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Third image in my re-visualization of Larry Niven’s short story ”The Warriors.” The Kzinti warship Tracker matching course and velocity with [my re-envisioned and renamed] UN human colony Ram-ship Light-Bearer.
By and far the most illustrated scene from Niven’s The Warriors shows the broken hull of the Kzin warship in the aftermath of first-contact. In the aftermath of the “Kzinti lesson.”
Winchell Chung observes:
—Larry Niven
Read more on propulsion as a weapon, and the counter Anti-Kzinti-Lesson, on Winchell Chung’s Atomic Rockets, here: Propulsion Systems.
As I started out: most artists depict the Kzin warship Tracker destroyed in the aftermath of first-contact. Since this has been done to death I thought it more interesting, with these posts, to illustrate other aspects of Niven’s story, for there is much here to remark upon, for one, the draconian nature of Niven’s world government. The Earth of Niven’s Known Space is ruled by a one-world U.N. state, and perhaps here we see a germ of the concept which later brought us Niven’s The State series, beginning with Rammer. Niven’s U.N. world government embarks on a generation’s long program of social re-programming involving advanced psychiatry, drugs, and a selective editing of historical records (with access to actual historical records restricted to a select few) aimed to the purpose of creating a more docile human society. This program underpins Niven’s narrative in The Warriors, and when it comes down to a matter of survival, The Warriors tells the story of how this program ultimately fails: in the end the protagonist uses the powerful drive of Angel’s Pencil as a weapon to burn right through the Kzin warship, splitting the vessel in half.
The engagement happens at a range of two hundred thousand miles, when the Kzin commander orders the weapons officer to “use the inductors,” a thermal beam weapon, possibly microwave based, turned on the human vessel with intent to kill the crew leaving the ship intact for analysis.
Here, clearly Niven, was engaging in some Worldbuilding, setting up the conditions of Human Kzin contact and the cultural differences which underpin not only the character of the Kzin, as a species, but set the stage for the Man Kzin wars. Also interestingly this foreshadows Puppeteer manipulations with many of the denizens of Known Space.
The bulk of narrative in Niven’s story illustrates contrasting expectations surrounding the first-contact event. The Kzin, in contrast to socially re-programmed humans, are an evolved hunting carnivore who embrace their nature. Kzin see aliens in terms of their utility, either as food animals, or slaves, or both. The humans impose their own values, presuming that a species which can construct such an advanced spacecraft (as they perceive the Kzin craft to be) would have long since evolved the food production technologies and economic theory that would eliminate aggression and the need for war.
About my composition: Niven’s text states the engagement happens at a range of 200,000 miles —here I’ve used an exaggerated visual scale for illustrative purposes, in order to capture both vessels in frame. The mood and tone of the piece is intended to highlight the character of Kzin, this is the scene as a Kzin might see it, the warship Tracker closing on its pray.
Description of the Kzinti vessel Tracker from ”The Warriors”:
“The star was both duller and larger than those around it. Among points which glowed arc-lamp blue-white with the Doppler shift, the alien ship showed as a dull red disk.”
"I looked at it through the telescope," said Steve. "There are, bumps and ridges all over it. And there's a circle of green dots and commas painted on one side. Looked like writing."”
Composition notes: In the context of Larry Niven’s short story ”The Warriors” first contact between Man and Kzinti happens while the two vessels are at relativistic velocities, approximately .8c. In my composition Relativistic Sky, the first image in this sequence, I’ve shown the human colony Ram-ship Light-Bearer in boost phase, approaching its terminal cruise velocity – consequentially the stars behind Light-Barer in that image are red-shifted and their positions are distorted due to both Doppler and relativistic effects, as these effects were understood in the 1970's when Larry Niven wrote the story (see Relativistic Sky for additional commentary in regards to the understanding of Doppler effects at the time Niven wrote the story). The composition shows the approach of the Kzinti warship Tracker as it matches velocity to investigate Light-Bearer, the camera POV is behind and above Tracker, hence the star field is shown from Tracker’s reference frame, pointing along its direction of flight, and the star field is, consequentially, blue-shifted.
Note: Caption text expanded and updated August 31, 2015.
Resources:
Relativistic Sky created using numerous NASA/JPL sourced star field images as a base.
Related Images:
Relativistic Sky
Light-Bearer: Construction Orbit
Orders can be placed at wblack42@sbcglobal.net
See my profile page for details.
Third image in my re-visualization of Larry Niven’s short story ”The Warriors.” The Kzinti warship Tracker matching course and velocity with [my re-envisioned and renamed] UN human colony Ram-ship Light-Bearer.
By and far the most illustrated scene from Niven’s The Warriors shows the broken hull of the Kzin warship in the aftermath of first-contact. In the aftermath of the “Kzinti lesson.”
Winchell Chung observes:
If your torchship's exhaust is pumping out a few terawatts, it might occur to you that your enemy would be real unhappy if you hosed them with your tail flame.
This is called "The Kzinti Lesson", from a Larry Niven short story called "The Warriors". Most science fiction fans have the mistaken belief that Niven first came up with the idea, even though John W. Campbell Jr. used it in his short story Solarite in 1930 (collected in The Black Star Passes).
The Kzinti Lesson: A reaction drive's efficiency as a weapon is in direct proportion to its efficiency as a drive.—Larry Niven
Read more on propulsion as a weapon, and the counter Anti-Kzinti-Lesson, on Winchell Chung’s Atomic Rockets, here: Propulsion Systems.
As I started out: most artists depict the Kzin warship Tracker destroyed in the aftermath of first-contact. Since this has been done to death I thought it more interesting, with these posts, to illustrate other aspects of Niven’s story, for there is much here to remark upon, for one, the draconian nature of Niven’s world government. The Earth of Niven’s Known Space is ruled by a one-world U.N. state, and perhaps here we see a germ of the concept which later brought us Niven’s The State series, beginning with Rammer. Niven’s U.N. world government embarks on a generation’s long program of social re-programming involving advanced psychiatry, drugs, and a selective editing of historical records (with access to actual historical records restricted to a select few) aimed to the purpose of creating a more docile human society. This program underpins Niven’s narrative in The Warriors, and when it comes down to a matter of survival, The Warriors tells the story of how this program ultimately fails: in the end the protagonist uses the powerful drive of Angel’s Pencil as a weapon to burn right through the Kzin warship, splitting the vessel in half.
The engagement happens at a range of two hundred thousand miles, when the Kzin commander orders the weapons officer to “use the inductors,” a thermal beam weapon, possibly microwave based, turned on the human vessel with intent to kill the crew leaving the ship intact for analysis.
Here, clearly Niven, was engaging in some Worldbuilding, setting up the conditions of Human Kzin contact and the cultural differences which underpin not only the character of the Kzin, as a species, but set the stage for the Man Kzin wars. Also interestingly this foreshadows Puppeteer manipulations with many of the denizens of Known Space.
The bulk of narrative in Niven’s story illustrates contrasting expectations surrounding the first-contact event. The Kzin, in contrast to socially re-programmed humans, are an evolved hunting carnivore who embrace their nature. Kzin see aliens in terms of their utility, either as food animals, or slaves, or both. The humans impose their own values, presuming that a species which can construct such an advanced spacecraft (as they perceive the Kzin craft to be) would have long since evolved the food production technologies and economic theory that would eliminate aggression and the need for war.
About my composition: Niven’s text states the engagement happens at a range of 200,000 miles —here I’ve used an exaggerated visual scale for illustrative purposes, in order to capture both vessels in frame. The mood and tone of the piece is intended to highlight the character of Kzin, this is the scene as a Kzin might see it, the warship Tracker closing on its pray.
Description of the Kzinti vessel Tracker from ”The Warriors”:
“The star was both duller and larger than those around it. Among points which glowed arc-lamp blue-white with the Doppler shift, the alien ship showed as a dull red disk.”
"I looked at it through the telescope," said Steve. "There are, bumps and ridges all over it. And there's a circle of green dots and commas painted on one side. Looked like writing."”
Composition notes: In the context of Larry Niven’s short story ”The Warriors” first contact between Man and Kzinti happens while the two vessels are at relativistic velocities, approximately .8c. In my composition Relativistic Sky, the first image in this sequence, I’ve shown the human colony Ram-ship Light-Bearer in boost phase, approaching its terminal cruise velocity – consequentially the stars behind Light-Barer in that image are red-shifted and their positions are distorted due to both Doppler and relativistic effects, as these effects were understood in the 1970's when Larry Niven wrote the story (see Relativistic Sky for additional commentary in regards to the understanding of Doppler effects at the time Niven wrote the story). The composition shows the approach of the Kzinti warship Tracker as it matches velocity to investigate Light-Bearer, the camera POV is behind and above Tracker, hence the star field is shown from Tracker’s reference frame, pointing along its direction of flight, and the star field is, consequentially, blue-shifted.
Note: Caption text expanded and updated August 31, 2015.
Resources:
Relativistic Sky created using numerous NASA/JPL sourced star field images as a base.
Related Images:
Relativistic Sky
Light-Bearer: Construction Orbit
Image size
2475x3360px 2.91 MB
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Note: Caption text expanded and updated August 31, 2015.