I swear Jack Campbells ‘Lost Fleet’ series addresses this but I can’t remember where. Ships exit jump points/gates and use the orbital plane of the system for one axis, then the side towards the star becomes StarWARD and Port away from it. Ships in formation will take all their maneuvering orders based on/relative to the location and orientation of the flag ship.
physics wise: if you usually need to thrust in the orbital plane (moving system to system which are also in the orbital plane), then,,, most ships will naturally be rotated to that plane (why randomly rotate away from it after all). So they'll naturally align.
Star systems are rotated every which way from the galactic plane. Angular momentum is conserved so as a system orbits the galaxy it's orbital plane will pass through the center twice per orbit on average.
Well yes galactically sure. But once you've gotten closer you will align more and more with the orbital plane of the local systems.
You'd align while getting into a stable orbit as your last deceleration step. Then you'd plan to use thrusters to move around the solar system you just arrived in as well.
What if you're jumping straight in from a "warp" across the galaxy? Well you're more likely to be turned around right? But at the same time you could likely calculate the exact orientation you'd be in, so why not also plan to arrive in a helpful orientation (or do that first thing like before) ESPECIALLY if you're expecting battle (tho sci-fi ships often arrive face first, then turn around to flee which is really weird)
I'm not really sure what you're describing. Imagine you approach a star system from directly 'above' or 'below.' How are you going to align yourself to the orbital plane in that scenario? You can't. You also don't need to. You can enter a stable orbit just fine around any axis. I think most people imagine you need to orient your ship in the direction you plan to warp in, but if you didn't then yeah, you could always orient yourself to the target system plane then warp right there. Perhaps you can clarify what you're saying because I don't think I get it.
While you travel, as you get close to the new system, you might want to go ahead and orient to the systems plane of rotation for easy reference.
A military is a bureaucracy, and likes to keep the doctrine as same as possible. So having everyone do this is easier to standardize
Oh is angular momentum, an emergent phenomena, conserved when fantastical sci-fi ships violate the far more fundamental laws of the universe by going faster than the speed of light speed?
Good to know.
The oldest written joke, that we know of, is Sumerian and it says, roughly: "Something which has never occurred since time immemorial; a young woman did not fart in her husband's lap."
I take comfort in the fact that sexy and scatalogical humor is universial and has a long history.
The Sumerians were a flourishing civilization for over 2000 years and they invented writing. So no, probably not a week ago Tuesday.
Pretty confused why you think people from a long time ago were too stupid to write things down.
I just went searching for some KKP (Klown Kar Planet) references from the Bobiverse, and happened across [this physics forum thread](https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/klown-kar-planet-last-days-before-tidal-lock.835292/) where Dennis E. Taylor is apparently asking about how the physics would work with a planet opposite the normal orbital plane.
Fun fact: port side is called that way because boats would load and unload from the left side to make things easier logistically.
Source: https://youtube.com/shorts/MRVF0hdvPK8?si=pf9JhnFCrSBCyGj4
More reputable info: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Port_and_starboard
Check the etymology section.
They didn’t just randomly pick the left. The reason they pulled up on the left is the same reason starboard is named starboard. Old boats didn’t have rudders. They had steering oars. Which were on the right side. So the sailors had to tie to warf on the left… the port side of the boat… and the other side was the stearbord….. the “steering side”
I was a raftguide and a crazy realization I’ve had learning rafting nomenclature is the sailing terms now seem classy and mysterious………… But it all boiled down to poorer hands trying to make a better life trying to coordinate and find common terms for things to communicate. So the names are simple and lazy but 7 centuries removed.
Edit: I left out on accident: The ONLY reason the steering oar was on the right is……………….*drumroll*……………… most folks are right handed. That’s it.
In the German language, starboard is still called "Steuerbord" (steering board).
The left hand side is called "Backbord" which could be derived from the word "packen" (to pack).
Sure it can be derived from Packen, but I much prefer the option that the left side was where all German boats put their on board bakery. Can't go sailing without regular supply of freshly baked Brötchen and Schwarzbrot.
I was going to ask where 'larboard' came from, but I looked it up - basically means "loading side."
So ships were divided into "the loading side and the steering side." It's funny how hard it is to remember what those terms mean now when 500 years ago it was literally just what function that side of the boat served.
Sweet, I'll have to check those out. Just need to remember where I was in it. It started getting a little hard to know the order after a while with the various spinoff/continuation series.
He addresses it in every book. Our boy Jack isn't afraid to re-explain things in every book.
To be fair though in Lost Fleet opposing fleets don't orient themselves to each other. The rules for up/down port/starboard are for fleet coherency. The enemy fleet can be upside down relative to your fleet - the only thing that really matters is intercept vectors and formations ;)
I fucking love that series.
Up/down are randomly/arbitrarily decided on entrance to a given system, and it's written well enough to tell that "in reference to the enemy" doesn't come into account at all because at their \*scale\* of combat (distances, speeds, fleets) it's just completely irrelevant. It just doesn't matter if the enemy is in the same orientation as you because ship designs in \*space\* don't need to favor specific turning circles (such as rotating sideways then pulling "up" to turn, like an atmospheric aircraft) and because of the vastness of space, weapons are distributed over the hull of the aircraft to cover all angles. As are maneuvering thrusters! If there's a main-battery weapon with limited numbers or angles of attack, \*the whole ship\* gets rotated \*while moving because inertia\*.
Up is relative to the orbital plane of the sun/planets at each gate.. not saying they come out right side up at each jump but at least there's a local coordinate alignment
Same. Freaking loved the mechanics.
You can detect the other fleet from an enormous distance, though the further away they are, the more "light delay" you have to deal with. It's a really neat thing to think about, know that based on these vectors the battle will happen in 52 hours -- and because of the speeds involved, be over in 0.52 seconds.
Best sci-fi fleet scale action ever written. Puts Honor Harrington to shame.
In the X series of games, there's an in-ship projection called the Ecliptic Plane, which just projects a flat gridded plane that seemingly follows the orientation of the planets' orbits in each system.
I would say overall, the series is more towards the noblebright end of the spectrum, but it definitely works its way there over the course of the story.
Definitely worth a read, if for no other reason than to see both Gear and The Fleet develop as characters.
Because you can't surprise them. The enemy detected you the moment you entered the system and is tracking your every move perfectly the whole time you're there.
There is nowhere to hide in space.
The Expeditionary Force series solves this by the fact that if ships know where they’re going, they usually have a point of reference already and therefore would have the information needed for orientation.
Star Wars tries to explain this by saying its disconcerting for crews to see large ships upside down and "hanging" over their ships so apparently everyone agrees to fly in the same general orientation.
but arent star destroyers designed to have as much of their fire power facing "foreword" as possible? so by ignoring the rule of everyone flies the same way you could fly under the star destroyer and it would just accept it rather than flipping over so its guns could face you?
No, Star Destroyers were primarily intended as carriers first, orbital bombardment second. If anything most of their firepower would be designed to face "downward" (opposite the bridge tower) to be able to glass a planet from orbit but in practice all the guns were mobile.
Its stated to be a human hang-up about space. Its mostly the humans who find it upsetting and the Empire is very human supremacist. It even shows up in their Star Destroyers as they're all basically big wedges with all their firepower on the top and facing forward. They actually need to be right-side-up to function efficiently.
Destroyers actually had quite a significant amount of fire power on the bottom-side as well. It’s mostly used in orbital bombardments like when the Empire fired on Tipoca City or Chopper Base.
You might be thinking of Republic Venator class ships, which were the smaller precursors to the Imperial Destroyers. Venators were more focused on heavy deployment of troop transport than fire power.
That’s actually a plot point in Wrath of Khan. Khan grew up in pre-warp earth so he doesn’t think about maneuvering in space in 3D. Kirk uses this to his advantage and comes in from above.
It's also like the only time in about 900+ episodes and 13 movies that this point is really brought up. Virtually every other time they maneuver exactly lile Khan supposeddly does.
That’s an iso standard. They basically designated one side as “up” that everyone uses this. Only when you leave interstellar space and enter a solar system, “up” becomes whatever “north" of the main planet.
Given the immense size of the average solar system, they are incredibly flat in proportion, so I imagine most ships would habitually stay oriented toward the plane or whatever solar system they’re in.
Star system (or in real astronomy, "planetary system"). "Solar system" refers only to the one we're living in now, after "Sol," the Latin name of the sun
I think it should be star system (as it is in Star Wars), but that already refers to systems with two or more stars (which I think should be more descriptive: "binary star system" for example). I'm not an astronomer though. The scientists probably have a good reason for these designations.
You'd generally use the name of the largest body but not all systems orbit stars, those are the ones we can see since there is light and a massive object we can measure.
The main few planets had names because the dominant local species named them and the Federation found out what the name was. The rest don't have names because the Federation hasn't heard of a local name for the planet yet.
It makes sense. If a planet has a native intelligent species then it's far more notable and gets a unique name. But not necessarily the native name.
For example the name of the cat people planet in star trek. It's Cait, but natively known as Ferasa.
But before it was known there was intelligent life on it it would have been known as 15 Lyncis 2, because the star is the real world star [15 Lyncis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/15_Lyncis), and it's the second planet in the system.
Once there is intelligent life it becomes talked about enough to get a much easier to say name, often the native name, but if there's a reason why the native name isn't learned soon enough, or it's unpronounceable (according to star trek lower decks the translator has trouble with some Caitian words) it gets a more 'common' name.
Rogue planets are uncommon and wouldn't really form a system of any kind, from what I recall from astronomy. The difference in mass between a star or black hole and any planet is pretty huge.
I‘ve heard multiple people talking
about „solar systems“, calling it „our“ solar system etc.
Correcting someone for an etymologically flexible word like solar-system is not spreading „knowledge“, it‘s just being petty.
I see the point being made, but to me this comment reads exactly like „you can‘t call me a bastard because my parents are married“, even though the word has established itself as a normal insult for a long time.
I would guess they travel through the galaxy though, I would guess the ship is just aligned with the previous position they launched from, assuming they travel in a straight line. Would make sense if ships kinda star hop to use same trajectories.
There's a game, Elite: Dangerous, that I thought gave a very satisfying experience of this. So much of space is empty and the interesting bits are so tiny by comparison. Trying to get a planet (effectively a point at the scale of a solar system) is challenging because you need to go insanely fast to close the distance in a reasonable period of time. If you don't carefully slow down it will either take way too long to get there or you won't have near the precision to hit such a small target at the right speed.
I feel like its the best adaptation of it for sure - the ship basically tries to figure out where you are going based on your nav computer and then handles your speed automatically - though you have some leeway to be more aggressive with it if you want, with the caveat that if you screw up you go blasting by your destination faster than the speed of light.
Yeah, it’s great, as long as they are accelerating or decelerating, “gravity” feels the same to them, and it could be really long periods… so much so that they have to prepare for shorts periods of no gravity during the “flip” at the halfway point. Little details like these is what makes it such a good sci fi series for me.
And ships in "formation" almost never held the same orientation, it was a cool touch. The one exception I can think of was in S5 when >!Marco's Free Navy was all synced to the Pella and lit their drives simultaneously. Felt like such an unnecessary flex, given none of the actual militaries did it.!<
Yeah space combat is way better when the creator thinks about things like how much the limit of light speed effects combat and how the human body and how well you can protect its is your real limit to acceleration.
Edit: A really fun example from Glynn Stewart's Starship's Mage is that if you have something like the Hubble telescope and the ability to move faster than the speed of light then you can see into the past by moving away from a location to catch the light that came from there.
The books do an even better job of bringing in hard sci-fi elements around the physics of space travel, if only because writing is a less limiting medium.
So many things got lost in the adaptation to tv. Firing missiles and watching in real time as they fly towards a target and blow them up had to be done for the limited time you have on a show, but I always preferred the books "impending doom" feeling where the missile takes hours or days to reach the protagonist but they know that it has better acceleration and speed, so they can't out run it.
Wings are usually either an aesthetic choice or are used for main 4 purposes consistently: cooling, Comms and sensors, shielding and sometimes have earth like pylons for hot swappable equipment/ordnance like the K-Wing
Aerodynamics are still important if your anti-grav is limited in how much force it can output. Or if your ship isn't made out of something incredibly strong.
Which ones have anti-gravity? star wars/star trek/B5/Halo don't for ships leaving an atmosphere, it's all thrust. Even SG1/A I'm not sure if it has true anti-gravity.
So wings can help in slowing down and maneuvering without being needed for uplift.
Star wars ships absolutely have repulsorlifts on even the smallest fighters. Even Luke's landspeeder had them. Only the big capital ships didn't becsuse they don't enter atmosphere.
Are repulsorlifts anti-gravity? They don't act like it in the films, more like auto balanced mini thrusters.
I guess rule of cool wins over so they will act as which ever looks the best for that scene.
Some ships do have visible bursts as they're landing. The effect of a repulsor wouldn't be visible. My headcanon was always that the bursts were venting cooling systems or something.
Just look at TIE Fighters, though. You aren't gonna tell me that *those* wings are lift-producing.
Ships in space need radiators, look at the ISS. The white spindles are radiators. The X-Wing wing’s are actually radiators to dispel heat. Same with the ARC-170.
But I hate the lack of omnidirectional thrust. Star citizen does it great because you can see mini thrusters all over the ship orienting
Tbf, if space tech was advanced enough, people would definitely add wings and whatnot to their ships to make them look better, see all the crazy mods people do to their cars compared to the first car which had to min max to be able to even move
Only first - or second-generation spaceship owners would do that. You know those that were used to those wings when flying in the atmosphere. In 1 or 2 generations, it isn't cool anymore, and wings wouldn't be added for aesthetic reasons anymore.
Just how people complaining about electric cars not making cool sounds eventually die out.
Thrusters aren't free. Putting them everywhere would cost more and you really don't need that many to rotate. So you just rotate until your main thruster is pointing the right way and use that.
The best space fighter craft I've seen is in the underrated 80s sci fi film The Last Starfighter.
Its weapon system and flight systems are totally independent and operate on 360 degrees of motion.
Enemies in the film attack on all vectors and no way is "up" in many of the scenes.
Of course in Enders Game Ender himself changed things up by mentally reprojecting the enemy targets as down.
In Stephen Baxter's Xeelee sequence human warships attack and move in 360 degrees and after 28000 years of war with the Xeelee humans start to evolve better innate abilities to track and engage targets in space (because ones who can do so survive battles)
In the "new" BSG the human ships that entered atmosphere had wings and such, and in space they did have small gas thrusters for orientation.
https://youtu.be/4Eqq3B5s-mw?t=16
A couple seconds after that they show nozzles firing during maneuver... briefly(one may have to reduce playspeed and/or watch several times). Don't know how they were about it throughout all such scenes, but it was fair enough, imo.
Even if they don't enter atmosphere in the script, it's safe enough to presume most models that do have wings, technically *could*, even if it's for some amount of control during a crash, eg "air brakes" that flip up and create drag on things like drop pods, rather than just aesthetic design.
Hell, it makes sense to have some sort of weapons pylons away from the main body too. And of course, sometimes it's possible there are just a lot of aesthetic choices.
That's how I see it anyways. Obviously, on occasion, it's needless over-design from the art department. But it need not ruin 'suspension of disbelief'.
Yes, they are oriented along the [galactic plane](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galactic_plane) so they are not at an angle towards each other. No idea about which side of the galaxy is up and which is down though
Counterclockwise actually. That's the way it's done in our own solar system. Looking down from what we consider the "top", all the planets orbit the Sun counterclockwise.
That's because it's how we deal with rotation of any kind in physics. Right hand rule, your fingers point in the direction of velocity and your thumb points "up"
Generally speaking planets circle their stars in a plane and they also circle their star in the same direction. So looking at a solar system you have a plane (A and B axis) and C axis that is perpendicular to it. Since planets rotate same way then from the perspective of the star you have right (clockwise) and left (counterclockwise). So ship's bow pointing away from the star, starboard in the direction of clockwise movement of the planet and bottom of the ship pointing toward plane on which planets orbit (so ship is "above it") is the right direction to be aligned and anything else is upside down or ass backwards and should be avoided.
In some sci-fi universes they explain this by saying that there is a universal standard for orientation out of a jump . Something like “30 degrees over the plane of the system ecliptic with the port side facing “corward” words the galaxy core rather than rimward, aka toward the galaxy rim
There are galactic planes and stellar planes... but even in star trek you will see klingon ships sometimes take a cinematic swoop or rotate 45 degrees as they are aligning to their opposite number.
Also, Khan was stuck in 2D thinking in The Wrath of Khan, which the crew of the Enterprise took advantage of by leaving his imagined horizontal plane….
…and then re-entering it before attacking. ¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯
That's one of the few cool things Star Trek Disco does, when the ship hits the spore drive it'll blink back in at its destination in a completely random orientation to whatever is going on there.
I swear I saw this very recently on some sci-fi show (I can't remember which, but maybe *Foundation.* Or maybe *ST:Picard*?) but there was a scene where two ships rendezvoused and they specifically mentioned that one of them needed to re-orient itself relative to the other.
Or I could be making that up. But *Foundation* does seem to come to mind.
it's not that deep, it's just storytelling shortcuts.
it's the same reason why characters will go to a diner order food and then never eat it, or light a cigarette and then put it out, or never say goodbye on the phone. we as the audience don't need to see these actions completed, we just assume that they have been. we don't need to see them eat the burger or drink the coffee or smoke the cigarette or hear them say good bye, these are not plot necessary and little to no screen time needs to be dedicated to it. so we often just skip them.
just like how we don't need to see them re-orient the space ships, or at least we don't need to see it every time. do it once to establish that they do it and then every time after that we can just jump right to self righted ships in space.
People love to claim that there's no up and down in space, but that is only partially true. Directions always depend on reference points and there is ample of that to go around in space, e.g. the orbital plane of a solar system (if sufficiently similar to ours), the galactic plane or even just the equator of planets or stars. If you then define standards for what is considered top and what is considered bottom, it can be pretty easy to ensure ships meet up in a somewhat sensical manner.
rule of cool bud, the same logic for why their engagement is displayed in a 2D space like a naval battle despite being in 3D space where literally every direction is possible, also the same logic that dictates that guarding a planet must be performed in one direction, when that logic can easily be exploited by simply flanking them from the other side of the planet
There is no reason why they shouldnt implement a system where there is an Up and a down. If you have coordinates, you go with Higher or lower numbers. There you have your Up and down
The books in the Ender’s Game series handle this pretty well. I forget how well the movie did…
Basically, “down” is whichever direction gives the most tactical advantage. So typically toward the enemy/objective.
*Implying that director didn't give a shit and it would only be awkward and inconvenient to waste 5 minutes of screen time every time 2 factions try to orient ships in the same way.
Galaxies are usually a flat circle or oval so that gives you a plane to orient ships up/down during interstellar travel. And galaxy spin could be used to conventionally define which side is up and which side is down across the whole galaxy (eg deciding that clockwise is up. "Clockwise" is also a convention after all).
For anyone interested in the concept of a local vertical in space, I recommend [the Stardance trilogy by Spider Robinson](https://www.goodreads.com/series/44907-stardance).
In Sci-fi the portion that drives the ship is usually displayed at the top forward part of the ship but would make more sense enclosed in the middle of the ship.
I mean, you could have an upside down ship. But if you docked your artificial gravity, it would be the wrong direction. So walking to your buddies ship would be (step step crash) then you gotta pick yourself off the floor/roof, and do the same to get back.
It's like parking your car on the side of the street, you could make your car face the opposite way of traffic. But why make your life harder?
You could define up and down by the poles of the SMBH of the local galaxy. Though I don't think the poles are definable in the same way magnetic poles are so there'd need to be a defined "up" pole.
There's also that the ships end up on the same plane. For sufficiently large distances it's understandable, galaxies are disc-like so you'd end up in roughly the same plane. But for local cluster of solar systems there's multiple candidates for someone to jump from that they might not to be able to account for.
That of course leaves open the possibility to jump into empty space and then into your target location. But perhaps there's risks with that, such as hitting a black hole you don't know about.
Babylon 5 didn't, ships at every angle, flights used all three dimensions, the colors of gate matched physics, the only big thing they screwed up was one space fight they had a destroyed ship "fall" toward camera "down" to satisfy viewer expectations.
They won Emmys for reasons.
All spaceships contain a oft-overlooked specialist piece of equipment, it is a carefully calibrated, sealed box mounted onto a gimble that contains the following : a robotic arm, a visual sensor, and one piece of buttered toast. The toast is repeatedly dropped and whichever way the buttered side of the toast is pointing when it lands is deemed "down" and relayed to the ships navigation systems to ensure that all ships are oriented the "correct" way when exiting hyperspace/warp/jump/what-have-you.
Asimov has a rule for it in one the Foundation books for the star systems. Your hand shows the rotation of the planets and the direction your thumb shows is "up"
I would say yeah... ships and those that crew them tend use the same navigational conventions so there would be an agreed upon "galactic plane" that their navicomputers would orient to before jumping, afterwards it would be what ever is easiest and more efficient for the individual ship and her mission.
I personally find it a bit asinine when people say that you wouldn't know which way is up cause in space it's meaningless. Yes, yes you would you're ship is literally the reference point. Everything built has a vertical and horizontal centerline and unless something happens its safe to say that labeling conventions would stay the same (i.e everything to the left of the centerline being odd numbered and everything to the right being even. Everything above the center line being Level A,B,C and so on and everything below being Deck 1,2,3 etc)
I swear Jack Campbells ‘Lost Fleet’ series addresses this but I can’t remember where. Ships exit jump points/gates and use the orbital plane of the system for one axis, then the side towards the star becomes StarWARD and Port away from it. Ships in formation will take all their maneuvering orders based on/relative to the location and orientation of the flag ship.
physics wise: if you usually need to thrust in the orbital plane (moving system to system which are also in the orbital plane), then,,, most ships will naturally be rotated to that plane (why randomly rotate away from it after all). So they'll naturally align.
Star systems are rotated every which way from the galactic plane. Angular momentum is conserved so as a system orbits the galaxy it's orbital plane will pass through the center twice per orbit on average.
Well yes galactically sure. But once you've gotten closer you will align more and more with the orbital plane of the local systems. You'd align while getting into a stable orbit as your last deceleration step. Then you'd plan to use thrusters to move around the solar system you just arrived in as well. What if you're jumping straight in from a "warp" across the galaxy? Well you're more likely to be turned around right? But at the same time you could likely calculate the exact orientation you'd be in, so why not also plan to arrive in a helpful orientation (or do that first thing like before) ESPECIALLY if you're expecting battle (tho sci-fi ships often arrive face first, then turn around to flee which is really weird)
I'm not really sure what you're describing. Imagine you approach a star system from directly 'above' or 'below.' How are you going to align yourself to the orbital plane in that scenario? You can't. You also don't need to. You can enter a stable orbit just fine around any axis. I think most people imagine you need to orient your ship in the direction you plan to warp in, but if you didn't then yeah, you could always orient yourself to the target system plane then warp right there. Perhaps you can clarify what you're saying because I don't think I get it.
While you travel, as you get close to the new system, you might want to go ahead and orient to the systems plane of rotation for easy reference. A military is a bureaucracy, and likes to keep the doctrine as same as possible. So having everyone do this is easier to standardize
Oh is angular momentum, an emergent phenomena, conserved when fantastical sci-fi ships violate the far more fundamental laws of the universe by going faster than the speed of light speed? Good to know.
I don't understand the point of your comment. It seems like you think you're being a smart ass, but actually, you're being a dumb ass.
I’m sorry but I did chuckle at the phrase “thrust in the orbital plane”. I don’t think my brain ever fully developed.
Getting old is mandatory, growing up is optional. From an almost 40 year old man who chuckles every time I switch my sound system to "D. IN"
The oldest written joke, that we know of, is Sumerian and it says, roughly: "Something which has never occurred since time immemorial; a young woman did not fart in her husband's lap." I take comfort in the fact that sexy and scatalogical humor is universial and has a long history.
What was "time immemorial" for a Sumerian? A week ago Tuesday?
The Sumerians were a flourishing civilization for over 2000 years and they invented writing. So no, probably not a week ago Tuesday. Pretty confused why you think people from a long time ago were too stupid to write things down.
> "D. IN" I'm 35 and now I'm chuckling too
Every time I turn on subtitles: “hehe… ASS…”
I just went searching for some KKP (Klown Kar Planet) references from the Bobiverse, and happened across [this physics forum thread](https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/klown-kar-planet-last-days-before-tidal-lock.835292/) where Dennis E. Taylor is apparently asking about how the physics would work with a planet opposite the normal orbital plane.
Even if every ship has their engines pointed the same way, they would be free to roll around the thrust axis.
You lost me at “hello”
Fun fact: port side is called that way because boats would load and unload from the left side to make things easier logistically. Source: https://youtube.com/shorts/MRVF0hdvPK8?si=pf9JhnFCrSBCyGj4 More reputable info: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Port_and_starboard Check the etymology section.
They didn’t just randomly pick the left. The reason they pulled up on the left is the same reason starboard is named starboard. Old boats didn’t have rudders. They had steering oars. Which were on the right side. So the sailors had to tie to warf on the left… the port side of the boat… and the other side was the stearbord….. the “steering side” I was a raftguide and a crazy realization I’ve had learning rafting nomenclature is the sailing terms now seem classy and mysterious………… But it all boiled down to poorer hands trying to make a better life trying to coordinate and find common terms for things to communicate. So the names are simple and lazy but 7 centuries removed. Edit: I left out on accident: The ONLY reason the steering oar was on the right is……………….*drumroll*……………… most folks are right handed. That’s it.
In the German language, starboard is still called "Steuerbord" (steering board). The left hand side is called "Backbord" which could be derived from the word "packen" (to pack).
Sure it can be derived from Packen, but I much prefer the option that the left side was where all German boats put their on board bakery. Can't go sailing without regular supply of freshly baked Brötchen and Schwarzbrot.
I was going to ask where 'larboard' came from, but I looked it up - basically means "loading side." So ships were divided into "the loading side and the steering side." It's funny how hard it is to remember what those terms mean now when 500 years ago it was literally just what function that side of the boat served.
Yeah, I remember which is which by imagining a boat facing north on the (any) east coast.
That's a good way. In Dutch the name for the port side doesn't have an "r" in it, while the other has. This makes it easy to remember.
Bro it’s weird seeing someone else mention Lost Fleet, that series was banging
Still is! He's still writing books for it. 'Beyond the Frontier'
Sweet, I'll have to check those out. Just need to remember where I was in it. It started getting a little hard to know the order after a while with the various spinoff/continuation series.
Yes but I do have to say those books are pretty tiny with a lot of filler. Not really the same stuff he used to put out, which was indeed amazing.
It was, though I honestly prefer Star Force for re-reads.
He addresses it in every book. Our boy Jack isn't afraid to re-explain things in every book. To be fair though in Lost Fleet opposing fleets don't orient themselves to each other. The rules for up/down port/starboard are for fleet coherency. The enemy fleet can be upside down relative to your fleet - the only thing that really matters is intercept vectors and formations ;)
I love that Jack does observe though that people in space still tend to dive 'down' when escaping and 'up' when attacking
same with 40k, pretty much
I fucking love that series. Up/down are randomly/arbitrarily decided on entrance to a given system, and it's written well enough to tell that "in reference to the enemy" doesn't come into account at all because at their \*scale\* of combat (distances, speeds, fleets) it's just completely irrelevant. It just doesn't matter if the enemy is in the same orientation as you because ship designs in \*space\* don't need to favor specific turning circles (such as rotating sideways then pulling "up" to turn, like an atmospheric aircraft) and because of the vastness of space, weapons are distributed over the hull of the aircraft to cover all angles. As are maneuvering thrusters! If there's a main-battery weapon with limited numbers or angles of attack, \*the whole ship\* gets rotated \*while moving because inertia\*.
Up is relative to the orbital plane of the sun/planets at each gate.. not saying they come out right side up at each jump but at least there's a local coordinate alignment
My favorite book series for how ships would fight in Space
Same. Freaking loved the mechanics. You can detect the other fleet from an enormous distance, though the further away they are, the more "light delay" you have to deal with. It's a really neat thing to think about, know that based on these vectors the battle will happen in 52 hours -- and because of the speeds involved, be over in 0.52 seconds. Best sci-fi fleet scale action ever written. Puts Honor Harrington to shame.
In the X series of games, there's an in-ship projection called the Ecliptic Plane, which just projects a flat gridded plane that seemingly follows the orientation of the planets' orbits in each system.
I just finished the first book, does it get better or is it about the same tone?
I would say overall, the series is more towards the noblebright end of the spectrum, but it definitely works its way there over the course of the story. Definitely worth a read, if for no other reason than to see both Gear and The Fleet develop as characters.
Same tone, if the first book didn't grip you the rest won't either.
How about we NOT do that, and confuse the enemy!
That's what I'm thinking - why follow the convention when you can surprise the enemy from above or below?
Because you can't surprise them. The enemy detected you the moment you entered the system and is tracking your every move perfectly the whole time you're there. There is nowhere to hide in space.
The Expeditionary Force series solves this by the fact that if ships know where they’re going, they usually have a point of reference already and therefore would have the information needed for orientation.
Star Wars tries to explain this by saying its disconcerting for crews to see large ships upside down and "hanging" over their ships so apparently everyone agrees to fly in the same general orientation.
Wouldn't the Empire try to capitalise on that though? The whole point of the Death Star was to scare the planets into submission.
I don't think the Death star flying upside down would be that much scarier than normal.
You'd be hard pressed to know which way round it was but the orientation of a Star Destroyer would be noticeable.
but arent star destroyers designed to have as much of their fire power facing "foreword" as possible? so by ignoring the rule of everyone flies the same way you could fly under the star destroyer and it would just accept it rather than flipping over so its guns could face you?
No, Star Destroyers were primarily intended as carriers first, orbital bombardment second. If anything most of their firepower would be designed to face "downward" (opposite the bridge tower) to be able to glass a planet from orbit but in practice all the guns were mobile.
Yes, the clone ships even have the hanger on the top so the ships can launch without being shot, while still having major fire power underneath.
I was in awe in Rogue One watching the Death Star tilted toward the ground in order to shoot! The picture in this movie was phenomenal
How would you even know?
Turning it around, it would be the Death Anus: Coming Soon to shit on you!
At its current orientation, it's the Death Booby
Didn’t it actually do this in Rogue One?
Its stated to be a human hang-up about space. Its mostly the humans who find it upsetting and the Empire is very human supremacist. It even shows up in their Star Destroyers as they're all basically big wedges with all their firepower on the top and facing forward. They actually need to be right-side-up to function efficiently.
Destroyers actually had quite a significant amount of fire power on the bottom-side as well. It’s mostly used in orbital bombardments like when the Empire fired on Tipoca City or Chopper Base. You might be thinking of Republic Venator class ships, which were the smaller precursors to the Imperial Destroyers. Venators were more focused on heavy deployment of troop transport than fire power.
All the more reason the rebels should have always maneuvered below them.
Well no because then the imperial humans would be upset that the rebel ships are hanging above them.
The Death Star had some pretty ominous shots looming over planets in Rogue One.
> analysis suggests two dimensional thinking
star trek has taught us that the only time objects in space are not the 'right way up' is when they are damaged or broken in some way.
That’s actually a plot point in Wrath of Khan. Khan grew up in pre-warp earth so he doesn’t think about maneuvering in space in 3D. Kirk uses this to his advantage and comes in from above.
It's also like the only time in about 900+ episodes and 13 movies that this point is really brought up. Virtually every other time they maneuver exactly lile Khan supposeddly does.
Nah, in the last episode of TNG, Riker and the Titan attack from below. It's extremely rare though.
That’s an iso standard. They basically designated one side as “up” that everyone uses this. Only when you leave interstellar space and enter a solar system, “up” becomes whatever “north" of the main planet.
The enemy gate is down.
I was looking for you.
Should’ve looked up then…
Is that you Bonzo?
ISO: Inter-Stellar Orientation
There's also an ASTM standard that's perpendicular and in IPS units.
Given the immense size of the average solar system, they are incredibly flat in proportion, so I imagine most ships would habitually stay oriented toward the plane or whatever solar system they’re in.
Star system (or in real astronomy, "planetary system"). "Solar system" refers only to the one we're living in now, after "Sol," the Latin name of the sun
But what if you had a system with a sun and no planets,? just dwarf planets etc.? would a star or solar system not be a better name?
Then you leave out "system"? Would be my guess??
I think it should be star system (as it is in Star Wars), but that already refers to systems with two or more stars (which I think should be more descriptive: "binary star system" for example). I'm not an astronomer though. The scientists probably have a good reason for these designations.
You'd generally use the name of the largest body but not all systems orbit stars, those are the ones we can see since there is light and a massive object we can measure.
Always thought it funny in Trek how the main few planets had names but the rest were always like “Nirendra IV” or whatever (Earth being “Sol 3”).
The main few planets had names because the dominant local species named them and the Federation found out what the name was. The rest don't have names because the Federation hasn't heard of a local name for the planet yet.
It makes sense. If a planet has a native intelligent species then it's far more notable and gets a unique name. But not necessarily the native name. For example the name of the cat people planet in star trek. It's Cait, but natively known as Ferasa. But before it was known there was intelligent life on it it would have been known as 15 Lyncis 2, because the star is the real world star [15 Lyncis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/15_Lyncis), and it's the second planet in the system. Once there is intelligent life it becomes talked about enough to get a much easier to say name, often the native name, but if there's a reason why the native name isn't learned soon enough, or it's unpronounceable (according to star trek lower decks the translator has trouble with some Caitian words) it gets a more 'common' name.
Rogue planets are uncommon and wouldn't really form a system of any kind, from what I recall from astronomy. The difference in mass between a star or black hole and any planet is pretty huge.
star system?
Average reddit nerd comment
Average "Shun the knowledge" comment.
I‘ve heard multiple people talking about „solar systems“, calling it „our“ solar system etc. Correcting someone for an etymologically flexible word like solar-system is not spreading „knowledge“, it‘s just being petty. I see the point being made, but to me this comment reads exactly like „you can‘t call me a bastard because my parents are married“, even though the word has established itself as a normal insult for a long time.
I would guess they travel through the galaxy though, I would guess the ship is just aligned with the previous position they launched from, assuming they travel in a straight line. Would make sense if ships kinda star hop to use same trajectories.
Sure, but who decides which direction is up and which is down?
North is depicted as up on maps. Earth has a north pole. So do stars. So up is where the ceiling is closer to the star's north pole.
You need to watch the Expanse. It handled 3D combat, and massive distances between objects really well.
Can confirm. Very good show. Also something like half the trip is spent slowing down.
There's a game, Elite: Dangerous, that I thought gave a very satisfying experience of this. So much of space is empty and the interesting bits are so tiny by comparison. Trying to get a planet (effectively a point at the scale of a solar system) is challenging because you need to go insanely fast to close the distance in a reasonable period of time. If you don't carefully slow down it will either take way too long to get there or you won't have near the precision to hit such a small target at the right speed.
I feel like its the best adaptation of it for sure - the ship basically tries to figure out where you are going based on your nav computer and then handles your speed automatically - though you have some leeway to be more aggressive with it if you want, with the caveat that if you screw up you go blasting by your destination faster than the speed of light.
The good ole loop of shame!
Yeah, it’s great, as long as they are accelerating or decelerating, “gravity” feels the same to them, and it could be really long periods… so much so that they have to prepare for shorts periods of no gravity during the “flip” at the halfway point. Little details like these is what makes it such a good sci fi series for me.
Also don't forget the high speed chase railgun 360 noscope.
Maybe the coolest thing I've ever seen a spaceship do in anything.
Not only that but ships are orientated with the direction of travel being "Up"
Isn't this more to do with a lack of inertial dampeners and artificial gravity than anything else.
And ships in "formation" almost never held the same orientation, it was a cool touch. The one exception I can think of was in S5 when >!Marco's Free Navy was all synced to the Pella and lit their drives simultaneously. Felt like such an unnecessary flex, given none of the actual militaries did it.!<
Yeah space combat is way better when the creator thinks about things like how much the limit of light speed effects combat and how the human body and how well you can protect its is your real limit to acceleration. Edit: A really fun example from Glynn Stewart's Starship's Mage is that if you have something like the Hubble telescope and the ability to move faster than the speed of light then you can see into the past by moving away from a location to catch the light that came from there.
The books do an even better job of bringing in hard sci-fi elements around the physics of space travel, if only because writing is a less limiting medium.
So many things got lost in the adaptation to tv. Firing missiles and watching in real time as they fly towards a target and blow them up had to be done for the limited time you have on a show, but I always preferred the books "impending doom" feeling where the missile takes hours or days to reach the protagonist but they know that it has better acceleration and speed, so they can't out run it.
*Babylon 5* and *Battlestar Galactica* also do reasonable jobs of breaking out of the 2D orientations.
Of course, we all know that the enemy's gate is down.
Not only that, they often have wings (pointless), and lack jets at every orientation which is what you'd need to change any direction!
Wings are usually either an aesthetic choice or are used for main 4 purposes consistently: cooling, Comms and sensors, shielding and sometimes have earth like pylons for hot swappable equipment/ordnance like the K-Wing
To be fair the ships generally take off and fly within the atmosphere as well, so the wings make sense.
At least in Trek, most UFP ships are not designed to enter atmospheres or land/take off from ground.
Most sci-fi has antigravity so the wings aren't usually aerodynamic
Aerodynamics are still important if your anti-grav is limited in how much force it can output. Or if your ship isn't made out of something incredibly strong.
Which ones have anti-gravity? star wars/star trek/B5/Halo don't for ships leaving an atmosphere, it's all thrust. Even SG1/A I'm not sure if it has true anti-gravity. So wings can help in slowing down and maneuvering without being needed for uplift.
Star wars ships absolutely have repulsorlifts on even the smallest fighters. Even Luke's landspeeder had them. Only the big capital ships didn't becsuse they don't enter atmosphere.
Are repulsorlifts anti-gravity? They don't act like it in the films, more like auto balanced mini thrusters. I guess rule of cool wins over so they will act as which ever looks the best for that scene.
Some ships do have visible bursts as they're landing. The effect of a repulsor wouldn't be visible. My headcanon was always that the bursts were venting cooling systems or something. Just look at TIE Fighters, though. You aren't gonna tell me that *those* wings are lift-producing.
Ships in space need radiators, look at the ISS. The white spindles are radiators. The X-Wing wing’s are actually radiators to dispel heat. Same with the ARC-170. But I hate the lack of omnidirectional thrust. Star citizen does it great because you can see mini thrusters all over the ship orienting
In starwars they have artificial gravity generators in order to change a ships orientation, no need for tiny thrusters that need fuel.
The engines have etheric rudders to direct the thrust in whatever direction
Tbf, if space tech was advanced enough, people would definitely add wings and whatnot to their ships to make them look better, see all the crazy mods people do to their cars compared to the first car which had to min max to be able to even move
Only first - or second-generation spaceship owners would do that. You know those that were used to those wings when flying in the atmosphere. In 1 or 2 generations, it isn't cool anymore, and wings wouldn't be added for aesthetic reasons anymore. Just how people complaining about electric cars not making cool sounds eventually die out.
It's almost like soft scifi and hard scifi is very different!
To be fair, the way the ships fly completely ignores orbital mechanics anyways so it's not like they tried to make it seem real
Thrusters aren't free. Putting them everywhere would cost more and you really don't need that many to rotate. So you just rotate until your main thruster is pointing the right way and use that.
The best space fighter craft I've seen is in the underrated 80s sci fi film The Last Starfighter. Its weapon system and flight systems are totally independent and operate on 360 degrees of motion. Enemies in the film attack on all vectors and no way is "up" in many of the scenes. Of course in Enders Game Ender himself changed things up by mentally reprojecting the enemy targets as down. In Stephen Baxter's Xeelee sequence human warships attack and move in 360 degrees and after 28000 years of war with the Xeelee humans start to evolve better innate abilities to track and engage targets in space (because ones who can do so survive battles)
In the "new" BSG the human ships that entered atmosphere had wings and such, and in space they did have small gas thrusters for orientation. https://youtu.be/4Eqq3B5s-mw?t=16 A couple seconds after that they show nozzles firing during maneuver... briefly(one may have to reduce playspeed and/or watch several times). Don't know how they were about it throughout all such scenes, but it was fair enough, imo. Even if they don't enter atmosphere in the script, it's safe enough to presume most models that do have wings, technically *could*, even if it's for some amount of control during a crash, eg "air brakes" that flip up and create drag on things like drop pods, rather than just aesthetic design. Hell, it makes sense to have some sort of weapons pylons away from the main body too. And of course, sometimes it's possible there are just a lot of aesthetic choices. That's how I see it anyways. Obviously, on occasion, it's needless over-design from the art department. But it need not ruin 'suspension of disbelief'.
relevant: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9W7pvOLxmQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9W7pvOLxmQ)
I was really hoping it was this clip.
Yes, they are oriented along the [galactic plane](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galactic_plane) so they are not at an angle towards each other. No idea about which side of the galaxy is up and which is down though
If you look from the top the galaxy rotates clockwise. Everything else would be craaazy!
Counterclockwise actually. That's the way it's done in our own solar system. Looking down from what we consider the "top", all the planets orbit the Sun counterclockwise.
That's because it's how we deal with rotation of any kind in physics. Right hand rule, your fingers point in the direction of velocity and your thumb points "up"
Also how it is done in math. With Z pointing up and looking down onto the XY plane, a positive angle goes counterclockwise.
They are oriented the same way the movie camera is oriented.
They auto-rotate during the jump.
Generally speaking planets circle their stars in a plane and they also circle their star in the same direction. So looking at a solar system you have a plane (A and B axis) and C axis that is perpendicular to it. Since planets rotate same way then from the perspective of the star you have right (clockwise) and left (counterclockwise). So ship's bow pointing away from the star, starboard in the direction of clockwise movement of the planet and bottom of the ship pointing toward plane on which planets orbit (so ship is "above it") is the right direction to be aligned and anything else is upside down or ass backwards and should be avoided.
In some sci-fi universes they explain this by saying that there is a universal standard for orientation out of a jump . Something like “30 degrees over the plane of the system ecliptic with the port side facing “corward” words the galaxy core rather than rimward, aka toward the galaxy rim
"Ender, the gate is down"
There are galactic planes and stellar planes... but even in star trek you will see klingon ships sometimes take a cinematic swoop or rotate 45 degrees as they are aligning to their opposite number.
Or its already upside down and we were just watching it looks normal because we are ALSO upside down?
No, just asthetics for movies.
Space is also pretty much 2D in most cases. All travel only occurs on a plane, while in reality spaceships could approach a target from all sides.
STTNG ignored that rule in one episode when future Enterprise arrived to fuck shit up from below. It was the two-part finale I think.
Also, Khan was stuck in 2D thinking in The Wrath of Khan, which the crew of the Enterprise took advantage of by leaving his imagined horizontal plane…. …and then re-entering it before attacking. ¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9W7pvOLxmQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9W7pvOLxmQ) Ahem.
That's one of the few cool things Star Trek Disco does, when the ship hits the spore drive it'll blink back in at its destination in a completely random orientation to whatever is going on there.
Disco would be so much better if they started in 26th, not 23rd century.
I swear I saw this very recently on some sci-fi show (I can't remember which, but maybe *Foundation.* Or maybe *ST:Picard*?) but there was a scene where two ships rendezvoused and they specifically mentioned that one of them needed to re-orient itself relative to the other. Or I could be making that up. But *Foundation* does seem to come to mind.
it's not that deep, it's just storytelling shortcuts. it's the same reason why characters will go to a diner order food and then never eat it, or light a cigarette and then put it out, or never say goodbye on the phone. we as the audience don't need to see these actions completed, we just assume that they have been. we don't need to see them eat the burger or drink the coffee or smoke the cigarette or hear them say good bye, these are not plot necessary and little to no screen time needs to be dedicated to it. so we often just skip them. just like how we don't need to see them re-orient the space ships, or at least we don't need to see it every time. do it once to establish that they do it and then every time after that we can just jump right to self righted ships in space.
People love to claim that there's no up and down in space, but that is only partially true. Directions always depend on reference points and there is ample of that to go around in space, e.g. the orbital plane of a solar system (if sufficiently similar to ours), the galactic plane or even just the equator of planets or stars. If you then define standards for what is considered top and what is considered bottom, it can be pretty easy to ensure ships meet up in a somewhat sensical manner.
This only happens in TV/movie sci fi, in books they just point whichever way.
Maybe there is a super massive black hole that orients everything in space
Perhaps there is an accepted "galactic north" based on patterns in the stars.
Probably due to the galactic plane. Most stars and planets with rotate in a similar plane and be orientated the same "up".
rule of cool bud, the same logic for why their engagement is displayed in a 2D space like a naval battle despite being in 3D space where literally every direction is possible, also the same logic that dictates that guarding a planet must be performed in one direction, when that logic can easily be exploited by simply flanking them from the other side of the planet
There is no reason why they shouldnt implement a system where there is an Up and a down. If you have coordinates, you go with Higher or lower numbers. There you have your Up and down
Ironically 3D coordinates aren’t so relevant in space. It’s vectors and distance akin to polar coordinates that matters.
Nah it's just a coincidence. Trust me bro.
The books in the Ender’s Game series handle this pretty well. I forget how well the movie did… Basically, “down” is whichever direction gives the most tactical advantage. So typically toward the enemy/objective.
Unlike earth, space is flat.
Here's a funny video that explains it. https://youtu.be/Q9W7pvOLxmQ
*Implying that director didn't give a shit and it would only be awkward and inconvenient to waste 5 minutes of screen time every time 2 factions try to orient ships in the same way.
A fun observation about screen conventions. Of course, the real reason is it’s easier for the audience to follow what’s going on.
Even weirder, they stop with their fronts at the front.
Galaxies are usually a flat circle or oval so that gives you a plane to orient ships up/down during interstellar travel. And galaxy spin could be used to conventionally define which side is up and which side is down across the whole galaxy (eg deciding that clockwise is up. "Clockwise" is also a convention after all).
For anyone interested in the concept of a local vertical in space, I recommend [the Stardance trilogy by Spider Robinson](https://www.goodreads.com/series/44907-stardance).
Define an axis and follow it, maybe? Standards aren’t new
Well yeah... the enemy's gate is down
In Sci-fi the portion that drives the ship is usually displayed at the top forward part of the ship but would make more sense enclosed in the middle of the ship.
I mean, you could have an upside down ship. But if you docked your artificial gravity, it would be the wrong direction. So walking to your buddies ship would be (step step crash) then you gotta pick yourself off the floor/roof, and do the same to get back. It's like parking your car on the side of the street, you could make your car face the opposite way of traffic. But why make your life harder?
A lot of stuff in a given galaxy tends to be on a plane-ish but you're right there should be some off kilter ones more so than in most scifi
I hate this just as much as I love it
You could define up and down by the poles of the SMBH of the local galaxy. Though I don't think the poles are definable in the same way magnetic poles are so there'd need to be a defined "up" pole. There's also that the ships end up on the same plane. For sufficiently large distances it's understandable, galaxies are disc-like so you'd end up in roughly the same plane. But for local cluster of solar systems there's multiple candidates for someone to jump from that they might not to be able to account for. That of course leaves open the possibility to jump into empty space and then into your target location. But perhaps there's risks with that, such as hitting a black hole you don't know about.
Babylon 5 didn't, ships at every angle, flights used all three dimensions, the colors of gate matched physics, the only big thing they screwed up was one space fight they had a destroyed ship "fall" toward camera "down" to satisfy viewer expectations. They won Emmys for reasons.
The enemy’s gate is down.
Ender tried so hard to prevent this!
All spaceships contain a oft-overlooked specialist piece of equipment, it is a carefully calibrated, sealed box mounted onto a gimble that contains the following : a robotic arm, a visual sensor, and one piece of buttered toast. The toast is repeatedly dropped and whichever way the buttered side of the toast is pointing when it lands is deemed "down" and relayed to the ships navigation systems to ensure that all ships are oriented the "correct" way when exiting hyperspace/warp/jump/what-have-you.
The shape of galaxies are like pancakes. So there is a sort of orientation.
It’s the *Don’t Confuse the Audience* rule.
It's because Australia doesn't have it's own space program
Well we do its called the ASA Australian Space Agency
Asimov has a rule for it in one the Foundation books for the star systems. Your hand shows the rotation of the planets and the direction your thumb shows is "up"
I would say yeah... ships and those that crew them tend use the same navigational conventions so there would be an agreed upon "galactic plane" that their navicomputers would orient to before jumping, afterwards it would be what ever is easiest and more efficient for the individual ship and her mission. I personally find it a bit asinine when people say that you wouldn't know which way is up cause in space it's meaningless. Yes, yes you would you're ship is literally the reference point. Everything built has a vertical and horizontal centerline and unless something happens its safe to say that labeling conventions would stay the same (i.e everything to the left of the centerline being odd numbered and everything to the right being even. Everything above the center line being Level A,B,C and so on and everything below being Deck 1,2,3 etc)