quote:the author was more interested in droning on and on about the technical specs than giving the reader a vivid mental picture of the things.
Reverend hits it on the head. Visual descriptions is Weber's weakest spot, as with a subplot race called Medusans, which I still don't have a stationary mental image for. Weber can't decide himself and in the end basically says, IIRC, "like a praying mantis only humanoid, not insectoid, with four legs and three arms".
While Weber talks about components and sections of his ship archetype in all novels, he can't describe the scale of the parts or their placement and direction. This confusion is clear when looking at the shifting cover art of the first eight books (up until the implementation of the official dildo doctrine):
In all fairness, one of those ships is a fake-merchant vessel built to lure in pirates, but since Weber's ship design is dependent on a specific configuration in order to generate its version of a warp field, it can't deviate to the extent shown in the above picture (the red one).
I'd like to make it clear (to Honorverse fans on Flare) that I am not writing all this as an axejob on David Weber, it's intended as ship- and novel discussion, not bullying.
I'll get my main grievances out of the way first. Weber's political views shine through more than I'd care to. For example, there's a diplomat intent on conflict-aversion and seeking negotiation with a super-judeomuslim militia, and he's portrayed as a snivelling, bleeding-heart idealist only worthy of a haymaker to the face. The plot is written so that armed conflict indeed is the only solution, but although the novel in question was written long before the disputed 2003 Bush invasion, the comparisons in lingo and justifications are unavoidable.
I was personally bothered when Weber had Harrington prove religious diversity and tolerance in the Manticoran Navy by naming 3-4 different faiths held by crewmen on her ship and having one be a Scientologist. In the year 4000. Good grief. I still don't know if Weber is one or not.
He can fall into formula easily, for example having Honor serve her senior staff Old Tillman ale from her personal store once, to get them to relax, and then eight books later, whenever there's a personal guest or it's off-hours, still Old Tillman in a foggy glass.
I once got a weird surprise. In one story, Honor meets a young, muscular First Officer with glasses, a long black ponytail and a goatee. I thought "these are very weird, vain and improper affectations for a senior officer, who's not a villain but a potential romantic interest for Honor?". Then it dawned on me.
Now, they say Tolkien wrote Gandalf as himself, and far be it from me to judge someone who's invented a successful sci-fi universe and (I imagine) would gladly cut off his legs to live there, but, I mean...damn.
But though there are some of these kinks and oddities (a rich, comfy elder statesman from Manticore and a ruthless arms dealer from Haven use the exact same vocabulary, metaphors and swearwords), there are strong saving graces in there too (this is for you, Jason).
First and foremost, you can't write 10+ books about a universe without it getting more substance and content for every publication. He also balances large regions of known space (empires, republics and corporate conglomerates) with large expanses of uncharted territory and "western" frontiers, so you can have varying atmosphere for different stories.
Then there is the fan service. Those moments of juicy ship upgrades, or new ship classes (eaten like ice cream by that nerdy gremlin who lives in your tummy), discoveries of weapon caches in desperate moments, decisive hand-to-hand battles under unfair odds, and those classic crew hostilities that lead to cooperation and nice feelings allround.
The space battles are of course the major drawing point, and they are very varied in scale, weaponry and setting, in the best tradition of Hornblower and Jack Aubrey.
Also, he seems to like cats a lot.
Almost done with that ship sketch.
[ September 26, 2011, 03:27 AM: Message edited by: Fabrux ]
Registered: Aug 1999
| IP: Logged
quote:Visual descriptions is Weber's weakest spot...
ONE of his weak spots, sure. I'd argue that three dimensional characterization and a chronic over dependence on 18th Century allegory are right up there too.
I forget which book it was (and look away now those that don't want to be spoiled) but the bit where she's captured and it looked like they had gon and murdered the cat was the closest I ever came to being interested in Honor as a character.
Usually when a character is that insufferable the author has the narrative sense to set-up a nemesis of equal ability. No such luck. One came close I think but only after his government ended up being on the "good" side after all. I can see why this franchise has never been adapted as a movie or a TV show. Any script writer worth their salt would basically have to start from scratch, lest the audience die of boredom.
..Damn, I really am dumping on this IP aren't I? I mean it's not all bad. I mean I'm not one to slog through anything I'm not enjoying just so I can bitch about it, but it's one of those things that's entertaining enough to read through, but the series accumulates things that niggle away at the back of your mind until you look back and realise how crap some if it really was.
quote:the bit where she's captured and it looked like they had gon and murdered the cat
Can you ever describe a scenario without making it sound like Fawlty Towers?
Office of the Admiralty: "Where's that tart flown off to now then? The enemy will be here soon!" *knock-knock* "Send in the prisoner! No, NOT THE BLOODY CAT!" *entire staff enters room, arguing loudly* "Shut up! I said shu-" *violin ditty escalates*
The Tricolore references may get a bit heavyhanded now and then. I half-expected a new stealth cruiser of the Pimpernel class to be built and sent into Haven. But the plot element of "political" officers lent a degree of excitement to the "meanwhile, on havenite cruiser" chapters.
Registered: Aug 1999
| IP: Logged
quote:Can you ever describe a scenario without making it sound like Fawlty Towers?
Of course, but only when I make it sound like 'Allo 'Allo! or Open All Hours. *he typed while humming 'Alice Where Art Thou'*
BBC sitcoms are lens through which I view the universe.
Anyway, yeah the Havenite bits should have come with a Frank Welker voiced intro, Superfriends style : "...meanwhile, at the legion of doom..." Seriously, I'm almost certain there was *actual* moustache twirling going on.
posted
Those books sonun fuckawful. those coverse (linked) have nice illustrations but some of the very crappiest graphic design I have ever seen- way to completely fuck up a nice cover illustration with bad text and framing!
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
posted
Some of the covers are very archetypical "sci fi schlock corner" material, which doesn't necessarily do them justice. What I tried to convey in my posts is that the books do have solid parts and entertainment. Of the three books I've ever thrown into a wall after the last page, none of them were Webers. My main beef has been with the uninspiring, hypersymmetrical ship design, why I called it "one of the most tragic missed opportunities" in sci-fi. Because there's so much built up around them in the narrative.
Speaking of, I'm almost done with my dream schematic now, keep pantyhose on. The ventral view is the bitch of the bunch. Will be done tomorrow.
Registered: Aug 1999
| IP: Logged
posted
So...what were the books that you threw at the wall?
We need a thred for that- Sci Fi that made you hate the book/author/genre!
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
posted
Ok, here goes. So this is an amalgamate of my mind's eye view of a Manticoran battlecruiser, during my reading of the first four Honor Harrington-books. My main impression was a ship that was tall and slim, like the Sulaco, had a hammerhead bow and could take a rigorous beating.
HMS Hammer, 600 meters, 400,000 tons. What you must know about Honorverse ships is that their conventional layout favors the broadside, with forward/aft weapons (chase armament) being more sparse. In a prolonged engagement, the ship fires a broadside, then does a barrel roll and empties the other side in the same direction, while the first side reloads. Timed right, the ship can fire side after side in rhythm, in a continuous roll.
Now, seen in animation, that move would look dramatic with an asymmetrical ship, but very boring in the conventional Weber cylinder-ship design, as rolling cylinders don't move at all. The only indication would be small dots flying past. I didn't do a line drawing with arrows on ship sections, because the only arrow here would go to the hangar bay, situated on the belly of the ship. But now you know it's there, so I don't need to draw lines. The missile tubes are the main weapon, with lasers and *grasers (*much more potent energy weapon) finishing off at close range.
Got front and ventral views soon.
Registered: Aug 1999
| IP: Logged
posted
Actually, going by the Honorverse's own rules I think a narrow hull makes more sense than a cylinder purely from a tactical stand-point. I may be wrong in some of this (it's been a while) but as I recall the reason for the focus on broadside armament is because of the way the drive system creates a nigh impenetrable shield along the length, with the weak spots along the central axis, hence the minimal "chase" armaments.
With a tall, narrow hull you maximize the surface area you have that's shielded and present only a (relatively) minimal target profile along the axis of thrust.
posted
Yes, Honorverse ships don't have glowing aft-mounted thruster engines like most other franchises. The ship's "impeller drive" generates a forcefield, the impeller wedge, that moves the ship in sublight mode. It's shaped like a clamshell with holes up front, in the back and on the sides. The doctrine usually is to fire your broadside, then roll onto the side and let the topside of your wedge absorb the return fire.
Here is another point where I question Weber's judgement. The impeller wedge, as I would draw it, would extend about two shiplengths in level directions, one shiplength high. Much larger than a Galaxy class shield bubble, but not infeasible. It would be also be a very attractive and grateful aesthetic element to draw in artwork (I will do that next, after ventral view).
But Weber decides that the impeller wedge extends "hundreds of kilometers" in all directions, a figure totally meaningless to the human imagination, as it would make the ship driving the wedge smaller than a grain of sand, in scale. The kind of power needed to generate something like this is unimaginable and pointlessly improbable to the reader, it's a lot to file under "suspension of disbelief".
It's the same with weapon ranges. The common Honorverse laser, the weakest weapon in a warship's arsenal, has an effective range of one million kilometers, according to Weber. The planet Earth is thirteen thousand kilometers wide. The moon is four hundred thousand kilometers from Earth at its farthest point. So is a million kilometers really necessary? Giving even the smallest frigate class ship the gunpower of the Macross SDF-1? If Weber would've said 2000 km for lasers I would've been happy, because that is just enough for planetary bombardment in medium earth orbit. And that's what my imaginary spec card for HMS Hammer would say. You know, if I'd been interested in statistics.
[ September 30, 2011, 01:46 AM: Message edited by: Nim ]
Registered: Aug 1999
| IP: Logged
posted
Well actually I'm with him on the weapons ranges front. Space is after all, very very very very...BIG. For one ship to realistically threaten another their reach has to be significant, otherwise a star system would be utterly indefensible.
Still, even with that kind of range, the trick is in getting a bead on the enemy, adjust for light lag and hope he doesn't change course before the beam gets there. Realistically, I think if any enemy can get so close you can see them with the naked eye then you're in a *lot* of trouble.
quote:Well actually I'm with him on the weapons ranges front. Space is after all, very very very very...BIG. For one ship to realistically threaten another their reach has to be significant, otherwise a star system would be utterly indefensible.
I see what you mean, but I have a threshold for realistic content in sci-fi. I prefer the kind of encounters a Star Destroyer would get into, encounters you could draw as a scene. When it all becomes automated, approximated, beeping dots on a screen, you can just let the computers do all the work and have no humans at all. The Honorverse battles are very tense, exciting and dramatic, and describe the exploding hulk of the enemy (or unfortunate ally) in poetic detail, but knowing that the winner who fired the deciding volley is many worlds away and can't possibly see it happen takes something away from it, for me.
I realize that non-eyeball naval warfare occurred as early as WWII, but if I wanted to make an animation of my HMS Hammer in battle, it would be a Mutara Nebula deal, not Tron-meets-RISK.
The only movie I know of that has broadside-firing sci-fi ships doing battle was "Wing Commander" (1999), and although that movie was very subpar, the one scene where David Suchet takes his capital ship on strafing speed past a Kilrathi cruiser, was the one interesting scene in the movie for me. THAT'S space opera.
Couldn't find the scene on Youtube, but at 0:49 here you see a miniscule part of it. The missiles are even shaped like Weber's official mk.7 missiles. Oh, and at 0:25, Suchet's very pretty capital ship.
Registered: Aug 1999
| IP: Logged
posted
Well are we talking about science fiction or space opera here? They're not necessarily the same thing. To my mind science fiction must be rooted in science, but a space opera is basically fantasy that happens to involve space ships (see Star Wars, and I suppose Trek too to a lesser extent.)
I think modern submarine warfare is more or less analogous to what space combat would really be like and a skilled storyteller can still spin a compelling tale within those restrictions. Indeed, to me, sub-warfare is far more tense and dramatic than a pair of surface ships bludgeoning each other to death with broadside after broadside. It focuses the drama on the people. You don't ever know exactly where the enemy is, just where they've been and at any moment a ship or a barrage of missile or lasers can seemingly appear from nowhere. It's the difference between a boxing match and a game of chess. One is a battle of endurance while the other is a battle of wits.
In the case of Honor Harrington, it was most often the latter. IIRC the dramatic broadsides were usually reserved for the final stroke or when two ships were forced to stick close to a gravity well.
posted
There are plenty of examples, both good and bad, about what can happen in space combat when you can't see your enemy.
Exhibit A: "Balance of Terror." The two ships didn't have to be in visual range all the time for there to be tense action.
Exhibit B: "Andromeda." The quintessential "beeping dots on the screen" killed a lot of the action, and cutaway shots didn't make up for it. It was the most scientifically accurate, one could argue, but that didn't make it interesting.
Let's face it: modern combat, even/especially in real life, is mostly people staring at computer screens guiding or controlling their weapons at targets dozens, hundreds, or thousands of miles away.
-------------------- “Those people who think they know everything are a great annoyance to those of us who do.” — Isaac Asimov Star Trek Minutiae | Memory Alpha
Registered: Nov 2000
| IP: Logged
quote:Let's face it: modern combat, even/especially in real life, is mostly people staring at computer screens guiding or controlling their weapons at targets dozens, hundreds, or thousands of miles away.
Will do. *indistinct noises* There. Fully faced. Now, let's face away from it again...towards gun cams, ramming speed, capital ship acrobatics, Slim Pickens whooping, and Shaka, when the walls fell.
Reverend:
quote:Well are we talking about science fiction or space opera here? They're not necessarily the same thing.
Nuh-no, still firmly entrenched in sci-fi. When I said "space opera" I was referring to that particular capital ship duel in "Wing Commander", it had good dramatic and aesthetic flare for a straight-to-video astroturd.
I agree, the most memorable battles of the Honorverse involve inspired improvisation or exploiting an opportunity, not just brute force. However, I'd say that both analogies (boxing and chess) are applicable to most Honorverse (and Hornblower) battles, in that both sides take a lot of fat licks before the situation changes or escalates, often through the point-defense margin of error.
No one else could write stuff like "the faltering hulk was sent into oblivion by a storm of bomb-pumped laser fury". Well, I guess several others could, but no one would. *rimshot*
Registered: Aug 1999
| IP: Logged
Printer-friendly view of this topic
