Shark_Force wrote: in megaversal terms, rifts earth IS a nowhere planet. the CS are like tiny little krill in an ocean full of gigantic sea monsters. there are canon galactic empires that have thousands of planets, each with more advanced tech than the CS by quite a bit.
Not really. The only thing they have is space flight. Their weapons or anything else aren't better than the CS. Much less "by quite a bit". The CS have never gone starward. They've been busy.
Shark_Force wrote: yes, it has lots of rifts leading to and from it. and most of those are also from planets that are even more pathetically tiny in the grand scheme of things.
Information not in evidence. Rifts go to everywhere. The number of technologically advanced dbees shows that.
Shark_Force wrote:
in megaversal terms, it *is* six guys in a mud hut
Says you. Others seem to think it's the key to metaversal travel and have made it the centerpeice of such a spanning system. You know, Atlantis is based around the fact.
Shark_Force wrote:
how do i know that others don't have it? because the article is about the special technology available to the CS.
So an article only about the CS doesn't tell you about everyone else? No kiddin' Shark. Really? the CS have laser pistols and Body armor. They're very own special built ones with scaaaaaaaaaaary skull motifs. Does that mean noone else has laser pistols and armor? Doubtful. We know it doesn't.
Shark_Force wrote:
if everyone has it, it's no more special than a laser pistol or a fully automatic SMG.
It's special to the CS as it solves a problem. We don't know if others use it or not. Again as I pointed out (( and people like to ignore)) The information on Bases out side of the CS or in other planets is pretty slim.
look at the siege on tolkeen. When the war started, Tolkeen suddenly had the ability to literly suck up nuclear ICBMs and shunt them off to other dimenions. Thhat worked 100%, having never been tested. out of nowhere, with no prior indication of anything even remotely like it in Rifts Canon ever.
Yet there it was. Poof. Done. And the war went on for 6 books instead of 6 paragraphs had the nukes hit. The Tolkeenites managed to develope uniquie technology (( as far as we know)) out of no whhere that solved a major problem (( getting nuked and the war lasting 5 minutes)).
For all we know it could be standard, but it never appeared before (( Even in atlantis who is far far more magically advanced)).
Shark_Force wrote:
and it's the sort of thing that completely changes how the setting works.
Oh posh. It just stops magical twinks from going "ok I use a level 4 spell to blow up chi town" it doesn't "Completely change how the setting works" It's technology thatblocks two magic spells. It's less system changing than technowizardry ((in wich you find technology CAN and DOES effect magic if used right))
Shark_Force wrote: it's the sort of thing that would be important to know. it isn't important to the setting to know whether the CS or anyone else has access to microwave ovens, for the most part. but it would be pretty damned important to know if they have something equivalent to the robotech's grand cannon,
So now in your hyperbole you're equating a defence ring that prevents teleportation and astral scrying..... but not simply walking past it... to a mile long ships cannon that does infinate damage to everything in it's path?
LOL
Wow.
Shark_Force wrote: and that sort of information really needs to be included if it does exist. now we could argue that we don't know that the CS (or anyone else) doesn't have that kind of weapon... or we could acknowledge that since it isn't mentioned, the CS (and other places) most likely don't have it.
It is mentioned. Right where I said. And repeatedly in multiple rifters. *shrugs* As to why it wasn't mentioned in the RUE. I suspect, that it didn't come up. Not becuase it's totally unknowable, but because when the game first came out, the designers didn't think it up. They're game players and hobbiests. Look at the hundreds of military things glossed over or just blatently wrong about rifts. It's just one of those. The books aren't written by military folk. So they don't think like Military folk. These are the same guys that write about dragons and floopers. As for 'revisions' later on. Again..... other than very very very general terms. What information DO we have about the megacities? Not much.
If you don't want to use it. Thenn don't. But it explains, and simply, a 'hole' in the setting.
Shark_Force wrote: as far as keeping this a secret, it's not a matter of not telling anyone. it's a matter of people noticing "hey, when someone tried to teleport themselves/some object in they/it got launched 2,000 feet through the air and crashed into the middle of the burbs just after they spent months digging up all the sewers for no apparent reason
Right.. they're that stupid. They went out with big massive trucks and installed all the stuff with people watching and turned it on all at once, and there were so many mages out there teleporting in at such a swift frequency they could assertain that exact moment.
Riiiight.
The CS is sooooo stupid, that they did it that braindead way.
Shark_Force wrote:
and shipping in massive high-tech electronics to the site".
Right. The CS.. in it's MASSIVE STUPIDITY.... never would have thought that far ahead. never would have actually... gone in and repaired some sewers.... naa... wouldn't have hidden the rings in pipes marked "BIO HAZARD, HUMAN WASTE" with big bright pictographs for those that can't read. Wouldn't have put in more pipes 100% the same that HAD... bio waste in them. Couldn't have sent in people from the processing plants, Through the pipes instead of driving out and digging a hole or going down a manhole cover.
Couldn't have organized distractions, like burbs burnings or military actions, mass round ups or detainment.... Couldn't have done it 100 ways other than just walking out there shouting at the top of their lungs that they were installing top secret stuff underground. They're sooo stupid that they can build megacities, and do all the genetic engineering, and nuclear science, but they're SOOOO Dumb, they didn't think even 10 seconds about how to sneak the tech in, under a bunch of illiterate squatters.
Shark_Force wrote: the odds of that happening more than a couple of times, and anyone chalking it up to mere coincidence, are so low that it's an insult to our intelligence to try and claim that it's a secret.
No Shark. it's not a secret that you can no longer teleport into the mega cities or Bases. It's just a secret as to how they do it. The Mages have no idea how it's being done. It could be a bubble projected from some machine in the center of the city. it could be something from the top of the vaguely pyramidal city shape (( remember they're big in rifts magic)), it could be something beamed down from space. (( the mages don't know the CS has no satellites. Or have not sinced launched some)) The mages don't know if it's something imbedded in the walls. Or even the effect of alll that technology itself. It's like trying to explain an Ipad to a member of one of the rainforest tribes today. It's not that the guy from that rainforrest tribe is stupid. He's a human, same as you or I. It's just so far beyond anything he understands and out of his realm of experience, that no matter what he GUESSES it is, he's not going to get it. He has no frame of reference. You can show him. "Tap this bright square, then the arrow, and it'll play a movie" But he has no fathoming of how it works. (( not that many of us do either really)) Same sort of thing with the anti teleporter rings. The mages trying to teleport through, know they're flung back. but have no clue as to why they were. They just know they were.
Shark_Force wrote:
especially when, if it's available elsewhere, who's more likely to have the technology, or knowledge of the technology's existence... the many dimension-traveling super-intelligent creatures which live outside of the CS, or the xenophobic knowledge-suppressing magic-hating nation with no interdimensional allies?
Maybe some of them do know about it. The write ups we have for dbees are a page or two at bbest. All the things they know or do not know would take 100s of 1000s of books per species.
Shark_Force wrote:
information which completely changes the function of the setting needs to be stated.
Information that blocks two spells, isn't as big or dire as you're making out. But if it helps to sccream and run around and say the sky is falling!! The entire universe is changed, go ahead.
Shark_Force wrote: this is not some minor side-note, this is a major change in how the setting works.
It's so minor as to only be needed to fill one plot hole. All it does is prevent the teleporting and astral scrying of the area inside the ring.
Does nothing else. You can walk across them with out even breaking stride.
Plans for advancement, what the CS is working on, what they have up their sleevs for the near future. 
If it can be done on something as small as cuffs,it can be done on something bigger.
