Epoch as a FTL device?

[Flarebringer]

Hi. I'm new here, as my post count likely indicates, but I've been lurking on these forums for a month or so now, and read the articles pretty well. I had a random idea a minute or so ago.

Is there any reason why the Epoch/Neo Epoch couldn't be a machine capable of travelling at highly relativistic/superluminal speeds? I mean, traveling at .999999999999c or something would allow for relativly quick transit through time forward, and I seem to recall a theroy that superluminal particles like tachyons could theoretically move backwards in time.

Granted, this doesn't explain why Epoch can only go to certain places in time (though I think that's supposition) or how it gets to the End of time, but it was more of a wacky mental exercise than anything serious.

Comments? Discussion? Pipe bombs?

EDIT: Okay, assuming the big rip cosmological theroy, the universe will end in a finite amount of time. A pretty short finite amount of time compared to waiting for a Big Crunch or thermodynamic death. So let's say the End of Time exists after the universe is gravatationally unbound. Then...

Assuming a speed of 0.999999999c, and w=-1.5 (so the universe ends about 20 billion years from now)...
T(observed by outside factor) = T(observed by moving factor) / sqrt(1-(v^2/c^2))
T(outside) = T(moving) / sqrt(1-0.999999998000000001)
20,000,000,000 = T(moving) / sqrt (0.000000001999999999)
2.0 * 10^10 = T(moving) / 4.4721359538815454039286982406293e-5
T(moving) = 894427.1907763090807857396481258 years to get to the End of Time

...no, that's not going to work. Let's see how fast it would have to go to shorten travel time to half an hour(5.7077625570776255707762557077626e-5 years)--still unrealistic, but then you can make the time as arbitrarily short as you want as long as your calculator can handle that many sig figs...
2.0 * 10^10 = (5.7077625570776255707762557077626e-5) / sqrt(1-C^2), where C = fraction of the speed of light.
sqrt(1-C^2) = 2.853881278538812785388127853881e-15
1-C^2 = 8.1446383519943287254227393090203e-30
C^2 = 0.99999999999999999999999999999186
C = 0.9999999999999999999999999999955c

That's pretty darn fast. I'm not even going to try to calculate the amount of energy you'd need to go that fast (zero-point energy, anyone? But I personally think that the free-field quantum field theroy calculation is bunk.) or how you're supposed to survive that kind of acceleration, but the potential is there.

[GrayLensman]

That was an interesting post, but I don't think the Epoch uses reletavistic time dilation for future time travel.  The exact method by which the Epoch time travels was never stated (the Neo-Epoch has an "antiprooton" drive), although it may function similar to the Time-Gates (i.e a worm hole).  The Epoch is also limited to time periods connected by Gates.

However, General Relativity shows that any method of FTL travel would also allow travel into the past, so the Epoch, being a time machine, would also be capable of FTL travel.  The Epoch must actually cross light-years of empty space instantly to travel to the earth's location in 65 million BC.

[Zaperking]

That was an interesting post, but I don't think the Epoch uses reletavistic time dilation for future time travel.  The exact method by which the Epoch time travels was never stated (the Neo-Epoch has an "antiprooton" drive), although it may function similar to the Time-Gates (i.e a worm hole).  The Epoch is also limited to time periods connected by Gates.

However, General Relativity shows that any method of FTL travel would also allow travel into the past, so the Epoch, being a time machine, would also be capable of FTL travel.  The Epoch must actually cross light-years of empty space instantly to travel to the earth's location in 65 million BC.

Though, It was revealed that the Epoch was being powered by the total sum of all spiritual energy that ever existed. (basically the energy from anyone or thing that was ever born)

[DeweyisOverrated]

As for why the Epoch couldn't travel to ANY time period, there's a few explanations.

1) The game-mechanics explanation: Obviously you can't program an infinite amount of time periods.

2) Story-explanation: Belthasar put those time periods into the machine, knowing those were the necessary periods to be able to travel to to eventually defeat Lavos.

[Chrono'99]

The Epoch is powered by the sum of all spiritual energy that ever existed. More probably all spiritual energy that ever existed on the planet though, rather than in the whole universe. So, since we all know that the Entity is the planet, it makes sense that the Epoch can only travel to the eras in which there's a Time Gate.

[Zaperking]

As for why the Epoch couldn't travel to ANY time period, there's a few explanations.

1) The game-mechanics explanation: Obviously you can't program an infinite amount of time periods.

\

Epoch should still be able to go into Satis. Like it travels to 65,000,000BC, then just sits there in like a PD or something and when you stop is when you get out, like in 3,000,000BC, but yeah. Obviously they wouldn't program it all, to hard and to time consuming and possibly irrelivant.

[AuraTwilight]

...Wow, that was a GREAT first post. Welcome to Chrono Compendium.

(All the n00bs are kicking my brain's ass recently >_>;; ))

[Flarebringer]

That was an interesting post, but I don't think the Epoch uses reletavistic time dilation for future time travel.  The exact method by which the Epoch time travels was never stated (the Neo-Epoch has an "antiprooton" drive), although it may function similar to the Time-Gates (i.e a worm hole).  The Epoch is also limited to time periods connected by Gates.

However, General Relativity shows that any method of FTL travel would also allow travel into the past, so the Epoch, being a time machine, would also be capable of FTL travel.  The Epoch must actually cross light-years of empty space instantly to travel to the earth's location in 65 million BC.

Doesn't the Epoch move really really fast when entering/exiting time warp? Anyways, I have a few more questions.
1) Does the finite number of time portals at the End of Time imply that the portals linked to the End of Time are the only possible ones? If the Enitity knew which time periods would be nessecary to defeat Lavos and only made travel to that location possible, then doesn't that mean it can completly forsee the future, i.e be completly prescient? I mean, doesn't predestination go against the whole grain of the changing-time-everything-is-in-flux nature of Trigger?
2) Okay, if I'm understanding time error right, it means...screw it, I don't understand it right. But let's say we have the Truce Canyon-600 AD and Millenial Fair-1000 AD portals. Somebody (preferably immortal) racks up 400 years of Time-Error, and goes from the End of Time to Truce Canyon-600 AD. Which gate does he come out of? Will Truce Canyon-600 AD just dump him out at Millenial Fair-1000 AD?

[GrayLensman]

Doesn't the Epoch move really really fast when entering/exiting time warp? Anyways, I have a few more questions.
1) Does the finite number of time portals at the End of Time imply that the portals linked to the End of Time are the only possible ones? If the Enitity knew which time periods would be nessecary to defeat Lavos and only made travel to that location possible, then doesn't that mean it can completly forsee the future, i.e be completly prescient? I mean, doesn't predestination go against the whole grain of the changing-time-everything-is-in-flux nature of Trigger?

There are some Time Gates which do not link to the End of Time, such as the 65 million BC/12,000 BC portal.  There could be other Gates that were never shown.

Most aspects of the Entity are purely speculation.  All we know is that the Planet was in a weakened state and created the Gates to share its memories with the time travellers.  We don't know whether the time travellers' quest to defeat Lavos was planned by the Entity, but this does go against the idea of self-determination presented in Chrono Trigger.  I think that the Entity was only responsible for the Gates, and the rest was left up to the time travellers and the gurus.

2) Okay, if I'm understanding time error right, it means...screw it, I don't understand it right. But let's say we have the Truce Canyon-600 AD and Millenial Fair-1000 AD portals. Somebody (preferably immortal) racks up 400 years of Time-Error, and goes from the End of Time to Truce Canyon-600 AD. Which gate does he come out of? Will Truce Canyon-600 AD just dump him out at Millenial Fair-1000 AD?

That's still a mystery.  Presumably, at some point the 600 AD Gate must be replaced by the 1000 AD Gate.

[CyberSarkany]

These 2 gates (Prehistory and Dark Ages) do link to the End of Time after the seal from Magus has been destroyed(=you get Epoch)

[ZeaLitY]

Just to cut through crap, the "sum total of spiritual energy" is a metaphor messed up in the US version. Robo was merely stating that the Epoch amplified human willpower. The Neo Epoch is and the Epoch was presumably operated by an anti-proton drive.