solas
2nd Incarnation
Posts: 97
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Post by solas on Jan 8, 2010 16:48:35 GMT
I've been curious about this as I don't have access to the Expanded Universe audibooks and novels and was wondering if this was addressed anywhere.
I have an idea to use an unbonded Tardis in my game and want the player characters' personality (through the psychic bonding that seems to occur with a Time Lord and a Tardis) to influence the look some of the Tardis. That being said, I have no idea what an 'undesigned' Tardis might look like and imagined it being somewhat featureless, like the all-white Zero Room.
Following that, I imagine also that a Tardis as it configures is crystalline (only going from the core visual feature of the console room, the time rotator column). My visual was for a white Zero Room-style console room with a sunken floor around the console where seats would be (and could be 'raised' or 'sunk' along with the rest of the room) and the room itself being dome-shaped.
Again, not having read how a Tardis is grown, I'd appreciate any feedback and thoughts on this.
S.
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Post by renegadetimelord on Jan 8, 2010 18:26:55 GMT
Can't recall where this came from, but my understanding was externally an 'undesigned' (or 'unbonded') TARDIS looked like a plain silver box with a sliding door in one side. Internally, I'm inclined to believe the new show's TARDIS would have the current coral look, but going by the old show, it would be very much as you described - white everywhere, roundels and plain furnishings.
I would favour the concept of a new TARDIS forming a telepathic bond with it's pilot(s) and the interior reforming on entry. Passing through the dimensional transition point between exterior and interior, the pilot's personality would assert itself through the telepathic link and voila! The exterior (assuming activation of the Chameleon Circuit) would only change on arrival and the first non-Gallifreyan destination - or perhaps just the first stop out of the 'birthing bay' (or wherever the new TARDIS was sitting).
All TARDIS (in the new series) would contain all the basics components of the Time Sceptre, illustrated in The Visual Dictionary. This would include, at least: Control Room, power and time travel systems, life support, basic crew facilities (living quarters, bathrooms, maintenance bays, research labs, wardrobe, etc.) and Zero Room.
It's entirely possible the War TARDIS of the later books would be completely different from the ones we have seen in the series... but, that discussion is for another time.
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Post by dvalkyrie74 on Jan 8, 2010 22:16:16 GMT
When an old friend and i started playing Doctor Who in the late 80's with the Fasa rules, we asked that very same question and came up with the same idea. A silver capsule with a sliding door and very spartan features. The old architectural rules in the Fasa system said that the TARDIS was mathematic computation that was so intricate, that it became solid. Rooms were deisgned into existence and removed just as easily based on the comforts of the Tardis occupants.
Reminds me of an old saying in one of the old D6 Star Wars RPG books. You can own a stock light YT-1300 freighter, but no two YT-1300 freighter's are alike. Freighter captains (like Han Solo) modify their ships to what ever they wish the ships to be. TARDISes in my campaigns have always been viewed as the same, each with their own artistic elements.
On the other hand, someone once drew a picture of a TARDIS as if it were created like a circle with the Console room built at the center and the rest of the rooms built around it. I believe I saw this picture on Deviantart.com, but can't remember.
Mark
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Post by kaemaril on Jan 8, 2010 22:26:02 GMT
The old architectural rules in the Fasa system said that the TARDIS was mathematic computation that was so intricate, that it became solid. Rooms were deisgned into existence and removed just as easily based on the comforts of the Tardis occupants. Wasn't that based on the concept of 'block transfer computations' from Logopolis? Was it this? |
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Post by Rel Fexive on Jan 8, 2010 22:40:49 GMT
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Post by kaemaril on Jan 8, 2010 23:03:27 GMT
It's good, isn't it?  |
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Post by Null and Void on Jan 9, 2010 1:09:15 GMT
Its remarkable, really.
I can't recall where it was that I read it, but somewhere said that the Cloister Rooms were the first to be grown... this makes a certain amount of sense, if you consider it truly the 'heart' of the TARDIS, and explains why when something threatens the existance of the TARDIS, the Cloister Bell sounds.
I would go with a fusion of ideas for what an unconfigured TARDIS looked like on the inside. Perhaps a substance that is white and textured like coral.
As an aside about the exterior of a TARDIS, if I recall, SIDRATS simply looked like large featureless boxes, and I wouldn't be surprised if thats what a TARDIS looks like. But as a slightly more possible look, consider what the Rani's TARDIS looked like in Time and the Rani, which was a silver pyramid shaped thing.
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Post by kaemaril on Jan 9, 2010 9:14:22 GMT
Its remarkable, really. I can't recall where it was that I read it, but somewhere said that the Cloister Rooms were the first to be grown... this makes a certain amount of sense, if you consider it truly the 'heart' of the TARDIS, and explains why when something threatens the existance of the TARDIS, the Cloister Bell sounds. Isn't there a section in AHistory on the manufacture of TARDISes? |
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Post by renegadetimelord on Jan 9, 2010 9:23:11 GMT
It's good, isn't it? And it somewhat matches up to the Visual Dictionary explanation of the interior, with blobs of matters circling the core that can be shaped into new rooms or dispersed back into formlessness. I just watched 'The Edge of Destruction' the other day... I'd like to think companion quarters vary somewhat, as I doubt Fitz or Turlough would have gone for a standard build (I imagine Fitz's room would look like some student flat or like Sean's place from "Sean's Show"; while Turlough might well have favoured well-manicured boarding school lodgings simply to keep reminding him to keep in character, lest the Black Guardian drop by to give him a slap). |
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Post by The Historian on Jan 10, 2010 5:57:26 GMT
Chello!
Episode 50 "Wargames" does not show the inside of a tardis per se. However, the "time-space machines" that the Renegade "the War Chief" makes have some interior shots. I would think that a normal "unaligned" tardis would be similar.
I say this because the exterior shots of the row of Tardises (Tardii? Tardiseis?) on Gallifrey are identical to the ones that he constructed. Note, however, that this was merely saving budget by reusing the same set pieces, but still....
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Post by Marnal on Jan 14, 2010 5:05:16 GMT
The Secondary Control Room (or Number Two Control Room) is a much simpler Block Transfer program than the more aesthetically oriented Primary Control Room. Since it is designed to function as something of a Safe Mode, the Secondary Control Room, desk-top theme can't be altered from default. Only minor modifications can be made to its décor and the console can only be altered by upgrading to a higher Mark number. Number 2 Control Room has six walls that are about 4.6 meters tall and is about nine meters in diameter. In the center of the room is the Master Control Console. In layman’s terms (and again, going by the novels) the grey console room we see in most of seasons of the classic TV series IS the default setting of a TARDIS of any given Mark #. The default state for the Exo-Shell of a Type 15-52 TARDIS is a silver-grey metallic cube 3 meters on each side. For later Types the exterior is a white domed topped cylinder 2 meters tall and 1.2 meters in diameter. - Marnal Gate "I was told by the producer that the guiding principle was to make the scripts complex enough to keep the Kids interested and simple enough for the Adults to understand!" -Douglas Adams on writing Doctor Who For Everything about the TARDIS check out www.whoniverse.net/tardis/ For all things Gallifreyan check out meshyfish.com/~roo/roo.scificities.com/ |
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