Paths of Civilization

Abby Normal · Jun 20, 2017

Candesce said:
Oh, good catch on that AN note!

But reading this part makes me think "study forests," so...

Yeah, i think all three (forests/alchemy/health) will be useful for the current problems; Forest is long overdue, alchemy is new and advanced and so has plenty of potential, and health is the most direct, though we've gotten enough crits on it we've kind of drained it of potential to an extent.

...And then Bungie steps in and says what i was about to try to figure out how to word

BungieONI said:
As to the Study Alchemy vs Forest vs Health if I may dip my hat into the pot.

I think we need to do forest first. It synergizes with our Renewal project, and I think we need more materials from within the forest before Health and Alchemy can be really effective. For example that incense that Gon burned could actually work as insect repellent as well as medicine.

I agree with the notion that Study Health is probably unlocked again, it's been a while since we bitchslapped cholera, but again we need more things.

Alchemy helped with soaps, so it is an avenue to more anti-disease tech.

I figure go Study forests when our actions open up again, then go Study Health + Study Alchemy. That, I hope, will put us on the very early path to crude medicines and drugs. Essentially really really old Chinese mixed herbal and mineral medicines.

Not the best by a long shot but there are some gems in there to be found.

Reader of all said:
I really found it a shame that we did not use our mystic hero to study metal had we done that we possibly would have acquired steel and she would have still been alive but at the same time her dying opened the door for her... Progeny (She really does not deserve to call rulwyna her child) to become king but still steel.

Ehh, she was around for study metal, wasn't she? She was focused on her alchemy, but she still should have boosted the study metal we took, and that "just" got us iron scale. I think we're at a point where to our People we've got really good iron, and a shitton of it, but we haven't really gotten around to figuring out new ways to use it, so i think barring crits our next few Study Metal rolls will be stuff like "iron swords" and "iron shields" and stuff...i think there's "pressure hammers" as a way to improve iron production as well, which was a major deal in the transition from bronze age to iron age and increases iron output, but doesn't inherently change the type of iron we get?

BungieONI · Jun 20, 2017

Candesce said:
In context, "study forests" could be read as "study insects" or "study environment" - it's about figuring out where the insect swarms are coming from, and what natural defenses against them might already exist.

Yeah this is kinda what I was thinking, though more what can we find in the environment of the forests that fucks with the bugs in my thinking.

The other two I totally agree.

Abby Normal said:
...And then Bungie steps in and says what i was about to try to figure out how to word

You're welcome. *wiggles eyebrows*

Abby Normal said:
i think there's "pressure hammers" as a way to improve iron production as well, which was a major deal in the transition from bronze age to iron age and increases iron output, but doesn't inherently change the type of iron we get?

The thing you are looking for is Trip Hammers. And Trip Hammers are awesome because they let you make plates of iron and or steel.

E: Basically once we have trip hammers, we can make plate armor and then when our horses get big enough, have actual knights.

E2: Also note Candesce that Lolwyna may have been doing Study Health + Forests + Alchemy all at the same time in the background as actions far below a Secondary level. Because honestly that sounds a lot like a outcome you would get from mixing all three.

Glassware · Jun 20, 2017

Reader of all said:
I really found it a shame that we did not use our mystic hero to study metal had we done that we possibly would have acquired steel and she would have still been alive but at the same time her dying opened the door for her... Progeny (She really does not deserve to call rulwyna her child) to become king but still steel.

Given her general lack of regard for safety, I get the impression Lolwyna would have found some way of killing herself on any study action, or even without one.

Carrnage · Jun 20, 2017

Glassware said:
Given her general lack of regard for safety, I get the impression Lolwyna would have found some way of killing herself on any study action, or even without one.

I wouldn't be suprised if there was a non-zero chance of her starving to death in the middle of research.

BungieONI · Jun 20, 2017

Carrnage said:
I wouldn't be suprised if there was a non-zero chance of her starving to death in the middle of research.

There is actually a relevant quote from the update that introduces her...

Academia Nut said:
thin from her obsessions often causing her to forget to eat

Candesce · Jun 20, 2017

Andres110 said:
With all due respect,

With all due respect, if you want to debate moderator actions, there's a thread for that. And it's not this one.

Abby Normal · Jun 20, 2017

Andres110 said:
With all due respect, it didn't appear to me as if he was advocating genocide. Expressing disgust while making mention of that particular people's tendency to bounce back from disaster, but not to the point where he outright said we should exterminate them. Hate speech, sure, but not genocide advocacy.

Furthermore, having read Rule 2, it says that the rule can be relaxed if the situation warrants. In this case, he was talking about a civilisation that literally performs child sacrifice, something that IC people in our civilisation would be horrified by and hate. (To my understanding whether it's IC or not does matter, as, for example, someone levelling McLuvin's level of speech against an alien race in a quest where players play the Imperium of Man would not get reported for breaking Rule 2.)

There have also been a few outright plans made by other players detailing the best, greatest, most efficient way to wipe out a civilisation - killing all of its inhabitants in the process (it's been speculated that these wars of annihilation would be fought in part with biological and incendiary weapons) - but that has never been reported or punished to my knowledge. (I'm referring to "The Button", which details how to produce the maximum amount of War Missions in a single turn as possible. It was originally designed to kill the nomads, if my memory serves me correctly.)

I don't share McLuvin's enmity nor do I support hate speech or genocide, I just think the punishment he's facing is a little harsh considering the circumstances.

While i agree with you, i'm pretty sure it is against the rules to argue with a mod decision like that...much like "don't grandstand about using the ignore function, just use it and don't talk about it", it's one of hte most commonly forgotten ones... if @McLuvin disagrees with the infraction, he can (and in my opinion should) file an appeal; addressing cases where something looks bad but is not actually that bad in context is one of the main reasons we have that system.

Back on topic... @BungieONI correctly identified Trip Hammers as what i was thinking about, though skimming wikipedia it looks like we'd need water wheels first? I'm not really sure what would lead to that, though...we have ox-driven wheel mills, so the idea of using external forces to drive a standing wheel exists, but what would make the People extend that to water? The Dam and Snail Cultivation seem the most likely, since the dam deals with rivers and snails deal with underwater building...

BungieONI · Jun 20, 2017

Abby Normal said:
Back on topic... @BungieONI correctly identified Trip Hammers as what i was thinking about, though skimming wikipedia it looks like we'd need water wheels first? I'm not really sure what would lead to that, though...we have ox-driven wheel mills, so the idea of using external forces to drive a standing wheel exists, but what would make the People extend that to water? The Dam and Snail Cultivation seem the most likely, since the dam deals with rivers and snails deal with underwater building...

More Dam, more snail, more boats strangely.

The reason I say boats is a very loose idea that someone watching a boat moving on the water might get the idea to move other things with water. I mean you ever held a light object like a really light piece of wood in the water and noticed how if you did it right the piece would "flap"?

More chariots too because they use wheels too. But again a really big reach, but humans have made weirder leaps.

E: Also Abby I coulda swore we already had water wheels... hmm.

Anyone remember anything like that?

Andres · Jun 20, 2017

Candesce said:
With all due respect, if you want to debate moderator actions, there's a thread for that. And it's not this one.

Where is the right thread? Neither the FAQ on appeals nor your post tells me where it is.

Malevolo · Jun 20, 2017

Well that's why i say, do a Paraguayan War on them XD

Abby Normal · Jun 20, 2017

BungieONI said:
More Dam, more snail, more boats strangely.

The reason I say boats is a very loose idea that someone watching a boat moving on the water might get the idea to move other things with water. I mean you ever held a light object like a really light piece of wood in the water and noticed how if you did it right the piece would "flap"?

More chariots too because they use wheels too. But again a really big reach, but humans have made weirder leaps.

Looking more at wikipedia, apparently water wheels were also used for irrigation, including kind of the reverse of what we usually think of; instead of using water power to replace human or animal power, it used human or animal power to move water uphill. So maybe doing some of the more difficult (the 6/8 expense ones) aqueducts would help? Also, the second on ancient china seems to say that they were invented specifically for trip hammers, so maybe study metal would be the way to go outright? It seems like a lot to go straight to "waterwheel, and cam, and trip hammer" in one action, though, especially since it sounds like even with our advanced tech we're still a few centuries from those inventions in actual history (they all seem to be very late BCE/early CE stuff)?

But yeah, dam seems the most likely, since it would require our people to pay close attention to the actual flow of the river, if i understand dams correctly. On that note...if as others have suggested, the climate increase leads to new rivers or drastically changes the flow of existing ones, then maybe the climate/sacred forest renewal project will involve careful attention to river flow and potentially lead to water wheels?

maximillian · Jun 20, 2017

We should do a solid double main study forest or fuedalise-federalise already.
It's the bloody iron age and we aient got apiculture yet. We're the damned sicilian caucasus, we're prime beekeeping territory, we could be making proper honey instead that light coloured, runny, sugary euro-american sorry excuse of honey.

Bloody desert Nomads developed it in the bronze age and they had far less bees and greenery around.

Candesce · Jun 20, 2017

Andres110 said:
Where is the right thread?

Strictly speaking, it's "make a thread of your own in the management forum."

You can see it called out in the section of The Rules in which it's stated not to try to argue with the mods mid-thread:

Don't make it harder for us to do our jobs.

You can't do anything that, for whatever reason, gets in the way of the Staff doing our jobs or which could cause trouble for Sufficient Velocity that we would have to clean up.
That means, for example, that you can't:

Create multiple accounts without staff permission;

Encourage other users to break the rules;

Challenge a staff action outside of the normal appeals process or a complaint in the Management forum;

Attempt to get around the rules and the staff's enforcement of them;

Use Sufficient Velocity to plan or otherwise participate in any kind of behavior that might be against the rules or law elsewhere.

Therealtahu · Jun 20, 2017

BungieONI said:
More Dam, more snail, more boats strangely.

The reason I say boats is a very loose idea that someone watching a boat moving on the water might get the idea to move other things with water. I mean you ever held a light object like a really light piece of wood in the water and noticed how if you did it right the piece would "flap"?

More chariots too because they use wheels too. But again a really big reach, but humans have made weirder leaps.

E: Also Abby I coulda swore we already had water wheels... hmm.

Anyone remember anything like that?

Probably more canals/aqueducts too. Plant the idea of directing water into enough places and someone might figure out water wheels. Though we might need to get the concept of gears first. Or maybe something like the Archimedes' Screw.

Andres · Jun 20, 2017

Candesce said:
Strictly speaking, it's "make a thread of your own in the management forum."

You can see it called out in the section of The Rules in which it's stated not to try to argue with the mods mid-thread:

Thank you.

BungieONI · Jun 20, 2017

Malevolo said:
Well that's why i say, do a Paraguayan War on them XD

*looks it up*

O.O

Abby Normal said:
Looking more at wikipedia, apparently water wheels were also used for irrigation, including kind of the reverse of what we usually think of; instead of using water power to replace human or animal power, it used human or animal power to move water uphill. So maybe doing some of the more difficult (the 6/8 expense ones) aqueducts would help? Also, the second on ancient china seems to say that they were invented specifically for trip hammers, so maybe study metal would be the way to go outright? It seems like a lot to go straight to "waterwheel, and cam, and trip hammer" in one action, though, especially since it sounds like even with our advanced tech we're still a few centuries from those inventions in actual history (they all seem to be very late BCE/early CE stuff)?

But yeah, dam seems the most likely, since it would require our people to pay close attention to the actual flow of the river, if i understand dams correctly. On that note...if as others have suggested, the climate increase leads to new rivers or drastically changes the flow of existing ones, then maybe the climate/sacred forest renewal project will involve careful attention to river flow and potentially lead to water wheels?

Those aqueducts may provide the innovative situation to come up with them, line up all the necessary things waiting for some slightly crazy human to put it together. Canals work too, thank you @Therealtahu.

Study metal will maybe(?) help but I am kinda sketchy if that is where most of our more likely innovations are gonna lie, unless we mix it with a canal or aqueduct action or the Dam.

Interesting idea that we may end up paying attention to the rivers while doing the renewal. It makes sense actually, making sure the river does not swamp growing trees and stress them out for example is one of many good reasons to watch the rivers.

Chehrazad · Jun 20, 2017

Andres110 said:
With all due respect, it didn't appear to me as if he was advocating genocide. Expressing disgust while making mention of that particular people's tendency to bounce back from disaster, but not to the point where he outright said we should exterminate them. Hate speech, sure, but not genocide advocacy.

Furthermore, having read Rule 2, it says that the rule can be relaxed if the situation warrants. In this case, he was talking about a civilisation that literally performs child sacrifice, something that IC people in our civilisation would be horrified by and hate. (To my understanding whether it's IC or not does matter, as, for example, someone levelling McLuvin's level of speech against an alien race in a quest where players play the Imperium of Man would not get reported for breaking Rule 2.)

There have also been a few outright plans made by other players detailing the best, greatest, most efficient way to wipe out a civilisation - killing all of its inhabitants in the process (it's been speculated that these wars of annihilation would be fought in part with biological and incendiary weapons) - but that has never been reported or punished to my knowledge. (I'm referring to "The Button", which details how to produce the maximum amount of War Missions in a single turn as possible. It was originally designed to kill the nomads, if my memory serves me correctly.)

I don't share McLuvin's enmity nor do I support hate speech or genocide, I just think the punishment he's facing is a little harsh considering the circumstances.

with all due respect Normally, challenging a moderator direction in the thread is a breach of the rules, but I feel lenient and we just cut the report queue to a single digit, so I'll humour you.

@McLuvin was infracted for the specific wording and tone of his post, in which he advocates the brutal murder of every woman and child with flame weapons, even if these are fictional characters, they remain fictional human characters; if you were to argue that every Nazi be incinerated in the fire, you would be infracted for that, if you were to argue that every Eldar of Warhammer 40.000 fame were to be incinerated, you would be infracted for that. Admittedly, this is a fine line to walk, but the difference tends to be whether you advocate it or act upon it; let us construct a vote for the imaginary Hypothetical Quest. In Hypothetical Quest, you play Prince Theoretical of Imaginaryland; Prince Theoretical has recently won a war over his sworn enemies, the Speculative Folk. The quest master, Chehrazad (a real asshole that one, I can tell you; why I even infracted her once!) writes up the following voting options:

[ ] Accept Their Surrender
[ ] Kill Them All, Let God Know His Own
[ ] Write-In

Our theoretical player, is named OfDebatableVeracity, now he has several options:

He can choose to write a short or long post, arguing why the Speculative Folk are a disgusting species or a horrible kind of people and why they should be exterminated to the last man, woman and child, he can choose to make a simile with a kind of insect; cockroaches or ants, maybe? These things would get OfDebatableVeracity infracted.

He can also choose to write a post of varying lenth on the merits of exterminating them, he can explain why it makes more sense for Prince Theoretical to do so based on his character arc, he could explain how the mechanics simply make it better to just exterminate them or he could even just vote with no extra commentary! All of these things would not get OfDebatableVeracity infracted.

Now, sometimes leniency can be applied, and if @McLuvin feels that the infraction was perhaps unjust or made without full thought of the situation, he can certainly appeal it, no doubt that he or one of our Advocates could make a trustworthy case for reduction or complete removal of the report.

In the future, please use the private messages system instead, I am quite open to questioning, but I recommend that you do not use the thread for it, arguing with a moderator is never on-topic.

Have a good day.