Forging Ahead (GURPS Interstellar Wars/Celestial Forge)

[Ultim@tePower]

For some reason I imagine people coming across her work and having a bunch of Eureka! Moments. Leading to the entire tech tree being rapidly uncovered due to how similar it was to their existing tech.

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To be fair Dr Saunders is a genius like he's the best in hyperspace physics and the only one that can come close is McAndrews who wrote the foundation for the jump drive in the first place, it's not that hard to see him standing on Novak's work to find a new breakthrough it's how science works and besides it still took him a month

Been reading Interstellar Wars again and it mentions plagues that occurred right after the 3rd Interstellar War:Have the Terrans already dealt with this? Because maybe Sophie could help develop advanced medicines or ideas regarding disease treatment or other things as well.

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She could but why would she? It's already being handled by conventional medics and even if she did and magically make Terran diseases disappear, the Vilani will still find an excuse to start the 4th interstellar war, remember the Vilani governor is an anti-Terran she's going to start a war on way or another

 

[Arimai]

Been reading Interstellar Wars again and it mentions plagues that occurred right after the 3rd Interstellar War:Have the Terrans already dealt with this? Because maybe Sophie could help develop advanced medicines or ideas regarding disease treatment or other things as well.

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No. It's currently being handled by Confed Bureau of Health.

 

[Blade4]

Been reading Interstellar Wars again and it mentions plagues that occurred right after the 3rd Interstellar War:Have the Terrans already dealt with this? Because maybe Sophie could help develop advanced medicines or ideas regarding disease treatment or other things as well.

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Thing is she is a physics genius. She suddenly branches out as a medical genius making cures and treatments that will cause her issues. The government is already watching her as a anomaly. She starts pulling polyglot answers for everything they need out of her hat that will make people nervous why and how.

 

[Faralis]

Thing is she is a physics genius. She suddenly branches out as a medical genius making cures and treatments that will cause her issues. The government is already watching her as a anomaly. She starts pulling polyglot answers for everything they need out of her hat that will make people nervous why and how.

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That said, they know she studied advanced biotech in the uni, so it wouldn't be completely out of the field ...

 

[Blade4]

That said, they know she studied advanced biotech in the uni, so it wouldn't be completely out of the field ...

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Physics is far safer for her right now. If they knew what she could do and did she would be in a birdcage or a bullet in the head. That's not joking or exaggerating. Sometimes the only safe thing is to terminate a threat.

 

[wellis]

You know, what if Sophie invents nuclear dampers here at least 2 tech levels or so before they appear in Traveller canon? Some breakthrough on physics on her end or someone builds off of it or something

 

[Blade4]

You know, what if Sophie invents nuclear dampers here at least 2 tech levels or so before they appear in Traveller canon? Some breakthrough on physics on her end or someone builds off of it or something

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Perhaps but she has no reason to go for that or know about it and the Confed does not have the tech to properly use or maintain it. At best she puts together a blackbox device thats way to big that she has to hand make and can only be properly used by her.

 

[Arimai]

Physics is far safer for her right now. If they knew what she could do and did she would be in a birdcage or a bullet in the head. That's not joking or exaggerating. Sometimes the only safe thing is to terminate a threat.

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The Forge rewrote reality to ensure witnesses to her somehow amassing 7 doctorates from high school to now and continues to do so. It won't be a problem, but it is a waste of her time at the moment

 

[Taliesin]

The Forge rewrote reality to ensure witnesses to her somehow amassing 7 doctorates from high school to now and continues to do so. It won't be a problem, but it is a waste of her time at the moment

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This really drives home that the ultimate technology is whatever is driving the Forge itself. It breaks causality, and that's the kind of technology that makes you indistinguishable not just from magic, but from a god.

If I could add something to my wishlist for the fic, it would be an interesting explanation of where the Forge comes from and why it exists.

 

[Slayer 10321]

This really drives home that the ultimate technology is whatever is driving the Forge itself. It breaks causality, and that's the kind of technology that makes you indistinguishable not just from magic, but from a god.

If I could add something to my wishlist for the fic, it would be an interesting explanation of where the Forge comes from and why it exists.

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Cliff's previous CF fic had the Celestial Forge being the Cosmic Forge from the RIFT's setting and although we didn't get an origin story for the Cosmic Forge, we had the origin story for how and why the MC gained access to said Forge.

 

[cliffc999]

In 'Light of the Forge', I'd written that one into the plot from the beginning. In this story, I had nothing particular in mind for why the Celestial Forge is, it just is.

 

[Dextority]

Yeah, when people add in explanations for the Celestial Forge or similar things that make sense in-universe, it kind of takes up too much air. I'd much prefer it's just the work of a random omnipotent wizard then some greater thing.

 

[Jordisk]

She didn't do that intentionally though. She explicitly stated she didn't realize the math could be used to leapfrog the Jump-3 development and was surprised by it.

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She said she was surprised that they found the leapfrog, not that she didn't know it existed. The Jump-3 drive uses the exact same math, if to a lesser degree, that her hypothetical Jump-9 drive does.

I didn't even know that edition of Traveller existed, but I doubt I'll be paying much attention to it.

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As per wiki.travellerrpg.com, it is TL17 for Hop-1, the same as Jump-8. Basically, instead of going Jump-8/Jump-9/Jump-10, they went Jump-8/Jump-9/Hop-1. Hop-1 is Jump-10, Hop-2 is Jump-20, and so on. They actually went even higher. Hop-10 is Skip-1, Skip-10 is Leap-1, Leap-10 is Bound-1, Bound-10 is Vault-1. Beyond Vault, they just went with Sixdrive, Sevendrive, and so on, as in "sixth order jump drive". Each higher-order drive also has a landing scatter equal to the lower drive; a Hop drive can land you anywhere within Jump-1 of your destination, a Skip drive can land you within Hop-1 of your destination, and so on.

Another limitation is that Order of Magnitude thing also applies to the safe distance from a gravity well. Jump Drives have to be 100 times the diameter of the planet? Hop Drives have to be 1000D away. Skip Drives have to 10kD. Thus the idea of not just a "lowport" and a "highport", aka a groundside shuttle port and an orbital starport, but also a "farport" for Hop Drives to connect to. Or, you know, using a secondary Jump drive to get closer after jumping with your Hop Drive.

Ugh, minor continuity note - StarLeaper Two was a ship name already in-use in the setting (it was the first exploration vessel to reach Peraspera, as it happens). So I need to go back and name the damned thing something else.

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Starbounder, because it is the next order of Starleaper?

 

[wellis]

People here should read Agent of the Imperium by Marc Miller if you want to get a taste of what the 3rd Imperium is like. This is several thousand years in the future of the era when this story takes place but it shows what the "canon" timeline eventually became you could say.

 

[Arimai]

I'm not a young woman, but I'd like to think the average young woman, however heterosexual, would still notice fairly quickly if their new acquaintance looked like a supermodel... which is about how attractive Mira is.

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Oh, they notice alright. Another beautiful woman is a potential threat and rival for resources and potential partners.

 

[The Unicorn]

Author's Note: It lives!

Well, provisionally lives. I still have no story outline for what comes next, I'm still gonna have to wing it, and I'm still struggling to make a viable Celestial Forge fic because I've never gotten one really through the empire-building stage yet, that's where I always choke. But I am at least going to try this one again, because I really did like it. So no guarantees, but we'll see how far I can get this time.

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HURRAY!!!
Glad to see this alive and especially glad to read you're going to try and continue it - Sophia's thoughts after completing the quest made it sound like you were preparing to wrap up the story just to give it some sort of ending.

All I'm going to say at this juncture is that it's pretty obvious they really hand-picked the agent for this assignment as being not only one of the very best they had available anywhere but who was also highly compatible and with an exceptional IQ and eclectic knowledge base of her own. Which of course tells you exactly what kind of priority Sofia's case has. There are a lot of places an operative of Special Agent Song's caliber could have been assigned, but instead she's here.

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Really? I wonder why they consider a super genius inventor in at least three completely unrelated fields who's also a super-genius administrator/project manager valuable
About the security, are they going to try and pretend(for officials that don't have clearance to know about the FTL com) Song is private security hired by Sophia's parents, or did they decide to just tell them "classified" and draw conclusions from the super-battery on what else Sophia may be working on?

Author's Note: Yes, cue the screeching that Sophia is actually letting the jumpdrive research be led by someone else, down another path.

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I'm actually very happy to see that. One of the things I dislike about stories featuring a super-genius MC is that too often they end up robbing everyone else of agency.
Yes she's a supergenius and had the solution literally handed to her, but plenty of other people are geniuses and if you give them a clue they can run with it.

Glad to see both Mira and Dr. Saunders actually doing things and thinking for themselves.
I did find it amusing that it seems both Sophia and Mira and waiting to see if the other will say anything about Sophia's strangeness.


On a different note, something I seem to be missing about either Sophia's battery, or Traveler's FTL drive.
If I got it correctly the new battery has 10 times the energy density of the current capacitor banks used to power a jump and can hold the charge nearly indefinitely which means that while the advantages of her battery are insignificant compared to FTL-com much less Jump-3, freeing up 90% of the space/mass needed for those giant capacitor banks would still be a significant advance they'd want to keep classified, and being able to have couriers wait for months with the jump charge ready to go in an instant is also a n advantage they'd want to keep from the Villani...but the battery is treated like civilian technology that will upgrade the entire economy, not classified military technology.

Actually what are the chances of if the Vilani government upon finding out about ftl coms and jump 3/free jumping they send a full delegation to earth?

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I could see that happening, but only AFTER the fourth war. Given the views of the leader of the closest Villani region there's no way she'd do anything like that, but once she's crushed someone willing to actually talk(who has the power to do so) might find out about it.
Now, the idea that the Terrans would agree to sell the technology to the Vilani (so they could quickly upgrade their main fleet and conquer Terra) is so ridiculous that I can't see them even asking for that, but some compromise like inviting the Terran Confederation to establish 'consulates' in various locations throughout the Vilani empire on condition that they agree to provide FTL com services (for a price) is possible, and from the POV of most Vilani will help show the Terrans how much better off they'd be joining the empire voluntarily.

She didn't do that intentionally though.

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And that makes that even better because it shows both that she isn't perfect, and that other people can think on their own.

Honestly, I think other Traveller setting FTL drives would be better than K-F jump drives. While these other drives also fall under the "parsecs per week" aspect of the OTU jump drive, their mechanisms are often quite different and how the "parsecs per week" range differs, in my opinion, makes them more flexible than the OTU jump drive:

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Do any of them get up to 9 parsec/week? If not they're slower than BT drives and while they may have some cases where they're better, for strategic mobility they're inferior.

Except all the territory the Terrans may try to exploit here is basically taken by the Vilani.

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Not with their new drive, which allows double the normal Jump-3 range between gravity wells.

Create an actual, working, utopian society without any of the usual sci-fi drawbacks.

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That inherently can't exist. There's a reason utopia means a place that doesn't exist. You either have humans (or aliens that are mentally similar enough to count) with all the issues having large number of people together bring, or you don't have any humans there (either because you altered them to the point they're not anything we'd recognize as human mentally/emotionally, or because there's no people there).

If Sophia is straight, then a woman being beautiful is a conclusion she has to reach. And it's not always something she would consider all the time.

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People notice those they aren't attracted to are beautiful, often as part of identifying competition. If Sophia was constantly noticing the physical features she thought made Mira beautiful you might have a point, but as it is I think it's fine.

Thing is she is a physics genius. She suddenly branches out as a medical genius making cures and treatments that will cause her issues.

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They already know she worked in at least three completly unrelated branches, one of them biotechnology of some sort. Justifying her doing more development in biology in her spare time would be easy. Convincing the military to let her divert from FTL research to...pretty much anything else? That would be hard.

 

[namar13766]

Suppose the MC could build micro-miniaturized nuclear fusion power plants, the smallest of which was only 5 cm in diameter and had an output of over 55 kilowatts per second. What sort of spinoff technologies could the Terran confederation derive from that?

 

[The Unicorn]

Suppose the MC could build micro-miniaturized nuclear fusion power plants, the smallest of which was only 5 cm in diameter and had an output of over 55 kilowatts per second. What sort of spinoff technologies could the Terran confederation derive from that?

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Assuming you meant 55 kiloJouls per second, i.e 55kilowatts, and assuming it's efficent enough that you can use it for something other than a bomb(55kW in a 5cm diameter iron sphere means it goes from room temp to liquid in around 6 seconds, that's explosive disassembly of anything around it)? The question should be what can't they make with that, because that's well past the point where personal flight suits become viable

 

[wellis]

Do any of them get up to 9 parsec/week? If not they're slower than BT drives and while they may have some cases where they're better, for strategic mobility they're inferior.

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Two of them, the hyperdrive and the superluminal drive, while only having been pushed to 6 parsecs per week & 7 parsecs per week respectively, are different from both jump drives & KF drives in that their drive numbers indicate speed, not range.

What this means is that in both cases, at high drive numbers, while it may take one week to travel say 7 parsecs, it only takes one day to travel one parsec.

To use an example, a hyperdrive-1 drive would take 1 week to travel 1 parsec, and 7 weeks to travel 7 parsecs. But it could travel 7 parsecs without needing to worry about fuel or range.

Another advantage, specifically about the hyperdrive, is that it only relies on electricity to run. No need for fuel.

Of course the disadvantage for the hyperdrive is that organics need to be sedated and kept frozen while the ship is in hyperspace, or suffer dangers from epilepsy and mental damage:

Effects of Hyperspace

Snark's astounding feat marked man's freedom from the confines of his system of birth and the start of his race to the stars. Less advertised, however, was the condition of the flight's test pilot, US Navy Captain Michael Squires. Animal test subjects had been utilized in previous tests and they'd returned with alarming behavioural disorders. The physicians believed these side effects could be overcome by a human being's understanding of the bizarre experience and that they were for the most part the result of the subject's stress. They proved to be wrong however and eleven human pilots suffered horrendous mental and emotional disorders after their exposure before researchers proclaimed hyperspace unfit for conscious passengers. When subjected to the hyperspace environment while in cryosleep or 'hypersleep' as it came to be called, travellers were unaffected by the neurosis and occasional coma-like symptoms experienced by the early test pilots. It became common protocol, therefore, to put passengers and crew into hypersleep and to assign monitoring duties on hyperspace voyages to the ship's computer or (on military craft) to an android.

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Of course, unlike default Traveller or Cepheus Engine, in the setting of HOSTILE low berths were perfected and have zero danger of killing people when in normal operation (even with emergency wakeups, the worst is that someone may get damaged.)

EDIT: As for the Zimm drive, it can be used for FTL inside a solar system (after an appropriate cooldown of course). In fact such usage is often used to do microtransits to a gas giants for refueling and to get to main worlds much faster.

 

[The Unicorn]

Two of them, the hyperdrive and the superluminal drive, while only having been pushed to 6 parsecs per week & 7 parsecs per week respectively, are different from both jump drives & KF drives in that their drive numbers indicate speed, not range.

What this means is that in both cases, at high drive numbers, while it may take one week to travel say 7 parsecs, it only takes one day to travel one parsec.

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Yes, and? I stand by my previous statement. There might be cases where that's superior but for strategic movement it's decidedly inferior than BT jumpdrives which can go ~9.2 parsecs a jump. And that's before starting to count hot charging, Lithium-Fusion Batteries, charging stations, pirate points and all the other additions in BattleTech that make the Drive even better.

Another advantage, specifically about the hyperdrive, is that it only relies on electricity to run. No need for fuel.

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That's true of pretty much all FTL drives I know of. Of course getting electricity without any fuel can be rather difficult, but some settings (BattleTech for example) have solar charging to get around that.

Of course the disadvantage for the hyperdrive is that organics need to be sedated and kept frozen while the ship is in hyperspace, or suffer dangers from epilepsy and mental damage:

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That seems like a huge disadvantage and seems to more than offset the speed you mentioned for short hops, so I'd say there's no advantage to using it over the BT jumpdrive.

EDIT: As for the Zimm drive, it can be used for FTL inside a solar system (after an appropriate cooldown of course).

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So can the Battletech jumpdrive, at least if you have gravity control, or even just good mapping of large asteroids in the system that could disrupt pirate points.

 

[Blade4]

I could see that happening, but only AFTER the fourth war. Given the views of the leader of the closest Villani region there's no way she'd do anything like that, but once she's crushed someone willing to actually talk(who has the power to do so) might find out about it.
Now, the idea that the Terrans would agree to sell the technology to the Vilani (so they could quickly upgrade their main fleet and conquer Terra) is so ridiculous that I can't see them even asking for that, but some compromise like inviting the Terran Confederation to establish 'consulates' in various locations throughout the Vilani empire on condition that they agree to provide FTL com services (for a price) is possible, and from the POV of most Vilani will help show the Terrans how much better off they'd be joining the empire voluntarily.

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Yeah earth is not going to want to sell period but the Vilani are not stupid. Jump 3 alone gives Earth such a advantage they are hard fucked in a war always at a serious disadvantage. They would have to gather pretty much their entire fleet and try to drown earth to win. And even then Earth might be able to make it very bloody. Far easier to try to carrot and cheese. "Consulates" is something they might consider with their social focus. The problem is Earth is outside their culture and its checks and balances and has no easy way inside only made worse because successive governors keep screwing up a diplomatic issue with wars. Getting them in and seeing Vilani culture as something not evil and involved in the bureaus and politics with skin in the game is far better than grinding war.

Hell it worked with Sophia. She knew them only as faceless devils until she meet and actually worked with a Vilani captain and found him to be a good man just working a job.

They already know she worked in at least three completly unrelated branches, one of them biotechnology of some sort. Justifying her doing more development in biology in her spare time would be easy. Convincing the military to let her divert from FTL research to...pretty much anything else? That would be hard.

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Different if related branches. There is a world of difference from working with wetware tech and making cures for viral or bacterial infections. Actual doctors with medical degrees and residencies would probably be leery at best letting her do anything unless she can show similar credentials and she cant without the forge really mind fucking people.

 

[The Unicorn]

Different if related branches. There is a world of difference from working with wetware tech and making cures for viral or bacterial infections.

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Not nearly as much as you may thing, or as there used to be.

Actual doctors with medical degrees and residencies would probably be leery at best letting her do anything unless she can show similar credentials and she cant without the forge really mind fucking people.

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They'd be just as leery if someone with credentials showed up to provide them with the solution.
The normal process is approximately like this:
1)Scientists develop a possible solution, test it in their lab and are pretty sure it works.
2)A Pharmaceutical/biotech company and a bunch of their scientists and engineers figure out how to actually produce that and test that they can do so reliably and safely.
3)A third party tests to confirm the stuff is relatively safe to use.
4)Various doctors in multiple locations are asked to perform clinical trials on actual patients

Steps 1 & 2 don't require any medical doctors, and often won't have any except possibly as advisors.
Sophia could easily handle 1 and help with 2. While they still require credentials those are exactly the sort of academic credentials her PhDs (Fantastic Four) provides.

 

[Ultim@tePower]

Far easier to try to carrot and cheese. "Consulates" is something they might consider with their social focus. The problem is Earth is outside their culture and its checks and balances and has no easy way inside only made worse because successive governors keep screwing up a diplomatic issue with wars. Getting them in and seeing Vilani culture as something not evil and involved in the bureaus and politics with skin in the game is far better than grinding war.

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I highly doubt that unless a significant Terran presence exists because any consulate with the FTL comm is going to target number 1 for the Vilani, in fact not only the Vilani but the multiple Vilani factions would want it for themselves to gain an immense advantage. Also other foreign powers because the Vilani isn't the only spacefaring nation.

Also the black boxes lack the range to actually cover the entire empire unless tens of thousands are built as relays which would be all impossible to garrison to maintain Terra's monopoly. So it's very very unlikely to actually happen, the Vilani in their ignorance of the black boxes limitations may make it but the Terrans will flat out refuse unless a Terran battle group is in orbit of that world to enact asset denial

 

[namar13766]

So just out of curiosity, is the formation of the Empire an inevitability, or is it possible that the Terran Confederation will remain as a democratic government instead of collapsing into neofeudalism?

 

[The Unicorn]

I highly doubt that unless a significant Terran presence exists because any consulate with the FTL comm is going to target number 1 for the Vilani, in fact not only the Vilani but the multiple Vilani factions would want it for themselves to gain an immense advantage. Also other foreign powers because the Vilani isn't the only spacefaring nation.

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Target to what? Remember we're talking about the Villani inviting the Terrans in order to get the use of the FTL com, the consulate would be protected by the Vilani empire.

Also the black boxes lack the range to actually cover the entire empire

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And? A few dozen stations providing links from the various regional capitals and the imperial capital would be enough to be highly valuable.

unless tens of thousands are built as relays which would be all impossible to garrison to maintain Terra's monopoly.

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What makes you say that? Staffing them wouldn't be difficult, nor would maintaining the monopoly, but making thousands of black boxes may be difficult, especially politically when the Terran military keeps complaining they need more Blackboxes...

So just out of curiosity, is the formation of the Empire an inevitability, or is it possible that the Terran Confederation will remain as a democratic government instead of collapsing into neofeudalism?

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I don't know about remaining a democracy, but since feudalism requires(among other things) relatively slow transport and communication, providing high-speed communication and transport would prevent them from becoming a feudal state.

 

[Blade4]

I highly doubt that unless a significant Terran presence exists because any consulate with the FTL comm is going to target number 1 for the Vilani, in fact not only the Vilani but the multiple Vilani factions would want it for themselves to gain an immense advantage. Also other foreign powers because the Vilani isn't the only spacefaring nation.

Also the black boxes lack the range to actually cover the entire empire unless tens of thousands are built as relays which would be all impossible to garrison to maintain Terra's monopoly. So it's very very unlikely to actually happen, the Vilani in their ignorance of the black boxes limitations may make it but the Terrans will flat out refuse unless a Terran battle group is in orbit of that world to enact asset denial

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That a feature not a bug. They want Earth drawn into the empire but also drawn into the endless factional fun that keeps the empire stable. Once they are just one more player at the table they have no reason to leave or flip the table.

So just out of curiosity, is the formation of the Empire an inevitability, or is it possible that the Terran Confederation will remain as a democratic government instead of collapsing into neofeudalism?

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Maybe but probably not. The collapse was them trying to take the whole pot when they could not grasp it. They did not have the legitimacy or reach to hold the whole Vilani empire and trying broke them to. Just the tech gained so far should give them a far easier time.

 

[Ultim@tePower]

Target to what? Remember we're talking about the Villani inviting the Terrans in order to get the use of the FTL com, the consulate would be protected by the Vilani empire.

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There is no way the Vilani/consulate faction will be able to protect the consulate from all covert attempts to sneak in and steal it. Remember the defenders have to get lucky everytime while the enemies only needs to be lucky once, and the vilani Emperor is not a monolith he cant just declare something and every imperial citizen intantly follows his word. There will be factional differences and when they see a FTL comms that they can use to coordinate/plot/plan faster and more reliably in secret? Its not just likely but inevitable

And? A few dozen stations providing links from the various regional capitals and the imperial capital would be enough to be highly valuable.

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What makes you say that? Staffing them wouldn't be difficult, nor would maintaining the monopoly, but making thousands of black boxes may be difficult, especially politically when the Terran military keeps complaining they need more Blackboxes...

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A few dozen? Maybe, that depends on what the range of the black box that Novax inveneted will be and I may have exaggerated, but unless its the K6 with 367 parsec range which may be enough its not going to be easy to link each black box in a daisy chain to their destination. Have you looked at thefull starmap of the vilani and confederacy in full? Its above the starmap extra post and you really get a grasp of just how huge the imperium is. Covering all of that is easier said then done.

Also staffing wont be a problem, but its the security, maintenance and general logistics. No way Terra will ever trust a vilani security team which means terran security, then you have to find a way to ship in replacement parts, even with Jump 3 shipping parts from one side of the imperium to the other will take decades, overall a headache, if Im in the Terran's shoes I dont need to even consider it the answer is no

 

[The Unicorn]

There is no way the Vilani/consulate faction will be able to protect the consulate from all covert attempts to sneak in and steal it.

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There is no way anyone could still it covertly - it's a BattleTech Device that requires basically no maintainence to keep working for a century. You can drop it in a pit and fill it with concrete - as long as the data cable is long enough to stick out it won't affect the operation.

Anyone wanting to steal it better show up with heavy equipment and an expert bomb disposal team to get around the self destruct systems - that's not something anyone is going to do covertly.

Remember the defenders have to get lucky everytime while the enemies only needs to be lucky once, and the vilani Emperor is not a monolith he cant just declare something and every imperial citizen intantly follows his word.

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Can he order his troops to provide security against someone seizing it by force? Because that's all you need. Rendering it impossible to steal subtly is easy. Impossible to destroy would be a lot harder, but that would be on the Vilani - if they fail the Terrans won't care much.

then you have to find a way to ship in replacement parts,

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I take it you're not familiar with Battletech setting? There's a reason it's called Ragnorak proofed technology. You only need replacement parts to deal with battle damage, and the black boxes in particular were designed to be operated as black boxes, i.e you don't open them or do anything to the internals, just trust they'll work (and they'll continue working even after a couple of centuries with no maintenance).

 

[Ultim@tePower]

There is no way anyone could still it covertly - it's a BattleTech Device that requires basically no maintainence to keep working for a century. You can drop it in a pit and fill it with concrete - as long as the data cable is long enough to stick out it won't affect the operation.

Anyone wanting to steal it better show up with heavy equipment and an expert bomb disposal team to get around the self destruct systems - that's not something anyone is going to do covertly.

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It doesnt matter if its done covertly or not its still possible and if its possible then the Terrans wont go for it

Can he order his troops to provide security against someone seizing it by force? Because that's all you need. Rendering it impossible to steal subtly is easy. Impossible to destroy would be a lot harder, but that would be on the Vilani - if they fail the Terrans won't care much.

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I dont get your reasoning, like have you considered this from the perspective of the Terrans? The Emperor himself personally orders soldiers to guarantee safety, but you know thats not going to cut it because you are human you know that individuals can be bribed, blackmailed, coerced. Its not easy to render it impossible to steal subtly because again, they only have to get lucky once. Like you keep assuming that the god-emperor of the vilani can wve his hand and boom suddenly no one is capable of good subterfuge to steal it.

I take it you're not familiar with Battletech setting? There's a reason it's called Ragnorak proofed technology. You only need replacement parts to deal with battle damage, and the black boxes in particular were designed to be operated as black boxes, i.e you don't open them or do anything to the internals, just trust they'll work (and they'll continue working even after a couple of centuries with no maintenance).

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Oops, yeah I mixed them up, but still how are you going to ship in the logistics to maintain the consulate? Terra will never ever allow Vilani supplies/engineers in because thats a huge security risk, maybe yes for food if its vetted

 

[The Unicorn]

It doesnt matter if its done covertly or not its still possible and if its possible then the Terrans wont go for it

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The point is that it's not actually possible.

Terra will never ever allow Vilani supplies/engineers in because thats a huge security risk, maybe yes for food if its vetted

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This means that Terra will never actual trust the Vilani to stick to their deal. In such a case of course they wouldn't agree to the deal, but that's a very different argument than what you were making before.