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Kerbfleet: A Jool Odyssey-CHAPTER 22 pg 2: Yet >another< narrative device!

Mister Dilsby

By Mister Dilsby
in KSP1 Mission Reports

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superstrijder15

superstrijder15

Posted
Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, Kuzzter said:

Umm...no. Those wheels would better be called "rolling down the runway into the water" gear :) 

Shouldn't you blow them of for a better streamline? Anyway, I've been there too. I used them to to make the worst arts-lite-or-something-which-is-mandatory-in-my-country project ever. A KSP sailing vessel in lieu of the ships going the the East Indies in the 16th century*! 

*Not actually sail powered

Edited by superstrijder15
typos
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KSK

KSK

Posted
Posted
2 hours ago, Ultimate Steve said:

Can it land on another aircraft carrier?

Oh boy. Carrierception!

I should build a flying aircraft carrier sometime.

Or you could do it with cargo vessels. You could have a whole stack of tankers all carried by one mega-vessel to move them to where they need to be. Or put another way

A ship shipping ship, shipping shipping ships.

 

...I'll get my coat.

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AviosAdku

AviosAdku

Posted
Posted

Ok, I think I just choked on nothing for a moment when I saw that (for effect that's all, don't worry).

An aircraft carrier, flying.

OK, it really did take off? Not that I find it unlikely in fact it probably makes perfect sense, these being Kerbals and all but ... aircraft carrier, flying.

...

Brain.exe has suffered a fatal error and stopped working.

...

Right, brain rebooted.

I don't know what the Kerbals plan is (apart from Shirley's intention to scan for the Kerbulan attack ship) but I'm pretty sure that rescuing any at-risk/stranded crews will be high on their priority list. I'll also second @KSK's idea that the Kerbulans will assume what comes up will be an armed response and think they are in trouble, particularly if the Enterprise finds the Kerbulan vessel and they converge on it, they only have limited (and possibly partly exhausted) ammunition after all (though to be on the safe side, I suggest approaching it with remote controlled vessels first until they're sure their racks are empty). On that note, I'd absolutely love to see ... who is it? ah, Gregmore Kermulan (at least I assume it's him), his reaction to a how many hundred ton aircraft carrier taking to the skies, quite the demonstration of capability in my eyes as well as getting a closer look at space (even if it is only for a short while, that much rocket power can't stay up that long but they don't know that).

Eagerly awaiting for what happens next.

Aku

P.S. apologies for the terrible attempt at parodying computer error messages (couldn't find a short one in the minute or so of research, any more would probably be over doing it for a minor joke.

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Zhetaan

Zhetaan

Posted
Posted (edited)

@AkuAerospace:

Apparently, you and Mort have something in common.

@Kuzzter:

This makes for some very interesting reading.  For most of this comic, I've been wondering about the obvious indications that Kerbin and Kerbulus are supposed to be the pacifist and violent sides of the same coin, otherwise equal in most every measurable way, but also the indications that they really aren't equal.

What I mean to say is that even when Kenlie started writing his 'ugly SSTO' story, it was obvious that the contents shocked, distressed, and even embarrassed him, but he was able to understand it.  By his own admission, his Kerbulan counterpart could not, which implies that Kenlie Kerman is more mentally capable.  That fact that he went to face that counterpart and expects to win (whether or not he survives the victory) suggests that he is aware of this.

If we look at Wernher, he is obviously an example of a Kerbulan who could adapt to Kerbin's nonviolent ways, but because we don't see his Kerbin counterpart, we don't know whether he is more capable of understanding the other point of view, as Kenlie Kerman is, or his counterpart was a true evil twin in what amounts to a mistake in the cosmic switcharoo.  (Or maybe the beard did it!)

Furthermore, though I don't know what you have planned for Gene, the Admiral, and the others, given that some people didn't make it out of the Tracking Station (and it would seem that quite a few didn't make it out of Micarooni), this is the first time that Kerbin has been directly confronted with murderdeth ... and they are coping beyond surprisingly well.

It was either outright stated or at least heavily implied that, just as Kerbfleet doesn't understand intentional violence, SPQK doesn't understand intentional nonviolence.  But the examples given by Kenlie, Gene, and Lisa show (from our oh-so-great sample size of three) that the pacifists can, if not adopt (we haven't seen that yet), understand the idea of violence.

All of this brings me to consider the question of what this means in terms of the larger worldview.  The Kerbulans as a group seem patently unwilling--or unable--to beat their swords into ploughshares, but the Kerbals who are aware of it seem capable of, if not beating their ploughshares into swords, then recognising that a ploughshare to the head is still an effective weapon.  Is this indicative of Kerbals as a group, as well?  What does it mean in terms of the morality of it?  The fact that the Kerbulans cannot grasp the concept of nonviolence implies in turn that their actions, though unpleasant, are just as natural as those of a mosquito.  I'm not sure I can accept that.

Instead, I decided to take a look at Adm. Shirley's personnel file: 

PERSONNEL RECORD--CONFIDENTIAL

Name = Shirley Kerman
Service = Command
Rank = Admiral
BadS = True
BadS = True
BadS = True
BadS = True
BadS = True
BadS = True
BadS = True
BadS = True
BadS = True
BadS = True
BadS = True
BadS = True
BadS = True
BadS = True
BadS = True
...

Nicely done, sir.

Edited by Zhetaan
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Mister Dilsby

Mister Dilsby

Posted
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Posted
26 minutes ago, Zhetaan said:

It was either outright stated or at least heavily implied that, just as Kerbfleet doesn't understand intentional violence, SPQK doesn't understand intentional nonviolence.  But the examples given by Kenlie, Gene, and Lisa show (from our oh-so-great sample size of three) that the pacifists can, if not adopt (we haven't seen that yet), understand the idea of violence.

Some really first rate analysis here, also by @AkuAerospace, @Dman979, @KSK and others--so, do Kerbals have the capacity for violence? The canonical answer--maybe! I refer to the first page of the Zweischenspiel:

Spoiler

pt1Cjlb.png

What would have happened, I wonder, if Wernher's arrival, and the beginning of the Space Program, hadn't unified the Federation in a mission of peaceful exploration? What if O.M.B. did have an "accident" with their building separators,and some kerbs got hurt? And then StrutCo caused an "accident" of their own? It's not hard to imagine where that could have led...I suppose one way to look at it is that the decision has been put off until now, ten years later.

And the related question: can the Kerbulans understand pacifism--that is, the decision not to do violence, even when violence might be the most practical, logical, and possibly even a plausibly moral solution? So far they haven't shown any such ability. Bob Kermulan has repeatedly said things like, "there's nothing else it could possibly be!" when mistaking Jooldiver probes for nuclear missiles. 

I guess we'll see, on both counts :) 

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Zhetaan

Zhetaan

Posted
Posted
1 minute ago, Kuzzter said:

What would have happened, I wonder, if Wernher's arrival, and the beginning of the Space Program, hadn't unified the Federation in a mission of peaceful exploration? What if O.M.B. did have an "accident" with their building separators,and some kerbs got hurt? And then StrutCo caused an "accident" of their own? It's not hard to imagine where that could have led...I suppose one way to look at it is that the decision has been put off until now, ten years later.

I was looking more at the second page, actually, where Gene admits that no one knew what they would do if StrutCo wouldn't let Kerbfleet talk some sense into them.  That indicated to me that they really didn't understand the concept of intentional violence--by rights, what you describe in terms of the corporate posturing could just as easily be taken as the various corporations' willingness to knock down their towers of blocks rather than let the new kid play with them.  In other words, I thought O.M.B. would just detonate all of their decouplers in the warehouse and then no one would have them.  Besides, even if O.M.B. was threatening harm, I sincerely doubt that StrutCo would have been the one getting the full attention of an aircraft carrier, nonviolent or otherwise.  The more obvious choices there are either O.M.B. for the threat or Kerbodyne/Rockomax for making the fuel pact that started all of it.

The idea that O.M.B. could have been making an actual threat didn't even enter my mind; I'll say that means you did a good job on the 'nonviolent Kerbal' characterisation.

On the other hand, the idea that Kerbin could be so easily tipped into a cesspit of violence suggests even more strongly that Kerbals make a choice not to engage in it, even if that choice is so thoroughly ingrained that they are not aware of having made it.  But that in turn makes the Kerbulans, who do not exhibit this, even more of an animalistic caricature; instead of equal-and-opposite, yin-and-yang, or even I-am-everything-you-are-not, the result is that as much as nonviolence describes Kerbals, violence defines Kerbulans--they will have a much harder time choosing something else, if they even can.

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Mister Dilsby

Mister Dilsby

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Posted
1 hour ago, Commander Zoom said:

Whenever I see a surface-navy vessel in the weight class of a battleship - or a carrier - taking to the skies, there's one musical theme I always think of.

Funny you should mention that. (See also: bilingual bonus)

hYaE3gb.png

...hey, if Admiral Riker can get an extra nacelle added to his flagship, surely a Kerbfleet admiral can get a couple added to hers :D 

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KSK

KSK

Posted
Posted

Just needs a little bit of Kerbfleet special saucer  now for a truly iconic look. :) 

Oh - and I know that the premise of Kerbfleet webcomics has always been that 'what you see on the page works in-game' but in this case, I say: full speed ahead and darn the physics hacks. When the Rule of Cool just got turned up to 11, well sometimes that's all you need!

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Mister Dilsby

Mister Dilsby

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Posted (edited)
15 minutes ago, Deddly said:

That was glorious! Though I do admit I was a little bit disappointed that Alt-F12 was needed

Yeah, me too :( But given the amount of time I spent developing the sealaunch-to-orbit Skimmeroo (which is actually, you know, shaped like an aircraft) it probably would have taken me a month or more to do it legit. 

22 minutes ago, Angel-125 said:

I'm curious to know how the Enterprise flies, it looks like a lot of mass aft. Must've been fun getting the thrust balanced too! :)

It flies exactly how you would expect if you took a hastily-built seagoing aircraft carrier model, which was only ever intended for a few B&W scenes, and bolted a couple of really heavy gratuitous pods to the rear flight deck. Turns out the nacelles are actually pretty useful for offsetting the unbalanced mass of the bridge! It flies reasonably straight, and I didn't even need a gravity hack to lift off. (though I may have turned it on a few times to get her down the runway and into the water in one piece) The only cheat active when Enterprise is flying is infinite fuel :) 

Edited by Kuzzter
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