For The Tyrants Fear Your Might (A quest of interstellar rebellion)

AKuz · Dec 10, 2020

THE ALL-RADIANT CONGRESS

Setting Information: The Solarian Compact:

Initially formed as the Solarian Treaty Organization from the ashes of the old United Nations Security Council, United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs, and the Global Climate Relief Organization in the worst decade of Earth's environmental collapse. The STO was originally a body tasked with overseeing the granting of offworld mining permits and the purchase and distribution of the resources to countries struggling from climate change.

The advent of the Korolev-Chandrashker gates and the construction of the first one under STO oversight in 2063 led to the beginning of the transformation of that body into the de facto single governing body of the Human species.

Reorganized into the 'Solarian Compact', the first Charters were granted to massive corporate conglomerates to explore and exploit the cosmos for Humanity with little to no regulation or restriction.

In the early decades, the Solarian Compact oversaw the construction of KC gates in the systems closest to Sol and began the process of granting colonization rights to the most habitable worlds within that region with colonization rights granted to a number of national and international blocks.

With the growth of the Solarian Compact's power came calls for the body to become more representative and democratic, and in 2099, the Solarian Compact held its first elections and constitutional convention, inviting representatives from the Sol system and the five systems that held permanent Human settlement.

Over the course of the 22nd and 23rd centuries the Solarian Compact has held fast to what it sees as its duty to act as the mediator and financier of the Charters, the unifying agent of the disparate first Human colonies, and the guarantor of interstellar peace for Humanity.

As of 2252, the three most important bodies within the Solarian Compact are the Solarian Parliament -Located on Earth, the Solarian Compact Navy -based in the Korolev-Chandrashker system, and the Solarian Central Bank, -based out of the Columbia System.

Organized as a liberal democracy, with universal suffrage, the Solarian Compact is theoretically overseen by three equal institutions: the Solarian Parliament, the office of the Solarian Secretary General, and the Solarian High Court.

Though the Solarian Compact prides itself on being a Constitutional government, the actual original document merely outlines the terms of admitting new MPs and High Court Judges, and the electoral procedures of the Compact Parliament, with subsequent Parliaments meeting to add items like the Declaration of Property Rights, the founding of the Central Bank, the creation of the Solarian Navy, and the Laws on Freedom of Navigation and Travel being added later.

The Solarian Parliament is made up of two thousand six hundred and twenty seats representing ridings on Earth, Columbia, Atlantis, Penglai, Olduvai, and Epsilon which are elected every three years to a Parliament that meets in the New York prefecture of Earth.

Though the many frontier colonies do not have direct representation in the Parliament due to being owned and operated by private entities, their inhabitants are considered 'Absent for Employment' and may register with a home riding and submit a physical ballot (for security reasons) by courier from when polls open until they close. Though this process was suitable for the closely settled regions of space at the time of the ratification of the Compact Constitution in 2100, the rapid growth of Human settled space in the century and a half since has seen the de facto voter suppression of over 90% of Human settled space.

At the first sitting of each new Compact Parliament, the assembled members will elect a Secretary General and a slate of Ministry officials on a majority basis, and those individuals will oversee the executive branch of government and day to day operations. Though the average Compact Parliament contains between seven to nine parties in each Parliamentary sitting, the vast majority of seats belong to one of either the Party for Human Rights and Liberties or the Justice and Development Alliance and have since the very early 2100s. The governments formed this way can be brought down by losing the confidence of the Parliament for example, by failing to pass a budget, the process of finding a majority government will repeat again.

Though a democratic body that has maintained stability for over a century and a half, the Solarian Compact Parliament has been dogged by accusations of dynastic politics, Charter influence, voter suppression, regulatory capture, inability to reign in the Banks and MIlitary, and corruption at all levels.

Separate from the Parliament is the Solarian High Court that consists of eleven judges that serve terms of up to thirty-three years, with each new sitting of the Compact Parliament selecting one judge from a list provided by the governments of the six main worlds of the Solarian Compact. The High Court rules on matters of adherence of laws to the Solarian Constitution, and have been accused of serving as an arm of the Charters, though this has been strenuously contested by the Solarian legal profession as a whole.

By law the Solarian Compact also oversees a number of other important institutions including the Earth Reconstruction Commission (In a permanent public-private partnership with the Earth Reconstruction Association), the Solarian Central Bank, and the Solarian Compact Navy, though these important institutions often exhibit an alarming degree of autonomy from Parliamentary control.

The Charters:

The result of a cleverly conceived merger between specialty transport vessel manufacturer Titan Staryards and Private Military contractor Martian Military Solutions, Ares cut its teeth not just supplying material to the skirmishes between Mississippi Shipping and United Starhaul, but in supplying military contractors to both sides.

The professionalism of Ares mercenaries and quality of Ares gear led to the rapid expansion of business opportunities for the company and investment skyrocketed even after the Mississippi-Starhaul war ended in a hostile takeover of Starhaul by Mississippi.

Thanks in part to Mississippi debts held by Ares, when the RT-2102 Gate was opened up for settlement strategic maneuvering saw the Compact grant Ares mining and settlement rights to the newly opened system.

The rest, as they say, is history. Leveraging the immense resources of the Alexander system with their existing military expertise, Ares expanded nearly exponentially over the following century. While they maintain a dominating edge in the military field, they now integrated companies in fields from agronomy to personal fitness centers to xenobiology.

Internally Ares very self consciously styles itself as a hierarchical military organization complete with a semi-formal rank structure and an ethos of respect for the chain of command, professional courtesy, and treating your subordinates with respect. In practice Ares is hidebound, authoritarian, filled with passive aggressive sniping and rampant empire building.

While Ares remains headquartered on Mars, they have holdings in several systems and own the distant system of Alexander outright.

Rhodes Mining

One of the three original Charters that the Compact granted, Rhodes considers itself the singular reason that Humanity survived ecological collapse and spread past Sol. Immensely wealthy, over 52% of all material mined and processed by the entire Human race has passed through Rhodes hands at one point or another.

While founded merely to provide Earth the vital materials that it needed to rebuild itself after the lost decades of ecological collapse, Rhodes quickly expanded into all areas of the economy to support their mining, refining, and processing operations.

Dedicated to their vision of logistical chain efficiencies they've developed an entire chain of star systems into an efficient production center based around the resource rich system of Foundry, and the nearby feeder systems of Ecrams, Qem, and Crucible.

Rhodes considers itself home to a version of meritocracy built on hard work, education, and good old fashioned personal drive. This has developed over time into a stratified internal divide between the rank and file workers, the lower level management, and the highly lauded senior management. Each class lives in entirely separate worlds, attending separate schools, consuming different products, and leading very different lives in what many observers have labelled a de facto caste system.

they make food and medicine, the 120 year old CEO is kinda creepy tho?

Techbros, some of them science, some of them explore

Born from the union of Hermes Interstellar Services and The Ishtar Group, the Hermes-Ishtar Corporation owns and operates not only the communications backbone of Compact space, but much of the content that crosses over it.

The results of increasing consolidation of pre-spaceflight communications infrastructure and content creation and management firms, Hermes Communications and Ishtar Entertainment Group were both part of the second round of Charters established after the advent of the KC gates.

While Hermes quickly established operations throughout Compact space, their waystations, couriers, and communications repeaters a common sight in every corner of Human occupied space; Ishtar Group mainly limited their own operations to Sol and the Radiant system, where Ishtar owned and operated the world of Elysium to support their many projects.

Following a wave of Compact space wide reorganizations following the Mississippi-Starhaul conflicts of the 2130s, a desire for complete vertical integration on Ishtar's part led to a mostly amicable union with Hermes in 2139.

Since then Hermes-Ishtar have dominated all communications across Human space with only the privileged internal high-level communications of the other Charters managing to avoid consolidation under Hermes-Ishtar.

While Hermes-Ishtar make a great show of respecting individual creativity, initiative, and drive from their employees; in practice this amounts to rampant internal fighting involving the parasocial personality cults of different "genius" inventors, artists, and executive that rise and fall inside of Hermes-Ishtar at a dizzying rate.

Sketchy buggers, they can get you anything tho

Historical Topics:

Between 2036 and 2071 the Democratic Federation was the governing body of much of Earth's Western Hemisphere.

Initially comprised of a Federation of Socialist, Anarchist, Communist, and other far left social movements, militias, and political factions controlling regions of Earth's North American continent during and after the decline and collapse of the United States of America (1776-2034) due to the effects of unaddressed climate change amplifying existing political and economic crisis.

Eventually solidifying into the governing body of the former United States of America, United States of Mexico and the Dominion of Canada, the Democratic Federation embarked on an ambitious program of cultural revolution and economic reform designed to mitigate and reverse the effects of the climate change crisis.

As the patron of much of the central and southern western hemisphere, the Democratic Federation attempted to chart a course of environmental restoration separate from that of the Solarian Treaty Organization (In 2063 reorganized into the Solarian Charter), choosing not to contest Eurasian and African domination of outer space.

Having never existed out of crisis conditions, a combination of pre-existing economic damage, sabotage, and instability drove the Democratic Federation into decline in the Grey Decade of 2062 to 2070 and eventually forced the Democratic Federation to ratify a series of treaties giving the Charters economic access to Federation member states in order to conduct vital reconstruction work.

A last ditch uprising by radical elements in 2072 to eject the Charters from the Democratic Federation failed when Solarian Compact peacekeepers were called in and in seven months of street fighting pacified most of North America's key urban centers via strategic use of orbital weapons on the areas of greatest urban resistance.

Though guerilla warfare would continue in the Western Hemisphere for another three decades, the Democratic Federation was officially defunct by December 2072 and parcelled out into a number of Charter owned reconstruction areas under Compact authority.

Today radicals still pine for the four decades that the Democratic Federation attempted to build an alternative to the emerging Charters, and the polity's distinctive black, red, and green flag is brought out for each and every Great Black Summer. Well into the twenty second century, riots were often accompanied by demands to 'Avenge the Martyrs of 72!'.

Despite this underground extremist nostalgia, Charter and Compact schools teach that the Democratic Federation was a collectivist state whose iconoclastic behavior saw the destruction of famous landmarks like Mount Rushmore, Stone Mountain, and other monuments to Liberal Democracy and the Free Market in a mad attempt to remake the human race, but whose doctrinaire adoption of command economics saw them unable to deal with the ever-changing complexities of climate change.

Misc Details:

The first five systems to hold permanent Human colonies are known as either "The First Sisters" or "Earth's Daughters", depending on who you are asking and their political persuasion. From oldest to youngest, these worlds are:

Columbia: settled by billionaire American expats and tens of millions of refugees who had fled the unfolding revolutionary violence of the North American continent several years beforehand. Columbia was founded under a vision of fidelity to the American dream and to prove the indomitability of the soul of the United States of America and liberalism in the face of the red flags of the (North American) Democratic Federation. Fiercely loyal to the Compact and the dream of Charter prosperity, and home of the Solarian Central Bank, Columbia is often known as the "Gilded World" in reference to what many see as a return to American Gilded Age wealth and social inequality. Ares Conflict Solutions' central command is located here.

Atlantis: With colonization rights to this majority oceanic planet initially granted to the waning power of the European Union, the nations of the EU opened up colonization opportunities to other allied powers, especially Russia and Egypt. Atlantis was often seen by the EU as a place to dump unwanted refugees from outside of Europe's borders, and Russia and Egypt's tendency to see the world as a genuine project led to the usurpation of colonization rights away from Europe in the mid 2080s. Known today as the most restive of the first wave of colonies, Atlantis is the most skeptical of Charter power and plays a delicate game of wealth redistribution to underwrite the greatest social security net in Human Space. Cernunnos is de jure headquartered here.

Penglai: Originally the world in the most need of terraforming of the original colonies, Colonization rights were granted to the People's Republic of China and their allies after a lackluster bidding campaign. As China's focus was mainly on attempting to stem the damage of climate change on Earth herself, colonization of Penglai initially lagged until the Chinese Politburo struck upon the strategy of subcontracting colonization rights to Pacific adjacent nations suffering from the rise of that ocean. As colonization unfolded in the early 22nd century Penglai became known as a multicultural mosaic as hundreds of millions from across the Pacific settled and intermingled on the wine darkened shores of that world. Known today for its vibrant cultural milieu, violent clashes between labour unions, and private police, Penglai hosts the headquarters of the Hermes-Ishtar, Omoikane and Rhodes corporations.

Olduvai: With Colonization rights granted to a coalition of African nations at the height of the 'African Century', the African Colonization Organization did not see their colony as a refugee destination, dumping ground, or resource colony like their fellows. Instead the ACO saw the colonization scheme as an opportunity to preserve and export the rich traditions and cultures of Africa on their own terms, fully intending to set up healthy and self-sufficient colonies. To the current day, Olduvai has the closest relations with the home nations and is the heartland of Daughter sentiment and a bedrock for the Party for Human Rights and Liberties.

Epsilon System: While not technically a single world, the cluster of heavily inhabited space colonies in the Epsilon system are always considered the 'Fifth Sister' or 'Fifth Daughter'. As the most mineral rich system of the original colonies, Epsilon was the source of many of the materials that helped pull Earth through her darkest hour, and the system was recognized for their efforts by being invited to send delegates to the 2099 Solarian Compact Constitutional Convention. Epsilon is famous for its people's long roots in spacing and for being the headquarters of Mississippi Shipping Interstellar and thus the most heavily trafficked system in history.
Technologies: Nanomanufacturing, summary:

The contemporary gold standard for manufacturing. These devices use mechanosynthesis, a process that guides chemical reactions by placing reactive molecules with atomic precision. Ribosomes in the body's cells use a form of this method.

While the largest units can create objects up to 2m x 2m x 2m, smaller units (halving the units each time) are viable on basically any human scale. Projects larger than this size (such as ships or buildings, need to be either grown layer-by-layer via nanofabricators attached to robotic arms, or assembled from smaller parts through traditional assembly line, dry dock, or construction processes.

In principle basically anything can be made with these devices, and some materials can only be manufactured via these methods in microgravity. All manufacturing patterns in Compact Space feature Charter DRM using embedded explosive molecules like octaazacubane or cubic gauche nitrogen that will damage a disassembler or x-ray machine making reverse engineering of their products difficult.

A common part of 23rd century life is the near ubiquity of Artificial Intelligences in daily life, from consumer grade VIs through specialist TLIs, controversial AGIs, finally the perpetually 10 years away Artificial Super Intelligences.

The common consumer will daily run into what are properly known as Narrow AIs, and generally labelled as VI -Virtual Intelligences- by people outside the field. This category covers a broad swathe of techniques, from search and pathfinding to expert systems to genetic fuzzy trees to deep neural networks, which are mixed and matched with each other to optimize for the designed task. VIs are ubiquitous, exceeding human peak skill in their areas of specialization (though real world applications often don't do all that much better than trained humans), and have spent the past two centuries getting augmented with more and more clever algorithmic tricks for improving VIs. In order to do this, the Charters employ large teams of analysts and software engineers to develop clever algorithmic tricks that supplement or outright supplant neural networks, exploiting machine precision where stochastic methods are inadequate.

The use of VIs in everyday life is well accepted by the vast majority of the population, with professionals mixing and matching various consumer VIs to analyse data or assist them with creative or scientific works. Some VI lines are well loved by both the populace and the Charters themselves, with Charter programmers often deliberately leaving VIs with behavioral quirks and unpredictable glitches that not only save money on quality assurance, but are considered endearing traits that lead to anthropomorphization by the consumer market

Despite the mass comfortability and profitability of VIs of all kinds, the introduction of AGIs has been, to put it delicately, controversial. Though computer science has advanced to the point of producing programs that can not only pass the Turing test, but demonstrate sapience and match 23rd century human intelligence, flexibility, and creativity, the public reaction to the introduction of AGI saw the companies of the time rapidly pull them from the market, and even say the Compact itself move to heavily regulate the AI sector.

First introduced in the 2060s, the great tech firms began replacing their work staff with AGIs who did not require food, rest, housing, or pay. This shift led to an alliance between white collar workers fearing that automation would put them out of work and radicals who opposed what they insisted was AGI Slavery, a growing movement that would climax in the First Great Black Summer of 2084. When the ashes of the First Black Summer settled, the Compact's Parliament moved to grant rights to AGIs, and the resulting economic damage saw dozens of formerly great names in computing consolidate under the aegis of several of the first Charters who flaunted their extra-Solarian wealth by buying up prestigious brand names and research divisions on the cheap.

Since the 2080s, while the regulation surrounding AGI production and use have been severely weakened none of the Charters have sought to reintroduce them into the market, perhaps fearing another backlash like the First Black Summer and the few hundred thousand surviving AGIs that were granted Solarian Citizenship rights have found spread throughout the Compact and Charter Space where they usually work at the same white collar jobs whose workers they were designed to replace.

Perhaps due to the risks of attempting to reintroduce AGIs to the market, Omoikane has instead introduced their flagship product the "TLI" or Temporary Limited Intelligence. Approximately as effective as an AGI, a TLI is billed as a more moral replacement for AGI that uses a suite of high end VIs and a proprietary batch of creativity algorithms in order to complete complex tasks.

TLIs are used as a fire and forget program designed to be licensed to solve a single issue, no matter how complicated and then delete itself. Though the TLIs are a black box product, scientists from the other Charters believe that the central creativity algorithm in the TLI is inherently unstable and rapidly degrades in ability with time, making the TLI an instance of Omoikane attempting to market a critical technical flaw as a selling point that is accepted due to the ubiquitous market practice of planned obsolescence and artificial scarcity.

Though expensive, most businesses and successful professionals will keep a few licensed Omoikane TLIs on hand to throw at difficult problems or to supplement manpower in crunch situations.

While AGIs have been possible for nearly two centuries, the promise of a Seed AI, a recursively self-improving general superintelligence, is perpetually 'a decade away from the market', and no successful ASI ever been demonstrated to the satisfaction of the Charters or the Compact.

This is not to say that the Gödel machine architecture or the AIXI model has somehow been forgotten in the past 230 years, but that the Friendly AI problem has yet to be cracked. Every demonstration has either stalled out or gone immediately rampant, attempting to overthrow Charter Space before being stopped by the safety net of Narrow AIs. The small trickle of roughly human intelligence level AGIs that are created every decade typically come from these projects.

Urban legends persist that a few Seed AIs managed to escape and hide out beyond known space, plotting to return and crush humanity, or that they control all of society in secret, puppeting the Compact and Charters from their very foundation and occasionally engineering publicly failed ASI attempts to allay suspicion. These rumours are, of course, patently false, and simply the fevered imagination of crackpots at work, no doubt inspired by entertainment made by Hermes-Ishtar that feature AI supervillainy.
Systems: Map made by @Redshirt Army

The Spinward Frontier:

The Middle Spinward Frontier

The Core Region:

UNDER RADIANT CONTROL OR ALLIED:

The Radiant system is host to a G-class star, only slightly smaller than Sol. The system itself is rather small and resource-poor; experts believe that one or more Jovian planets ejected much of the system's bodies and then followed themselves. This is evidenced by the system's asteroid belt degrading over time, with high levels of eccentric orbits and impacts on planetary surface.

Radiant 1: A rather unremarkable airless iron planet, gravity 0.4 Earth Standard.

Radiant 2: A slightly larger unremarkable airless iron-silicate planet, gravity 0.6 Earth Standard.

Radiant 3: A binary planetary system and the outermost of the Radiant systems' planets.

Asphodel (Radiant 3a): The larger of the Elysium 3 pair, Asphodel might have once hosted life of its own. That life has been snuffed out for hundreds of millions of years, though, as the planet's significant atmosphere began the runaway cycle of your usual hothouse planet. Hermes-Ishtar maintained a significant aerostat and automated surface miner operation for in-house manufacturing, given that the frequent asteroid impacts from the asteroid belt keep digging up chunks of the upper crust and having low-melting-point metals rain out of the sky and solidify, unoxidized, on the surface for collection. Gravity 1.4 Earth Standard.

Elysium (Radiant 3b): Elysium was settled in the late 2190's, being a relatively simple affair. Simple life had already begun to evolve under its oceans, but continued orbital bombardment far past the lengths of things like Earth's Late Heavy Period had kept it there. It was a simple matter of forming up a small anti-asteroid task force armed with tugs and mining lasers to artificially end the pummeling, and the surface proved amenable to Terran life transplants. The colony is energy-self-sufficient, using a variety of solar, tidal, and nuclear power. Gravity 0.9 Earth Standard.

Radiant I: The outermost significant feature of Radiant, this asteroid belt is more a loose mixture of a primordial asteroid belt much like Sol's with a Kuiper belt. The shepherding gas giants which once nudged all these rocks into their orbits are gone, and with it the entire outer system is a maelstrom of chaotic orbits as the belts lose their coherence. This requires constant vigilance from Elysium's anti-asteroid team, but the high eccentricity of many asteroids also makes it cheap and easy to mine the ones that might come Elysium's way, which provides a trickle of basic resources for upkeep and personal goods. All large-scale building and infrastructure projects have been supplied from out-system, however.

A G-K far binary system, Gaid is simply a transit point to Radiant. Gaid's own gate maintenance techs and SAR rotated in and out through Radiant itself. There is no infrastructure other than a set of buoy lines for communications in Gaid A, and nothing in Gaid B.

Gaid A1: An airless world. Quality 10.

Gaid A2: A planet much like mars with a vestigial CO2 atmosphere. Quality 7.

Gaid A3: This planet boasts a methane hydrosphere. Quality 4.

Gaid AI: An asteroid belt.

Gaid A4: A turbulent Jovian planet, its storms would make resource extraction difficult. Quality 5.

Gaid A4a: An icy moon, with tidal heating creating a large ocean under a thin icy shell. Quality 9.

Gaid B1: A molten Cthonian world hosting a simply ludicrous amount of iron. Quality 15.

Gaid B2: An airless world. Quality 10.

Gaid B3: An airless binary system with two near-identically sized planets. Quality 7 and 8.

Gaid B4: This airless planet boasts a large and beautiful ring system, famous as a screen background option across human space. Every few years, a cruise or scientific expedition will stop by for more images.

Gaid B5: A small icy planet. Quality 3.

Gaid B6: A frozen world. Quality 7.

Gaid B7: An interesting gas dwarf sometimes referred to as an 'ice dwarf.' Quality 14.

A close K-M binary, Shei is home to an old Ares penal colony.

Shei 1: A Cthonian world. Quality 15.

Shei 2: An airless world. Quality 12.

Sheol (Shei 3): A boreal world, with a large, decaying ring, the planet features two large continents. The population of the consists of a large prisoner population on the larger of the two continents and a small Ares training base on the smaller. Records show that the prison consists of several million persons convicted to "high risk labour" and dropped on the continent with automatic resupply via Ares contractors and watched from orbit by weapons satellites. Most of the planet's land area is covered in a native tree analogue with a strange multi-stranded trunk.

Sheol is actually home to a population of over 100 million made up of prisoners and their descendants taht Ares was usuing as a live fire training course. Cooperation between Radiant agents, Ares mutineers, and the Sheolites themselves have seen the planet freed.

Gravity .95 Earth Standard. Quality 12.

Watchman (Shei 3a): Once the outer of two moons, this body now boasts Ares' local light shipyards and system command center. Quality 13.

Shei 4: Spiraling in from the outer system, this planet will eventually evaporate near-entirely as it closes towards the dual suns of Shei. Quality 3.

Shei 5: Martian planet with an active methane cycle. Quality 5.

Shei I: Asteroid belt.

Shei 6: Jovian planet with high rotation rate. Slightly squashed as a result. Quality 8.

Shei 6a: An icy capture, this moon will be torn into a ring sometime in the next hundred thousand years. Quality 2.

Shei 6b: Cold Martian planet, covered in a thin layer of water and carbon dioxide ices. Active methane cycle. Quality 8.

Shei II: Asteroid belt.

Shei 7: Jovian planet. Quality 13.

Shei 7a: An icy moon with significant cryovolcanism. Quality 6.

Shei 7b: A tiny icy moon, this is on the edge of hydrostatic equilibrium. Quality 2.

Shei 8: Ice giant. Quality 6.

Shei 8a: An icy moon. Quality 9.

Shei 8b: An icy moon, orbiting in an unusual polar orbit. Quality 9.

Population: 103,000,000

While lacking any currently-habitable planets, Five Lions' large size and potential have made it a significant point of Rhodes' recent extraction efforts. Ambitious terraforming efforts have recently begun.

Carajas (Five Lions 1): A Cthonian ball of iron, it's actively mined by robotic Rhodes-built landers. Gravity 2.3 Earth Standard. Quality 12.

Five Lions 2: A small rocky ball. Quality 3.

Five Lions 3: A rocky ball. Quality 7.

Grasberg (Five Lions 4): A large rocky world, glaciation has rendered it uninhabitable for now, but terraforming efforts have begun to artificially ramp up the greenhouse effect and restore liquid water to the surface, along with mining its ice. Gravity 1.11 Earth Standard. Quality 14.

Five Lions 5: This planet's atmosphere is so significant it verges on a gas dwarf. While a solid surface covered in a thin layer of ice is at the bottom, no reasonable colonization is possible. Quality 7.

Five Lions I: This asteroid belt, along with all the others, is being mined heavily.

Five Lions 6: This Jovian planet forms the center of current Rhodes extraction efforts. Quality 4.

Five Lions 6a: This Martian planet boasts significant ice caps and active plate tectonics, though only a vestigial atmosphere. Debate on whether to put resources into terraforming it are ongoing. Gravity .81 Earth Standard. Quality 17.

Oyu Tolgoi (Five Lions 6b): Home to the local population in covered shelters, this Martian planet, while nearly completely lacking water or plate tectonics, has its own atmosphere. Comet bombardment away from populated areas is ongoing and is already beginning to show results. Gravity .79 Earth Standard. Quality 11.

Five Lions II: An asteroid belt.

Five Lions 7: An unremarkable Jovian. Quality 2.

Five Lions III: An asteroid belt.

Five Lions 8: Jovian planet, its rotation speed has resulted in an unusually calm upper atmosphere. Quality 15.

Five Lions IV: An asteroid belt.

Five Lions 9: Jovian planet. Quality 9.

Five Lions V: An asteroid belt.

Five Lions 10: Neptunian ice giant. Quality 8.

Five Lions 10a: A small icy moon. Quality 5.

Five Lions 10b: A large icy body, this was probably its own planetoid at some point before being captured due to the complex interplays of no less than 5 gas giants.

Population: 15,000,000

A rare system with a brown dwarf orbiting a G-type star (just barely in the limits of what's considered a single system rather than a binary), and with a Jovian planet orbiting that, and on top of that treasure trove a dual ice giant binary, Osliam presents a golden research opportunity, and was bid on by Omoikane despite its otherwise sparce resources and poor habitable prospects.

Osliam 1: A rare hot ice giant, this planet is actively shrinking on a measurable time scale. It must have migrated in as a much larger planet recently.

Osliam 1a: This once-rock-ice moon is now a tiny molten ellipse barely holding together.

Osliam 1b: This somewhat larger moon changes color unusually with its day, as the shade of its parent cools lava to a dull red before emerging back into the light heats the lava back to a healthy orange glow.

Osliam 1c: This entire moon glows dull red in its day, just barely solid, and cools to an unusually smooth moon in its night.

Osliam I: This asteroid belt was probably a planet before Osliam 1's passing tore it to shreds.

Osliam 3: A hothouse planet with a relatively thin atmosphere, it retains temperatures and pressures that are survivable with heavy-duty equipment on the surface—when it's not raining sulfuric acid, that is.

Osliam 4: This small Martian planet seems to have collected some of Osliam 1's offgassing in its move inwards, and has a renewed temporary atmosphere.

Osliam 5a: This planet seems to have survived at the edge of the frost line by siphoning gas off its smaller twin.

Osliam 5b: Barely a gas giant, this planet was probably only slightly smaller than Osliam 5a in the distant past.

Osliam 6: The focus of Omoikane colonization in-system, Osliam 6 retains plate tectonics from the nearby brown dwarf but no atmosphere, an odd combination.

Osliam 7: A brown dwarf, this substellar object long ago burnt its deuterium and now lies slowly cooling, glowing dimly red. It is, however, still giving off a prodigious amount of low IR radiation.

Osliam 7a: Once its own planet, Osliam 7a was captured at some point by Osliam 7, perhaps in the same interaction that threw Osliam 1 to its suicidal innermost orbit.

Osliam 7a1: This icy moon is simultaneously shrinking and becoming more habitable—while its outer layers of ice are sublimating, the fierce tides of its complex interplay with Osliam 7 and 7a are heating the inner ocean to temperatures comparable to terrestrial water sources. Some scientists even suggest a pocket of water vapor is forming under the ice, and may form an internal "sky" for as much as a hundred million years before the outer shell sublimates entirely.

Osliam 7a2: This moon is less lucky; its tides are so strong that they seem to slowly be ripping the moon apart. It won't have the honor of becoming more than an ephemeral ring; the same complex tides tearing at it will rapidly disperse its debris field. While it lasts, though, it's easy water harvesting.

Population: 650,000

UNDER CHARTER CONTROL:

A distant double G binary, Xotreh hosts a small habitable moon around Xotreh B, the smaller of the two stars. As such, development has focused on the second star, despite the fact that the jump points center closer to Xotreh A.

Xotreh A1: This world boasts an active liquid silicate cycle on its surface, with oceans of basalt and continents of granite. Gravity 0.38 Earth Standard. Quality 8.

Xotreh A2: A rather large airless world, its original atmosphere was likely blown off by a massive impact. Gravity 1.2 Earth Standard. Quality 9.

Xotreh A3: A binary planetary pair of airless worlds about the size of Mars. Quality 6 and 8.

Xotreh A4: A hothouse planet with a planet-wide sulfuric acid storm due to its rapid rotation. Gravity .71 Earth Standard. Quality 8.

Xotreh A5 "Cueball": This planet is remarkably similar to Earth—if earth was buried under a kilometers-thick ice sheet across 90% of the surface. One day, as Xotreh A expands and dies, this world will become an ocean planet, but for now it's a cold desert. Gravity .87 Earth Standard. Quality 5.

Xotreh A6: An unremarkable icy ball. Quality 4.

Xotreh AI: An asteroid belt.

Xotreh A7: A Jovian planet, Xotreh 7 corrals the entire inner system in line. Quality 10.

Xotreh B1: This planet must have once been a gas giant at least the size of Uranus before it was sent inwards. Now all that remains is a dense core with a molten surface. Gravity 1.51 Earth Standard. Quality 13.

Xotreh B2: A binary pair of earth-sized airless worlds. Quality 6 and 7.

Xotreh B3: Another once-gas giant, this planet remains far out enough to boast a wholly-solid surface of iron. Gravity 1.64 Earth Standard. Quality 14.

Xotreh B4: A Jovian right on the frost line, its tidal heating keeps its moons on the edge of habitability. Quality 3.

Xotreh B4a "Sushi": An ocean world with massive polar ice caps, Omoikane has constructed a series of seasteads on the equatorial high ocean plateaus where it was feasible to drive foundations into the sea floor a few hundred meters below the surface. These small facilities serve as housing, data storage, and production centers for the research teams studying the dual Cthonian planets of Xotreh B. Gravity .67 Earth Standard. Quality 2.

Xotreh B4b: The lesser tidal heating here worsened the glaciation, and the planet lies under a planet-wide crust of ice. Gravity 1.13 Earth Standard. Quality 10.

Xotreh BI: The close proximity of this asteroid belt makes it an ideal location for resource extraction.

Xotreh 5: This Jovian is definitively beyond the habitable zone. Quality 6.

Xotreh 6: A dense ice giant. Quality 4.

Xotreh 7: Jovian planet. Quality 6.

Xotreh 8: An exceptionally cold Jovian. Quality 9.

Xotreh 8a: An unremarkable icy sphere. Quality 8.

Xotreh 9: This planet would have a massive atmosphere, if it wasn't so cold it all froze and fell to the surface. Only a few degrees above the space surrounding it. Gravity 1.3 Earth Standard. Quality 9.

Population: 54,000

Besides an interesting Jovian-gas dwarf planetary system, Bestreer holds little of interest other than its connections to other places.

Bestreer 1: An airless world. Quality 2.

Bestreer 2: An airless world. Quality 6.

Bestreer 3: This airless world once had a captured moon, torn apart at the Roche limit and forming a ring. A small gate maintenance and SAR team bases here, siphoning fuel and water from Bestreer 5 and mining into the surface for both resources and safe spaces for housing. Quality 10.

Bestreer 4: A rock-ice world. Quality 5.

Bestreer 5: Another rock-ice world made up more of ice than rock. Quality 5.

Bestreer I: An icy asteroid belt.

Bestreer 6: A large Jovian planet, on the edge of becoming a brown dwarf. Quality 15.

Bestreer 6a: This gas dwarf might have become a gas giant in its own right without its massive sibling. Quality 5.

Bestreer 7: Another Jovian. Quality 14.

Bestreer 7a: An icy moon, with an internal ocean buried under kilometers of ice. Quality 12.

Bestreer 8: An icy ball. Quality 10.

Population: 450

G-class star. A transshipping point to Radiant and environs, Mississippi keeps a substantial support crew on hand for possible cargo ship breakdowns or emergencies in-system, due to the slightly increased risk of issues from the absolute shambles of Akleod's inner system. A minor executive has also put together a cheap refueling and battery exchange station.

Akleod 1: Even actively evaporating and leaving behind a trail in orbit of dissipating volatiles, this body is large enough to have usurped Akleod 1a's orbit temporarily until it disappears away or the chaotic orbit of the two throws one into the star or out of the system. Quality 2.

Akleod 1a: The original Akleod 1, its orbit has been badly disrupted by the current, migrating Akleod 1. Which of the two gets ejected is still uncertain despite a decent amount of computational simulation; odds put it at 48-52% relatively. Quality 6.

Gnat's Ass (Akleod 2): A small, loosely-held-together icy body, perhaps what used to be an asteroid belt before Akleod 1's suicidal inner-system dive. It's not yet had time to fully reach hydrostatic equilibrium. Quality 3.

Akleod 3: An icy planet similar to Akleod 1, perhaps an old sibling. Quality 13.

Akleod I: An asteroid belt.

Akleod 4: A Jovian with an unusually elliptical orbit, it's regarded as the culprit for the chaos of Akleod's inner system. Quality 11.

Population: 5,000

As it turns out, transponder codes from regular priority messages through Gaid (now that we can see them, having backdoored the gate control) bear tags from a system, Thoa, along with navigational chart updates for any ships that happen to stop by. Thoa and Gaid both seem to have been nothing more than transit points to the far-more-valuable Radiant for Hermes-Ishtar, but Thoa holds a small anti-pirate base guarding against raiders from Signia. Hermes-Ishtar was apparently serious enough about it to have a converted corvette on station.

All told, the Thoa system holds gates to 2 systems besides Gaid's. There's also an unimproved jump point simply labelled as "dangerous." that leads to Signia

Thoa System Stats:

Thoa 1: A molten mess of a planet, it's hot enough that a residual atmosphere of vaporized low-melting-point metallics exists.

Thoa 2: An unremarkable airless metal ball.

Thoa 3: A super-earth hothouse, this planet would have been uninhabitable due to its gravity even before turning scorchingly hot.

Thoa 3a: A captured asteroid barely on the edge of hydrostatic equilibrium, the Nasty Bastardhad been excavating rudimentary shelters for "leave" for its crew.

Thoa I: An asteroid belt.

Thoa 4: A normal Jovian planet.

Thoa 4a: A moon much like Mars in climate.

Thoa 5: A Jovian planet with an unusual triangular wind pattern at the poles.

Thoa 6: Blooms of hydrogen well up from the core of this Jovian, perhaps disturbed by some recent impact.

Thoa 7: Bathyscapes would find themselves at home on the surface of Thoa 7. Pressures much like that at Earth's seabed keep a crust of ice 3 stable enough robotic drones could walk on it.

Thoa 7a: Unusually, Thoa 7a is the only large icy body in the system. Scientists are unsure of where the others went. As the only easy source of volatiles, the UNasty Bastard periodically stopped by a handful of obsolete volatile collection systems on the surface to top up.

Thoa II: A Kuiper belt of icy objects.

Empty Systems

Kimberly: A fairly unremarkable and empty system, this site was chosen as Rhodes' spinward boneyard—a place for failed experiments, old equipment, and ships so worn they weren't worth maintaining anymore, but were still valuable enough to warrant not throwing into a gas giant or otherwise completely destroyed. For 2 decades a Rhodes-affiliated salvaging contractor worked here, gathering scrap and other valuables, but following high injury and death rates and low returns, the contract (and most non-local dumping) was cancelled in 2247 (4 years before the March Days.)

Kimberly 1: A large rocky planet, this must have migrated inwards from further out in the system a long time ago to be so large so close to its parent star.

Kimberly 2: A Martian planet that keeps a comfortable daytime temperature despite its lack of atmosphere due to a close orbit.

Kimberly 3: A Jovian world.

Kimberly I: This asteroid belt is actually combined with a thinly-spread junkyard corralled by Kimberly's 2 gas giants.

Kimberly 4: A Neptunian world, this planet has several starship hulks abandoned as the closest stable orbit to the gate out. An old deactivation hub orbits in resonance with Kimberly 4a, the former site of a salvaging operation.

Kimberly 4a: The only significant satellite in the system, this icy moon retains a thin crust and a massive subterranean freshwater ocean.

Total:

Radiant:

Gaid:

Five Lions:

Head of Diplomatic Corps:

Name: Amanda Redcrest, Victoria Blackwell, and Kayla Hayashi

DoB: "2222", 2219, 2227, 2224

Current Position: Influential media figure and figurehead of Social Committee propaganda

Not a traditional diplomat, or a traditional individual 'Veronica Stardust' is the persona of a trio of XP broadcasters who have been working together since 2246 and has consistently been one of the most recognized figures across Charter space and is a local Elysian celebrity.

In Charter space those individuals who choose to make money by recording their lived experiences, of all kinds, for later playback are treated with an indulgent disdain by the polite classes as a mix of internet celebrity and sex worker despite the practice of selling XP experiences being common in the poorer segments of society and a smaller portion of the professional middle class attempting to stay afloat in a tight gig economy.

Amanda Redcrest was a former media programmer whose attempts to supplement her income with XP work backfired and saw her fired from her job. Contrarily, Kayla and Victoria both come from lower class backgrounds, though Kayla's attempts to climb into the middle class by earning a marketing degree were frustrated when her lower class status markers and financing of education via XP work saw her frozen out of the job market.

A former collaborator of Kayla's, Victoria had been a rising XP star in her own right and had no desire to change her station, but as her brief celebrity began to fade Victoria approached Kayla to propose the creation of a dedicated broadcasting persona that both would act as. Later bringing on Redcrest, who they'd both done crossover XP work with, to do technical work, the trio used carefully gathered market data and some intuition to create the "Veronica Stardust" persona of an middlingly-intelligent and freewheeling persona who played to the upper class's picture of what depravities and indignities the poorer class must get up to in their spare time.

From 2246 to 2251 the Veronica Stardust persona (performed by all three at various times, though primarily Victoria) produced experience recordings that were nearly always in the top 10 best sellers across Charter space.

Though they enjoyed the wealth that they brought in, the trio increasingly chafed at the market driven limitations of Veronica, and were considering a number of possibly catastrophic brand shifts when the March Days broke out and all three participated in street actions in a private capacity after sending one last broadcast as 'Veronica' to encourage revolt.

Since the formation of the Social Committee the figure of Veronica has been rebranded to serve as the figurehead of Social Committee Propaganda and several major initiatives have been launched with her at the forefront including a highly successful part of the anti-overproduction initiatives.

As part of the now-completed campaign to maintain the charade that Radiant was still under Charter control, Veronica Stardust continued to sell broadcasts to HI media chains, though the trio could not help but begin a brand shift towards a far more intelligent and radical persona.

Pros: XP Celebrity, influential, well known, inspiring to the middle and lower classes

Cons: XP celebrity, little diplomatic experience, three people

Diplomatic Goals: Defeat the Charters in the field of public opinion, push social revolution and freedom of information and communication, cause public opinion to oppose attacking Radiant

Unlocked FRM

Ares Peacekeeping Grade - Access to planetary army formation

Ares Military Grade - Access to mid-sized shipyards, bonuses to planetary army combat. Bonus to completion of Chinook remodeling

Rhodes Light industrial Grade - 10% increase to all mining income, reduced Cost for BLG and other actions that use basic fabber processes

Rhodes Heavy Industrial Grade - Massive discount on mining upgrades, able to unlock automated technologies with Omoikaine

Cernunnos Consumer Grade - +1 to all Soccom actions

Cernunnos Enterprise Grade - NOT UNLOCKED

Omoikane Consumer Grade - +1 to FRM reserach for each two tech bases unlocked (+6 currently)

Omoikane Enterprise Grade - +5 to blue sky research, automation with Omoikane

Hermes-Ishtar Consumer Grade - Your economy doesn't crash when the turn of funding

Hermes-Ishtar Production Grade - NOT UNLOCKED

MSI Consumer Grade - Consumer Goods, Drones, and personal vehicles, +2 to domestic projects in IndComm and SocComm

MSI Enterprise Grade - NOT UNLOCKED

Original Tech

The Box: Fabber the size of a X-box that can, with time, materials and power, print the components for a full sized box. Less efficient, but easy to print and hide.

Defence Coordinator:

Name: Maria Awhina

DoB: 2165

Current Position: Military Committee Delegate from the Radiant Veterans Guild

Born into poverty on Earth as the twenty-second century began to wane, young 22-year old Maria Awhina caught up in radical anti-Charter politics during the third black summer of 2187 and was convicted of property destruction during the rioting and sentenced to serve as a contractor to Hermes-Ishtar until her contract was paid off.

The stark choice of starvation or service to Hermes-Ishtar caused Maria to descend into self-destructive behavior where for twenty years Ms. Awhina continuously volunteered for the highest paid and most dangerous positions that Hermes-Ishtar had available.

Hermes-Ishtar considers Special Operations Lieutenant Awhina to have served with distinction throughout the heavy skirmishing of that era, though Maria herself continues to carry guilt for her service and her survival.

After performing exceptionally well in a hostage rescue operation Awhina was transferred to the Protective Detail Division of Hermes-Ishtar Security, and was eventually assigned to serve as the head of the Radiant Vice President's protective detail.

Over the next four decades she came to see the world as her home, and while her professionalism never wavered, her loyalty to the company who still owned her contract did.

This March, Maria had the option to gun down her fellow planetary headquarters workers to secure Yang's escape, or to finally return to roots in anti-Charter agitation. The fact that we are all here today shows what choice she made.

Pros:

-Actual Combat Veteran, knows Radiant inside and out, special operations expert, professional.

Cons:

-only academic knowledge of starship operations, logistics, organization command and strategic operations.

Command Traits:

-Objective oriented, unflappable, aggressive, prefers attacks and operations to come from unexpected angles.

Reports from the Permanent Commission for Military Intelligence on hostile forces in neighbouring systems:

Blue Squadron:
-Allegiance: Ares Combat Solutions
-Service: Mars Interstellar Security
-CO: Rear Admiral Weylon Kang
-Flagship: MIS Yorktown

We know little about Rear Admiral Weylon Kang except that he has received a number of commendations from the MIS board for keeping costs low while on deployment. He appears to be making an effort to clamp down on the rumours racing back and forth across the fleet.

MIS Yorktown
-British Empire-class Fleet Tender
MIS Eurymedon
-New Model-class Strike Corvette
MIS La Rochelle
-New Model-class Strike Corvette
MIS Cape Rachado
-New Model-class Strike Corvette
MIS Second Schooneveld
-New Model-class Strike Corvette
MIS Matapan
-New Model-class Strike Corvette
MIS Valcour Island
-New Model-class Strike Corvette
MIS Kerch Strait
-New Model-class Strike Corvette
MIS Galveston Harbour
-New Model-class Strike Corvette
MIS Cape Sarych
-New Model-class Strike Corvette
MIS River Plate
-New Model-class Strike Corvette
MIS Third San Francisco
-New Model-class Strike Corvette
MIS Scipio Africanus
-Cossak-class Frigate
MIS Suleiman I
-Cossak-class Frigate
MIS Louis Botha
-Cossak-class Frigate
MIS Fort Ware
-Hudson's bay Company-class Fast Fleet Tanker
MIS Fort Mackinac
-Hudson's bay Company-class Fast Fleet Tanker
MIS Fort Osage
-Hudson's bay Company-class Fast Fleet Tanker
MIS Arabian
-Postal-class Courier
MIS Macedonia
-Legionary-class Fast Troop Transport
MIS Hispania Citerior
-Legionary-class Fast Troop Transport
MIS Hispania Ulterior
-Legionary-class Fast Troop Transport
MIS Gallia Narbonensis
-Legionary-class Fast Troop Transport
MIS Sicilia
-Legionary-class Fast Troop Transport
MIS Corsica et Sardinia
-Legionary-class Fast Troop Transport

Fixed Defences:
Battery A
-MSS-54-F LMP Constellation
Battery B
-MSS-54-F LMP Constellation
Battery C
-MSS-54-F LMP Constellation
Shoal A
-ASR-33-C TAM Shoal
Shoal B
-ASR-33-C TAM Shoal
Shoal C
-ASR-33-C TAM Shoal
Shoal D
-ASR-33-C TAM Shoal
Shoal E
-ASR-33-C TAM Shoal
Shoal F
-ASR-33-C TAM Shoal

Fixed Defences:
Battery A
-Blindfire-Pattern LMP Constellation
Battery B
-Airstrike Pattern LMP Constellation
Shoal A
-Macross-Pattern LMP Constellation
Shoal B
-Macross-Pattern LMP Constellation
Strikecraft Wing, ID# 48603
-Radiance-Type Strikecraft

-None

Local Security Forces
-Approximately fifty strong volunteer station security militia drawn from station personnel

Local Security Forces:
-Deep Space Security Solutions (Omoikane Subsidiary) Customs shuttle squadron based out of Xotreh B-4a's orbital station
-Three companies of Standard Planetary Security Company (Ares subsidiary) troops based out of Xotreh B-4a's habitat complexes for internal security and law enforcement

139th Solarian Navy Squadron:
-Allegiance: Solarian Compact
-Service: Solarian Navy
-CO: Vice Admiral David Visser
-Flagship: SNS Krak de Chevaliers

Thanks to his heavy handed labour discipline and extractive tribute and demands for corvee labour from Ascension Admiral Visser is viscerally hated by the populace of Ascension, and to a lesser degree the rest of the Solarian Force as well. While the gate's completion draws near, it is uncertain what path that Visser will persue.

SNS Krak de Chevaliers
-Star-hold-Class light-tender
SNS Victoria Newman
-Leonard Greyson-Chang-Class Strike Corvette
SNS Julia Stonechild
-Leonard Greyson-Chang-Class Strike Corvette
SNS Robert Chuikov
-Leonard Greyson-Chang-Class Strike Corvette
SNS Wallace Al-Wazir
-Leonard Greyson-Chang-Class Strike Corvette
SNS Dawn's Early Light
-Freedom's Light-class cruiser
SNS Jacob Nagumo
-Herald Kanumba-Class frigate
SNS Alexander Hamilton
-Liberation-class troop transport

Solarian Marines now spread throughout the system

PCMI Provides new system data on the single system that lies beyond beyond Five Lions:

Mobile Force:

Current Orders: Defend the All Radiant Congress by acting as a rapid response in the event of any hostile acts.

CO: Commodore Stephanie Rousseau

CNS Velasco, United States of America-class Fleet Carrier

-CO: Captain Esteri Attar

-Orca Wing, Switchblade-type strikecraft (Customized)

-CO: Wing Commander Jasmine Ang

-Red Wolf Wing, Switchblade-type strikecraft (Customized)

-CO: Wing Commander Heloisa Kimura de Lima

CNS Shieldmaiden, Great Heathen-class Light Cruiser

-CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

CNS Shamhat, Great Heathen-class Light Cruiser

-CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

CNS Righteous Tempest, Cossak-class Frigate

-CO: Captain Vehement Shade

CNS August Willich, Cossak-class Frigate

-CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

CNS Elysium, Cossak-class Frigate

-CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

CNS Asphodel, Cossak-class Frigate

-CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

-

Home Force:

Current Orders: Defend Radiant, comet patrol, act as a reserve force

CO: Commodore Erina Kozlova

CNS Blaire Mountain, New Model-Class Strike Corvette

-CO: Captain Guillermo Kageyama

CNS Scutum, Comet-Class Patrol Corvette

-CO: Captain Martin Pagonis

CNS Buckler, Comet-Class Patrol Corvette

-CO: Captain Samuel Smiles

CNS Nasty Bastard, A Jury Rigged Mess of a Drone Carrier

-CO: Captain Jean-Paul Beaumont

-

Radiant System Self Defence Force:

Current Orders: Defend Radiant, comet patrol

CO: Overseen by Admiral Gregory Mansur in his capacity as MilComm Chief of Naval Operations

Radiant Customs Squadron, Arabia-class boarding craft with marine contingents

-CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

Switchblade Wing, Switchblade-type strikecraft

-CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

Apogee Wing, Switchblade-type strikecraft

-CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

Battery A, Blindfire-Pattern LMP Constellation

(Radiant-Bestreer Gate)

Battery B, Blindfire-Pattern LMP Constellation

(Radiant-Bestreer Gate)

Battery C, Blindfire-Pattern LMP Constellation

(Radiant-Bestreer Gate)

Battery D, Airstrike-Pattern LMP Constellation

(Radiant-Bestreer Gate)

Battery E, Airstrike-Pattern LMP Constellation

(Radiant-Bestreer Gate)

Battery F, Airstrike-Pattern LMP Constellation

(Radiant-Bestreer Gate)

Shoal A, Macross-Pattern TAM Shoal

(Radiant-Bestreer Gate)

Radiant Orbital Yard 1

Current construction: None

Radiant Orbital Yard 1

Current construction: None

-

Gaid System Self Defence Force:

Current Orders: Defend Gaid

CO: Commodore Victor Raine

Battery A, Blindfire-Pattern LMP Constellation

Battery B, Blindfire-Pattern LMP Constellation

Battery C, Blindfire-Pattern LMP Constellation

Battery D, Airstrike-Pattern LMP Constellation

Battery E, Airstrike-Pattern LMP Constellation

Battery F, Airstrike-Pattern LMP Constellation

Shoal A, Macross-Pattern TAM Shoal

Shoal A, Macross-Pattern TAM Shoal

Shoal A, Macross-Pattern TAM Shoal

Zephyr Wing, Switchblade-Type Strikecraft (Customized)

-CO: Wing Commander Ara Helge

Aeolus Wing, Switchblade-Type Strikecraft (Customized)

-CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

Gale Wing, Switchblade-Type Strikecraft (Customized)

-CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

-

Frontier Force

Current Orders: Keep watch on SolNav force in Raphanus, assist with integration of Ascension military forces, patrol Spinward frontier

CO: Commodore Shayla McLean

CNS Kiel Mutiny, Kaiserreich-class BattleCruiser

-CO: Captain Inana Devlin

CNS Choreographer, Janissary-class Light Tender

-CO: Captain Karl Xanthopoulos

CNS Valiant, New Model-class Strike Corvette, attached to CNS Choreographer

-CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

CNS Defiant, New Model-class Strike Corvette, attached to CNS Choreographer

-CO: Captain Fool's Errand

CNS Reliant, New Model-class Strike Corvette, attached to CNS Choreographer

-CO: Captain Rouge Napier

CNS Actium, New Model-class Strike Corvette, attached to CNS Choreographer

-CO: Captain John Rankin

CNS Crête-à-Pierrot, New Model-class Strike Corvette, attached to CNS Choreographer

-CO: Captain Nkiru Chaudhari

CNS Valmy, New Model-Class Strike Corvette, attached to CNS Choreographer

-CO: Captain Sumac Barros

CNS Revolutionary Will, Cossak-class Frigate

-CO: Captain Yamamoto Hanae

CNS Revolutionary Grace, Cossak-class Frigate

-CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

CNS Under New Management, Don-Class Fast Tanker

-CO: Captain Adras Kierenos

CNS Liberte, Hollywood(C)-Class Frigate

-CO: Captain Colin McRae

CNS Egalite, Hollywood(C)-Class Frigate

-CO: Captain Adelia Swift

Resources
Naval Ship Types: Ship Types (Public Version)
Naval Officers: Congressional Navy Officers (Public Version)
System Codex: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1rtNbPCcPsTK7HCHKo9dPgK7ntx5tBKOpltrZb_In7GY/edit#
Blaze Zhang: Blaze Zhang is trans-masc. That means his pronouns are he/him.

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Derpmind · Aug 17, 2022

Tatbee said:
If all wormhole comms sub-projects overflow into each other, divided evenly. (@QMs do they?)

I really don't think they will. Some of these projects will unlock new ones, so progress might go into projects we only want to do later, not now. And IIRC sometimes we only get half of overflow to roll over, or be reduced some other way.

If we could just count on Overflow doing things for us with no inefficiency, we wouldn't have to pick specific projects. We'd just always do the first FTL Comms related project and let the overflow cover everything.

Forgothrax · Aug 17, 2022

Tatbee said:
Will likely finish from the other projects' overflow.

It won't from the MVP overflow. Per Laurent on Discord:

For MVP at least, honestly I'd just split it between [Redacted] and [Redacted] if I was running the zoo, since those two kinda run from it and are the "Can put it on warships now and also install them easier" combo.

I'm actually fine with this. If we get an average roll on MVP, 11 (call it 12 for ease of calculation) rolls over to two projects... thats basically +22 on the roll for those two projects (bonus of 16, +6 overflow). If they're each 30 points we have a good chance of spending 1 die each to finish them. Even if more (35 or 40) we might get lucky and they roll into each other, meaning 3 dice to finish 2 projects.

Going by guessing, of the 5, energy is irrelevant if we autofinish it. MVP we know rolls over. I suspect FRM does too (its a Basic FRM. That hints at Advanced). I'm guessing there might be a tech past Persistent to increase bandwith that one rolls over to. SR reduction... that one might fall over to other categories, who knows. Maybe there's "make it even cheaper" options, idk.

MrRageQuit · Aug 17, 2022

Some will definitely overflow, MVP into the two Laurent mentioned, and FRM into the Advanced Version. The Persistent Wormwhole might overflow into whatever project is needed to unlock Generation 1.5/2. Given that the Energy one is First Generation, I suspect any successor possibly there there won't unlock until we've achieved Generation 1.5 or 2. However, I'm pretty sure the Qubit project won't have a successor, because of another thing mentioned in Discord:

The_Laurent said:
But yeah, in under a year you could go from 4E per facilitiy, 3 SR per pair, 1 E per pair... to 2 E per facility and .25 E and .25 SR per pair.

So unless we talking about reducing an SR cost to building a facility, I don't see any followups there.

Setsul · Aug 18, 2022

BaseDeltaZero said:
If anything VI Retrain should remove a bonus from that.

Well, the VI we used to figure out FRMs should apply to figuring out FRMs.
But we still need to reverse the polarity so it adds copy protections instead of removing them.

DeltaV11.2 said:
We really need first focus on IndComm at least once in the next two turns, preferentially this turn. Both Argent Chevalier and the capital yard are sitting at the point where a +5 makes a big difference in them completing in two turns versus three, putting the focus on it this turn means we get an opportunity to evaluate if it will reliably complete next turn with/without the bonus.

I'd also like first focus on IndComm (Automated Harvesting should also be there), but I think it makes more sense next turn.

First focus on SciComm gives us a chance to get the Jailbreak done, and in my plan specifically also massively helps with Grey Skies and VI Retraining.
This turn we're most likely going to build some mining infrastructure, first focus is wasted on that.

With Dice Efficiency most projects are missing just 4, so a +1 bonus from either Grey Skies, Jailbreak, or All the Toys finishing, plus another +1 from second focus and voilà, guaranteed completion as long as we got omakes.

Forgothrax said:
Hmm.

[] Extreme Dice Efficiency
-[] [SciComm] +10 Persistent Wormhole Communications
-[] [SciComm] +15 First Generation Wormhole Communications Facility Energy Efficiency Improvements

This is pinging off @Tatbee 's excellent analysis, noting that the only one that truly needs the boost is Persistent at 10. +5 on FRM just takes it up from 77.5% to 96.25%. So... why not just blow away the Energy Efficiency option? That way, we have 3 options that have 96% or better to finish, and one option that has 77.5% to finish. We've got a good chance of blowing away all these topics with 4 dice only. Plus, if we set up a Wormhole before we finish everything else, we can more easily absorb the E cost to do so.

I'd argue that Energy Efficiency is the least important. It saves us just 2E per facility and we first need to build those.
If we're going for dice efficiency then a single IndComm die could give us +20E. As long as we've got at most 5 facilities I think better chances to complete everything else and half an IndComm die for E (the other half for SR) would be better.
Also the chance to finish all with 4 dice is 69.1%. It's not bad, but it's almost 1 in 3 for needing 5 dice anyway. Plus we'd be gambling on FRM, so we run into the same old choice of building facilities without FRM or delaying by one turn.

And it still needs first focus for everything. I'd rather spread things out so we get guaranteed completions with second focus as soon as Jailbreak finishes. I'm assuming we're at least doing Jailbreak.
IndComm, MilComm, and MedComm all have projects that we might want first focus on next turn, so I'd rather take the plan that doesn't lock first focus into wormhole research for multiple turns, now that that's actually an option.

mira · Aug 18, 2022

I think it's a fair argument that Energy Efficiency is the least important. We can then do it in a way where we only need First Focus on one of the dice while getting very good chances (see below), which is a large improvement over needing First Focus on every die.

[] Plan: Dice Efficiency
-[] [SciComm] +5 Improve Wormhole Comms Qubit Utilization
-[] [SciComm] +15 Persistent Wormhole Communications
-[] [SciComm] +5 Develop Amaranthine Basic Fabrication Rights Management

This version assumes we'll use First Focus when doing FRM, giving us a 98,75% chance for getting FRM in one die and a 96,25% for getting MVP, Qubits, or persistent in one die, without needing any focus for those. Those chances rise to 100% and 98,75% respectively if we get another +1, either from one of the projects or second focus, and are all 100% if we get +2. That's an 88,1% base chance for getting all four in four dice, a 96,3% chance with a +1, and a 100% chance with a +2, without taking into account any overflows.

Alternatively:

[] Dice efficiency, qubit version
-[] [SciComm] +15 Persistent Wormhole Communications
-[] [SciComm] +10 Develop Amaranthine Basic Fabrication Rights Management

This gives the same chances, but assuming first focus is getting used on the qubit die. That's probably the better option if we want FRM right away, but don't want to use First Focus on Science for a while. Not sure if that's likely, but it's possible. (Edit: Okay, I think it's very unlikely this will be the better option of the two)

Given that it will probably be a bit before we start building facilities and that even at that point IndComm dice on energy will be a lot more effective for a while, I think this is a good option. If we want it, Energy Efficiency is still a guaranteed one die action we can do later. Right now, this gives way better chances and saves on needed focus, while only losing out on something that will not be useful for a while.

Edit: Changed the plan names to be in line with Setsul's post, which seems like a good idea for SciComm the next two turns, and basically makes this post obsolete anyway.

Setsul · Aug 18, 2022

The time for more math has come!

Ok, so I'm thinking we shouldn't keep first focus on SciComm longer than necessary.
Yes, getting Energy Efficiency (8SR, 9E) directly saves one die, but forces us to keep using first focus for the 4 other projects, and FRM would still be down to 77.5%, which might outright negate that advantage again.
First focus could instead be used to reduce the capital dock (30BR, 15SR, 8E), Argent Chevalier (10BR, 15SR, 5E), and Automated Harvesting (4BR, 2SR, 4E) by up to one turn each. They are too far from completing to know the odds now, but if we go for Plan Extreme Dice Efficiency, then we might really regret it next turn.

So for best efficiency overall, not just within SciComm, I'd minimize the number of projects that need first focus and only put it on a committee where most projects benefit from it.

Now that first focus won't be needed next turn, the plan to finish Jailbreak via Monster Within is dead. Without first focus the chance is just too low, better to finish Jailbreak by simply taking it again if we need to.
Since we've got so many omakes that we're unlikely to run out, getting a guaranteed completion for projects that are just missing 4 requires only two +1 bonuses. Second focus works as a backup plan, so All the Toys can go. We should still do it later because 12x +1 is huge.
With both Fractured Skies projects gone, only FRM would benefit from VI Retraining. But we need FRM first or at least at the same time as MVP, and even with VI Retraining and both Grey Skies and Jailbreak it's not guaranteed to complete without first focus. Better to just do it now with first focus. Axe VI Retraining because it's not needed anymore.

Which leaves me with this:
[] Plan: Dice Efficiency
-[] [SciComm] +5 Improve Wormhole Comms Qubit Utilization
-[] [SciComm] +15 Persistent Wormhole Communications
-[] [SciComm] +5 Develop Amaranthine Basic Fabrication Rights Management

SCICOMM: (first focus)
-[ ] [SciComm] Prepare for TLI Emancipation (100%)
-[ ] [SciComm] Genetic Augmentation Jailbreak (27.5%)
-[ ] [SciComm] Grey Skies Project (98.75%)
-[ ] [SciComm] Develop Amaranthine Basic Fabrication Rights Management (98.75%)

Next turn needs no focus.
We'd get at least 96.25% without any focus on any wormhole projects even if everything this turn fails (0.011% chance), but assuming something reasonably likely like either Grey Skies or Jailbreak finishing (99.09% chance of +1) and using second focus (+1), we get this:

SCICOMM: (second focus)
-[ ] [SciComm] Grey Skies Project (100%) / Genetic Augmentation Jailbreak (depends on roll / 97.19% across both turns)
-[ ] [SciComm] Minimum Viable Product Wormhole Comms (100%)
-[ ] [SciComm] Persistent Wormhole Communications (100%) / Automated Harvesting Breakthrough
-[ ] [SciComm] Improve Wormhole Comms Qubit Utilization (100%) / Develop Amaranthine Basic/Advanced Fabrication Rights Management (100%/?)

We don't actually need to start the improvements in that turn because a facility wouldn't finish before the third turn, but the odds stay the same in the third turn. With both Jailbreak and Grey Skies done we'd get 100% without even second focus.
If we really want to and get a bit lucky we might get the Advanced FRM done at the same time as MVP.
Automated Harvesting Breakthrough gets to enjoy the big +5 from first focus in IndComm, together with the capital dock and Argent Chevalier.
Those three and at least one die for E/SR mining are going to block IndComm for the next two turns anyway, and I'd rather not drop any of them just to get wormholes a single turn faster. If we need to build two facilities we'd need to drop two even.

Two turns is my goal for infinite BR because that's when our spoils from the Kimberly Gacha run out and Ascension is finished deconverting. We will have at least 6 yards available then, if the one Ismeu is converting, the smallcraft yard Five Lions is building, and the almost finished one in Radiant are all completed, and we count Sheol Mediumcraft 1 as well, then we could get up to 10. Keeping them running takes 20 BR per quarter for each. I don't need to tell you what 120-200 BR per turn would do to our budget.
2 dice from IndComm (this and next turn), 1 die from SciComm (next turn), plus omakes, plus the starting 16, plus +5 on each die, plus first focus one and second focus twice, plus probably +1 from Grey Skies and we're looking at:
3d20 + 3d4 + 16 + 3x5 + 5 + 2x1 + 1 = 3d20 + 3d4 + 39, which means expected rolls of 39 +39.
I deem that good enough. Maybe we roll badly or it's a /80 or even /100, but I'm optimistic and hoping that "pretty sure it's more than 40" means that it's /50 or /60.

EDIT: Yeah, pretty much what mira said, just a bit more in-depth and assuming that we will do one turn with first focus on SciComm where we can include FRM.

Cassiemouse · Aug 18, 2022

I admit to not really understanding the dice efficiency plan. Why spread points around to ensure that we can complete things in one turn then not plan to complete them in one turn on the next turn? If we aren't going to invest heavily in wormholes on the next turn then it seems like we would get more value from buying Minimum Viable Product now and working on the other projects later.

slybrarian · Aug 18, 2022

I think the idea is that MVP is not actually all that useful except for setting up a sort of emergency telegram to Ascension. We're better off waiting a turn to get the better connection techs before we start construction of the actual facilities, and so getting MVP earlier won't get us an actual link earlier.

Zanfib · Aug 18, 2022

Cassiemouse said:
I admit to not really understanding the dice efficiency plan. Why spread points around to ensure that we can complete things in one turn then not plan to complete them in one turn on the next turn? If we aren't going to invest heavily in wormholes on the next turn then it seems like we would get more value from buying Minimum Viable Product now and working on the other projects later.

The MVP without the FRM is useless, because we can't (safely) deploy it.

We need the FRM ready on the same turn we get the MVP.

Torgamous · Aug 18, 2022

Cassiemouse said:
Why spread points around to ensure that we can complete things in one turn then not plan to complete them in one turn on the next turn?

Saving dice on projects won't stop being valuable next turn.

Cassiemouse · Aug 18, 2022

Yea, I don't really understand getting points in projects unless we are going to immediately spend three dice on them next turn to finish them. Just having the points hanging around seems weird to me. If we aren't going to invest the dice to finish all the projects we put points in as soon as possible then we should just buy MVP because it will allow us to rollout our wormholes faster.

Setsul · Aug 18, 2022

Cassiemouse said:
I admit to not really understanding the dice efficiency plan. Why spread points around to ensure that we can complete things in one turn then not plan to complete them in one turn on the next turn? If we aren't going to invest heavily in wormholes on the next turn then it seems like we would get more value from buying Minimum Viable Product now and working on the other projects later.

Because we still want to do those projects later. Getting them done with one die is better than needing two. Getting them done without first focus is better than needing it.

FRM first because I'd rather be sure we have it when MVP finishes and because it needs the focus die to have very good chances at finishing with only one die. The plans need to only be stolen once, so why take the chance? Also gives us the option to do Advanced FRM if the overflow and bonuses look good.

Yes, we could "buy" MVP now.
Do you want to build facilities without FRM?
Which IndComm project do you want to drop to build facilities? We might even have to drop two if we need two facilities.
What does that get us? Without Persistent Wormhole Communications we can only do scheduled transmissions. Without Qubit Utilization or giving IndComm time to build more E and SR mining, we can't afford a lot of pairs, so bandwidth will be low.
Yes, we could do all the improvement projects and FRM this turn. Are you willing to drop TLI and Jailbreak for that?

At this point wormhole comms aren't some magic box anymore that we buy and then good things happen.
We know how much things cost and we can't really afford them until we built some more resource gathering infrastructure, for which we'll probably want infinite BR to be able to skip BR mining and afford higher level expansions.
We know which projects we need to actually get instant communications, which is what we want for emergency communications. But for a one system distance that's not really worth it (Radiant/Chinook/Bestreer) and who is going to attack Ascension? Putting them on ships will need a successor project.
For a reasonably high bandwidth connection to Ascensions, which will probably give us a research boost, we need lots of pairs and we need to be able to afford them. Which means building more SR mining first and doing the cost reduction projects.

The "problem" with wormhole comms is that they are completely new technology. Including facilities we've already got half a dozen projects just to get something usable and those projects will only unlock more projects. This won't be over and done with by rushing them all next turn.
We're going to be working on this for a while. We can't afford to drop everything as soon as more wormhole projects unlock and always use first focus to guarantee completion.

"Buying" MVP or Energy Efficiency Improvements means we are forced to use the first focus on SciComm if we want likely/guaranteed completions. We don't even know our budget for this turn yet. We don't know what 129th Squadron is doing, we don't know what the third battlegroup is doing, we don't know how other projects are going to roll that we might want to complete next turn.
The Dice Efficiency plan (+Jailbreak and maybe Grey Skies) means we can do the improvement projects whenever we want, without needing to base our entire plan around it.

tl;dr
We can cripple our economy (both dice & resources) and survival chances to get mediocre wormholes next turn.
It's not worth it.

Chanceseal · Aug 18, 2022

One possible use for FRM is to include FRM encrypted technology in the Broadcast as a way to grant technology to allies without also giving it to enemies.
We'd need some way of getting authorization codes to our allies so this would only be of help to Sol where we already have agents.
Another downside is that the transmitted FRMs will be a boon to the Charters efforts to crack them.
It might be possible to hide the FRMs somehow(like say disguising them as a steamed hams compilation) so that the Charters know neither what we have sent or that anything at all has been sent but they would be found eventually.

At this point we don't have any technology that would help Sol enough to be worth the risk.

Shipyard automation is not worth sending as Sol is perfectly capable of developing their own version.
Wormhole based technologies would good candidates for sending but require further development.

The optimal use of this tactic would be to send the blueprints for a Sol Wormhole Comm capable of connecting to Radiant from Sol (if that is even possible) and then use the resulting connection to send everything else.

slybrarian · Aug 18, 2022

Chanceseal said:
The optimal use of this tactic would be to send the blueprints for a Sol Wormhole Comm capable of connecting to Radiant from Sol (if that is even possible) and then use the resulting connection to send everything else.

This isn't possible. The wormholes don't work like a stargate where you can dial a destination. They only work in matched pairs and you have to haul the endpoints to their destinations.

Setsul · Aug 18, 2022

Chanceseal said:
One possible use for FRM is to include FRM encrypted technology in the Broadcast as a way to grant technology to allies without also giving it to enemies.
We'd need some way of getting authorization codes to our allies so this would only be of help to Sol where we already have agents.
Another downside is that the transmitted FRMs will be a boon to the Charters efforts to crack them.
It might be possible to hide the FRMs somehow(like say disguising them as a steamed hams compilation) so that the Charters know neither what we have sent or that anything at all has been sent but they would be found eventually.

At this point we don't have any technology that would help Sol enough to be worth the risk.

Shipyard automation is not worth sending as Sol is perfectly capable of developing their own version.
Wormhole based technologies would good candidates for sending but require further development.

The optimal use of this tactic would be to send the blueprints for a Sol Wormhole Comm capable of connecting to Radiant from Sol (if that is even possible) and then use the resulting connection to send everything else.

We run into a circular issue there. If we've got a safe way to give them authorization codes, we already have a safe way to transmit blueprints, unless the bandwidth is extremely limited.
Right now we don't have any way to do it, so it's not possible anyway.

I still think we should be able to contact Ambassador Santiago on Earth. We've got backdoor admin access to all comm relays, it shouldn't be that hard. With that we could probably establish secure communications.

As I understand it, we need to physically haul entangled qubits to the destination of the wormhole comms. We can improve how many we need, but not get rid of the need entirely. That might change with the next generation, but I doubt it.

Forgothrax · Aug 18, 2022

Personally I would advocate for MVP this coming turn, followed by a 3-Wormhole focus turn to clean out Persistent, FRM, and SR. If SR is not a big issue we can drop it and maybe work on the follow-on projects from MVP. My understanding has been that E has been an issue, and with per-system E tracking we now may have local issues where we would need to expand Energy production in individual systems to leverage wormholes.

As noted, my goal with Extreme Dice Efficiency is to reduce dice spending. MVP is highly likely to succeed without a Focus if that's a concern (96%). Persistent is 77.5% likely with omake and Second Focus. FRM is 57.5% with Second Focus.

We could also go MVP first, I guess. Roll over the 5 points to Persistent. 72.5% chance of 1 dice completion with First Focus. I would want to hear from Redshirt about Energy production. Could do Persistent this turn, FRM the following with just Second Focus.

As far as putting out wormholes without FRM... I quote Laurent in the context of building 1 Wormhole.

I will say that you assess the risk as very low at this stage.

Setsul · Aug 18, 2022

Forgothrax said:
Personally I would advocate for MVP this coming turn, followed by a 3-Wormhole focus turn to clean out Persistent, FRM, and SR. If SR is not a big issue we can drop it and maybe work on the follow-on projects from MVP. My understanding has been that E has been an issue, and with per-system E tracking we now may have local issues where we would need to expand Energy production in individual systems to leverage wormholes.

The way I see it, we can do 1 wormhole project this and 3 next turn with my plan as well and not even need first focus for guaranteed completions.
The only difference is that we'd do FRM this turn and MVP only next turn. I don't see that as a downside. FRM is cheaper and I expect our budget to be tight. Not just E, but SR as well.

The per-system E tracking could really cause problems and I don't see us being able to resolve them within one turn.
I mean I've got no idea how it works, BR/SR are 10 per level iirc, but we've got 14 E levels total plus 21 E from Sheol and only 129 Energy Production. Let's just say it's less than 10.
So for example, if I'm not mistaken, Radiant only got a level 3 energy collection operation on Elysium and that's it. Less than 30 E, minus most of our upkeep from population, and 12 E if we actually want to use our yards. Paying 100 BR for the fourth level expansion is not going to be fun without infinite BR. And that's our only option, there's no E anywhere else in Radiant, according to IndComm.

Forgothrax said:
As noted, my goal with Extreme Dice Efficiency is to reduce dice spending. MVP is highly likely to succeed without a Focus if that's a concern (96%). Persistent is 77.5% likely with omake and Second Focus. FRM is 57.5% with Second Focus.

Yeah, but missing the 2E Energy Efficiency Improvements saves is a very specific situation. If it's 3E we need to expand anyway and if it works out, it doesn't help us. I'd just ... not do it at all if we don't need it. And if there's a successor project then actually doing it with dice will help us due to overflow.

Indeed, MVP isn't really a concern but the others add up. Unless we just lock in First Focus for SciComm and hope we don't need it elsewhere, Persistent and FRM drag you down to 44.56% chance of finishing with 4 dice. Qubit/SR reduction is also down to 77.5% with omake and Second Focus. 34.54% for 4 dice now. I haven't done the math, but with the chances that two or even three of them might need a second die, I don't think we'd be saving anything anymore.

I'm not saying your plan is terrible, but it hinges on using First Focus on SciComm next turn and Energy Efficiency Improvements being useful while having no successor project to really pay off, and I don't think we know enough at this point to commit to that.
I'd rather get MVP one turn later while having a plan that can't be disrupted by more pressing concerns taking away First Focus. Plus I still expect at least two turns of fixing our resource troubles, especially if we want to keep the yards busy.
I mean apart from that it's pretty much the same idea. 1 project this turn, up to 3 next turn, depending on what we feel like.

Forgothrax said:
We could also go MVP first, I guess. Roll over the 5 points to Persistent. 72.5% chance of 1 dice completion with First Focus. I would want to hear from Redshirt about Energy production. Could do Persistent this turn, FRM the following with just Second Focus.

Persistent this turn is a bit weird. I guess it says that it's part of unlocking the next generation, but only part. Doesn't really get us anything until we've either got facilities, and I still doubt we can afford them this turn, or all the other projects needed for next gen.

I dread per-system energy tracking. Radiant is going to be such a mess to deal with.

Forgothrax said:
As far as putting out wormholes without FRM... I quote Laurent in the context of building 1 Wormhole.

Was that for 1 wormhole in a lab or 1 wormhole connecting e.g. Radiant and Ascension?
Either way, low isn't none.
So far I think we need lots of projects to make wormholes useful, and I see no compelling reason to do MVP and build facilities before FRM.

Cassiemouse · Aug 18, 2022

We do know that there are some rather important projects behind Minimum Viable Project that would likely change our calculations on the order to research things. So leaving it to last could be something we regret. Hrm.

Redshirt Army · Aug 18, 2022

Beyond the projects it unlocks, there's likely a bonus of some kind available to us by connecting Ascension and Radiant's science teams. Even if it's as minor as a +1 to some wormhole research, that's still enough that it probably makes more sense to do MVP next turn and FRMs the turn after that, rather than the other way around - assuming that we can afford the energy costs, of course.

Setsul · Aug 18, 2022

Cassiemouse said:
We do know that there are some rather important projects behind Minimum Viable Project that would likely change our calculations on the order to research things. So leaving it to last could be something we regret. Hrm.

I don't think anyone is arguing for MVP last.
It should be the second at most, with FRM being first partially for safety reasons and partially how the math works out. MVP doesn't really need the First Focus bonus so it's a bit of a waste to do it during a turn where we use that.

Redshirt Army said:
Beyond the projects it unlocks, there's likely a bonus of some kind available to us by connecting Ascension and Radiant's science teams. Even if it's as minor as a +1 to some wormhole research, that's still enough that it probably makes more sense to do MVP next turn and FRMs the turn after that, rather than the other way around - assuming that we can afford the energy costs, of course.

+1 to just wormhole research is obviously the lower end, but we've got 3 projects that give +1 to any research and 2 other or even all committees and should finish in at most two turns.
If it's just a bonus to wormhole research, even if it's higher then we're not on a hurry to get it. We'd already get guaranteed completions on everything with just Grey Skies and Second Focus, so it would just result in a bit more overflow.
It could be a general bonus, but I'm willing to bet that it scales with bandwidth and for that we need the other projects.
I want that bonus, I was expecting it, counting on it, but I think we'll have to work for it.

And I don't think we'll have the IndComm slots to build facilities any sooner than two turns from now, when the Capital Dock, Argent Chevalier, Automated Harvesting Breakthrough, or whichever combination of those we took while filling the rest with E/SR mining projects, had a chance to vacate their slots in IndComm.

I'm still assuming that building facilities is going to be an IndComm project and that we'll probably need at least two.
There is not just the immediate energy crunch, but also a massive general resource crunch coming due to the yards.
We're not out of the woods yet regarding 9th Fleet until it's either confirmed that Bastion is empty and the third battlegroup has just disappeared into thin air, or until we've built quite a few more ships, so not using the yards is probably a losing strategy.
Infinite BR is really, really good and I think we'll need it soon. Higher level E expansions are way too expensive without it, even ignoring the BR the shipyards will gobble up. I've mentioned this before, but we're looking at 10 shipyards in the new future, likely 8 within 2 turns, and we are not building 10 levels of BR mining on top of everything else we need, no way no how.

So we've got the capital dock that we probably don't want to interrupt, Automated Harvesting Breakthrough that I really don't think we can afford to delay anymore, Argent Chevalier, which we might want to restore, and an unknown number of dice we need to spend on fixing our energy problems and the incoming SR and E shortage due to the yards.
None of these are going to be done next turn, if we're lucky some of the might disappear after two turns though. Before then I don't see us fitting in two more dice on building wormhole comm facilities.

And yes, the shipyards are absolutely going to be a problem. If we don't want to just build strikecraft everywhere but the biggest ships we can fit in each dock, then in two turns with the Kimberly Gacha run out (those are thankfully cheaper) and Ascension is finished deconverting, just the 6 yards we are guaranteed to have, ignoring the smallcraft yards Five Lions and Ismeu are working on, ignoring the medium dock in Sheol that we share because it's Shei's turn, ignoring the the smallcraft yard we could finish in Radiant in one turn, just the 6 we are absolutely guaranteed to have, we're looking at 120 BR, 78 SR, and 36 E. That's roughly what we usually spend on an entire turn excluding shipbuilding.
And the only cheaper alternative that isn't strikecraft spam is rolling on another Kimberly Gacha. Which is another IndComm project!

BaseDeltaZero · Aug 18, 2022

Setsul said:
Yes, we could "buy" MVP now.
Do you want to build facilities without FRM?
Which IndComm project do you want to drop to build facilities? We might even have to drop two if we need two facilities.
What does that get us? Without Persistent Wormhole Communications we can only do scheduled transmissions. Without Qubit Utilization or giving IndComm time to build more E and SR mining, we can't afford a lot of pairs, so bandwidth will be low.
Yes, we could do all the improvement projects and FRM this turn. Are you willing to drop TLI and Jailbreak for that?

Yes, I think it's worth it to build facility (singular) without FRM.
No IndComm projects will be dropped because it's SciComm.
Well, the main plan of an Ascenscion-Radiant link. Multiple Committees will have options, we'll be able to choose which ones we're interested/able to invest in. We'll also unlock new wormhole projects which may be worth more than a head start in what we have.
We are not entirely sure, but there are almost certainly going to be benefits from wormhole connections.
I don't think we should do all the improvement projects this turn, that would be ludicrously ambitious.

Setsul said:
I'd argue that Energy Efficiency is the least important. It saves us just 2E per facility and we first need to build those.

mira said:
I think it's a fair argument that Energy Efficiency is the least important. We can then do it in a way where we only need First Focus on one of the dice while getting very good chances (see below), which is a large improvement over needing First Focus on every die.

What? It's by far the most E savings for the near future. It's not the utmost priority among the known upgrades only because of the other benefits of sustained wormholes.

There's not really a scenario where we're able to sustain construction in all of our shipyards until some time after we get AMB. That's a pipe dream. So the question is: Do we want to spend 4-8 energy on wormholes, or an escort. If we spend it on an escort, it helps our navy to recover, which we need, badly.
... however, a single escort will not be sufficient for said recovery. We'll need a lot of escorts, and we'll continue to not have enough resources.

Which is why our priority should be to improve our capabilities. Given the choice between something which gets us closer to our 'having more resources' goal, or another ship, we should almost always choose getting closer to having more resources. Wormholes are a side-road on that route, but they are almost certain to improve our critical research ability. The faster we get that improvement, the better.

Chanceseal · Aug 18, 2022

Setsul said:
We run into a circular issue there. If we've got a safe way to give them authorization codes, we already have a safe way to transmit blueprints, unless the bandwidth is extremely limited.
Right now we don't have any way to do it, so it's not possible anyway.

I still think we should be able to contact Ambassador Santiago on Earth. We've got backdoor admin access to all comm relays, it shouldn't be that hard. With that we could probably establish secure communications.

As I understand it, we need to physically haul entangled qubits to the destination of the wormhole comms. We can improve how many we need, but not get rid of the need entirely. That might change with the next generation, but I doubt it.

We don't need a backdoor to talk to Ambassador Santiago. (for him to talk back, is a diferent story)
We just need to slip in a coded message when we do the Broadcast.
This sound like pretty simple spycraft to me so I assume that this is something that has been worked out in advance.

The message sent along the FRMs would instruct the agents on how to unlock the FRMs and to deliver this information to whoever in Sol might make good use of it (this criteria could better worded) and if at all possible to keep it from enemy hands.

The authorization code I see as either being some code they'd have been issued beforehand repurposed or as being ciphered through a one time pad. If neither of these two methods are possible then we don't have a secure way of delivering the authorization code and my gambit shouldn't be attempted.

The Laurent · Aug 18, 2022

Zanfib said:
The MVP without the FRM is useless, because we can't (safely) deploy it.

We need the FRM ready on the same turn we get the MVP.

This is... not entirely the case. Your security experts basically all agree that a highly classified emergency telephone or two is probably not a problem.

Which isn't to say that MVP is a "must get" via overflow or whatever.

But people have this idea where if they don't immediately get FRM the already-handled Charter spies are going to James Bond their way to stealing it in a matter of weeks.

Burned_Cookie · Aug 18, 2022

The Laurent said:
But people have this idea where if they don't immediately get FRM the already-handled Charter spies are going to James Bond their way to stealing it in a matter of weeks.

If they actually James Bond their way into stealing it I'd be more concerned about the immense amount of collateral damage than the security leak

Setsul · Aug 18, 2022

BaseDeltaZero said:
Yes, I think it's worth it to build facility (singular) without FRM.
No IndComm projects will be dropped because it's SciComm.
Well, the main plan of an Ascenscion-Radiant link. Multiple Committees will have options, we'll be able to choose which ones we're interested/able to invest in. We'll also unlock new wormhole projects which may be worth more than a head start in what we have.
We are not entirely sure, but there are almost certainly going to be benefits from wormhole connections.
I don't think we should do all the improvement projects this turn, that would be ludicrously ambitious.

The result of MVP is:
"Can make Wormhole Communications systems outside of laboratory conditions, can begin project to build and deploy more pairs."
"Can"
We just gain the ability, this doesn't build anything yet.
The other projects mention facilities multiple times. We will have to build something to house the wormholes in Ascension and probably the same in Radiant, unless we want to stuff them all in the lab.
Maybe the project will be just for the pairs and the facilities are free, but I doubt it.
Maybe the project will be in SciComm, but usually building things is in IndComm. Before the an edit removed it we got a glimpse at a project to build a prototype and that was actually in IndComm.

I'm curious how you know that multiple committees will have options. Options for what, exactly?

BaseDeltaZero said:
What? It's by far the most E savings for the near future. It's not the utmost priority among the known upgrades only because of the other benefits of sustained wormholes.

That depends entirely on the number of connections/pairs per facility. Persistent Wormhole Communications reduce E cost by 0.75 per pair.
If our plan is a connection only between Radiant and Ascension, but lots of pairs, then Persistent saves more E.

BaseDeltaZero said:
There's not really a scenario where we're able to sustain construction in all of our shipyards until some time after we get AMB. That's a pipe dream. So the question is: Do we want to spend 4-8 energy on wormholes, or an escort. If we spend it on an escort, it helps our navy to recover, which we need, badly.
... however, a single escort will not be sufficient for said recovery. We'll need a lot of escorts, and we'll continue to not have enough resources.

Which is why our priority should be to improve our capabilities. Given the choice between something which gets us closer to our 'having more resources' goal, or another ship, we should almost always choose getting closer to having more resources. Wormholes are a side-road on that route, but they are almost certain to improve our critical research ability. The faster we get that improvement, the better.

I assume you mean AHB?
So you know we need a lot more ships and lack the resources, and say that we should always choose what gets us closer to having more resources but instead of being in favour of doing AHB asap and building more E/SR mining, which will straight up gives us resources, you want to invest research and resources into wormholes because they'll give us more resources somehow?
All the while building fewer ships and hoping it works out. Because it really isn't just 4-8 E for wormholes. The projects cost more and we are not going to get some huge research boost from a single pair linking Radiant and Ascension.

The whole approach of "we won't have enough resources, so we'll continue to not have enough resources, let's not do anything about it and do wormhole research instead" doesn't sit right with me.

Chanceseal said:
We don't need a backdoor to talk to Ambassador Santiago. (for him to talk backis a diferent story)
We just need to slip in a coded message when we do the Broadcast.
This sound like pretty simple spycraft to me so I assume that this is something that has been worked out in advance.

Two-way communication is the only way to establish encryption if he does not have a key already.
I really wouldn't send plans for wormhole comms or anything even nearly as secret over an unencrypted connection.
The point is we have admin access and the normal inter-system communication isn't via broadcast. We should be able to open a normal connection to him.

The Laurent said:
This is... not entirely the case. Your security experts basically all agree that a highly classified emergency telephone or two is probably not a problem.

Which isn't to say that MVP is a "must get" via overflow or whatever.

But people have this idea where if they don't immediately get FRM the already-handled Charter spies are going to James Bond their way to stealing it in a matter of weeks.

I think right now our first use case is a research connection between Radiant and Ascension, which isn't quite as secret and is meant to be used regularly. After that putting them on ships once we've unlocked and completed the necessary projects.
There's probably some time, but with the way the bonuses work out it's still more efficient to do FRM this turn.

Would FRM apply to the Automated Harvesting Breakthrough? That might not be as secret or secret at all, but it's definitely very noticeable and not something we want copied.

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