If there's one thing I love in sci-fi, it's creative use of light delay and ways of getting around it. Using transmission times to bring back some good ol' fog of war doesn't hurt either.
Have you ever read the Lost Fleet series by Jack Campbell ? If not you would probably enjoy it, because light lag and fog of war are at the heart of all the space battles in those books.
@@arthurvilain7270 an excellent recommendation and other than the Expanse books, the Lost Fleet is something I've been trying to find a follow-up/replacement for ever since finishing it. Nothing gets the mix of hard sci-fi and military strategy of space battles and logistics quite as well.
Author Miles Cameron uses it too in his sci-fi debut, Artifact Space. Our protagonists "see" the antagonists leaving a system at FTL, but the antagonists can't possibly have seen them, because they'd been gone for hours when the protagonists dropped out of FTL in-system and picked up the light of the event.
If a drift gate failed, a missed message would be the least of the worries for an entire system (since basically every drift gate in the cluster leads back to Centrum in increasing order of the importance of systems.
@@zed12-ui4jy Not to mention, depending on the system, water(looking at Maiala's Rest), air (looking at Cardeus Brink and Mericia), and every trade good which their industry can't make (looking at both C. Brink and Firewatch).
Data couriers are a criminally underrepresented aspect of science fiction and I love seeing them in a setting as cool and well thought out as The Sojourn. These lore shorts never disappoint!
Really interesting. I'm getting from this that it's like a combination of sending messengers and "yelling" the message from the top of a "hill". Really fascinating.
I always imagined ships having a contingent of specialized small FTL capable drone craft with high powered communications arrays flying to a system and contacting a specific recipient if FTL communication wouldn't be possible-but FTL flight is, and imagine these to be affectionately referred to as carrier pigeons if that's not already a part of their designation. I'm pleasantly surprised I'm not the only one to have that idea and this audio drama's iteration of the concept is really well throught out and nicely detailed and I never thought of it as dedicated manned ships that are basically space USPS trucks.
@@zed12-ui4jy It's an interesting concept, but it's functionally the same as just sending a beam of radio to a recipient, just without being hampered by any object in the way, it's still limited to the speed of light. I can definitely see it as a better method than radio communication between ships and intra-system in the far future and honestly as soon as I read up on the concept I immediately thought this was the titular "as of yet unknown method" typically hypothesized that advanced alien civilizations would be using to communicate in regards to the fermi paradox.
I assume the nature of the drift gates prohibits an Expanse-style "big stick with antennas at both ends" just chilling with one end on one side of the gate, and the other end on the other side?
They have a similar setup in the Honorverse, where Courier Boats are used. Courier Boats are basically a grav drive, hyperdrive, and a secure server, with a small crew usually skippered by a lieutenant. They're better at acceleration than any other ship, and probably as large as a Light Attack Craft. It has no weapons, and its wedge is really only meant for transit, not stopping anything serious thrown at it. When a Courier Boat arrives in orbit of a planet, it contacts the local command, and sends through all messages tagged as meant for that destination. The command then uploads its message queue to the Courier boat, and the boat moves on. Messages are encrypted as part of the transfer, and not even the crew of the boat can access them - they only have access to the destination tags so they know what has to go where. But even with this sort of courier system, it can take weeks or even months for messages and reports to come in from the front lines, so central command has to sometimes work on old data.
I think so many just hand-wave such communication delays off with techno-whatever for the sake of keeping the story or plot moving, rather than making it part of the story. It reminds me how in the original series of one show it was discussed between the crew how it took months to get somewhere, then in later versions of that franchise, it was instant anywhere for everything. it just makes the world small when travel time is ignored. This message delay thing is a nice return of 'science' to Science Fiction for sure.
I was looking at the courier's 3D model and there's one thing that strikes my mind: why isn't anyone ever using gimbals on thrusters, i mean it's a technology we are using even today to reduce the amount of rcs thrusters on shuttles and satellites and to perform more precise maneuvers using far less fuel, or even to redirect the engine bloom of a spacecraft in order to not use rcs fuel at all when turning during burns. The only sci-fi ship we've seen thruster gimbals on is the Guinevere but even there it was kind of an exception, as its rcs system was composed of actual vector drives similar to the main one, I know a gimbal it's a delicate moving part but for government organisations it's a great opportunity to spare both fuel and remove several internal delivering mechanisms, which are much harder to repair and maintain, and a gimbal can be made with compliant mechanisms, which use a material's ability to bend in order to reduce the amount of parts and the complexity of the mechanism as a whole. Another scarcely used device is the reaction wheel, which uses a spinning flywheel in order to change a small craft's orientation without any fuel, what i mean by this is that most sci fi vessels tend to use this hard "fixed thrusters only" approach to the situation, while even here on earth we've bren trying everything to avoid such a method ever since space exploration began as it really wastes lots of fuel and space. Was just an idea, I'm loving the audio drama and I'm actively trying to inspire to its hard sci fi aesthetic for my own stories, can't wait for season 2 volume 1 to come out, i love to listen to it on the train while i do the trip to and from my university, keep up the good work guys. Fair winds.
I've created an organization to deal with communication that works similarly in my own sci-fi setting. I love how this type of communication adds mystery and "fog of war" to things
I don’t understand how moving massless radio waves at FTL speeds is harder than moving something weighing multiple tons but at this point I’m betting any irl science related to space travel is suppressed for some reason or another. Maybe something to do with most people not being able to come to terms with being small specs in a giant universe because for some reason that’s a bad thing to them
@@QuarkGamingLLC simple question as a sci fi nerd myself to you what's more possible the warp drive (aka ships basically going faster than light with any ftl method) or quantum entanglement?
I really enjoyed the creativity here in developing a system of communication across extraordinary distances that does not resolve itself with some form of supraluminal communication! Great stuff!
I remember coming to this conclusion while doing some brainstorming as well. That in a world of FTL, what essentially amounts to mail is faster than the internet. I imagine important military assets might use quantum entangled particles as two way "land lines" though, since if people have figured out ftl, QE on demand probably is somewhat doable. The issue is that even entangling 2 particles is probably really hard, so complex data packages would be tricky, so there'd probably be some sort of future morse code, albiet a base 4 one since i believe thats how many vectors of spin a particle has. Im glad you thought about this!
I wonder... is there a window in which all comunication between couriers and planet is cut when sun cuts a view line between gate and each planet during coronal mass ejection? If that was true there should be few days blackout demanding couriers to go arround the sun to recive information from transceiver and endangering tham to being captured or attacked by enemy or pirate forces. It would also mean that it coan be used as a way to attack planets.
Question, I noticed in the animated map the drift gates are located in system and will follow a circular route around the sun. Would this not block and limit gate travel? Is it not safe and more efficient for them to be stationery and the outer edges of the system facing the respective target/receiving gate?
This is good stuff. Quick question. Are the fleet of courier vessels owned by the state or a corporation? Actually for that matter, are the drift gates themselves owned and operated by a corporation or the state?
@@sonwig5186 FTL and artificial intelligence are not intertwined concepts. Plenty of sci-fi out there has had FTL be a thing without the other and vice versa.
Get #TheSojourn here: www.thesojournaudiodrama.com/
If there's one thing I love in sci-fi, it's creative use of light delay and ways of getting around it. Using transmission times to bring back some good ol' fog of war doesn't hurt either.
Have you ever read the Lost Fleet series by Jack Campbell ? If not you would probably enjoy it, because light lag and fog of war are at the heart of all the space battles in those books.
@@arthurvilain7270 an excellent recommendation and other than the Expanse books, the Lost Fleet is something I've been trying to find a follow-up/replacement for ever since finishing it. Nothing gets the mix of hard sci-fi and military strategy of space battles and logistics quite as well.
Author Miles Cameron uses it too in his sci-fi debut, Artifact Space.
Our protagonists "see" the antagonists leaving a system at FTL, but the antagonists can't possibly have seen them, because they'd been gone for hours when the protagonists dropped out of FTL in-system and picked up the light of the event.
“Why haven’t you texted back?”
“Sorry babe, drift gate was down. I only just got your message.”
A 19th century tragical romance scene on the SciFi background…what the hell it is
If a drift gate failed, a missed message would be the least of the worries for an entire system (since basically every drift gate in the cluster leads back to Centrum in increasing order of the importance of systems.
@@sylquinn4075 Sorry, babe, but the drift gate was down, so I had to face 12 riots, All of them relating to food.
@@zed12-ui4jy Not to mention, depending on the system, water(looking at Maiala's Rest), air (looking at Cardeus Brink and Mericia), and every trade good which their industry can't make (looking at both C. Brink and Firewatch).
@@sylquinn4075 This is why you don't use drift gates after a small collision.
Data couriers are a criminally underrepresented aspect of science fiction and I love seeing them in a setting as cool and well thought out as The Sojourn. These lore shorts never disappoint!
Really interesting. I'm getting from this that it's like a combination of sending messengers and "yelling" the message from the top of a "hill". Really fascinating.
Most realistic way of doing this, and reminds me of how things used to be done
Exactly as a sci fi nerd I'm happy they did this very rare a series does it like this
USENET is eternal.
I always imagined ships having a contingent of specialized small FTL capable drone craft with high powered communications arrays flying to a system and contacting a specific recipient if FTL communication wouldn't be possible-but FTL flight is, and imagine these to be affectionately referred to as carrier pigeons if that's not already a part of their designation.
I'm pleasantly surprised I'm not the only one to have that idea and this audio drama's iteration of the concept is really well throught out and nicely detailed and I never thought of it as dedicated manned ships that are basically space USPS trucks.
What do you think about neutrino Pigeons?
@@zed12-ui4jy
It's an interesting concept, but it's functionally the same as just sending a beam of radio to a recipient, just without being hampered by any object in the way, it's still limited to the speed of light.
I can definitely see it as a better method than radio communication between ships and intra-system in the far future and honestly as soon as I read up on the concept I immediately thought this was the titular "as of yet unknown method" typically hypothesized that advanced alien civilizations would be using to communicate in regards to the fermi paradox.
I assume the nature of the drift gates prohibits an Expanse-style "big stick with antennas at both ends" just chilling with one end on one side of the gate, and the other end on the other side?
Yes. Drift gates are far more akin to catapults than to portals.
They have a similar setup in the Honorverse, where Courier Boats are used. Courier Boats are basically a grav drive, hyperdrive, and a secure server, with a small crew usually skippered by a lieutenant. They're better at acceleration than any other ship, and probably as large as a Light Attack Craft. It has no weapons, and its wedge is really only meant for transit, not stopping anything serious thrown at it.
When a Courier Boat arrives in orbit of a planet, it contacts the local command, and sends through all messages tagged as meant for that destination. The command then uploads its message queue to the Courier boat, and the boat moves on. Messages are encrypted as part of the transfer, and not even the crew of the boat can access them - they only have access to the destination tags so they know what has to go where.
But even with this sort of courier system, it can take weeks or even months for messages and reports to come in from the front lines, so central command has to sometimes work on old data.
I think so many just hand-wave such communication delays off with techno-whatever for the sake of keeping the story or plot moving, rather than making it part of the story. It reminds me how in the original series of one show it was discussed between the crew how it took months to get somewhere, then in later versions of that franchise, it was instant anywhere for everything. it just makes the world small when travel time is ignored. This message delay thing is a nice return of 'science' to Science Fiction for sure.
I was looking at the courier's 3D model and there's one thing that strikes my mind: why isn't anyone ever using gimbals on thrusters, i mean it's a technology we are using even today to reduce the amount of rcs thrusters on shuttles and satellites and to perform more precise maneuvers using far less fuel, or even to redirect the engine bloom of a spacecraft in order to not use rcs fuel at all when turning during burns.
The only sci-fi ship we've seen thruster gimbals on is the Guinevere but even there it was kind of an exception, as its rcs system was composed of actual vector drives similar to the main one, I know a gimbal it's a delicate moving part but for government organisations it's a great opportunity to spare both fuel and remove several internal delivering mechanisms, which are much harder to repair and maintain, and a gimbal can be made with compliant mechanisms, which use a material's ability to bend in order to reduce the amount of parts and the complexity of the mechanism as a whole.
Another scarcely used device is the reaction wheel, which uses a spinning flywheel in order to change a small craft's orientation without any fuel, what i mean by this is that most sci fi vessels tend to use this hard "fixed thrusters only" approach to the situation, while even here on earth we've bren trying everything to avoid such a method ever since space exploration began as it really wastes lots of fuel and space.
Was just an idea, I'm loving the audio drama and I'm actively trying to inspire to its hard sci fi aesthetic for my own stories, can't wait for season 2 volume 1 to come out, i love to listen to it on the train while i do the trip to and from my university, keep up the good work guys.
Fair winds.
I've created an organization to deal with communication that works similarly in my own sci-fi setting. I love how this type of communication adds mystery and "fog of war" to things
I love that this is a very nice update to the Express boat courier or Pony Express systems of communication. Very nicely done
Damn the worldbuilding here goes so deep! Great concept!
This is something have been wondering for a while! I adore the worldbuilding
That is the best way I’v seen ftl comms made in scifi
Its a much more realistic way of doing it than FTL communication because FTL travel is more possible than FTL communication well done
Assuming quantum entanglement isn't possible
@@arkadian2917 a vid by PBS Space time says its possible with quantum tunneling
@@arkadian2917 ua-cam.com/video/iDIcydiQOhc/v-deo.htmlsi=FmNAHfJ_ih1b3oW0
I don’t understand how moving massless radio waves at FTL speeds is harder than moving something weighing multiple tons but at this point I’m betting any irl science related to space travel is suppressed for some reason or another. Maybe something to do with most people not being able to come to terms with being small specs in a giant universe because for some reason that’s a bad thing to them
@@QuarkGamingLLC simple question as a sci fi nerd myself to you what's more possible the warp drive (aka ships basically going faster than light with any ftl method) or quantum entanglement?
The Expanse on steroids! Brilliant infrastructure.
I really enjoyed the creativity here in developing a system of communication across extraordinary distances that does not resolve itself with some form of supraluminal communication! Great stuff!
Now this is a lovely bit of lore
Excellent video in an even more excellent setting.
Tiny ship. Four walls, one door, one seat…
That's a reasonable way of handling it. Cool.
I remember coming to this conclusion while doing some brainstorming as well. That in a world of FTL, what essentially amounts to mail is faster than the internet.
I imagine important military assets might use quantum entangled particles as two way "land lines" though, since if people have figured out ftl, QE on demand probably is somewhat doable. The issue is that even entangling 2 particles is probably really hard, so complex data packages would be tricky, so there'd probably be some sort of future morse code, albiet a base 4 one since i believe thats how many vectors of spin a particle has.
Im glad you thought about this!
Wow that all sounds super cool
Kinda reminds me of the early telegraph network in the US/pony express
I wonder... is there a window in which all comunication between couriers and planet is cut when sun cuts a view line between gate and each planet during coronal mass ejection? If that was true there should be few days blackout demanding couriers to go arround the sun to recive information from transceiver and endangering tham to being captured or attacked by enemy or pirate forces. It would also mean that it coan be used as a way to attack planets.
Reminds me of Fidonet from back in the day
The tiers of message priority very much remind me of mass effect (mixed with a bit of T'au?)...
Also I guess drift doesn't work on photons?
Question, I noticed in the animated map the drift gates are located in system and will follow a circular route around the sun. Would this not block and limit gate travel? Is it not safe and more efficient for them to be stationery and the outer edges of the system facing the respective target/receiving gate?
This is good stuff. Quick question. Are the fleet of courier vessels owned by the state or a corporation? Actually for that matter, are the drift gates themselves owned and operated by a corporation or the state?
Shame if somebody decides to
Tax your data transfers
I'm sure they pay for the data transfers with taxes from people anyway, or the governments pay for it
So, when can we expect Season 2?
I LOOOOVE DRIFT GATTTESSSSS
Comment to feed the algorithm ( love this series )
Are these ships manned or unmanned? It would make sense for them to be the latter.
Judging by the size based on the RCS, it wouldnt be big enough to fit a man with his life support inside, hinting it to probably be AI controlled
They’re manned. You can see the window and the airlock.
@@sonwig5186 Technology levels. The universe of the Sojourn has neither of those things.
@@sonwig5186 FTL and artificial intelligence are not intertwined concepts. Plenty of sci-fi out there has had FTL be a thing without the other and vice versa.
✌️✌️
algorithm comment
Oooooooooooooooooooooooo
The couple from Voices of a Distant Star would’ve benefited a lot from having courier ships… 🥲