Ringworld Planet Type?

[arosenberger14]

Had this thought when playing; a ringworld type "planet" could be a very cool map. No mining or oil, but lots of water and a reasonable climate, or not if the ring is starting to break down from age, neglect, or the dissolution war. Could make for a rather unique campaign playstyle.

[mroyer]

Maybe all the worlds are ring-worlds already, and that's why we can't go endlessly north or south.
(I guess latitudinal climate variation disproves that theory, though..)
-Mark R.

[Don_Kiyote]

From what I remember of the books, the original Ringworld had a surface area of about 20,000 Earth-sized planets. (...or was it way more?)

So a comparable SE map would be maybe ten million hexes wide...

[mroyer]

From what I remember of the books, the original Ringworld had a surface area of about 20,000 Earth-sized planets. (...or was it way more?)

So a comparable SE map would be maybe ten million hexes wide...

Yeah - Larry Niven's ringworld of the early 1970s went fully around the sun. There are other sorts of ringworlds speculated since then. For example, the game franchise Halo has much smaller ringworlds.

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-Mark R.

[Don_Kiyote]

the game franchise Halo has much smaller ringworlds.
-Mark R.

True enough. I haven't seen that until now.

They did the math for Ringworld. I mean, Niven and his contributors had an explicit design which was mathematically feasible. Given this incredibly strong ribbon material, granted. But in terms of orbital mechanics feasible. The idea is a variant of the Dyson Sphere, and shares its mathematical realism. (This is from the Intro to Book 2 iirc.)

I dont know any Halo lore. But do you think their ringwold has any math behind it? It might be more like some kind of really big space station, just without the hub and spokes, with a bunch of astroturf, potting soil, and goldfish ponds on it.

Also, theres no energy source

[mroyer]

I dont know any Halo lore.

Yeah, me either - I watch my kid play it and it seems pretty cool. The kind of thing I'd have gotten into if it existed forty years ago.

But do you think their ringwold has any math behind it?

I thought I read/heard somewhere that it did - but I really can't say.

For sure, intuitively it seems less stable, especially as it gets larger. I imagine things like differences between gravitational and centripetal forces of orbit from inner side of ring to outer side would conspire to put large stresses on the structure.

-Mark R.

[arosenberger14]

If I recall correctly, he did some basic math before writing the first book and thought it was stable, but then after it came out a bunch of astrophysicists started writing him telling him that the thing wasn't stable and would slide into the sun... so in the second book he added a bunch of engines to the thing to stabilize it and made it a big plot point.

[Don_Kiyote]

a bunch of astrophysicists started writing him telling him that the thing wasn't stable and would slide into the sun... so in the second book he added a bunch of engines to the thing to stabilize it and made it a big plot point.

I remember the space-ports on the outside of the ring, but I dont remember any engines. ...unless it was an angular boost from some kind of hydrogen scoop... And maybe yes, something about the revolution period becoming incrementally longer each year... in book 2?

Everything is so haaazy... Im not gonna check right now

Niven had the same chops as Bucky Fuller for a while. Pre-internet and he opened sourced the actual math for a Gigastructure. It was high modernism in space. And it was mathematically, ecologically and Physics-wise 100% conceptually valid. That 'planet', that entire stellar structure, could and may exist in reality as permanent artifact in, or outside of, the Galaxy. And it could, like a planet, subsist and evolve for millions of years independent of and impervious to sentient meddling. Almost.

Ringworld was an analog of Metabolisms "Artificial Ground", from the Architecture of Megastructures: a new kind of Nature. It was only the actual engineering which was inconceivable.

[mroyer]

So, at 93million mile radius, that's about 942.5 million km or about 4.7 million Shadow Empire hexes, longitudinally. Probably qualifies as a large world. Probably don't need the 'spread out' history class for that one.

-Mark R.

[Don_Kiyote]

I know right...

Just imagine a multiplayer or PBEM on that map, where you need to play one turn every two days.

So, advancing at an average of 10 hexes a turn in to the unknown, it will take you until the fourth generation of your children just to find the other player.

[Tartannosaur]

For some reason I always imagined ringworlds being latitudinal. It might have been due to this cover art. Anyway for gameplay purposes you could definitely implement "small" ringworlds either with a longitudinal basis (200x20 hexes) or latitudinal basis (20x200 hexes). These would have enough strategic variety to set them apart from other worlds because fronts would eventually span from edge to edge of the map, and global conquest would require deep pushes into these narrow fronts. There would be less flanking, less maneuver, and more set-piece, grinding battles as fronts swayed back and forth.

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[Don_Kiyote]

you could definitely implement "small" ringworlds either with a longitudinal basis (200x20 hexes) or latitudinal basis (20x200 hexes).

ha thats just a new map size.

Honestly the map type I would most like to see is a sphere.

[fibol]

A small ringworld does sound like a pretty interesting map to play on.
Should definetly be 200x20 though because monitors are wider than high.

[mroyer]

My original question near the top of this thread is: what would be the difference between a small ring world and what we already have (besides no variation of climate based on longitude)?

-Mark R.