collapses back to its natural state -- releasing quite a few gigatons of
hard gamma rays in the process, so any ships or space stations which were
in the immediate vicinity of either side are probably toast. Most such
hoops are therefore of quite sturdy construction, and surrounded by defenses
and traffic control stations at both ends. Since it is quite possible to
move these hoops around by normal means (though they tend to mass many
thousands of tons, so it's not usually done without some forethought and
preparation), whoever is in authority can put their hoops where they like.
So in most "safe" civilized regions, jump-point hoops (also known as gates)
are in lowish orbits around the system's mainworld (for convenience), while
"wilder" areas (where there are known, or thought to be, hostiles or potential
hostiles within a few star systems, for instance) tend to have their jump-gates
positioned a bit further away from vulnerable spots (suffering some
inconvenience for the sake of safety). Miscalculations have been known to
happen.
When traversing a jump point, whether a natural or a dilated one, a ship
does experience a certain time dilation effect -- going into the hole,
shipboard time will run slower than local outside time (going exponentially
toward a factor of about 90, which takes about four and a half seconds
subjective or about 90 seconds objective) before the ship appears to vanish.
This process is repeated in reverse when a ship emerges from a jump point,
and in between a certain amount of time elapses at the jump-point ends
while the ship seems to not exist at either end, before it begins to reappear
-- this time depends on the jump-point, and actually varies somewhat for
the same jump point (though rarely more than +/- 10%); it is usually in the
range of a few hours for most points, but there are known points where the
time-loss is best measured in days or even weeks. Clearly, a ship going in
or coming out is rather vulnerable, which means that the defender holding
a jump point has a massive advantage over any would-be attacker. The fastest
way to communicate between star systems is to send whatever message through
the jump point carried in the data banks of a starship and then transmit it
via radio or other light-speed communication immediately after the starship
reaches its destination. Indeed, most jump-gate authorities maintain small
"fleets" of unmanned message drones which jump back and forth on a regular
basis (as well as making extra trips for urgent messages); in some backwaters
the propagation of news might be left to casual travellers.
Back to Daufesk Index
Copyright nonsense: Theoretically, the Daufesk universe and everything in it
is my creation and should therefore be considered to be my "property". But
it is freeware, for what it's worth. Anyone can use it as they please, with
one exception: Nobody's allowed to make any money off it (yeah right, as if
that's going to happen) without me getting my slice of the pie, okay?
GURPS and everything pertaining thereto is copyright and trademark and
whatever of SJ Games.
Last modified: Mon Jun 2 14:36:45 DST" 1997