Novalith Physics

umm... is this soase or halo or stargate or startreck or what? you did alot of cutting and pasting it seems...

it travels in phase space... so the whole light speed thing is moot.

it travels in phase space... so if you can monitor phase space (everyone can) you can detect it...

and cause its traveling in phase space you cant destroy it (just like everything else in phase space...)

Um I believe you can detect phase space lanes. but Novalith Slugs travel where ever they want in phase space, and Im not too sure if you can detect it. You might be able to see it on the map but I have no clue as to if your warned of an impending Novalith Slug.

Yes, you are warned of incoming slugs.

The way the game explains the Novalith, is essently, a Giant Phase Missile.

1. It is a missile, though the explosion on launch indicates it may have an initial push to help. But the in-game descriptions describe it clearly as a missile.

2. It is in phase space. It is detectable, but an object in phase space cannot interact with other objects. Thus defense/atmostphere are moot.

3. It might be a nuclear warhead, but it might not. Antimatter is NOT out of the question, remember, most abilities cost antimatter. Thus there must be antimatter to cost! Remember, the Novalith DOES require antimatter to fire. I doubt it is a nuclear warhead, as they just arn't' that big.

It actually travels in normal space and is an anti-planetary weapon.  Really, it is probably fired near .99c.  The other thing to keep in mind is the size of the round.  Something a few kilometers in length is not going to disintegrate.  It can't.

In all reality, the Novalith is weak.  A true Novalith ought to be far more powerful than it is.  250MT is enough to take out a large swath of territory, but not a planet.  One GT would cause continental destruction, but not a planet.  If you really had a round that was a few kilometers in length, it would be far more deadly than you could imagine, even if it was a kinetic bolt only.

The government is looking into an alternative to nukes right now, this new type of weapon would be simple kinetic darts.  These would be held in high orbit satellites that would hold around two dozen.  Each dart would be twenty feet long and a foot in diameter.  Now, they would not be explosive in any way shape or form.  All you do to fire is send the satellite over the target and drop the dart.  Gravity does the rest.  By the time it hits the ground, it is going fast enough to have the same damage potential as a nuke.  This kinetic energy is in the range of MT.  So imagine what would happen with the same thing only scaled up a hundred times.  The destruction would be incomprehensible.

So in all reality, the Novalith would be incredibly powerful and would be in the range of 10GT.  However, if you used AM instead, that damage potential would be so high that you could wipe an entire planet from existence.  They say that it takes 60T of AM to break a planet in two, well the Novalith shot would be far more massive than that, so you can be sure that nothing would be left.  Either way, you still end up with everyone on the planet dying.

EDIT: Also, it should be noted that anything in phase space is transluscent.  The novalith warhead is not transluscent.  Also, if you aim it so that it goes through an enemy gravity well, it can be clearly seen and does not have the classic Phase Cone trailing it.  Also, it isn't a PM as the TEC doesn't have them.  Another note is that it is indeed nuclear.  Read the description of the missile while it is in transit to its target.

the "Project Thor", which was the satellite with the "telephone pole darts of doom" that dropped onto a planet was actually dropped. A real pity, as the weapon would have lost only 3% of its mass from reentry, and inflict 15 tons of TNT equivalent damage.

The weapon is also called "Rods of God".

Correct, but the principle still applies.  You get something aerodynamic and you don't have to worry about loss of energy through vaporization.  Of course, the other option is to make something that will vaporize in the atmosphere and boil off all the air.  That would be an equally nasty weapon as one that makes a crater.

The description doesn't support your claim (althought it doesn't refute it, either).

"The apex of TEC ordinance technology; it will cause tremendous damage to a planet's infrastructure on impact."
and the research subject description:
"Grants access to the Novalith Cannon, allowing your empire to bombard enemy planets from afar."

In addition, the Vasari audio cue for ANY superweapon discharge is "A giant shockwave ripples through phase space!"

The TEC Warining is "A power surge of GREAT MAGNITUDE has been detected!" (Capitolized to note words emphasized)

"This is the ultimate weapon of the TEC and can be constructed only after laborious re-search and cost.  the Novalith Cannon is capable of firing a devastating shot through phase space at an enemy planet, causing obscene damage."-Sins Training Manual

No mention of nuclear ordinance here or the info infinite void provided, though i think it may be hinted by its effect on population.

Also, all the other TEC siege methods are nuclear...

Perhaps that is where I got it confused, though I was thinking that somewhere it at least mentioned something about being nuclear..

From real world physics:-

An object 1000m across hitting a planet at 50,000Km/h would create a crater 50+Km across and cause damage to 1000Km, and would most likely be an ELE.

An object 1000m across hitting a planet at 0.99c would instantly vapourize the planet.

So, at 0.99c, an object just has to be an object. It doesn't need to be a weapon of any kind.

very true Fuzzy Logic.

Anything that travels at 3 km/s (kips) will do its own weight (or more) in damage of TNT equivalent; i.e., a 1 lb object at 2 miles/second (assuming an inert rock or similar) will do as much damage as 1 lb TNT.

Seems like not much, no? Well, the damage goes up a bit as things get bigger and/or larger masses.

Anything hitting at high relativistic velocity is a "I win" card for the sender. It is effectively impossible to dodge (unless you are shooting a non-fragmentary round at a ship of a distance of several light-minutes to light-hours (or more)), and is NEVER where you see it.

I will use a similar scenario to what Fuzzy used, except I will use- kips, instead of km/h, and mass (in kg/metric tonnes) instead of diameter (in meters).

So, we will say, 42,000 kips, 1,000,000 kg (1,000 metric tonnes). This just happens to be sub-relativistic BTW.

Ke= 0.5*M*V^2, so the object has=8.82e14 (e=exponent) joules of energy. Nearly 300 kilotons TNT equivalent damage. About a citykiller.

Now, let's scale it up EVEN MORE. We will now say- V=0.5c, M=1,000,000 metric tonnes (1,000,000,000 kg). Since this is relativistic, we use a different equation that properly describes the damage.

Ker= ((1/sqrt(1-P^2))-1)*M*C^2. C=3e8, so C^2=9e16, P=% of c, which is 0.5; so, Ker=1.39e25 J, or nearly enough yield to blow off the atmosphere of Earth.

That's true.  Basically, don't mess with a novalith if one was ever made.  In the game though, they are far weaker than they should be.  They say that interstellar particles moving at .97c have the same force as a tennis ball at 100mph.  That's a lot of energy for one particle, but multiply that by however many quintillion, and you will start to see why a true novalith would spell doom to a planet very very easily.

I really need to get the book The Killing Star. It has a civilization that has developed R-Bombs (term for >0.14c weapon system), and uses them against humans. Only 2 people left (of course male+female), and they become "zoo animals" for the aliens.

The aliens apparently explain their reasons as "you developed AM rockets. It was you or us." I personally cannot blame them. Humanity would do the same thing, would they not?

no.  we didn't nuke Russia when they developed nukes.

Its called MAD.  That is why Moscow isn't glass.  Though I think that a war with such a race could have been avoided by the same principle.  AM bombs are deadly, but firing anything near c is overkill.

When it comes to humans vs humans, we usually have no problem killing each other off when one has a substantial advantage over the other...for example guns vs bows and arrows. When you have two groups that are leveled enough when it comes to killing power, both sides will step back and think about the ramifications of going to war with each other. They will remain heated opponents of each other but out of fear of being on the losing end they will only use less upfront techniques to piss each other off or underhandedly get the advantage through development.

The Killing Star, obviously the aliens were the ones with guns and we were the ones with bows and arrows, We could still do damage, but the enemy had weapons far better then our own. And just used the threat of us being able to do damage as their excuse to wipe us out. Eliminating any chance of us becoming equal to them in firepower.

That's true.  When you have two races meet with different technological levels, you get one of three results.

1. The advanced race wipes out the inferior one.  This is very common throughout history.

2. The advanced race just leaves.  This is very rare.

3. The advanced race acts benevolently to befriend the inferior race, though usually for purposes such as aiding them in one of their wars.

1 is by far the most common thing, while three only happens when the advanced race is fighting their own battle and need all the help they can get, so they call on an inferior race to join them.  We did this in the French and Indian War.  We treated them well so that they would fight our battles.  And then we turned on them and shoved them on the reservations.  A tragedy yes, but especially when we kicked the Cherokees out.  They had become modern in virtually every way, and we still kicked them off their land.  (Actually, Georgia did as the Supreme Court said that they had a right to stay there, though Jackson told Georgia he wouldn't enforce the ruling...)

makes you wonder about the Kostra cannon

If you scale the novalith cannon and warhead to a planet in Sins, the cannon would be more like a 100 or so miles across and 10 or so miles across, respectively, assuming that the planets are Earth sized. A several mile-wide projectile, even if it were nuclear, would probably annihilate a planet (or at least a good deal of it). Considering that asteroids go much slower and are not filled with explosives (in most cases :P), the target planet would become uninhabitable at best (at least for a long while).

Btw, Evil, come back to being alive! lol

Problem with using a normal projectile, firing at .99 C the speed of light, according to newtons laws, all the energy that goes into the proctile, goes into the cannon itself.

AKA- that is one large recoil!

Again, I am pretty sure the novalith is a missile. Which would explain why it is on the end of the missile reaserch tree.

Anubis-Come back alive to what? no one has posted on the RG forums for who knows how long. Even if someone does, a few posts per month doesn't equal life.

Personally, i think it's a hybrid missile/railgun round.  Watch the weapon when it fires and you'll see why.

*bookmarking for later*

stupid copy and paste from manual   

Novalith Cannon:

This is the ultimate weapon of the TEC and can be constructed only

after laborious re-search and cost. The Novalith cannon is capable of firing a devastating

shot through phase space at an enemy planet, causing obscene damage.

Just wanted to put that up there so everyone saw that according to the manual, it is shot into phase space. Someone said earlier that it couldnt possibly be in phase space as it didnt have the well known cone around it while it travelled. If anything this projectile is a smartbomb. Basically it knows where its going, and to adjust when a change occurs. If you zoom in to the GW that the shot is targeting and watch it intercept the planet. You realize its travelling far too fast for it not to be in phase space aka hyperspace if you look into the files. Obviously real world it wouldnt be moving that fast if the TEC still wanted the planet to exist after the fact. If anything this smartbomb probably drops out of phase space miliseconds before making contact so that it doesnt pass right through the planet considering how it travels through planets between the Novalith and the target planet. (ingame this is probably to keep it from striking nontargets aswell because everything is seethrough when in phase space which indicates that its "phased" out as the namesake indicates) 

Real world physics tells us that most of the things ingame arent realistic at all. So we need to accept the idea that SoaSE is in its own universe with its own physics.

Now for the impact. If your lucky enough to have a scout or even some ships in the GW of the target planet. Or if your on the recieving end of a Novalith shot. Youll notice the difference between Siege/Capital ship bombardment and the Novalith. Siege/Capitals use Nuclear ordinance to accomplish this. Just look up the TEC Siege Frigate to see that its been armed with Nuclear ordinance.

The Novalith on the other hand, appears to do something different. First instead of a fireball its more of a shockwave with a flash of light. It is immediately followed by a billow of smoke that actually leaves the atmosphere. This tells us that it doesnt carry any ordinance as it doesnt react upon impact as the Nuclear impact sustained from other siege methods. But that its actually just a kinetic projectile with an onboard computer. And the sheer force from the speed of the projectile parts the atmosphere long enough for smoke to actually escape. To imagine this think about a .50 cal round. Literally the size and speed of the round creates a bubble as it parts the actual air. You dont have to be hit by the actual round to sustain damage. Only be close enough to the round to lose flesh and body parts.