Another Travel/Flight Speed Thread

[Agnaa]

This thread has unearthed another bit of ambiguity with our current rules for scaling travel/flight feats to reaction speed.

Our standards currently say:

Simply being able to stop accurately at the target destination does typically not qualify, as it can be spotted from a large distance to make preparations to stop or the character could even slow down before reaching the destination, assuming we only know the average speed with which they moved.

Stating that two important factors that can mitigate reactions for these feats (and as such need to be accounted for in calcs) are:

1. Characters can make preparations to stop as soon as they know where they're landing (such as by spotting it or by somehow knowing where the planet they're traveling to is).
2. Characters can slow down before reaching the destination.

However, it's not clear when we assume this slow down is happening.

This became an issue when it was (arguably) demonstrated that the character in question darted around the planet to find an appropriate place to land after entering the atmosphere.

If we assume they would have slowed down before finding the location (i.e. assuming they slow down when the planet is visible, assuming they slow down when within a moon's orbit, or assuming they slow down after they enter the atmosphere), then this darting around the planet wouldn't scale to their average flight speed.

However, if we assume that they would have slowed down just before the flight finished (i.e. after they found the location and prepared to land), then this darting around the planet would scale to their average flight speed.

Of note is that, as of now, the series itself doesn't give us concrete on when any potential slowdown occurred. While the character did cut through the air and create an explosion when landing, this could've been done with speeds over 10^15 times slower than the average flight speed. And pixel scaling the flight speed they showed around that time gives a speed far below the average flight speed.

So, how should we treat situations like this? When should we believe that slowdown is happening?

(Putting it in Q&A since this may not revise the page itself, and could just set up a standard for interpreting it. If it looks like revisions are necessary, a staff member should move it to content revision/staff as deemed appropriate)

 

[Zamasu_Chan]

Another one

 

[AKM sama]

So, how should we treat situations like this? When should we believe that slowdown is happening?

The note itself assumes that the slowdown is happening and that is the reason why travel speed doesn't scale to reactions for simply being able to land on a planet. When is it happening, is not something concrete that needs to be determined. Could have happened as soon as the character saw the planet, or when they entered the Moon's orbit, or near the atmosphere. There are several possibilities when it could happen. The main concern is not to pinpoint when it is happening, unless the particular feat itself gives us that information.

 

[ProfessorKukui4Life]

Well since this is up now, might as well comment.

My issue with this, generally speaking and not in specific relation with the linked thread, is that there's a needless precedent of assumption being set that not even the rule itself accounts for as being a likelihood currently. And that being you would start deciding on when to slow or halt your movement without even first seeing the desired stopping point beforehand. When you actually see the location you are heading for come up, this is one scenario currently accounted for in the rule where slowing is a reasonable possibility. You see the place you are stopping at coming up, so what is the first thing you would do? Slow yourself to approach it.

But why would you assume that in the case where you haven't yet seen it coming into view? Your stopping point hasn't appeared yet, you are not approaching it yet to think about when to stop, and you can't properly discern when to stop without having that information yet available.

 

[Agnaa]

The note itself assumes that the slowdown is happening and that is the reason why travel speed doesn't scale to reactions for simply being able to land on a planet. When is it happening, is not something concrete that needs to be determined. Could have happened as soon as the character saw the planet, or when they entered the Moon's orbit, or near the atmosphere. There are several possibilities when it could happen. The main concern is not to pinpoint when it is happening, unless the particular feat itself gives us that information.

Like I said, it'd be relevant as some possibilities for when it could happen would result in the feat being far higher than other possibilities where it could happen.

And there are some situations where we'd obviously say that slowdown hadn't occurred, say that a character was 70% of the way through their flight and then an obstacle suddenly teleported/apparated in front of them. So I think that we already do assume a certain limit for when "They could have slowed down" would be applied, but the feat that brought up this discussion hits a bit of a grey area with it.

 

[AKM sama]

Like I said, it'd be relevant as some possibilities for when it could happen would result in the feat being far higher than other possibilities where it could happen.

And there are some situations where we'd obviously say that slowdown hadn't occurred, say that a character was 70% of the way through their flight and then an obstacle suddenly teleported in front of them.

These details depend on the feat and what the feat provides us. We can't assume these specifications by ourselves.

 

[Agnaa]

These details depend on the feat and what the feat provides us. We can't assume these specifications by ourselves.

What's important here is what we do when there aren't details provided by the feat.

It's not like, absent of details, we'd assume that a character 50% of the way through their flight would've already slowed down.

 

[Agnaa]

Well since this is up now, might as well comment.

My issue with this, generally speaking and not in specific relation with the linked thread, is that there's a needless precedent of assumption being set that not even the rule itself accounts for as being a likelihood currently. And that being you would start deciding on when to slow or halt your movement without even first seeing the desired stopping point beforehand. When you actually see the location you are heading for come up, this is one scenario currently accounted for in the rule where slowing is a reasonable possibility. You see the place you are stopping at coming up, so what is the first thing you would do? Slow yourself to approach it.

But why would you assume that in the case where you haven't yet seen it coming into view? Your stopping point hasn't appeared yet, you are not approaching it yet to think about when to stop, and you can't properly discern when to stop without having that information yet available.

It feels like you're kind of obfuscating things by vaguely saying "the location" or "the place you are stopping at". I do think this sort of thing could be a good idea if it isn't worded that vaguely. Do we consider "the place you are stopping at" to be, say...

• A specific part of a specific platform?
• A specific platform on a specific mountain?
• A specific mountain in a certain area?
• A specific area of a continent?
• A specific continent on a planet?
• A specific planet in a solar system?
• A specific solar system in a region of a galaxy?
• A specific region of a galaxy?
• A specific galaxy in a supercluster of galaxies?
• A specific supercluster of galaxies?

Only counting deceleration based on which of those is spotted could give astronomically different results. The rub being that those are all technically "the destination", just at different levels of focus.

Now we may not need to choose the same reference point for each feat, but we should have some system for choosing the reference point in question based on the feat.

 

[ProfessorKukui4Life]

snip

Well of course the location and the specifics would be largely different across different series, so apologies for making a rather vague description, but I am ultimately speaking about the same thing as those different location types.

 

[Agnaa]

Had some back-and-forth about it with AKM on Discord, leading to the idea of:

I'd say we should generally only assume that they slow down when their destination is close. Like, "close" can be up to interpretation, but generally if we are talking about a planet, the vicinity of it would be the solar system.

If you're traveling, say, 10 light years, you won't be starting to slow down 3 light years away, you won't even be in your target solar system at that point. But if you're planning to land on a planet, "entering a solar system" is where the idea of them slowing down starts being plausible. The chance of a character slowing down would get higher the closer they get, but once there's reasonable doubt that they could've been slowing down, you'd need to prove that they haven't to dispel that assumption.

 

[ProfessorKukui4Life]

Okay. Well a few things.

The chance of a character slowing down would get higher the closer they get, but once there's reasonable doubt that they could've been slowing down, you'd need to prove that they haven't to dispel that assumption.

Why would evidence be needed at this point if doubt on them slowing down arises?

EDIT: Also im most likely going to bed soon so if I may answer back to this tomorrow.

 

[Agnaa]

I did not mean "doubt on them slowing down", I meant "the feat is in doubt because they reasonably could've been slowing down".

I probably should've said "reasonable chance" or something like that.

 

[AKM sama]

@DontTalkDT @Wokistan

I think the issue here is that since characters can slow down while landing or reaching their destination, exactly when they would generally slow down is not something that can be factually determined. This would lead to arguments like "Character X started to slow down after completing 80% of the journey", even if the rest 20% contains a several solar systems or galaxies, which wouldn't take anything away from travel speed not inherently scaling to reactions or combat speed. But it will come into play in a certain scenario where the character encounters an obstacle they never saw coming during the remaining 20% of the journey.

Normally, if that obstacle they faced was many light years away from their destination, avoiding it at the last moment without prior knowledge should be scalable, but if one insists on making an argument like the above, assuming that they slowed down after 80% of the journey, it wouldn't scale. I think that argument goes too much in one direction and is a bit of a reach.

To avoid such a situation, would it help to include an example in the note.

We should generally only assume that they slow down when their destination is close. But, "close" can be up to interpretation, but generally if we are talking about landing on a planet, in case of interstellar travel, the vicinity of it would be the solar system. But in case of long intergalactic travel, it could even be the galaxy. Do you have any suggestions.


There is another thing I want to point out here though, in regard to where this thread originated from, even if we assume that the character did not slow down until the last moment, but was able to stop really really fast, that would only mean the deceleration rate of the character is insanely high. Like, one can see the planet from a distance and still decide "okay now... 3..2..1 now I have to apply the brakes" and it would make them stop almost immediately due to their high deceleration rate, but it still won't scale to their reactions.

 

[Agnaa]

There is another thing I want to point out here though, in regard to where this thread originated from, even if we assume that the character did not slow down until the last moment, but was able to stop really really fast, that would only mean the deceleration rate of the character is insanely high. Like, one can see the planet from a distance and still decide "okay now... 3..2..1 now I have to apply the brakes" and it would make them stop almost immediately due to their high deceleration rate, but it still won't scale to their reactions.

To clarify for any onlookers, the relevance of that argument here is that, the animated series showed a character approaching planet at an ocean with a clear sky, but landed on some land with a cloudy sky. This could be an animation error, but it was also argued to mean that after getting significantly close to the planet, they darted around to find land.

So if we say they didn't slow down until finding that patch of land, that would make them scale to MFTL+ reactions.

 

[Kulf_Boba]

What do you think about this, is it true?

The time in which a movement is made is irrelevant for maneuvering if you do not have reflexes in accordance with it, because no matter how long you have to see the obstacle, without at least comparable perceptions, everything would be blurred and indistinguishable, for which would be impossible to see where they are flying or realize what is in front of them. This is especially true when the speed of light is exceeded, since then the photons do not have time to reach the eyes of the traveler; therefore, it would be impossible to distinguish shapes or colors of any kind, unless their brains are capable of perceiving and processing that information at speeds greater than those of light.

 

[Agnaa]

What do you think about this, is it true?

Impressive perception would be needed, but:

1. What's needed is not fast perception, but precise perception. If you have 1 second to make a movement, you can take 0.8 seconds to process what hits you retinas, your brain just needs to be able to finely look through that slurry of information. Also, this problem is vastly overstated; if an object is large enough it can easily be seen by humans approaching it at fast speeds (think pilots). Thus, it is not a speed feat.
2. Being faster than light does not strengthen this idea, it makes it even more ludicrous. You can't just suddenly break the laws of physics to manifest photons when they wouldn't otherwise arrive just because your brain can process data quickly.
3. Sticking strongly to this train of logic would entail giving every sufficiently fast character vastly superhuman perception (in the sense of being able to notice fine details at long distances), and in certain cases being able to see things that are normally invisible, but we don't do this, so it seems strange to use it to justify flight speed scaling.