The bunkers are less about us living and more about no human is caught unaware by the storm coming. So if we build bunkers in a structured pattern no matter where you are you can get to a place of safety soonish.
<cough> The storm anemone "stones" might be an avenue of research for your biomech materials -- if you could get it to mimic their defensive mechanisms that would make one hell of a armor cladding material... </cough>
I mean it makes sense. The Circle is the plan of the Vorlons and the Shadows and the First Ones.
Our existence is a anomaly in the plan and our actions would splinter the plan as the First Ones would see it.
Added into the fact we have a First One (I vote Lorien) benefactor whose powerful enough to do time shenangians. (It could be the Great Machine but I still vote Lorien) Yeah any idea the First Ones have of what the future should be like is going to go out the window the moment we appear on the galactic stage.
Ooooh. Oooh I just realized something. The Second Ship was I think post B5 appearing. It was def post Dilgar and Minbari War so that is something. But yeah I think its post B5 being established. Which could totally be useful and interesting to us. We know the station and its presence, even if not all details are quite so clear.
Also, honestly, if there were two ships lost through time (and I think the second one was telepaths that would have been given to the Shadows) nothing says there can't be a third arrival. Maybe one from the disaster that was the Telepath War.
[X] Preparing for the big one
-[X] Industry:
--[X] 1 Autofactory will serve as 3 Autofabbers this Turn (1/11)
--[X] 1 Storm hardened Basic Autofactory: Cost: 2 Autofab Actions (2/6). -6 Minerals.
--[X] 1 Storm hardened Basic Autofactory, assigned to support the Militia permanently: Cost: 2 Autofab Actions (4/6). -6 Minerals.
--[X] 1 Storm hardened Syngas Reactor. Cost: -2 Minerals, -1 Biomass. 1 Autofab Action (5/6)
--[X] 1 Storm hardened Syngas Storage tank (24 Capacity). Cost: 1 Autofab Action (6/6) -13 Minerals
--[X] 3 Militarized Shuttles. Cost: 3 Autofactory Actions (4/12), 1 Psi-Crystal Machine Action (3/5), -21 Minerals, -18 Biomass.
--[X] 1 Storm hardened Psi-Crystal Machine assigned to support the Militia permanently: Cost: -6 Minerals, -2 Biomass, 1 Psi-Crystal Machine Action (4/5), 1 Autofactory Action (5/12)
--[X] 1 Storm hardened Shipscale Fusion Reactor. Cost: -10 Minerals, -6 Biomass, 4 Autofactories (9/12).
--[X] Total build Cost: -58 Minerals, -27 Biomass
--[X] 3 Autofactories (12/12) and 1 Psi-Crystal machine (5/5) left on standby to fulfill other Actions
--[X] Convert Biomass to Syngas and store at rate (6/6)
--[X] Assign 1 psi-drone job each to Labs 1, 2, and 3.
-[X] Orbital
--[X] 1 Supply Operation (1/11)
--[X] 4 Asteroid Mining Operation (5/11)
--[X] 5 Capture Asteroid Operations (10/11)
--[X] 1 harvest Biomass Operation (11/11)
- [X] Military:
--[X] Disaster Preparedness: Shelters. Look through the database and try to find designs for Hurricane shelters or Bomb shelters. Fabricate some test models and see how they stand up to the storms this year, or maybe do some destructive testing. The data may be useful in designing shelters for people to temporarily relocate to during a disaster.
-[X] Exploration:
--[X] Storm Study. Use the Orbital sensor net to observe the Storms. This is the first Storm year we have had this capability for, so we may learn some things.
-[X] Research:
--[X] Lab 1 will begin Research on Blight Cure II, hopefully the last one
--[X] All other labs will continue current projects
-[X] Diplomacy:
--[X] Bureau of Kobold Welfare. Organize policies and monitoring of Kobold Welfare and ensure they are not being exploited or unduly endangered. Set PPE standards for Kobolds in dangerous environments like space installations. Try to gather DNA samples from Kobold pets to start the Gene Bank for Kobolds.
-[X] Personal:
--[X] Just get ready to be a grandfather. Willow and Aspen probably have no idea what they are getting into.
Military Assets:
-- Telekinetic Militia. (+1 Effectiveness, +1 Psi-Amps, +1 Well-Equipped )
-- Clan Irregulars. 1 Squad. ( Can be applied in offworld operations and spec/recon activities, including spacewalk operations.)
-- Networked Watch Drones ( +1 Effectiveness )
-- 2 Squadrons of Telekinetic Militia Ground Effect Vehicles.
== Database Techs
- Colonization Basics.
Can build Tier 0 "Basic" basic facilities with autofabber action.
- Defense Basics.
Can build basic military gear, both personal and semi-autonomous drones.
- Energy Production Tier 1
Can design specialty Tier 1 facilities for power production. Most will require a Basic Autofactory.
- Ecological Architecture.
Can perform special actions to modify buildings to better perform or integrate better with local environment. (Example: "Storm Hardening").
- Space Operations.
Spaceports, Shuttles, Sensor Grids, and bears. Oh my!
- Ground Effect Vehicles.
Amphibious colonial survey design found in database. Increases efficacy of surveys, patrols, and hunts.
== Social Development
- Production/Energy Credit Economics
Basic and specialist pops have a minimum output that will always be met, and maintenance cost.
- Sporting Event Telepathic Training
Psi-amps have allowed teep training to be viewed as a form of athleticism rather than something to be endured. Long term impacts yet to be revealed.
- Clan Secrets
The Council of Matriarchs is planning to have each Clan develop their own unique spin on the skills one acquires as a teep and how to obtain them. While this can't affect Psi-ratings, the techniques one focuses on can have an impact on the jobs one is good at.
- Apprenticeships
The teens of the colony have persuaded the original generation to allow them to take on more responsibility and provide practical aid to the workers of the colony, easing the burden on the workforce.
- Telekinetic Dueling Culture.
The people of the colony are growing more invested in the personal prowess capabilities offered by the psi-amps.
- Civilian Economy Morale
The Civilian Economy has expanded to the state that it now provides a +1 Morale bonus to any facility with a malus that turn.
- Disaster Preparedness.
Militia Effectiveness now applies to disaster events.
- Storm Festivals.
Shocking culinary practices will now be a long-term part of the colony's social identity, representing endurance and togetherness. The Storm Month will be seen as a time when social status is secondary to reconciliation.
== Kithhame Techs
- Anti-Sandworm Thumpers
Sonic generators designed to mimic pestilent sandworms' predators.
== Kobold Techs
- Kobold Veterancy Archives.
Eliminates potential unskilled labor penalties. Grants +1 bonus to tasks requiring extreme skill (combat rolls, medical performance, etc.,)
- Squadlink Technique.
Provides +1 effectiveness in small units from superior coordination.
- Stealth Technique.
Can allow militia members to remain undetected by sentient beings.
- Hive Repeaters.
Psi-crystal receiver/broadcasters that digitize Kobold hivemind mental broadcasts so they can be relayed via tightbeam tachyon broadcast. Allows Kobold Pets perk to apply in more situations, especially orbital operations.
== Psi-Crystal Techs
- Psi-Amps (Primitive)
Through the use of electrically charged Psi-Crystals, a telepath can -- very clumsily -- use telekinetic abilities. The surface has barely been scratched with this. Psi-Amps can now also enhance telepathic operations and mind-machine interactions. +1 benefit (+10 to Research rolls).
- Telekinetic Weapons
Can use unengraved but larger psi-crystals to create heavy recoilless slug-thrower weapons, though they require hip or backpack power supplies.
- Laser-kinetic Weapons
Vehicle-scale weapons based on mining lasers using telekinetic "bubbles" as supplemental focusing media, imparting kinetic energy psychically to the energy streaming through creating lasers with kinetic impact.
- Telekinetic Thrusters
Use of psi-amp telekinesis to recoillessly compress springs in conjunction with "mental echo" training to provide impulse in a given direction. (Needs further research to advance above human-scale.)
- Psionic Interfaces
Telepathic interface technology can now work reliably with human-made computer components.
- Telekinetic Auras
By imbueing telekinetic energy into one's own bioelectric field, the field can draw on the person's metabolic energy and provide a basic 'reinforcement' of the bioelectric field into a sort of aura.
- Psi-Amp Multitasking.
Stronger telepaths can split their attention to perform telepathic and telekinetic actions simultaneously by 'shoring up' the strength of the 'psychic echo' in the psi-amps.
== Clan Psi-techs
> Alexander
-- Telescopic Clairsentience: Alexanders learn to use psi-amp interactions with light and sound to amplify signals coming from a given direction. Improves Psi-Amp bonus to some military actions.
-- Hostility Awareness: Alexanders (and those trained by them) can detect "killing intent" directed towards them in advance of the action actually being carried out. This can allow pre-emptive dodging or deflecting in almost prescient senses
> Gray
-- Empathic Telemetry: Grays learn to use their telepathic senses to detect the emotional resonance a person experiences with objects, thus determining in a sense the nature and degree of any importance personal possession, greatly easing disputes over personal possessions and theft complaints.
> Runningdeer
-- Kobold Memory Art: Runningdeers learn to use the Kobold Veterancy Archive in an abstract way, allowing the 'encryption' of personal secrets within the group by pairing symbolic references within the Archive with imagery that's shared as 'decryption keys' with fellow teeps.
> Ironheart
-- Circle Amplification: Ironhearts learn to include psi-amps in their cooperative choirs. While traditionally choirs cannot actually increase their effective P-rating, including a trained Ironheart into a choir can make psi-amps more energy-efficient when multiple teeps are involved. Adds +1 to the effect of psi-amps on any telepathic action that requires a choir.
> Stoner
-- Psychic Contracts: Stoners learn to use their telepathic capabilities and the informed consent of those involved to create a 'resonance' with a certain list of terms between those individuals. This creates a sort of mutual awareness of compliance with the agreement and, with psi-amp assistance, an aversion to breaking the terms as understood by both parties. Improves Civilian Economy yields with +1.
> Namikawa
-- Psi-Hand Technique: Namikawas have learned methods to partner the telekinetic 'bubble' psi-amps can maintain with the tactile response of their hands, drastically improving the resolution of sensory feedback from psi-amps when analyzing or appreciating the shapes and flows within the field. Adds +10 to Psi-Amp bonus to Research Rolls.
== Military Techs
- Clan Irregulars. 1 Job per Squad. Specialist Operatives trained to perform hostile ship boarding, hostage rescue, and sabotage operations.
== Biomechanoid Techs
- Biomechanical Material Farms. Grows ancient alien's biomechanoid structural material from raw biomass.
-- High Tensile: Biomechanoid Materials usage reduces total Minerals/Biomass cost by 10%. Highly suitable as armor.
Tier 0:
- Basic Autofab: -1 Energy Prod. Allows 1 Autofab Action/turn. Cost: 1 Autofab Action. 2 Minerals.
- Basic Militia Gear. Allows 1 pop to perform military actions. Cost: 1 Autofab Action. 1 Minerals.
- Basic Hab Complexes. +1 Pop Cap. Cost: 1 Autofab Action.
- Basic Greenhouses. +1 Food Prod. Cost: 1 Autofab Action.
- Basic Mines: +1 Minerals Prod. Cost: 1 Autofab Action.
- Basic Lumber Camp: +1 Biomass. Cost: 1 Autofab Action.
---
- Wind/Solar Farm: +1 Energy Prod. Cost: 2 Minerals. Up to 1 Autofab Action (build up to 12 with 1 action.) (Cannot be Storm Hardened.)
- Syngas Reactor: +1-3 Energy/-1-3 Biomass. Cost: 2 Minerals. 1 Autofab Action.
- Hydroelectric Reservoir: Can store Energy for later use. 2 Energy to bank 1. No cap on storage. Can output up to 12E/t. Cost: 2 Minerals, 1 Autofab.
---
- Basic Autofactory: -2 Energy Prod. Allows 3 Autofab Actions OR 1 Autofactory Action. Cost: 2 Autofab Action. 5 Minerals.
- Gunshuttle. -1 Energy Prod. Allows 1 Orbital Operation /turn. Cost: 2 Autofab Actions. 5 Minerals, 4 Biomass (Biomechanoid). (High-Tensile: -1 Biomass)
- Basic Kelp Farm. +1 Food, +1 Biomass, -1 Energy Prod. Requires deposit. Cost: 1 Autofab Action, 1 Minerals.
- Cultural Center. 0/0/0. Negates all Cultural Crisis penalties when complete. 1 Autofab Action, 4 Food per stage. (Core / Ring / Wings )
- Basic Vehicular Maintenance Bay. Provides 'care and feeding' for 1 squadron of storm-hardened GEV's. -1 Energy. Cost: 2 Autofab Actions, 2 Biomass, 2 Minerals. Includes the squadron.
- Build Storm Peat Deposit. Adds a Storm Peat deposit to the planet. Cost: 1 Autofab Action, 10 Food.
- Build Ironwood Plantation. Takes 4 years. Requires at least one Dredging Station to be operational the entire term. Cost: 3 Biomass, 1 Minerals per turn. 1 Autofabricator action per turn.
- Seed Ironwoods Into Mine Tailings. Adds +1 Minerals and +1 Biomass to a Mine. Cost: 1 Autofab Action, 2 Biomass.
- Standard Shuttle: Allows 1 Orbital Operation /turn. Cost: 1 Autofactory Action. 12 Minerals.
- Militarized Shuttle: Allows 1 Orbital Operation /turn. Can perform Orbital Combats. Cost: 1 Autofactory Action, 1 Psi-Crystal Machine Action, 7 Minerals, 6 Biomass. (High-Tensile: -1 Biomass)
- Exowomb Nursery: -2 Energy Prod, -1 Food. Counts as extra pop for Pop Growth calculations. Cost: 1 Autofactory Action. 2 Minerals. 2 Food.
- Spaceport (3 stage facility.) -2 Energy per stage. Provides subfacility slots for orbital-related activities. Cost: 1 Autofactory Action, 5 Minerals per stage.
- Solar Rectenna Station: Provides ground link to Orbital Solar Satellites. Supports up to 5 Satellites. Cost: 5 Minerals, 1 Autofactory Action.
- Food Synthesizer: Converts Biomass into Food. Not very palatable, requires -1 Energy/t when in operation. Cost: 1 Autofactory Action, 5 Minerals, 3 Biomass.
- Biomechanical Material Farm: Permits production of Biomechanoid Materials to substitute Minerals with Biomass. -1 Energy/t when in operation. Cost: 2 Autofactory Actions, 5 Minerals, 5 Biomass.
- Training Facility: Provides ongoing Training experience to Colonial Military units. Requires: -2E/t, -2M/t, -2B/t. Cost: 1 Autofactory, 5 Minerals.
Psionic Tier 1:
- Psionic Drones: +1 "psi-drones" pop. Cost: 1 Autofactory Action, 1 Psi-Crystal Machine Action, 2 Minerals. Can support 3 Psi-Drones pops per Human Pop. Psi-Drones may work 1 Job per pop, producing +1 to that Job, and cost -1 E/t.
- Psi-Crystal Machines: +1 Psi-Crystal Build Operation, -1 Energy/t. Cost: 5 Minerals, 2 Biomass, 1 Psi-Crystal Build, 1 Autofactory Action
Orbital Infrastructure Tier 1:
- Storm Nullifier Satellites: +2 Energy Prod. Cost: 1 Autofactory Action. 5 Minerals. (Mitigates Storm Turn Penalty.)
- Sensor Grid Satellites: Requires ground control. Provides sensor coverage for star system. Less effective when used passively. -2 Energy. Cost: 1 Orbital Operation, 5 Minerals, 1 Autofactory Action.
- Solar Satellite: Provides control to up to 12 Solar Farms in Orbit. +2 Energy/t (base). Cost: 5 Minerals, 1 Autofactory Action, 1 Orbital Operation.
- Orbital Station Modules: Provides Job-related infrastructure or habitation. Costs: 10 Minerals, 4 Autofabber Actions, 2 Orbital Operations, 1 Basic Fusion Reactor.
-- Orbital Station Core: Allows other Modules, provides habitation for Jobs. Requires 1 Orbital Operation per Job sustained aboard station.
-- Astro-Mining Bay: Supports 1 Job, allowing up to 4 Asteroid Mining Operations per Job. Each Asteroid Mining Operation gets "best-of-2" on yield roll.
Psionic Tier 2:
- Neuro-Throne Room: 2 Autofactory Actions, 1 Psi-Machine Action, 5 Minerals. Requires 1 Human Job, allows 3 Psi-Drone Jobs. -1 Energy/t. Limit 3 Throne-Rooms per Human Pop.
- Asteroid Mining. Harvest Asteroids that approach near Kithhame orbit. Provides 1d12 Minerals.
- Launch Assets. Allows deploying manufactured goods into orbit. (Max capacity, 12 Solar Farms / 1 Satellite.)
- Send Probe. Allows exploring anomalies or other planetary bodies.
- Capture Asteroid. Capture Organic asteroid and seed with biomech materials, that can then grow with solar energy and planetary dust emissions, allowing +2 Biomass/t from Harvest Orbital Biomass Operations.
- Harvest Orbital Biomass. Collect all Captured Asteroid Biomass that turn.
Trinary Star System.
Kith Prime A. Yellow Giant (50x larger than Sol). 2 hadean planets, 2 hot dead worlds, 1 possibly terrestrial, 2 gas giants. 2 dwarf planets. No asteroid belt.
Kith Prime B. Brown Dwarf. 2 frozen worlds. 1 gas giant. 2 asteroid belts. 1 dwarf planet.
Kith Prime C. Blue Dwarf. 2 Hadean Worlds. 1 Hot dead world. Kithhame. 1 frozen world. 1 asteroid belt. 2 gas giants. 3 dwarf planets.
2 Energetic Anomalies.
"Lighting Hole". Building "Rift Observation Station" will grant permanent +20 to Hyperspace Theory rolls.
"Radrock". Building "Radrock Observation Station" will grant permanent +10 to Nuclear Physics rolls.
Charted (+1 to asteroid mining operations).
Colonies:
Kithhame
[*]Population:
Humans: 5 Units (~1030 people) ( -5 Food/t )
Kobolds: 9 Units (Self-sustaining)
Psi-Drones: 2 Units ( -2 Energy/t )
[*]
[*]Planetary status:
Marginally habitable. Indigenous wildlife obviously alien but at times oddly familiar.
Planetary Storms hit every 5 years. (2072,2077,2082, etc.. Causes -1 to all facilities that turn. Chance of facility loss.)
Hostile Fauna: Sandworms. 25% 10% chance annually of attack on food reserves/production.
Notable Fauna: Stormrider Anemone. Catxlotls.
3 Basic Minerals deposit found (3 Medium Exploited).
5 "Storm Peat" Deposits Found (5 Lightly Exploited). ( Build mine to produce +1 Energy/turn, +1 Biomass.)
3 Kelp Forest Deposits Found ( 3 Lightly Exploited). (Build Kelp Farm to produce +1 Food, +1 Biomass, -1 Energy.)
3 Ironwood Deposits Found (2 Lightly Exploited)(1 Unexploited). (Build Logging Camp to produce +1 Minerals, +1 Biomass.)
Ancient Blight: 20% chance of total crop failure in Farms annually.
[*]
[*]Colonization status:
One permanently landed converted Centauri cargo hauler. No jump-engine, but the previous owner never removed the on-board grav plating. Colony Ship Museum: The Old Ship can no longer function, but its systems are available for study and for 'edutainment' trips by colony children.
One ruined/derelict transport ship from 2260
Water Purification Plant ( Grants "Purified" Perk, Adding +1 to Hab Complexes and Farming Complexes, Storm Hardened)
3 Basic Hab Complex: 6 Pop Cap ( 2 Pop Limit, +2 Purification, Storm Hardened)
1 Hydroelectric Reservoir. No Storage Cap. Costs 2 Power to store 1. Can output 12 E/t.
24 Syngas Tanks. (24 Syngas cap. Costs 1 Biomass to store 1. Stored Syngas can be burned at 12/t per Syngas Reactor.)
Cultural Center (Complete) ( Negates Cultural Crisis.) (All sub facilities automatically Storm Hardened.)
Automated Field Hospital. -1 Energy, -1 medical emergency impact
Central Computer Core. -2 Energy. (Telepathic interfaces. Colony-wide network.)
Archives. -1 Energy. (Retains memories of history, culture, social theory, improves educational outcomes)
3 Vehicle Maintenance Bays. -3 Energy. (Provides 'care and feeding' for 2 squadrons of GEVs.) (Storm Hardened.)
Starport (Complete) -6 Energy. (Allows synthesis of fusion torch fuel. Protects Shuttles. Has subfacilities.) (Storm Hardened.) (Phase 2: Magnetic Launchers -- +1 to all Orbital Actions.) ( Phase 3: Tachyon Beacon )
Drydock. (Permits study, repair, and construction of larger ship classes.)
3 Standard Shuttle. ( +3 Orbital Operations. )
4 Gunshuttle ( +4 Orbital Operations. -4 Energy/t )
4 Militarized Shuttle ( +4 Orbital Operations. Can perform Orbital Military Ops.)
Clan Exowomb Nursery ( +10 Births/t, -3 Energy/t, -1 Food/t, Special: Does not count against cap, Storm Hardened, Blight-Hardened).
4 Exowomb Nursery ( +40 Births/t, -12 Energy/t, -4 Food/t. Max 1 Facility per Human Pop. Storm Hardened. Blight-Hardened.)
4 Research Facilities -4 Energy/t ( Grants "Labs" perk, granting +10 to research rolls. Can sustain 1 research project per turn each. Storm Hardened. 1 Facility Blight-Hardened.)
Private Research Facility -1 Energy/t ( Allows 1 research project per turn not under Questor control. Storm Hardened.)
Biomechanical Material Farm, -1 Energy/t ( Can spend 1 Biomass for 1 Minerals, for up to 50% of Minerals costs. -1 Energy when in use. Blight-Hardened.)
Orbital Station:
Core: Allows other Modules, provides habitation for Jobs. Requires 1 Orbital Operation per Job sustained aboard station.
Astro-Mining Bay: Supports 1 Job, allowing up to 4 Asteroid Mining Operations per Job. Each Asteroid Mining Operation gets "best-of-2" on yield roll.
Honeypede Ranching. -1 Biomass/t, Improves Morale Bonus 1 step. (Bonus now applies to terrestrial random rolls.)
Food Synthesizer (Can convert Biomass into Food. Requires -1 Energy/t when active.).
Planetary Sensor Grid. (Provides early warning of spaceborn events, or planetary ecological disasters. Can improve survey and exploration actions.)
Training Facility. Provides Training Experience to Colonial military assets. -2 Energy/t, -2 Minerals/t, -2 Biomass/t.
2 Syngas Reactor. +0 Energy -0 Biomass. (Max of 6) (Storm Hardened.)
Solar Rectenna Station: 3/5 Satellites. (Storm Hardened).
3 Solar Satellite(s). +6 E/t, ( Supports 12 Orbital Solar Farms. )
36 Orbital Solar Farms. +36 E/t.
[*]
Clan Activity:
--
Civilian Economy:
--
Spaceport Beacon Transcripts:
-- The Drazi explorer ship's broadcasts have not been picked up again this year, but notably some of the Brakiri transmissions have included English "loan" words.
Military:
-- Disaster Preparedness: Shelters. Look through the database and try to find designs for Hurricane shelters or Bomb shelters. Fabricate some test models and see how they stand up to the storms this year, or maybe do some destructive testing. The data may be useful in designing shelters for people to temporarily relocate to during a disaster.
The colony's experience in constructing facilities that can withstand intensive assault plays into the efforts at scouring the colonization database further. Most of the facilities that the colony has implemented are already quite robust and interconnected in ways that make the idea of going to the surface to seek other shelter counter-productive. Instead, the militia leaders decide to settle upon "shelter/survival kits" to be distributed to various places throughout the colony. Backpack-sized kits with kevlar-and-mylar pop-up tents, with air conditioning systems, water filters, high-nutrient bouillion, and survival manuals, along with short-range radios. The idea is that should the worst happen somewhere, the most that anyone would need to do is endure the weather and live with it. The designs that they instead scour for are for highly rugged textiles like the kevlar-mylar tents. This is compounded on by adding additional "service tunnels" for the various facilities to ensure that no matter the damage to the colony's buildings, the people within could always find a way out -- or emergency services could find a way in.
All of this, it is felt, would make the colony's people better prepared to survive any attacks or catastrophes. But the colony itself is, it is felt, not very prepared for catastrophe -- all of your people's eggs, so to speak, are all in the same basket. The militia feels that a secondary settlement might be ideal; someplace to act as a "fallback" in case something catastrophic happens to the main colony. The exact particulars of what that might look like are not well-established, and this is a decision that will be left to your making.
-- Results:
- Kits improve colonists' general sense of feeling prepared for disaster.
- Militia recommends the possibility of establishing some kind of fallback outpost to recover and rebuild from in the case of extreme catastrophe. What that might look like -- a new hamlet, a mothballed bunker, a concealed fortress for military units to operate out of, or something more exotic -- will be an exercise for the colony's leader.
Exploration:
-- Storm Study. Use the Orbital sensor net to observe the Storms. This is the first Storm year we have had this capability for, so we may learn some things.
Watching the storm systems' progression in the geopositional sensor grid is revelatory. Specifically, the storm systems themselves don't seem to simply swell and decline as was previously believed. Instead, it is discovered that there is some sort of tectonic-electrical pattern to the progression. New storm fronts are revealed to come from areas that appear to be some sort of fault-lines. Sending GEVs to those areas once the peak of the storm cycle passes is not very informative -- the storms are still fairly frequent and the GEVs must 'batten down' for the intermittent storms -- but the result is interesting nonetheless. Unlike what was previously believed, the blue-dwarf star that Kithhame orbits is not likely the source of the planetary storms. The initial checks reveal what appear to be natural springs of some kind of naturally occurring room-temperature ionic liquids. You can't be certain at this time, but it seems that the storms might very well be operating on some sort of interaction between aquifer veins strewn across the planet of these fluids and some cyclical tectonic activity. With further study, more might be learned.
-- Results:
- Piezoelectric aquifers discovered to be responsible for storm cycle.
Research:
-- Lab I will study Blight Cure II
-- Lab II will study Colony Ship Systems
-- Lab III will study Future Transport:Transport Hulls
-- Lab IV will study Psi-Crystal Weaponry (vehicle/fighter scale)
The wide-area blight cure approaches have almost paid off. With the storm year approaching, there was more focus on ensuring the proposed planet-wide delivery mechanism would actually work than ensuring the cure would be safer than the disease. With just a little more time to confirm the right pattern needed, by the time the next Storm Year rolls around, your doctors feel quite confident this menace can be put behind your people's worries.
With the storms making it harder for anyone to actually spend time outside, your researchers were far more willing to engage in the kind of tedious work that had staved off finalizing the ship design research from previous years. You are now quite confident that you could recreate the Uptimer's transport ship's basic hull structure if necessary. The exact science behind why the design has the stress tolerances it does aren't quite understood at this time, however -- while you can adapt the basic template should you get to the point of having offworld construction capabilities, they would have to be basically recognizable as being of the same general shape and structure as the transport itself. As these things go, however, that's not necessarily the end of the world: whoever designed the transport ship in the first place had clearly meant for it to haul large and not well-balanced masses over periods of weeks or months at a time. This means that some adaptability in the exact cargoes is built-in with the design, and your people could very likely make great use of that.
In the meantime, the basic understanding of how exactly all of the Centauri ship's components fit together is now completed. Any hopes of the original colony ship's systems giving insights to any really revolutionary technologies will have to be put on hold for the time being, however: you got that ship "pre-owned" and "refurbished" and it shows. The thing was over a century old when you first acquired it -- which goes to show how tough the old bird really was -- but furthermore, it was made with largely substandard parts wherever it could be. A "cheap knockoff" as it were. Still, the variant design philosophies could help future colonist ship designers, engineers, and physicists with the diversity of application of common principles if nothing else. The one exception to this is the grav-decking. That has your engineers and researchers scratching their heads a little: unlike the other systems which are all quite well explicable, the grav-decking will take dedicated research. The initial attempts at simply 3D and spectrographic scanning and inputting into the autofabbers did output something that looked the same as the original, but the new-build simply didn't work. Discerning the reasons why will need to be a full project to itself.
The private research lab has worked out, in the meantime, the basic module structure necessary to build and deploy a Neuro-Throne module into orbit. The end product simply awaits an Orbital Operation and a Basic Fusactor to be deployed.
-- Results:
- (85 + 1d100->41 + 20 Psi-Amps + 10 Labs +10 Sampling + 10 Hardened +10 Psi-Drones )=186 out of 200 to study Blight Cure II. (Lab1) -2 Food, -2 Biomass.
- ( 41 + 1d100->55 + 20 Psi-Amps + 10 Labs +10 Psi-Drones )=136 out of 100 to study Colony Ship Systems (Lab2)
- (69 + 1d100->41 + 20 Psi-Amps + 10 Labs +10 Psi-Drones )=150 out of 150 to study Future Transport Hulls. (Lab3)
- ( 43 + 1d100->92 +20 Psi-Amps +10 Labs )=160 out of 200 to study Psi-Crystal Weaponry (Lab4) (Psi-Crystal Machine, Autofactory, -5 Minerals, -2 Biomass)
- (48 + 1d100->37 + 20 Psi-Amps + 10 Labs + 30 Psi-Drones )=145 out of 100 to unlock Neuro-Throne Orbital Module. (Private Lab)
(Costs: -2 F, -5M, -6 B )
- Neuro-Throne Orbital Module prototype completed. Requires 1 Basic Fusactor and 1 Orbital Operation to be deployed to the station.
Diplomacy:
-- Bureau of Kobold Welfare. Organize policies and monitoring of Kobold Welfare and ensure they are not being exploited or unduly endangered. Set PPE standards for Kobolds in dangerous environments like space installations. Try to gather DNA samples from Kobold pets to start the Gene Bank for Kobolds.
While kobolds living in space require far more human supervision and interaction than their terrestrial counterparts, they do take to a sort of "monkey-see monkey-do" attitude when it comes to using tools and equipment. They can't, however, actually understand why they're being made to do certain things. This makes it a necessary requirement to develop "smart" safety gear for the kobolds that can report its configuration and do self-checks for human companions to monitor and affirm. Training sessions are planned and conducted for humans to learn to look out for indications that their happy green friends are likely to have somehow tampered with said gear. With great care, some of the hives even come to understand the general purpose of the gear as being meant to keep them safe from general hazards, if not specifically which gear and what hazards. Still, members of those hives work much better in orbit, and this is noticed by your people.
-- Results:
- DNA banks now extend to kobold "lineages" as well as human usage.
- Kobolds will be safer in offworld operations, though they are not yet fit for EVA rockhopping in spacesuits.
Personal:
-- Just get ready to be a grandfather. Willow Juniper and Aspen probably have no idea what they are getting into.
The girls are actually much better prepared for child-rearing than you'd anticipated. Turns out, they'd spent much of their apprenticeship time at the exowombs already which was part of what made their decision so straightforward.
This didn't stop you and Mira from fussing over the little tykes -- two boys and two girls -- that your daughters had brought into the world. While not the first of the second-generation Kithhame people, they were the first Alexanders. And you couldn't help but feel a true and deep sense of permanence whenever you looked at them: these twenty years since you first fled the Psi-Corps... they were not escaping a past, but laying the foundation of a future.
-- Results:
- James now slightly more forward-thinking, with concerns over the world he'll leave behind to his grandkids.
Votes by plan, please:
Each turn is 1 year.
1 Action in each category, only write-ins for now while the dust settles and interest is shown.
- [] Industry:
(Agricultural, economic, and residential leadership actions go here.)
-- []
- [] Military:
(Militia, naval, wartime, and such go here.)
-- []
- [] Exploration:
(Scouting, mapping, resource survey type actions go here.)
-- []
- [] Research:
(Pulling schematics for practical application out of the colony ship's AI, discovering new techniques, biotech, and so on.)
-- []
- [] Diplomacy:
(Internal or external diplomatic actions. Building community, negotiating trade deals, and so on.)
-- []
- [] Personal:
(Things you do yourself.)
-- []
Well. Colony now has 1000 inhabitants, only 300 of which were born off-world. Interesting things are happening but some of it is background for you guys. I did not miss that 90 result on the Event Roll -- the impact just isn't visible to you guys just yet.
Opening the vote via forum-mechanics, but do discuss your plans first.
What form it takes is up to you guys. That was just the militia giving feedback on disaster preparedness and saying "if rocks fall on our town, we're fucked" because that's where you guys are keeping all your stuff.
Setting up a fort compound for the Militia and Irregulars to operate out of that's half a day's travel by GEV away that has its own power supply, warehousing, and industry would give enough redundancy to recover in such a worst-case scenario.
So would building out a basic fusactor, farm, hab complex, and autofactory a hundred miles out and then mothballing them.
Studying the Stormrider Anemones could be useful, but beginning study of the piezoelectric aquifers could also bring big benefits, and potentially beginning the design work on a shelter down in the old magma tunnels. It might be worth it to hold off on working on either ship project for a couple of turns and knocking those out.
It would take about 1 Autofactory, 5 Autofabbers, and the Military action to set up the fort. Doable, and we could knock it out in one year.
Exploration actions could boost any of the new research actions. Send teams down to map the tunnels, start installing sensors in the piezoelectric aquifers, or just try to capture some Anemones for reasearch.
No strong ideas for Diplomacy actions other than bringing forward the potential need for a temporary shutdown of the Exo-womb nurseries in the next storm year while we are trying to wipe out the Blight.
No strong ideas for a personal action, other than more family time.
We need to boost that new module and a reactor to orbit.
Big question is do we add another big Fusion reactor or add more solar sattelites, the sattelites cost more minerals and contribute to that single failure point, but we can build more without spending 4 Autofactories for the big fusion reactor.
If we add more neuro-thrones I think the priority should still be on research.
On 2nd thought, we would need more production to set up the fort. We would need at least a Psi-Crystal machine and probably a Biomaterials farm to start rebuilding stuff. Add that to the reactors to power things, at least 1 Warehouse stocked and charged, a habitation complex, an Autofactory, and probably a Greenhouse farm. Most of that stuff take very little production capacity except for the reactors, the Psi-Crystals and the Biomaterials farms. And we do need the Psi-Crystal machine, because we don't have a way to make one without using one.
And we might have to rebuild everything after the big blow in the next storm year, since it won't be any sturdier than our usual buildings.
When I was thinking about the subterranean shelter I was thinking about how to preserve people, thinking about the best way to preserve essential technology and materiel will take some thought.
So I was thinking less as an archive and more as a secured facility in the case of invasion. Like the Castle Brians of Battletech. In the real life we could have it be like Norad base in Colorado. We pick a mountain, carve a deep base within it with command, engineering, habs, farming, industrial, etc. If its close to our town we might even create a secured link between our place and it.
Basically we can create a vault.
But I def don't think, with 1,000 people, this is absolutely necessary.
On another front we could create something like the Bunkers from Starcraft. Small surface footprint, big underground footprint.
As another note with 1000 people I def don't think we need a second town.
On the rest, still thinking it over.
Besides continuing our Blight research and starting gravdeck reasearch I am not really sure what else we want to do. Well, I do think us sending another probe into the rift could be useful, let us gain more hyperspace knoweldge.
Oh. Note. The use of English loan words in the transmission means there is an awareness of Earth stuff.
Yup. The Brakiri worlds are close enough to Earth that they canonically picked up a lot of Pre-FTL Earth's radio transmissions, and it became a bit of a cultural zeitgeist for them. The Brakiri have been aware of Humanity since the late 1900's, when they first started picking up our television broadcasts.
This had a significant stylistic and cultural impact on them, and is why Brakiri clothing is as similar to human clothing styles as it is.
People forget how /small/ Known Space is in B5 canon. The longest known distances are between two points is still less than 70LY.
Also yeah this is a very interesting and noteworthy point about the show. This isn't a setting where its 1,000 light years from one side to another, its hundreds.
Honestly if there was one thing I think needs to be changed - not in your game just in general B5 lore - is distances. Its too close.
But yeah them knowing about humanity but like nobody doing anything to us is interesting.
Actually. There was a note about Vorlons artificially surrounding the system in hyperspace turbulence so that humanity wasn't bothered for a while.
Though unless any of our uptimer commercial teeps had enough experience with the Brakiri to know that it must seem really spooky to us.
The worms will be a problem if we try to set up any supply/equipment cache if it isn't constantly manned, unless we can find better ways to ward them off or materials/subterranean environments they just won't cross.
But there's an obvious advantage to a cache over a manned base: less heat signature visible from orbit. If we had soil and plants growing on top of the buildings in the supply cache it might just blend into the landscape. But that leaves the worm problem.
JMS wasn't great on the canon for this. I seem to recall one Known Space map that implied the entirety was 60LY across on the longest axis.
I'm not keeping strictly to that, but the distances will still be best measured in Jumps rather than Light Years, to reflect the disparity between Hyperspace and Realspace.
It does, at that. This is a problem you could mostly mitigate by choosing a location that's not connected to the water table or aquifers. Drilling a tunnel a kilometer deep beneath a mountain would work. As would building on some archipelago off the coast. You could even repair/salvage the alien ruins and use a section therein to house stuff -- or build your own facsimile of the ruins under the sea using them as a template to mimic.
These things wouldn't, for the most part, be viable for larger populations, but as a backup cache to rebuild from they'd have different environmental needs.
JMS wasn't great on the canon for this. I seem to recall one Known Space map that implied the entirety was 60LY across on the longest axis.
I'm not keeping strictly to that, but the distances will still be best measured in Jumps rather than Light Years, to reflect the disparity between Hyperspace and Realspace.
I actually think this is a strength of B5. So often Science Fiction tries to set a galactic scale, and can't ever do it justice. The Star Wars galaxy supposedly has more than 1000 sectors with representation in the Senate. Warhammer 40k wants struggles on individual worlds to drive the story even though the lore of the setting has the Imperium so large that any wins or losses are meaningless. Keeping the scale of the setting more reasonable makes events feel like they have more weight.
Though I admit, it does make, "Get the hell out of our Galaxy!" a bit presumptuous of Sheridan. Presumably saying 'local star cluster' would lack gravitas.
An underwater cache would be great, but probably would require a full research project to design the cache. We might have to settle for mountains.
Reading through the first 10 updates or so has got me questioning what exactly we are going to be able to do given even with perfect lossless population growth rate of 10% (insanely unlikely) each year we cap out at like 3.4 million after a full century. That's like a single EarthGov starting colony, what exactly are going for in the long run with our extremely limited growth potential in mind?
I'm having fun trying to direct this little colony, but you are right that there is no direct path to being a major player. We can push our capabilities further through automation, or flat out try to bluff people that there are more of us, but at the end of the day we started with 250 colonists.
Certainly going toe to toe with Earthgov will never be in the cards. But if we manage diplomacy well there could be options to survive and thrive even if we can't win a direct confrontation. And maybe make our mark in other ways as part of the League of Non Aligned Worlds or in some other forum.
If someone else wants to try their hand at writing plans a competitive vote would be good for us.
Reading through the first 10 updates or so has got me questioning what exactly we are going to be able to do given even with perfect lossless population growth rate of 10% (insanely unlikely) each year we cap out at like 3.4 million after a full century. That's like a single EarthGov starting colony, what exactly are going for in the long run with our extremely limited growth potential in mind?
Well, you do have one major advantage in that they'll all be telepaths. In addition, there might be further developments your people could make with the exowombs, to increase birth rates.
Also, by the time 2170 comes around you might act as a destination endpoint for the "telepath underground railroad" and import people that way.
There's also the psi-amp technology and the way it amplifies what your people can accomplish both as telekinetics and telepaths. So you're not just looking at 3.4 million people, but 3.4 million "Inquisitors"/"Technomages" after a century of mastering the things.
You might not be able to make it to the rank of Major Powers, but you don't really need to until ~2230 or so. Which is still 140 years from the current year.
If we get recognized as an independent state by our neighbors other options open up. Like we have multiple bodies in our system that could be ripe for mining, and we might manage to reach another system before they are all gobbled up by our neighbors.
It would be an easy gesture to set up temporary foreign worker programs with neighboring species, to work on some of our worlds in industrial jobs or service jobs to support the workers. Once Earth enters the picture rogue telepaths might find a path to our stations or smaller colonies hungry for labor, with a reputation for not checking your documentation too carefully, and no extra-territoriality agreement with Earth.
Well, you do have one major advantage in that they'll all be telepaths. In addition, there might be further developments your people could make with the exowombs, to increase birth rates.
Also, by the time 2170 comes around you might act as a destination endpoint for the "telepath underground railroad" and import people that way.
There's also the psi-amp technology and the way it amplifies what your people can accomplish both as telekinetics and telepaths. So you're not just looking at 3.4 million people, but 3.4 million "Inquisitors"/"Technomages" after a century of mastering the things.
You might not be able to make it to the rank of Major Powers, but you don't really need to until ~2230 or so. Which is still 140 years from the current year.
Well that works then, though I thought Technomage tier abilities required high tier shadow implants to achieve?
Also our ships being atleast partially biotech just makes me picture Boron ships from the X series especially X4s
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