Minimal Presence of Starships - Page 2

Arith Winterfell · 01-10-2016, 07:59 PM

I'm working on a sci-fi setting that I thought I would share. I'm generally looking at the idea of a space setting with little to no starship use. Here are some general elements of the setting.

Hyperspace exists, but is lethal to all biological life and takes months between stars. As a result humanity uses AI and robot/droid manned starships to start new colonies, especially to set up new receiving "Quantum Distortion Gates".

Quantum Distortion gates are the main way people travel from star system to star system (or even just to other worlds within a star system). It's a series of arch like structures which when activated quantum teleports anything within to the targeted destination by quantum jumping it from one point to another (so there is no disassemble your atoms teleporting involved in that sense). Some distance is a factor in that one might need to pass through several star systems before reaching your final destination by making multiple jumps.

The downside of quantum distortion jumps is that it creates residual distortion in everything that jumps. Fortunately this can be fixed by simply waiting a number of days (or weeks) so the residual distortion can dissipate. This results in travelers having to stay at different worlds at different stages of their journey in order to shed built up distortion each time. This works nicely as it allows port cities to have that "mixed alien bar" feel of many different kinds of creatures mingling.

Interstellar communication is built on the same principle technology by using a quantum distortion to send a pulse of information or data using a smaller more compact version of the machinery than is required for transporting cargo or people.

Other elements of the setting are largely "Human" aliens in the form of humanity using advanced genetic engineering (akin to Transhuman Space) to diversify itself over the centuries resulting in a variety of "aliens" species which result from colonies and worlds which developed in diverse ways.

There are two (so far) actual alien races, the nicknamed "Greys" and the Tselons. The Tselons are a race that developed along bio-technology for the most part instead of mechanical technology, building living ships and the like. This means in order to set up new colonies on other worlds they had to send ships by normal space on long voyages resulting in extremely slow expansion.

When they met humanity, they had already developed their own version of quantum distortion tech, but realized humanity had expanded much faster than them. As a result the Tselons moved to seize human colonies in order to expand their own region of control. So they basically hacked the quantum distortion gates on various worlds, and dropped in countless troops, seizing colonies for themselves. Human resistance fought back, and eventually after a long and bloody war fought over different worlds humanity learned the location of the Tselon homeworld and used hacking in turn to send hydrogen bombs to devastate the Tselon world.

The "Greys" are an enigmatic race which secretly manipulated the Human-Tselon war so as to do maximum damage to both sides. They are highly manipulative, very psionic, and work with layers within layers of conspiracy.

So that's a general run down of the setting. Are there any parts that don't make sense, or need to be reworked to make more logical sense? Does the overall lack of starships in a sci-fi setting make sense given the technology of the setting?

01-10-2016, 07:59 PM	#1
Arith Winterfell Join Date: May 2014 Location: Indiana, United States	Minimal Presence of Starships I'm working on a sci-fi setting that I thought I would share. I'm generally looking at the idea of a space setting with little to no starship use. Here are some general elements of the setting. Hyperspace exists, but is lethal to all biological life and takes months between stars. As a result humanity uses AI and robot/droid manned starships to start new colonies, especially to set up new receiving "Quantum Distortion Gates". Quantum Distortion gates are the main way people travel from star system to star system (or even just to other worlds within a star system). It's a series of arch like structures which when activated quantum teleports anything within to the targeted destination by quantum jumping it from one point to another (so there is no disassemble your atoms teleporting involved in that sense). Some distance is a factor in that one might need to pass through several star systems before reaching your final destination by making multiple jumps. The downside of quantum distortion jumps is that it creates residual distortion in everything that jumps. Fortunately this can be fixed by simply waiting a number of days (or weeks) so the residual distortion can dissipate. This results in travelers having to stay at different worlds at different stages of their journey in order to shed built up distortion each time. This works nicely as it allows port cities to have that "mixed alien bar" feel of many different kinds of creatures mingling. Interstellar communication is built on the same principle technology by using a quantum distortion to send a pulse of information or data using a smaller more compact version of the machinery than is required for transporting cargo or people. Other elements of the setting are largely "Human" aliens in the form of humanity using advanced genetic engineering (akin to Transhuman Space) to diversify itself over the centuries resulting in a variety of "aliens" species which result from colonies and worlds which developed in diverse ways. There are two (so far) actual alien races, the nicknamed "Greys" and the Tselons. The Tselons are a race that developed along bio-technology for the most part instead of mechanical technology, building living ships and the like. This means in order to set up new colonies on other worlds they had to send ships by normal space on long voyages resulting in extremely slow expansion. When they met humanity, they had already developed their own version of quantum distortion tech, but realized humanity had expanded much faster than them. As a result the Tselons moved to seize human colonies in order to expand their own region of control. So they basically hacked the quantum distortion gates on various worlds, and dropped in countless troops, seizing colonies for themselves. Human resistance fought back, and eventually after a long and bloody war fought over different worlds humanity learned the location of the Tselon homeworld and used hacking in turn to send hydrogen bombs to devastate the Tselon world. The "Greys" are an enigmatic race which secretly manipulated the Human-Tselon war so as to do maximum damage to both sides. They are highly manipulative, very psionic, and work with layers within layers of conspiracy. So that's a general run down of the setting. Are there any parts that don't make sense, or need to be reworked to make more logical sense? Does the overall lack of starships in a sci-fi setting make sense given the technology of the setting?