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Per Aspera (Space Agency Plan Quest)

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Hunter531 said:
Unfortunately "things get weird that high up" is an issue that will only really be solved by actually getting Spaceplanes in the air. That's the problem with unknown unknowns.
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Yeah, to be clear, I'm not against a spaceplane program in general, I just think we've got a lot of things we need to do and committing to a deadline of "fly into space within 18 months or whatever" is inviting things to go wrong when we haven't even started development. I'm very cautious when we put human lives on the line.

If Supersonic Research 3 weren't 600 progress, I would have promised that, with the eventual goal of getting a spaceplane. My preferred spaceplane development program would be doing Supersonics 3 (and maybe 4 depending on the cost), Lifting Body, Demil locker access (to get ahold of bombers we can drop gliders from during testing), and then we take a shot at it.
Hunter531 said:
I'm not a fan of building a Pacific Islands facility either, but what do you think about Hawaii as a launch site? It should have the port facilities to do the job, courtesy of the U.S. Navy, and it's closer to the Equator than Cape Canaveral is. There's even a RL missile test facility there. Can't speak to landing sites though.
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Hawaii's 20 degrees North. IMO, if we have to pick any Pacific island, I'd prefer the Galapagos.
 
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CyberFemme said:
I will vote for any plan that doesn't involve the Kiribati Boondoggle Launch Center
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It's not in Kiribati. It's in an appropriately-selected area of the Pacific Islands region. Kiribati is just what C_Z said.

Hawaii/Philippines/Indonesia all sound like the likely sites to me. Since we don't have a map of the region boundaries it's hard to say exactly what's in the running. That being said, as was discussed earlier - we aren't being given trap options. The FWW isn't advocating for this without something rational in mind - where that is exactly is below our level of interaction with the quest.
 
MSH said:
It's not in Kiribati. It's in an appropriately-selected area of the Pacific Islands region. Kiribati is just what C_Z said.

Hawaii/Philippines/Indonesia all sound like the likely sites to me. Since we don't have a map of the region boundaries it's hard to say exactly what's in the running. That being said, as was discussed earlier - we aren't being given trap options. The FWW isn't advocating for this without something rational in mind - where that is exactly is below our level of interaction with the quest.
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I picked Kiribati because it's the best option for a launch site in the region. Look at how large Baikonur is on a map, then compare that to something like Nauru.

I don't see why Indonesia and the Phillipines would be considered part of the Pacific Islands and not Asia, given that they aren't in Oceania.

Hawaii is much further north, which makes it less efficient for launching.

Picking Pacific Islands isn't a trap option per se, but it is porkbarreling within the limits of what we're capable of.
 
MSH said:
It's not in Kiribati. It's in an appropriately-selected area of the Pacific Islands region. Kiribati is just what C_Z said.

Hawaii/Philippines/Indonesia all sound like the likely sites to me. Since we don't have a map of the region boundaries it's hard to say exactly what's in the running. That being said, as was discussed earlier - we aren't being given trap options. The FWW isn't advocating for this without something rational in mind - where that is exactly is below our level of interaction with the quest.
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Indonesia in Southeast Asia, not the Pacific islands.

The FWW can absolutely be advocating for it for reasons that are rational to them. That does not mean that those reasons are rational from a technical standpoint, any more than SLS was rational for NASA from a technical standpoint.
 
C_Z said:
I picked Kiribati because it's the best option for a launch site in the region. Look at how large Baikonur is on a map, then compare that to something like Nauru.

I don't see why Indonesia and the Phillipines would be considered part of the Pacific Islands and not Asia, given that they aren't in Oceania.

Hawaii is much further north, which makes it less efficient for launching.

Picking Pacific Islands isn't a trap option per se, but it is porkbarreling within the limits of what we're capable of.
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CyberFemme said:
Indonesia in Southeast Asia, not the Pacific islands.

The FWW can absolutely be advocating for it for reasons that are rational to them. That does not mean that those reasons are rational from a technical standpoint, any more than SLS was rational for NASA from a technical standpoint.
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Typically, New Zealand and sometimes Australia are considered part of the Pacific Islands as well, but here they are specifically separate. We don't have a map, so I'm not going to make assumptions about what's in or out of the region since the definition of region borders are hazy.

However, I don't think Kiribati is by any means the best option. New Guinea is virtually always considered part of the pacific islands on maps (including the part that is OTL administered by Indonesia), parts of New Caledonia are respectably sized, and Viti Levu is as well.

This is a secondary launch site rather than an entire closed research city like Baikonur, so I'd expect land usage to be significantly less. That's another matter, about the salt and the land use limitations - these are good things. Adverse conditions to overcome will fuel our research scope, and we should welcome such challenges. Anything that we want to launch in ideal conditions can continue to use the primary launch site.

I don't really see much daylight between "It's technically doable, but a ridiculous boondoggle fueled by political requirements which will inevitably fail" and "trap option".
 
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CyberFemme said:
Indonesia in Southeast Asia, not the Pacific islands.

The FWW can absolutely be advocating for it for reasons that are rational to them. That does not mean that those reasons are rational from a technical standpoint, any more than SLS was rational for NASA from a technical standpoint.
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I've seen Indonesia considered Oceania, so I think this is a very much ??? statement.
 
Aerrow Shadow said:
@C_Z Why does your Plan take another Politics dice instead of an Science or Engineering dice?
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Politics dice can be used to get more of other dice through the various options we take during the year like lab talent scouting or power in a union instead of doing GRAD picks. Politics options are also usually pretty cheap, so we can have the dice ticking away in the background without really needing to think about it if we have more than we need. Right now, we're more budget-limited than we are dice-limited. We should easily hit all our science and engineering targets if we can keep all our dice running non-stop as is. Basically, this is getting to my preference for Power in a Union/Talent Scouting/etc. over GRAD picks. Each time we take GRAD, that's an opportunity cost of +2 to the world stats. The global budget based loosely on the world stats, so by taking GRAD picks, we hurt our long-term budget growth.

KNakamura said:
I've seen Indonesia considered Oceania, so I think this is a very much ??? statement.
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Indonesia spans both Asia and Oceania, so if we're picking Indoneisa then it comes down to "would you rather launch from near Sumatra or New Guinea", and Sumatra is way better IMO.
 
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CyberFemme said:
No sites for downrange recovery on land IIRC. That's really a red line for me. Reuse MUCH cheaper and easier if you can land at a prepered landing site instead of at sea.

Its also just *far* from stuff. Being near a shipping route makes it much cheaper to build, service, and staff a launch site.

So I don't really see anything to put it in the running.
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Let's see, *checks map of global shipping routes*. Actually, there are a few routes that go through Hawaii. No core routes mind you, but there's a few secondaries. That should be enough to discount the price by a good bit.

As for why we conceivably should build a Launch Facility in Hawaii, I think the primary motivation would be economic. Hawaii probably isn't in a good economic state at the moment. The U.S. Navy was a major employer in the area, and they went bye-bye quite some time ago. Tourism helps, but that industry isn't known for bringing in high-paying jobs. If we choose not to build a Launch Facility in, say, Singapore, then it's probable that some other employer could come in to take up the slack. Not sure that applies to Hawaii.
 
Hunter531 said:
Let's see, *checks map of global shipping routes*. Actually, there are a few routes that go through Hawaii. No core routes mind you, but there's a few secondaries. That should be enough to discount the price by a good bit.

As for why we conceivably should build a Launch Facility in Hawaii, I think the primary motivation would be economic. Hawaii probably isn't in a good economic state at the moment. The U.S. Navy was a major employer in the area, and they went bye-bye quite some time ago. Tourism helps, but that industry isn't known for bringing in high-paying jobs. If we choose not to build a Launch Facility in, say, Singapore, then it's probable that some other employer could come in to take up the slack. Not sure that applies to Hawaii.
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I'm fundamentally opposed to using the space program as a job creation tool.

I've seen how that went with NASA and I want no part of it.

It's not our responsibility, and we should not try to make it our responsibility.
 
Disaster Prevention is doing that more than anything - taking responsibility for six points of dev at 250 progress each.
 
MSH said:
Disaster Prevention is doing that more than anything - taking responsibility for six points of dev at 250 progress each.
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That's specifically because someone pointed out that, uniquely for this turn, we can actually be net positive on PS if we pick the two points of dev promise; my original plan didn't have those promises. I'm extremely against the "use the space program to drive reconstruction" choices, and from a narrative perspective, I'd honestly prefer if we didn't take them. However, when someone points out that it's a net benefit to our budget, it is very hard to argue against it.
 
MSH said:
Minor budget increases aren't worth hundreds and hundreds of progress, IMO.
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After accounting for the PS/resource cost of acquiring new dice, and the PS cost of asking for enough budget to use those dice, for this turn only (because we can triple-dip) we come out ahead on political support. It's usually not the case, but for this year only, it works out.
 
C_Z said:
That's specifically because someone pointed out that, uniquely for this turn, we can actually be net positive on PS if we pick the two points of dev promise; my original plan didn't have those promises. I'm extremely against the "use the space program to drive reconstruction" choices, and from a narrative perspective, I'd honestly prefer if we didn't take them. However, when someone points out that it's a net benefit to our budget, it is very hard to argue against it.
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I wouldn't use the word "unique" to describe this set of circumstances. It was exactly the same last turn, and will likely continue to be the same so long as there's Infrastructure* to rebuild from the FAS conflict.

Even when the rebuilding of North America is done, it still can be argued that taking the option is a good idea. "Normally" we would lose the equivalent of .3 PS, but gain 2 Infrastructure. The increased Infrastructure will result in a bigger pie next WC meeting. With only a .3 PS investment, virtually any gain in budget will turn a profit.

*Even if we do nothing but Industry, we still turn a .5 PS profit before factoring in the budgetary gains next WC meeting that I mentioned.
MSH said:
Minor budget increases aren't worth hundreds and hundreds of progress, IMO.
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It's actually only 500 points of progress. The promises don't stack, so we're only promising 2 points of development. As for returns, a rather conservative estimate gives us an additional 4.7 PS, which isn't too bad.
MSH said:
Political support is extremely cheap to come by no matter what - I mean the cost of all those rolls being taken.
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Eh, we have a ton of slack with regards to Facilities dice at the moment. Occupying two of them for 1956 isn't much of a sacrifice.
 
MSH said:
Political support is extremely cheap to come by no matter what - I mean the cost of all those rolls being taken.
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What cost? I've taken the cost of acquiring new dice, the -5R drain caused by those dice, and the resource cost of doing the rolls, then converted that to PS using the 1 PS = 5 R conversion factor. Is there something else I'm missing?

Hunter531 said:
I wouldn't use the word "unique" to describe this set of circumstances. It was exactly the same last turn, and will likely continue to be the same so long as there's Infrastructure* to rebuild from the FAS conflict.

Even when the rebuilding of North America is done, it still can be argued that taking the option is a good idea. "Normally" we would lose the equivalent of .3 PS, but gain 2 Infrastructure. The increased Infrastructure will result in a bigger pie next WC meeting. With only a .3 PS investment, virtually any gain in budget will turn a profit.

*Even if we do nothing but Industry, we still turn a .5 PS profit before factoring in the budgetary gains next WC meeting that I mentioned.

It's actually only 500 points of progress. The promises don't stack, so we're only promising 2 points of development. As for returns, a rather conservative estimate gives us an additional 4.7 PS, which isn't too bad.

Eh, we have a ton of slack with regards to Facilities dice at the moment. Occupying two of them for 1956 isn't much of a sacrifice.
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Huh, really? I was pretty sure last turn it was only two promises.
 
C_Z said:
What cost? I've taken the cost of acquiring new dice, the -5R drain caused by those dice, and the resource cost of doing the rolls, then converted that to PS using the 1 PS = 5 R conversion factor. Is there something else I'm missing?
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Opportunity cost I suppose. If we're using those dice on this we won't be using them on say, building a Launch Facility. Speaking of which, are we sure we want to build our second one in an equatorial area instead of a polar one?
C_Z said:
Huh, really? I was pretty sure last turn it was only two promises.
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Nope, three were available.
 
MSH said:
The dice themselves. Using them on this means not using them on the program.
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Hunter531 said:
Opportunity cost I suppose. If we're using those dice on this we won't be using them on say, building a Launch Facility. Speaking of which, are we sure we want to build our second one in an equatorial area instead of a polar one?

Nope, three were available.
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There's minimal opportunity cost, before I added it I went back and calculated how much it'd cost if we were to get entirely new dice for the project using political rolls. We're not bottlenecked there, so for our purposes, we can consider it irrelevant.
 
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