There is also the fact, as I'm sure some of you are preparing to point
out, that the "relative stationary" of a pencil on Earth/Regina is not
merely notional, but also real, as all objects have almost infinite forces
acting on them at a given time. For my previous yammer I was trying to
think of an extreme, the pencil taken in theoretical isolation.
The reason for that is because the TNE-asserted J+ space non-Newtonian
force acts "in isolation" when it impinges on real space. The reason TNE
says this is so is because Traveller established (more accurately, failed
to establish the contrary--while absence of evidence is not evidence of
absence, I had to make a call on which it was) that there is no evidence
that the body of the Psi is generating energy to perform the work of TK.
If it were, this should be measurable and have other effects. For example,
Psis could be detected by the energy they were generating to perform these
functions. Where in your body are these effects generated? Does the
standard human physiology support this? How? Psis don't have special
organs, or thicker skulls to protect against the heat being generated in
their brains when they TK something. Therefore, that stuff takes place
entirely outside the Psi, the psi merely accesses/directs that force. And
the conservation of energy compensations take place outside of the Psi,
outside of "real space" in J+ space.
Is this all hooey? Duh. Traveller is an SF game which appropriated all
kinds of SF/fantasy tropes, which singly or collectively are hooey. But
having chosen our hooey, we try to figure out interesting ways to explain
how they internally work, since the books say they do.
> Only the wreckage would move. The TK force is acting directly on it from
> out of J+ space without any inertial linkage to the psi-guy. If what
> you're getting at is a TK analogy to the way the two bodies would be
> pulled toward each other (equal and opposite reactions) if they were
> connected by a string, that would not work. However, the psi could pull
> the wreckage toward him, hit himself with it, and some of that momentum
> would be imparted to him in the collision through normal collision
> physics. That is already VERY non-Newtonian if that is your intent.
>
> That's the way it would work in the TNE rules, but you can do what you
> want in your universe to make it interesting. I don't remember what the
> rules said about telekinesing yourself (flying), but it was probably
> something like some "field of yourselfness" saying you couldn't do it.
>
> I like Uxi's suggestion about giving penalties to accuracy in
> really-really-really-small G due to fineness of control compared to
> working in a g-field which tends to stabilize you (but more on how it's
> really the same in micro-G below).
>
> HOWEVER, here is where it gets interesting/stupid. I'll unpack "stupid"
> first.
>
> Traveller psi powers took your typical "magickal" (Gygax spelling)
> "mental" powers from popular culture and pulled them in as-is. But a
> pencil sitting on a table on Regina is not actually "stationary." It's
> moving at an ungodly absolute vector, being pulled toward the center of
> Regina + rotational vector of Regina's surface + orbital vector of Regina
> around (I don't remember name of) star + rotational vector of (name of)
> star around center of Milky Way + vector of Milky Way away from the Big
> Bang. The fact that Traveller grandfathered in the fantasy of classic
> magickal TK means that this physics is not a problem, it is abstracted
> down to/calculated on the Psi's "stationary" relationship to the object
> being TKed. Does this mean that the psi is actually controlling forces
> scaled to to the actual ungodly vector? Or somehow due to the magic of
> sloppy thinking about the actual physics embedded in taking over the
> classic magickal model does that stuff all cancel out due to the supposed
> "stationariness" of the TK actor and TK object relative to each other? On
> the one hand it doesn't matter, because CT said it existed, so there you
> have it, it must work. On the other, how does the classic TK on Earth's
> surface (from where it was photocopied) translate into TK in micro-G?
>
> So, back to where you can make it "interesting." If the psi is
> manipulating forces on the "ungodly vector" scale, then arguably he's got
> a lot more power at his disposal (the only reason I can apply a small
> number of Newtons to a pencil is because I am leveraging my vector towards
> Earth's center among others, which is why "picking up" a pencil in orbit
> creates the problems felt almost disastrously by Gene Cernan, Michael
> Collins, Dick Gordon, et al.). Which is good, because if he and the
> wreckage are in low Earth orbit, their orbital vector is ~8 km/sec for
> back-of-the-e-mail calculations (which you may be aware is the gaping plot
> hole at the center of "Gravity"--an MMU cannot generate enough force to
> appreciably bend a LEO vector--not counting Earth around Sol, Sol around
> Milky Way, Milky Way into the void, more on that in a moment). This might
> allow you as Ref to rule, "you try to apply some force to the thing, but
> nothing happens" because of the "invisible" size of the orbital vector.
> HOWEVER again, since you can do it on Regina's surface you are surmounting
> those absolute vectors because the psi force has nothing to do with your
> inertial link to the object. AND from a practical game standpoint, the Ref
> is NOT going to say, "okay, that's it for tonight, come back next week
> when I've calculated the vectors." So, from a practical and
> internal-handwavium-"CT-said-it-was-possible-so-we-have-to-make-it-work"
> standpoint, the TK process must have an internal normalizing effect, which
> means that if the TKing Psi and the TK target are both in the same "local
> frame of reference," i.e., "semi-stationary compared to each other"
> (whether that is on the surface of Earth/Regina, in the galley of a moving
> starship, or in a common orbit), the force calculated to move an object is
> only related to each other, and the other vectors outside of their "local
> frame of reference" wash out, with the understanding that there is no
> equal-and-opposite reaction on the TKing psi.
>
> I will lay money that GURPS already has an approach to this which is
> perfectly useful. The only thing to keep in mind is that if you wish to be
> a TNE purist, the psi force does not come from any physical manifestation
> between the body of the Psi and the body being TKed, so no Newtonian
> equal-and-opposite-reaction. If you want to think about why this is, you
> must start from clairvoyance and clairaudience as described in CT and work
> backwards from there. You might draw different conclusions/make different
> decisions than TNE did, but TNE did make a significant decision.
>
> Food for thought. Or, after all this typing, maybe "Junk Food" for
> thought. This was a better answer with only the first paragraph by itself,
> but I couldn't help myself.
>
> Dave
>
>> I have a scenario in mind to throw at my players in the future, however
> in
>> pondering the variables that players are so expert at inventing, I ran
> in
>> to a mental roadblock!
>> Basically, the scenario involves the need to be EVA in a barely operable
> suit, and as events transpire, the suit thrusters die. *(Yes, Gravity was
>> a
>> small inspiration, though I have not yet seen the movie) One of the
> characters has telekinesis. How can this be used to manipulate himself or
>> objects in zero gravity? I suspect the laws of conservation of
>> energy momentum may not work as envisioned by Newton 8-) example with
> round
>> numbers. player in vacc weighs 100 Kg, tried to 'pull' a 10kg piece of
> wreckage with his TK in order to develop momentum for a push to another
> more massive object. will player and object close at velocities relative
> to
>> each others mass? will only the wreckage move? or only the player? Or in
> a
>> true anti newtonian wrench, is TK dependant on some form of gravity as a
> medium?
>> In keeping with as much of a "hard science" flavor as an RPG game can
> handle, I want the scenario to play out with as much believability as
> possible, in order to minimize the handwavium affect.
>>
>> --
>> "Christmas is a time when kids tell Santa what they want and adults pay
> for
>> it. Deficits are when adults tell the government what they want and
> their
>> kids pay for it."
>>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
out, that the "relative stationary" of a pencil on Earth/Regina is not
merely notional, but also real, as all objects have almost infinite forces
acting on them at a given time. For my previous yammer I was trying to
think of an extreme, the pencil taken in theoretical isolation.
The reason for that is because the TNE-asserted J+ space non-Newtonian
force acts "in isolation" when it impinges on real space. The reason TNE
says this is so is because Traveller established (more accurately, failed
to establish the contrary--while absence of evidence is not evidence of
absence, I had to make a call on which it was) that there is no evidence
that the body of the Psi is generating energy to perform the work of TK.
If it were, this should be measurable and have other effects. For example,
Psis could be detected by the energy they were generating to perform these
functions. Where in your body are these effects generated? Does the
standard human physiology support this? How? Psis don't have special
organs, or thicker skulls to protect against the heat being generated in
their brains when they TK something. Therefore, that stuff takes place
entirely outside the Psi, the psi merely accesses/directs that force. And
the conservation of energy compensations take place outside of the Psi,
outside of "real space" in J+ space.
Is this all hooey? Duh. Traveller is an SF game which appropriated all
kinds of SF/fantasy tropes, which singly or collectively are hooey. But
having chosen our hooey, we try to figure out interesting ways to explain
how they internally work, since the books say they do.
> Only the wreckage would move. The TK force is acting directly on it from
> out of J+ space without any inertial linkage to the psi-guy. If what
> you're getting at is a TK analogy to the way the two bodies would be
> pulled toward each other (equal and opposite reactions) if they were
> connected by a string, that would not work. However, the psi could pull
> the wreckage toward him, hit himself with it, and some of that momentum
> would be imparted to him in the collision through normal collision
> physics. That is already VERY non-Newtonian if that is your intent.
>
> That's the way it would work in the TNE rules, but you can do what you
> want in your universe to make it interesting. I don't remember what the
> rules said about telekinesing yourself (flying), but it was probably
> something like some "field of yourselfness" saying you couldn't do it.
>
> I like Uxi's suggestion about giving penalties to accuracy in
> really-really-really-small G due to fineness of control compared to
> working in a g-field which tends to stabilize you (but more on how it's
> really the same in micro-G below).
>
> HOWEVER, here is where it gets interesting/stupid. I'll unpack "stupid"
> first.
>
> Traveller psi powers took your typical "magickal" (Gygax spelling)
> "mental" powers from popular culture and pulled them in as-is. But a
> pencil sitting on a table on Regina is not actually "stationary." It's
> moving at an ungodly absolute vector, being pulled toward the center of
> Regina + rotational vector of Regina's surface + orbital vector of Regina
> around (I don't remember name of) star + rotational vector of (name of)
> star around center of Milky Way + vector of Milky Way away from the Big
> Bang. The fact that Traveller grandfathered in the fantasy of classic
> magickal TK means that this physics is not a problem, it is abstracted
> down to/calculated on the Psi's "stationary" relationship to the object
> being TKed. Does this mean that the psi is actually controlling forces
> scaled to to the actual ungodly vector? Or somehow due to the magic of
> sloppy thinking about the actual physics embedded in taking over the
> classic magickal model does that stuff all cancel out due to the supposed
> "stationariness" of the TK actor and TK object relative to each other? On
> the one hand it doesn't matter, because CT said it existed, so there you
> have it, it must work. On the other, how does the classic TK on Earth's
> surface (from where it was photocopied) translate into TK in micro-G?
>
> So, back to where you can make it "interesting." If the psi is
> manipulating forces on the "ungodly vector" scale, then arguably he's got
> a lot more power at his disposal (the only reason I can apply a small
> number of Newtons to a pencil is because I am leveraging my vector towards
> Earth's center among others, which is why "picking up" a pencil in orbit
> creates the problems felt almost disastrously by Gene Cernan, Michael
> Collins, Dick Gordon, et al.). Which is good, because if he and the
> wreckage are in low Earth orbit, their orbital vector is ~8 km/sec for
> back-of-the-e-mail calculations (which you may be aware is the gaping plot
> hole at the center of "Gravity"--an MMU cannot generate enough force to
> appreciably bend a LEO vector--not counting Earth around Sol, Sol around
> Milky Way, Milky Way into the void, more on that in a moment). This might
> allow you as Ref to rule, "you try to apply some force to the thing, but
> nothing happens" because of the "invisible" size of the orbital vector.
> HOWEVER again, since you can do it on Regina's surface you are surmounting
> those absolute vectors because the psi force has nothing to do with your
> inertial link to the object. AND from a practical game standpoint, the Ref
> is NOT going to say, "okay, that's it for tonight, come back next week
> when I've calculated the vectors." So, from a practical and
> internal-handwavium-"CT-said-it-was-possible-so-we-have-to-make-it-work"
> standpoint, the TK process must have an internal normalizing effect, which
> means that if the TKing Psi and the TK target are both in the same "local
> frame of reference," i.e., "semi-stationary compared to each other"
> (whether that is on the surface of Earth/Regina, in the galley of a moving
> starship, or in a common orbit), the force calculated to move an object is
> only related to each other, and the other vectors outside of their "local
> frame of reference" wash out, with the understanding that there is no
> equal-and-opposite reaction on the TKing psi.
>
> I will lay money that GURPS already has an approach to this which is
> perfectly useful. The only thing to keep in mind is that if you wish to be
> a TNE purist, the psi force does not come from any physical manifestation
> between the body of the Psi and the body being TKed, so no Newtonian
> equal-and-opposite-reaction. If you want to think about why this is, you
> must start from clairvoyance and clairaudience as described in CT and work
> backwards from there. You might draw different conclusions/make different
> decisions than TNE did, but TNE did make a significant decision.
>
> Food for thought. Or, after all this typing, maybe "Junk Food" for
> thought. This was a better answer with only the first paragraph by itself,
> but I couldn't help myself.
>
> Dave
>
>> I have a scenario in mind to throw at my players in the future, however
> in
>> pondering the variables that players are so expert at inventing, I ran
> in
>> to a mental roadblock!
>> Basically, the scenario involves the need to be EVA in a barely operable
> suit, and as events transpire, the suit thrusters die. *(Yes, Gravity was
>> a
>> small inspiration, though I have not yet seen the movie) One of the
> characters has telekinesis. How can this be used to manipulate himself or
>> objects in zero gravity? I suspect the laws of conservation of
>> energy momentum may not work as envisioned by Newton 8-) example with
> round
>> numbers. player in vacc weighs 100 Kg, tried to 'pull' a 10kg piece of
> wreckage with his TK in order to develop momentum for a push to another
> more massive object. will player and object close at velocities relative
> to
>> each others mass? will only the wreckage move? or only the player? Or in
> a
>> true anti newtonian wrench, is TK dependant on some form of gravity as a
> medium?
>> In keeping with as much of a "hard science" flavor as an RPG game can
> handle, I want the scenario to play out with as much believability as
> possible, in order to minimize the handwavium affect.
>>
>> --
>> "Christmas is a time when kids tell Santa what they want and adults pay
> for
>> it. Deficits are when adults tell the government what they want and
> their
>> kids pay for it."
>>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>