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Author Topic: Starmap's size within the galaxy  (Read 4716 times)
Resh Aleph
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Starmap's size within the galaxy
« on: December 01, 2009, 10:27:02 am »

The story so far:

I'm wondering what fraction of the distance from the galactic center to the rim does the SC2 starmap cover.

Edit: Also I found this from Valaggar on the Ultronomicon: The galaxy has a diameter of at least 27646 standard HyperSpace distance units and a circumference of at least 86808 distance units.
Edit 2: if it takes 100 fuel to go from the top of the starmap to the bottom of the starmap, and if there is ten distance units in each unit of fuel, then the starmap is 1000 distance units wide. That makes it that the starmap is 1/27 the distance from rim to rim, or 1/14 the distance from the galactic center to the rim.

Ah, but corewards is NE, so you want the diagonal distance. Fortunately pythagorus steps in here.

distance (corner to corner) = sqrt(h^2 + w^2) = sqrt(1000000 + 1000000) = sqrt(2000000) = 1 414.21356

27646/1.414 = 19.5516266

So more like a 20th of the diameter.

So more like a 20th of the diameter.

Makes you wonder why it took the Ur-Quan thousands of years to get here.

They were taking the circular route. Now for that, we want the circumference. We're about in the middle, so let's assume that the diameter of our 'circle' is 13823, exactly half of the galaxy's 'real' diameter. So for the circular route, C=pi x d, so C=13823pi. Feed that into google and we get...
43 426.2353

Now 43426/27646 is about 1.6, so there's your answer. They took thousands and thousands of years to get here because they were going possibly1 and a half times the galaxy's diameter, stopping every few years for a quick war.

Actually, according to these numbers, the galaxy's "size" is about 600 million units, and each region like ours is 1 million units. So if both Ur-Quan stayed in each region for 66 years on average, it would take about 20,000 years to cover the entire galaxy. (2*20000/66 = 606)

66 years seems way too high an average...
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CelticMinstrel
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Re: Starmap's size within the galaxy
« Reply #1 on: December 01, 2009, 02:06:19 pm »

Does that mesh with the dates of the Sentient Milieu?
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SweetSassyMolassy
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Re: Starmap's size within the galaxy
« Reply #2 on: December 02, 2009, 02:27:10 am »

I remember making a thread similar to this a while back.
http://forum.uqm.stack.nl/index.php?topic=4426.0
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Re: Starmap's size within the galaxy
« Reply #3 on: December 03, 2009, 09:47:02 am »

Does that mesh with the dates of the Sentient Milieu?

I'm not sure what you mean; this is long after the Sentient Milieu's time.

20,000 years is the time passed between the two Doctrinal Wars:

Quote from: Ultronomicon
The defeat of the Ur-Quan marks the first chance in twenty thousand years for new civilizations to develop without the looming threat of being cut short by an Ur-Quan fleet.
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CelticMinstrel
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Re: Starmap's size within the galaxy
« Reply #4 on: December 03, 2009, 05:44:05 pm »

Does that mesh with the dates of the Sentient Milieu?

I'm not sure what you mean; this is long after the Sentient Milieu's time.
Well... we have dates for the Sentient Milieu, right? Do we know when it fell to the Dnyarri? Do we know roughly how long the Dnyarri enslavement lasted? And if so, does the travel time of 20,000 years mesh with those dates? (If we don't know the length of the Dnyarri enslavement, on the other hand, we could use this figure to estimate it.)
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Resh Aleph
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Re: Starmap's size within the galaxy
« Reply #5 on: December 04, 2009, 08:55:10 am »

If I'm not mistaken, the Dnyarri slave empire started 25,000 years before SC2 and ended 20,000 years before SC2. But I don't really see the connection between the empire's lifespan and the trip around the galaxy...

BTW, could someone remind me how come the Taalo's home world is in our region of space, when it should be on the other side of the galaxy? Undecided
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CelticMinstrel
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Re: Starmap's size within the galaxy
« Reply #6 on: December 04, 2009, 05:02:10 pm »

If I'm not mistaken, the Dnyarri slave empire started 25,000 years before SC2 and ended 20,000 years before SC2. But I don't really see the connection between the empire's lifespan and the trip around the galaxy...
So, the numbers do mesh. The Ur-Quan must have started traveling very soon after defeating the Dnyarri. (If the Dnyarri had been defeated, say, 10,000 years before SC2, it would have been evidence that taking 20,000 years to get around the galaxy would not work.)
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Re: Starmap's size within the galaxy
« Reply #7 on: December 04, 2009, 05:36:36 pm »

The numbers don't add up anyway, for the simple reason that the Taalo lived near here. Unless the Dnyarri slave empire oversaw a terrible contraction in the population of even the slaves and an even greater loss in propulsion technology, there's no way they'd come over here to wipe out the Taalo (though the Taalo *slid* away or whatever).

On this subject, I'm mystified.
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Draxas
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Re: Starmap's size within the galaxy
« Reply #8 on: December 04, 2009, 05:58:13 pm »

66 years seems way too high an average...

Actually, it doesn't seem all that unreasonable. Consider that the first war takes place from ~2112-2134, that's 22 years battling against an alliance of 7 species in our quadrant, which the Ur-Quan ended prematurely through use of the Sa-Matra against Procyon instead of using their typical, deliberate conquest. Once the Alliance was defeated, they also neglected to continue their conquest of the sector, instead retreating to Crateris in order to regroup for the coming Doctrinal War. Had they not had an urgent timetable with the advancing Kohr-Ah, they would have defeated the Alliance the old fashioned way and pacified the rest of the races in the sector (presumably, including their own battle thralls once everyone else was slave shielded and they were preparing to leave). I'd say 60+ years is not an unreasonable timetable for that. Other sectors could have mustered alliances twice as large, perhaps, or perhaps had fewer races willing to become battle thralls, forcing the Ur-Quan to fight alone.

The Kohr-Ah... Well, let's just say that they're really thorough.
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Re: Starmap's size within the galaxy
« Reply #9 on: December 04, 2009, 07:23:03 pm »

The numbers don't add up anyway, for the simple reason that the Taalo lived near here. Unless the Dnyarri slave empire oversaw a terrible contraction in the population of even the slaves and an even greater loss in propulsion technology, there's no way they'd come over here to wipe out the Taalo (though the Taalo *slid* away or whatever).

On this subject, I'm mystified.

Maybe it has to do with the difference between hyperspace and truespace travel. That way, to go "around" the galaxy wouldn't necessarily have the same meaning as in truespace, where you traverse the circumference. 
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Re: Starmap's size within the galaxy
« Reply #10 on: December 05, 2009, 12:00:44 am »

So, if the Ur-Quan started travelling one way around the galady, and the Kohr-Ah started travelling the other way, expecting to meet again, does this mean that Sol is roughtly on the opposite side of the galaxy from where the first doctrinal war began? And does this also mean that everything on one side of the galaxy has been enslaved, while everything on the other side has been annigilated?

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Re: Starmap's size within the galaxy
« Reply #11 on: December 05, 2009, 05:14:02 am »

So, if the Ur-Quan started travelling one way around the galady, and the Kohr-Ah started travelling the other way, expecting to meet again, does this mean that Sol is roughtly on the opposite side of the galaxy from where the first doctrinal war began? And does this also mean that everything on one side of the galaxy has been enslaved, while everything on the other side has been annigilated?
It is not necessary half and half , But unless something developed at the first doctrinal war region since then , the life in galaxy is either enslaved or destroyed . Furthermore , lack of battle thralls from another sectors gives me the impression that when they are done with any sector Kzer-Za slaveshield them as well .
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CelticMinstrel
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Re: Starmap's size within the galaxy
« Reply #12 on: December 06, 2009, 05:24:00 am »

The numbers don't add up anyway, for the simple reason that the Taalo lived near here. Unless the Dnyarri slave empire oversaw a terrible contraction in the population of even the slaves and an even greater loss in propulsion technology, there's no way they'd come over here to wipe out the Taalo (though the Taalo *slid* away or whatever).

On this subject, I'm mystified.
So, from that, we know it's possible to cross the galaxy in a reasonable time-frame. However, that would presumably mean travelling along the diameter. The Ur-Quan, on the other hand, are traversing the circumference, so they have over 6 times the distance to travel... plus, they're engaging in wars, and travelling radially in order to cover all worlds that support life. This applies to the Kohr-Ah, too.

So, if the Ur-Quan started travelling one way around the galady, and the Kohr-Ah started travelling the other way, expecting to meet again, does this mean that Sol is roughtly on the opposite side of the galaxy from where the first doctrinal war began? And does this also mean that everything on one side of the galaxy has been enslaved, while everything on the other side has been annigilated?
Essentially, yes... though, it's possible that the Kzer-Za did not make it half-way around the galaxy, and in fact more than half has been stripped of sentient life.
« Last Edit: December 08, 2009, 02:15:22 am by CelticMinstrel » Logged
Resh Aleph
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Re: Starmap's size within the galaxy
« Reply #13 on: December 06, 2009, 07:03:06 pm »

The Ur-Quan, on the other hand, are traversing the circumference, so they have over 6 times the distance to travel...

They've covered the entire galaxy, not just its outer edge. So what you really need is the galaxy "size", which is what I calculated in the first post (according to Valaggar's numbers). The travel time itself is just a small percentage of the 20,000 years.
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CelticMinstrel
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Re: Starmap's size within the galaxy
« Reply #14 on: December 08, 2009, 02:15:28 am »

They've covered the entire galaxy, not just its outer edge. So what you really need is the galaxy "size", which is what I calculated in the first post (according to Valaggar's numbers). The travel time itself is just a small percentage of the 20,000 years.

I did mention that:

plus, they're engaging in wars, and travelling radially in order to cover all worlds that support life.
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