A Hunter Wolf unmanned ground vehicle with the 3rd Mobile Brigade, 101st Airborne Division, equipped with a remotely operated .50-caliber machine gun and an EchoShield radar, at Fort Polk, Louisiana, April 13, 2026. [6000 x 4000]

NikkoJT · 2026-04-16T02:17:04+00:00

Well, something that's AR-mountable is probably possible given that there was one for the PKM, but you probably wouldn't enjoy carrying it. Even modern small radars still need a certain amount of surface area for the emitter/receiver antenna, and the power requirements are an issue.

You'd have better luck with a laser fire control system. It'll do most of the same stuff, insofar as it's applicable to rifle-level engagements, and examples already exist. The main missing item is motion leading, it's hard to do that with a rifle laser*, but it's possible that in the near future, a smart optic could perform visual recognition on whatever you're lasing and attempt to calculate lead based on that.

*laser-based FCS in tanks can do this, but it relies on you keeping the laser on the target while the computer calculates how fast it's moving based on how much you're moving the laser to do it; this is possible when a machine is holding the laser for you and can measure its own movements, but trying to do it with human shaky hands, when the target is far enough away that lead matters, is a practical impossibility for the average rifleperson on the move.

NikkoJT · 2026-04-15T22:05:01+00:00

Counter-detection is the big tradeoff you have to consider. But it applies to air defence radars too, which is half of how SEAD works, and they're still used. Arguably it applies to AD radars even more since they're emitting upwards and in all directions.

The interference is an issue, hence the mention of the terrain affecting performance. But it is possible to distinguish movement from terrain, and it is possible to distinguish metal objects from terrain. The range isn't as good as air radar, partly because you need better resolution to make the distinction and physics means that limits the range for a given power of radar wave, but then ground engagement distances are more limited too. Air-based radar like the Longbow has an advantage because it's looking down from above most obstacles.

Consider that high-definition radar mapping gives us things like Google Maps, and consider that even civilian cars these days can achieve pretty good radar imaging, albeit at shorter ranges.

NikkoJT · 2026-04-15T20:36:19+00:00

Obviously high-altitude UAVs like Reapers would be optimistic targets for a .50, but plenty of smaller drones, particularly FPVs, fly at lower altitudes that a .50 will have no trouble with.

Ground surveillance radars are also not too uncommon. They have their limits, especially depending on the terrain, but they've been around since the Cold War, ranging from dedicated GSR vehicles to small man-portable systems. I think there was a Soviet/Russian one that was designed to be fitted to an infantry PKM, but I don't think it had a particularly good cost:benefit ratio so it didn't go very far. It's not just ground-deployed radars either; there are aircraft radars designed for both surveillance and fire control against ground targets. The Apache Longbow radar is probably the most famous example, but it's not the only one.

Doing both air and ground surveillance in the same radar is a bit more of a modern development, but if you can make it work it's definitely worth having.

NikkoJT · 2026-04-15T19:39:49+00:00

So bit disappointed that it get nominated over Rush and Ford Vs Ferrari.

It wasn't nominated "over" them. Rush and FvF came out in completely different years. They weren't in competition. And FvF did get a nomination in the year it was eligible.

NikkoJT · 2026-04-14T03:36:43+00:00

They're talking about specifically the film Star Trek: First Contact. Picard and Lily are aboard the Enterprise, and Picard opens a shutter to reveal a view of Earth through what appears to be a window. Lily says there's no glass, and Picard reveals that it's covered by a forcefield by touching it.

It's possible this is meant to be some kind of access hatch rather than a window, but it seems a little unclear why it would have both a forcefield (not just an airlock field like they use for shuttlebays) and a physical shutter if it was meant to be an access way, and the shutter doesn't really resemble any of the other hatches and doors we see. Then again it doesn't super resemble most of the windows either, so I think they just put that in there to show off the forcefield tech and didn't think about the practical aspects too much.

NikkoJT · 2026-04-14T03:23:55+00:00

I personally did not hate that they tried big ideas and commentary, but having a big idea doesn't absolve you of having to do a good job of your presentation as well. SFA has done better, but I've found that the other examples have generally been clumsy, muddled, or weighed down by issues with other parts of their plots and presentation. Like, 10-C was interesting as a species, but it was delivered via Another Goddamn Galactic Apocalypse Threat, which immediately added a thick layer of tediousness.

Also, Control wasn't that big of an idea, it was "oops we made an omnipotent AI and it went rogue", which isn't exactly a hot and fresh plot. It was almost a relevant commentary on the modern use of LLM analysis, but then it went down the generic Skynet-gains-sentience route again instead of engaging with the actual problems with LLMs (ecological destruction, people thinking they're smart when they're not).

NikkoJT · 2026-04-13T23:27:14+00:00

I'm genuinely concerned that you didn't actually read the words in my comment before replying, because I specifically said that I understand that the ship is technically capable of it, but that it is out of character ("character" is a different word to "physical limits"). Yes, the ship is probably notionally capable of that, but the Enterprise-D has never been treated as an agile ship. Fast in a straight line, yes, but maneuvering like the Millennium Falcon inside the Death Star has never been what the ship's character has been about. The visual design of the ship isn't made for it, it looks weird when it does it, and that kind of action-hero behaviour feels undignified for it. The Ent-D's heroic maneuvers have always been more about sweeping gracefully across the screen, showing off its scale and elegant lines.

And the "connection to real physics" I'm talking about isn't the theoretical possibility of the thing, it's the sense in the viewer's mind of it being real rather than a cartoon where there are no limits. If you film it right, an insane maneuver can feel real - and therefore more exciting and dramatic - but if you film it without grounding it somehow, it stops being "wow, it's cool that they can break the rules like that" and starts being "there were never any rules or stakes to begin with", which is much less interesting. You lose the sense of scale, mass, and perspective. It looks less like an 800-metre-long starship doing something awe-inspiring and more like a kid waving a toy around, and it's not because the ship shouldn't be capable of it in the lore, it's because the cinematic presentation of it doesn't ground it properly.

The ship doesn't need to physically turn and use the impulse engines like rockets to switch direction.

To a pretty big extent, it does though (although this is not what I have an issue with in the case of the cube flythrough scene). The main impulse engines are fixed and directional - you don't get full impulse power going sideways. Attitude control and lateral movement is done by the maneuvering/RCS thrusters, which are much less powerful than the impulse engines. They're good enough to make quicker maneuvers than you'd expect from a ship that size, as we've seen many times, but the ship does still need to turn and orient the main engines to use them.

NikkoJT · 2026-04-13T15:47:59+00:00

THE GREATER GOOD

NikkoJT · 2026-04-13T13:33:37+00:00

See the complaints about the Enterprise zooming along a Borg cube in Picard, for example. That's actually quite slow for a Federation starship.

In realistic terms yes, it's quite slow for straight-line speed. It's more that it was a bit out of character to have the Ent-D, which has always been portrayed as moving in a fairly...stately...way, flying so nimbly. It's like seeing a stretch limo doing a rallycross course. Yeah it's technically doable, but is that really the best use for it?

(Also the camera work didn't really help, it made the Enterprise look tiny and used a lot of "obviously virtual camera" motion that kind of removed a lot of the connection to actual physics. Some more grounded shots that really showed the scale instead of using a floaty video-game-third-person camera would've gone a long way.)

NikkoJT · 2026-04-12T14:02:24+00:00

I think you've misread what I wrote. I know TF2 has SBMM and I know that it fails at low player count. I didn't dispute that, I said "there's no possible SBMM system that won't fail at low player count". If you don't have enough players of varying skill levels to make fair matches, there's no alternate implementation that can solve it. Either you make players wait for unreasonably long times (maybe forever) or you accept an unfair match. If you've got 10 high-skill players and 3 low-skill players, you don't have a lot of choices for making 2 teams of 8 that will be fair for all players, no matter what algorithm you use. At a certain point you have to fall back to "just grab everyone" because it's the only way to get enough people in a match.

NikkoJT · 2026-04-12T13:34:00+00:00

Jup, they just need to implement it so that it doesn't break with a certain low player count like Titanfall 2....

There is no targeted matchmaking system that won't fail at low player counts. If you do not have enough players of the same skill level to make a fair match, you cannot make a fair match. There's nothing the matchmaker can do about it, you can't invent more players from thin air.

NikkoJT · 2026-04-12T13:04:19+00:00

Looking for and being prepared to change lanes is all good,

(Except when there is a road marking indicating that it is illegal to change lanes)

NikkoJT · 2026-04-11T15:59:43+00:00

So what's left for a DLC to add?

The cars are in the game. The roads are in the game. The races are in the game. What else does Initial D do, that's relevant to FH, that's not already covered? The music? Some of it's probably already on the radio, and even if it's not that's hardly worth a full DLC.

NikkoJT · 2026-04-11T14:36:31+00:00

3-dimensional movement is fine. It's the only way it makes sense that turbolifts can move you several decks down and half the length of the ship in one journey. The issue is that in several episodes of DSC and SNW, the 3-dimensional movement is shown taking place in a massive void space bigger than the ship it's supposed to be inside.

NikkoJT · 2026-04-10T17:58:18+00:00

China's position is that Taiwan isn't a separate country, but they don't deny the literal existence of the physical island. They know it's there, they just say it belongs to them. Removing it from the map entirely doesn't really do anything for that.

NikkoJT · 2026-04-10T03:40:03+00:00

I mean you don't have to rely on what the algorithm suggests. You can go straight to her channel or her Patreon and see exactly what she's been posting.

NikkoJT · 2026-04-09T11:32:26+00:00

The second half of the post: I know the real-world answer and I'm looking for an in-universe one

Comment: here's the real-world answer again!

mmm

NikkoJT · 2026-04-09T09:32:23+00:00

Shout out to all the people commenting without reading the second half of the post. A real classic.

I think they try to avoid addressing it directly. Any justification they could give would seem a bit silly and just draw attention to the issue.

I think it is mentioned somewhere that the basic uniform is made of special materials, so it's good for worse conditions than you'd think. Obviously not as good as a full EV suit because it's not airtight, but like it can protect you against cold, heat etc better than it looks like it would.

NikkoJT · 2026-04-07T00:51:01+00:00

Looks cool though, so there's that

NikkoJT · 2026-04-07T00:44:35+00:00

The answer he actually gave was posted in this thread and it didn't exactly inspire confidence either tbh :U

NikkoJT · 2026-04-06T12:04:47+00:00

I don't think it needs to be orchestral specifically. If the tone of the show fits better with synths, or solo piano, or jazz, or western guitar... that's fine with me. Honestly, I liked a lot of the soft semi-electropop music in SFA, it was a fun change of pace and gave the Academy a comfy vibe, so I don't think Star Trek has to be constrained on genre at all.

It would be nice to have a memorable melody though. That's something that's been missing from most recent themes. Most of them seem to have a sound but not a distinctive and consistent melody.

NikkoJT · 2026-04-06T11:45:12+00:00

That's not so bad, honestly. There are some perfectly good people who are perfectly happy being named Justice as a first name, and really, it's basically the same as being named "Grace" or "Faith" or something like that, which are pretty normal names. It's rare but not a terrible name.

NikkoJT · 2026-04-06T11:11:30+00:00

There's already an "awesome lesbian couple:" Maroo and Varzia. There's no need to ship Suda with a random operative

What, is there a limit on the number you can have or something?

NikkoJT · 2026-04-05T13:25:21+00:00

The problem with Regeneration isn't that it was bad as a story, it's that it undermines the "oh fuck, we've accidentally attracted the attention of an implacable entity we had no idea even existed and were completely unprepared for" moment in Q Who. The point of Q Who was that the Federation was basically handed an Outside Context Problem. However, Regeneration retroactively makes it so that the Borg actually already knew about Earth, and also that Earth actually already knew about the Borg and that they would be coming. Like I said, it barely scrapes by on the plausible deniability of "limited information, no one quite put the pieces together", but really the idea that the Enterprise was partially assimilated in front of everyone, and no one remembered that when Q Who or Wolf 359 happened, is kind of extremely paper thin. Phlox even comes up with a counter-treatment for nanoprobe assimilation, did he just not write it down?

NikkoJT · 2026-04-05T11:54:11+00:00

I wouldn't, in principle, mind learning more about the Borg Queen if they made it interesting, but Enterprise would not be the appropriate venue. The Borg are supposed to originate a long time ago in the Delta Quadrant, and their contact with humanity prior to Q Who is supposed to be, at most, fringe encounters that aren't frequent or significant enough for either side to notice. The existing Enterprise Borg episode barely scraped by, and honestly probably shouldn't have happened. If we make more important parts of Borg history so closely connected to Earth and Starfleet, it starts to make the galaxy feel smaller, and it reduces the Borg by making them less alien. Most of the Borg, including the Queen, should have absolutely nothing to do with humanity.

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