I don't expect the Eve universe to be a absoutely accurate model of the real Universe as some of the real world mechanics are not easy to model but I was wondering why ships have top speeds?

Because the game breaks without them.

^ end of thread.

Edit: I was born of nano. It was glorious but made 90% of the ships redundant (or dead fairly quickly)

If ships didn't have top speed combat would be incredibly boring.

I don't expect the Eve universe to be a absoutely accurate model of the real Universe as some of the real world mechanics are not easy to model but I was wondering why ships have top speeds?

Here on the Earth we are restricted to top speeds because of the simple fact of friction. Be it from the air, the ground, whatever. However, space is frictionless and according to the laws of mechanics if you accelerate a body in a frictionless environment, and keep accelerating it, there is no limit to how fast you can go.

I'm sure people will talk about the speed of light being an absolute ceiling in reality but that only applies to other reference frames. If you accelerate at a constant rate of, say 1g for example, you can accelerate at the speed for as long as you like. If you had infinite fuel you could accelerate forever and never reach light speed.

But getting back to my point, why do ships have top speeds?

I expect this issue has probably already been raised so I apologise if this has been covered to exhaustion,

Because the game breaks without them.

I don't expect the Eve universe to be a absoutely accurate model of the real Universe as some of the real world mechanics are not easy to model but I was wondering why ships have top speeds?

Here on the Earth we are restricted to top speeds because of the simple fact of friction. Be it from the air, the ground, whatever. However, space is frictionless and according to the laws of mechanics if you accelerate a body in a frictionless environment, and keep accelerating it, there is no limit to how fast you can go.

I'm sure people will talk about the speed of light being an absolute ceiling in reality but that only applies to other reference frames. If you accelerate at a constant rate of, say 1g for example, you can accelerate at the speed for as long as you like. If you had infinite fuel you could accelerate forever and never reach light speed.

But getting back to my point, why do ships have top speeds?

I expect this issue has probably already been raised so I apologise if this has been covered to exhaustion,

I noticed sometimes if I am viewing someones ship while he is warping off the stuff starts going all wonky. In some games going stupid fast causes things to stretch all spastically.

Also, warp cores cause drag. I mean they do shift space around you to make you move at warp speed in the first place.

The thing that makes me curious is scientists are looking at the possibility of warp technology right now, what if it really doesn't cause drag when it is being used in space? or has someone mathed that one together already?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive

What I do find cool is how they talk about warp bubbles and a vacuum between two plates, which is somewhat what goes on in eve.

Here is how eve describes it.
https://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Warp_drives

Vacuum between two vibrating plates. I had an actual CCP picture of the warp core somewhere, but I can't seem find it. Just look at a disruptor module or stabilizer modules, they have a little picture of one on them.

Why do people think that a Space game is required to follow real world physics?

I don't expect the Eve universe to be a absoutely accurate model of the real Universe as some of the real world mechanics are not easy to model but I was wondering why ships have top speeds?

Here on the Earth we are restricted to top speeds because of the simple fact of friction. Be it from the air, the ground, whatever. However, space is frictionless and according to the laws of mechanics if you accelerate a body in a frictionless environment, and keep accelerating it, there is no limit to how fast you can go.

I'm sure people will talk about the speed of light being an absolute ceiling in reality but that only applies to other reference frames. If you accelerate at a constant rate of, say 1g for example, you can accelerate at the speed for as long as you like. If you had infinite fuel you could accelerate forever and never reach light speed.

But getting back to my point, why do ships have top speeds?

I expect this issue has probably already been raised so I apologise if this has been covered to exhaustion,

As I understand it, the game breaks even with them, if they're very high. I didn't play during the nano-everything days, but I've heard stories.