Miscellaneous Loroi question-and-answer thread

[Arioch]

Do Loroi ship systems use AI? I am aware Arioch created this story before AI became more mainstream, so it is possible the Loroi don't fool with AI at all.

If they do use spaceship AI, please tell me they are more competent than CONRAD (the spaceship AI for the cartoon Alien Monday on youtube).

So I was watching Alien Monday and was awe struck how awful the spaceship's AI was at keeping the crew safe. It was as if it was trying to get them all killed, and nearly succeeded. My issues I have with the AI, having watched the entire video, are as follows:

1. If the AI knows a crew member has been in a section of the ship for THREE days when it has other tasks to do, that's the kind of thing you would think it should at least check the camera footage and then relay it ASAP to any other crew members. The surviving crew member had to prompt the AI to even tell her where the missing crew member was even though it knew all along.

2. Instead of waltzing into the unknown to check on a crew member who has not left a part of the ship for THREE days, try using a voice intercom first by asking him is he okay. If no response you check the camera feed. If you have no cameras there then shame on you ship designers. If you have no voice intercom triple shame on them. You would then have to go yourself to check it out, but at least you would realize that something is seriously wrong and potentially unsafe before you waltz right into it unprepared. Like seriously, if a crewman has not left a room for 3 days that is a serious red flag.

"AI" has become a catch-all buzzword that's applied to almost any new software technology, so let's be careful to define terms. Most TL10/11 software (including Loroi versions) will include some features that are today included under the umbrella of "AI" such as machine learning and data-training-driven-content-generation. While these are powerful technologies whose applications can sometimes give the appearance of intelligence, they are not true artificial intelligence. ChatGPT can shit out working code or an essay on a requested subject (which may or may not be accurate), but it can't think or decide or understand anything fundamental about the universe outside of the data that it has specifically been trained on. It can't invent or create something that doesn't already exist, or solve a problem that someone else hasn't already taught it how to solve.

However do "true" sentient, self-aware, decision-making Artificial Intelligence systems exist at TL10/11? Yes.

Do the Loroi use these sentient, self-aware, decision-making Artificial Intelligence in their military ship systems? No.

The first reason why is that they don't trust machines to make decisions for them. The analogy that comes to mind is the gun aiming reticle that fighter aircraft have had since the end of WWII. We trust mechanical or software systems to make recommendations based on calculations that they can do far better than any human, but we depend on a human to make the decision to pull the trigger. Combat UAV's may sound like a great idea, but I'd rather trust my life to a human pilot than to a system designed by a software engineer somewhere. I've worked in software engineering for too long to trust software engineers with anybody's lives. The telepathic Loroi take this to another level, both because they are not tech-nerds and don't trust anything they can't read with their telepathy. They're not quite Butlerian jihadists from Dune, but they're not too far off.

The second reason why is that on a military vessel with several hundred crewmen, intelligent systems are simply not needed. You can expect that Loroi systems such as sensor monitor software or targeting software or the like will have systems which behave a bit like autonomous intelligences, but they will always have a living Loroi in command of that system. On a civilian merchant vessel like Nostromo that has less than a dozen crewmen to operate a huge vessel, a higher level of automation might make some sense, but even in that case you don't need self-aware AI to flag that crewmember has been missing for a certain length of time (hopefully a lot less than three days), nor do you need self-aware AI to make a call on the intercom, check a video camera or any other sensor to check on that crewman. So sure, there are expert systems that are monitoring Tempest's external and internal sensors, and they will inform the operators if they recognize patterns that they have been told are important. However, they may dismiss as noise something that they're not trained to look for, and there's not much that can be done about that until and unless you get into Historian-levels of technology; until then, having a living operator to manage smart software will almost always be better than giving a sentient AI control. And even in the case of the Historians, that's not the whole story.

[Urist]

To chip in as a robotics engineer:

With anything short of 'True' Human-replacement Artificial Intelligence (something as smart as a human, capable of every range of thought and learning that a human can, and possessing a body that can do everything a human body can) the choice to automate or not automate a complex mechanical system such as a ship boils down to a tradeoff between Efficiency and Redundancy. The same seems likely to hold true for 'Loroi-replacement' systems, with the main difference being that loroi have a much better 'built-in communications system' than us plains apes do.

An automated system is generally going to be more efficient at its designed purpose(s) than a human system, but *only* at those designed purpose(s). A piece of software overseeing a sensor net to, say, track the magazine-feed system for Tempest's AMM launcher is going to respond to any malfunctions a bit faster than some greenshirt Soroin staring at the sensor logs would, and it's not prone to exhaustion from too many long shifts, or being rattled by low morale, or distracted by another warrior's sending at a crucial moment.

*However*, that same sensor-software isn't going to be capable of doing any of the many, many other things that a sailor/warrior on a warship has to do. Said Soroin Pideir is not just a missile-feed monitor; in a pinch she can also serve as a:

- firefighter, if battle-damage causes a critical section of the ship near her to catch fire,
- casualty-recovery and treatment officer, performing emergency first aid on any wounded near her section,
- riflewoman, if the ship is boarded by the enemy,
- logistics hauler, if the ship needs to very-quickly store extra supplies throughout the ship,
- damage-control personnel, if the ship's gallen find themselves overwhelmed with critical battle-damage
- etc., etc.

You *can* design a physical robot that can do all of this if it's got an AI (or very advanced sub-AI smart system) loaded, but even here on Earth that's going to be very difficult to make cost-competitive to just placing another sailor/soldier aboard. And since loroi have far less problems filling out the ranks than humans do nowadays (loroi *want* to be warriors, you don't have to recruit or conscript them, they take fewer resources to keep alive than humans do, and they're simply produced & mature faster than humans), that's probably even more lopsided for them than for us.

So while an organic being is almost always worse at any one task than an automated system, trying to make an automated system that can do everything a single junior sailor can quickly becomes much more expensive & less redundant. One of the interesting lessons from many, many years of naval warfare (and being slowly re-learned today, after the last few decades of peacetime automation mania) is that on a *war*-ship in particular it's always good to simply have more warm bodies aboard to absorb casualties. If your ship has one skilled engineer watching over a bunch of automated systems, you're in a lot of trouble if that one engineer gets KIA by a lucky enemy shot. But if you had one chief engineer watching over a hundred-ish junior engineers, then chances are that one of them can step in to take her place.

This is one big reason why civilian (and in particular *commercial*) ships IRL have much smaller crews using much more automation than do most warships. Commercial ships (hopefully!) don't have to deal with battle-damage, or forming counter-boarding parties, or stuff like that. If things go too wrong, just abandon ship and call in outside help! And so the strong pressure of cost-saving has driven commercial ship crews smaller and smaller, with the result that they're far more 'fragile' than they used to be.

[Bamax]

Can the liquid rocket fuel Loroi use be frozen solid? If so... I imagine it would be subject to evaporation and liqueufication if I picked up a kilogram block of frozen Taimat (fuel type A).

Is it basically a neutral substance? Meaning it is not crazy reactive with everything like anti-matter, and basically stable unless a certain threshold is reached?

Like if a human was walking around a space station with a frozen kilogram ice block of taimat in his gloved hand, and telling every Loroi he passed by that's what he is holding, are the Loroi going to freak out... fearing if something heats that ice block of taimat too much it's going to go boom?

Will a Loroi die if someone slipped an ice cube made of taimat into their water cup with the rest of their ice?

[Arioch]

Can the liquid rocket fuel Loroi use be frozen solid? If so... I imagine it would be subject to evaporation and liqueufication if I picked up a kilogram block of frozen Taimat (fuel type A).

Is it basically a neutral substance? Meaning it is not crazy reactive with everything like anti-matter, and basically stable unless a certain threshold is reached?

Like if a human was walking around a space station with a frozen kilogram ice block of taimat in his gloved hand, and telling every Loroi he passed by that's what he is holding, are the Loroi going to freak out... fearing if something heats that ice block of taimat too much it's going to go boom?

Will a Loroi die if someone slipped an ice cube made of taimat into their water cup with the rest of their ice?

Taimat has properties similar to helium, becoming a liquid at very low temperatures. It does not freeze under normal atmospheric pressure. In order to freeze taimat you would have to cool it to about 1 degree Kelvin and raise the pressure to more than 25 atmospheres. If you took a block of frozen taimat out of that environment and held it in your hand, it would instantly explode and likely kill you and anyone nearby.

[Bamax]

Can the liquid rocket fuel Loroi use be frozen solid? If so... I imagine it would be subject to evaporation and liqueufication if I picked up a kilogram block of frozen Taimat (fuel type A).

Is it basically a neutral substance? Meaning it is not crazy reactive with everything like anti-matter, and basically stable unless a certain threshold is reached?

Like if a human was walking around a space station with a frozen kilogram ice block of taimat in his gloved hand, and telling every Loroi he passed by that's what he is holding, are the Loroi going to freak out... fearing if something heats that ice block of taimat too much it's going to go boom?

Will a Loroi die if someone slipped an ice cube made of taimat into their water cup with the rest of their ice?

Taimat has properties similar to helium, becoming a liquid at very low temperatures. It does not freeze under normal atmospheric pressure. In order to freeze taimat you would have to cool it to about 1 degree Kelvin and raise the pressure to more than 25 atmospheres. If you took a block of frozen taimat out of that environment and held it in your hand, it would instantly explode and likely kill you and anyone nearby.

Unless you had a canister with an uber powerful forcefield inside compressing the taimat while also keeping it insulated from heat.

Which I presume is core technology of all missiles/spacecraft etc

Makes me think maybe the taimat is suspended in a vacuum tank, so as not to have any heat conducted from the walls.... on maybe some vessels. Forcefields could feed propellant as needed.

Either that or missiles are kept refrigerated until fired lol. Which also means making them go boom is as simple as burning past the metal skin and blasting the taimat.

Even a microwave beam would work (maser).

[Bamax]

Can the liquid rocket fuel Loroi use be frozen solid? If so... I imagine it would be subject to evaporation and liqueufication if I picked up a kilogram block of frozen Taimat (fuel type A).

Is it basically a neutral substance? Meaning it is not crazy reactive with everything like anti-matter, and basically stable unless a certain threshold is reached?

Like if a human was walking around a space station with a frozen kilogram ice block of taimat in his gloved hand, and telling every Loroi he passed by that's what he is holding, are the Loroi going to freak out... fearing if something heats that ice block of taimat too much it's going to go boom?

Will a Loroi die if someone slipped an ice cube made of taimat into their water cup with the rest of their ice?

Taimat has properties similar to helium, becoming a liquid at very low temperatures. It does not freeze under normal atmospheric pressure. In order to freeze taimat you would have to cool it to about 1 degree Kelvin and raise the pressure to more than 25 atmospheres. If you took a block of frozen taimat out of that environment and held it in your hand, it would instantly explode and likely kill you and anyone nearby.

Unless uber awesome Fireblade is around. Girl could probably deflect the blast around her like Neo if she waa aware it was about to blow and was not taken totally by surprise.

Probably explains how she managed to survive her ship being destroyed multiple times.

[Urist]

With no moon to slow its rotation, Taben's day is just 13.6 Earth hours. This fast rotation is part of what drives Taben's fierce wind and currents, but it also makes it slightly less expensive to get objects into orbit from the surface. Taben's orbital period is 431 Earth days.

A follow-up on this one: without a moon, does Taben have any equivalent to 'tides'?

I'm barely familiar with astrogeology-scale physics, but it's always been my understanding that the tides are caused primarily by the moon's orbit. Without any such orbital body, would the planet have any meaningful tidal changes in water height near shore? It would be interesting to imagine how such a lack would affect a maritime culture... but we've also seen Taben-raised loroi like to use the term 'tide' a lot (as in the 'High-Tide Low-Lives' diral, and Spiral's surprised exclamation 'Low tide!'), so I'd assume that there's *some* reason for that kind of cultural impact.

[SVlad]

Sun affects tides too.

[GeoModder]

With no moon to slow its rotation, Taben's day is just 13.6 Earth hours. This fast rotation is part of what drives Taben's fierce wind and currents, but it also makes it slightly less expensive to get objects into orbit from the surface. Taben's orbital period is 431 Earth days.

A follow-up on this one: without a moon, does Taben have any equivalent to 'tides'?

I'm barely familiar with astrogeology-scale physics, but it's always been my understanding that the tides are caused primarily by the moon's orbit. Without any such orbital body, would the planet have any meaningful tidal changes in water height near shore? It would be interesting to imagine how such a lack would affect a maritime culture... but we've also seen Taben-raised loroi like to use the term 'tide' a lot (as in the 'High-Tide Low-Lives' diral, and Spiral's surprised exclamation 'Low tide!'), so I'd assume that there's *some* reason for that kind of cultural impact.

As SVlad said, the Sun causes tides too. IIRC, about a third of what the Moon causes.

[Arioch]

Yes, moonless planets will still experience solar tides. On Earth, the Sun's effect on tides is about half as strong as the Moon's (so it's about one-third of the total effect), and the greatest effect is when both are lined up and combined (or canceled out, as the case may be). So Taben will have weaker daily tides that are more regular (as they don't wax and wane as the Moon moves relative to the Sun), but because the planet's rotation is faster and the oceans are deeper, I think the currents caused by tides will probably be more aggressive, even if the change in sea level isn't as great, as there is more water that's moving faster.

There will also be some minor seasonal variation, with the strongest tides at perihelion and the mildest at aphelion (the "winter tide").

On Earth, tides are most extreme in particular locations like certain inlets where the flow of water in and out is constricted and funneled, amplifying the change in sea level. The most extreme example is the Bay of Fundy in Nova Scotia, which can experience something like 10 times the normal daily tidal rise and fall. There will be a few places like this in Beleri.

[Urist]

Neat, that's cool to learn! Thanks for the answers, everyone!

[SaintofM]

What would the Martial arts of the different culture be like compared to humans? I am assuming that given size and other factors they probably would take that into account, and how would they use that in a battle field situation? Probably not much they can do against a state-of-the-art combat Shell trooper, but they have squishier allies.

[Arioch]

What would the Martial arts of the different culture be like compared to humans? I am assuming that given size and other factors they probably would take that into account, and how would they use that in a battle field situation? Probably not much they can do against a state-of-the-art combat Shell trooper, but they have squishier allies.

Modern Loroi military training includes some knife techniques and some basic unarmed combat (called lishranen "grappling", roughly analogous to Judo). The latter is mainly concerned with Loroi vs. Loroi fighting.

Historical martial training was mostly concerned with weapons training appropriate to that subculture, and usually not as much with unarmed fighting. The various Loroi subcultures used many types of swords, and spears were also a common weapon. Axes and bludgeoning weapons were less common.

[Bamax]

What would the Martial arts of the different culture be like compared to humans? I am assuming that given size and other factors they probably would take that into account, and how would they use that in a battle field situation? Probably not much they can do against a state-of-the-art combat Shell trooper, but they have squishier allies.

Modern Loroi military training includes some knife techniques and some basic unarmed combat (called lishranen "grappling", roughly analogous to Judo). The latter is mainly concerned with Loroi vs. Loroi fighting.

Historical martial training was mostly concerned with weapons training appropriate to that subculture, and usually not as much with unarmed fighting. The various Loroi subcultures used many types of swords, and spears were also a common weapon. Axes and bludgeoning weapons were less common.

Loroi prefer to kill ASAP and efficiently rather than prolong it by using bludgening techniques. I suspect because as Arioxh implied before, telepathy itself can be used as a weapon, and the longer a fight goes on without a decisive victory the more time and opportunity you give an opponent to pull off some nsane Mizol trickery or superhero feats by way of Teidar.

Come to think of it, chemical warfare and poison would be quite good at all that. Even though that is basically a war crime... the Loroi already do that so it's only a question of whether it's worth the risk of similar retaliation.

[Hālian]

One of the most famous villains is from the same heroic myth: Windfury, the eldest of Tempest's treacherous sisters. And yet despite this she is today at the center of a common Loroi ritual celebrating motherhood.

[DESIRE TO KNOW MORE INTENSIFIES]

Out of curiousity, on average has Loroi capitol punishment been about as cruel as human capitol punishment or more?

The Loroi have had barbarous periods in their history to rival anything in ours, but they did not make a general practice of torture for reasons of simple practicality: psionic opponents cannot be easily rendered harmless. Loroi leaders tended to be the strongest telepaths and/or psionic users among them, not easily subdued or imprisoned, and certainly not likely to sit meekly by while being tortured. There were exceptions, but most Loroi WIlliam Wallaces died quickly (either on the battlefield or through assassination) and were very rarely taken captive.

For this reason, imprisonment was not used by the Loroi as a punishment, only as a temporary measure for a Loroi awaiting judgment on a lesser crime. Any capital crime had to be dealt with swiftly and on the spot. If a crime was not serious enough to warrant capital punishment, then it was usually punished by banishment or some sort of fines or revocation of privileges.

What method(s) of execution do(es) the Loroi Union use?

[Arioch]

What method(s) of execution do(es) the Loroi Union use?

It depends on who is being executed and why, and in what circumstances.

The default method of euthanasia would be some form of lethal injection. This would be used in a criminal justice context for most civilian executions.

A warrior receiving capital punishment may request a form of execution specific to her particular cultural traditions, subject to expedience and the approval of the relevant authority. As you can imagine, the various Loroi warrior subcultures have a variety of traditional methods of execution. These frequently involve blades. Beheading or a slash of the carotid are common examples.

For summary execution in a combat context, something more expedient is often required. In a planetside field context this usually means being shot. For spaceborne operations, the usual option is being spaced.

Some planetside authorities may retain traditional execution methods. Some of these may be deliberately cruel or humiliating, and reserved for the more heinous offenses (such as rebellion). Typical examples might be drowning or strangulation.

[Zorg56]

Is there any Quadruple, Sixtuple or more turrets in use by any side of the conflict?

[Arioch]

Is there any Quadruple, Sixtuple or more turrets in use by any side of the conflict?

There are a number of ships with quad point-defense turrets, including some Umiak and Morat designs. I think that larger than triple turrets for the main batteries would be unusual.

[Urist]

From an engineering standpoint (largely hypothetical, obviously) it seems unlikely that main-battery weapons would be mounted in large clusters like a 3+-barrel turret. They're all energy weapons, and so the limiting factor on their firepower isn't going to be the number of parallel barrels but rather the reactors/capacitors powering them (and perhaps the power-transfer cables leading from the reactors/capacitors to the turret).

IRL guns on warships have historically often used multi-barrel mountings because salvo density was a major desired trait (possibly *the* desired trait). Essentially, the more shells you have landing around the target at once, the more accurate the resulting feedback is on how accurate your estimation of the target's range, heading, and speed can be shown to be (or not be). It's better to fire, say, 12 shells once per minute rather than 6 shells twice per minute, even if the total number of shots per minute is the same and you'd save a lot on turret size & expensive barrels.

That's the reason why modern warships rarely have (large) guns in multi-barrel turrets anymore: the aiming and range-finding is done by radar, and so salvo density isn't as important. It's cheaper (in terms of tonnage and deck space, and also often financial cost) to have a single-gun turret that fires twice as fast compared to a 2-gun turret.

There's some reason for seeking salvo density in combat as presented in Outsider (obliterate a target in the first volley so they don't get any follow-up shots on you), but that's it. And unlike naval guns IRL, it seems that the 'shots' for most main-battery energy weapons aren't really 'loaded into the turret,' but rather the energy for them is sent from the ship's main grid at the time of firing. Maybe you can try and squeeze capacitors into the turrets themselves, but it seems much more survivable for the ship to put those inside the main hull and run cables out to the turrets. Either way, you'd be limited in how many barrels you can squeeze into a turret by the number of cables you can fit into its mounting base: after a certain number of barrels, you're not really gaining anything by adding more.

[Arioch]

If we were being strictly realistic, I think most beam weapons would be in single mounts.