Sterbelicht - One Sacrifice At A Time Against The Galaxy (40K)

[The Laurent]

I'm fully in agreement that birth control is valuable, but my primary point is that birth limits are a mistake, and that birth control comes along with quality of life increases naturally. If we try to implement some sort of one-child policy it's both not going to work very well and probably kick off a heresy or three.

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I mean, I don't know if I agree with you about the heresy? The problems of an inverted population period are massively less bad than the problems the Hive faces now. Any sane person would trade those problems for that problem.

But, because this is an overall vote, what I was thinking of wasn't a one-child policy, but a policy of requiring people to be able to care for and provide for any children they wish they have. Something more flexible, a requirement as it were to Plan their Families. But I'll say more later, except to clarify that this is not a vote for every single write-in we'll ever do on the subject, my five points are meant to establish the bones that later write-ins and policies can be hung up on.

 

[10ebbor10]

1. Building space stations is a great idea. I'm wondering if we might try to do a write-in to automate building living space. Something like the current automation plan but a bit larger. Maybe it builds 5 100-million stations every turn or something, distributed across our territory. Maybe it's an ISC we can create when we get to CIV XV to make more housing, then it just occupies one of our two slots for the next twenty turns.

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Actually, I'd counter that no, building space stations is a bad idea. Such a bad idea that the QM literally used it as a joke.

No, that Action needs the full 30 to be paid by you.

...but seriously, that is a 30 Actions Action, it's not serious.

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Our largest spacestation, which is literally an millenia old archeotech bastion, IIRC, houses just 1 billion pop. The rest of the space stations have house orders of magnitude fewer people.
Space stations will amount to little more than a rounding error.

Any effort in space stations would have been far better spent on either ships to move people, or to build local infrastructure.
Remember : planets are good. You get free air, free gravity, free water (sometimes), ...

We'd be better of trying to see if we can bribe the Irrita in giving us a few terraformed rocks.

The better way to bring a population under control is just straight-up increasing quality of life & education. Birth control is a part of that, but not necessarily explicitly. I think intentionally making birth control available early and easily is a good strategy to get the outcome we want (of a stable rather than exploding population) but we can't try to manually decrease the population size without triggering ISSUES.

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That is comitting to a demographic transition, likely to spike the population several fold.

 

[The Laurent]

That is comitting to a demographic transition, likely to spike the population several fold.

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It should be noted that we have absolutely no reasonable model for what the heck reforming a Hive World looks like, when it has a population of 700 billion.

There's never actually ever been a country in the history of world that's more ACTUALLY overcrowded rather than metaphorically or practically or economically overcrowded.

 

[Thalton]

A thought, Breskal was basically ground zero for a massive genocidal war, how many people do you think we can move in there if we push out hard.

Maybe with the Capital gone resistance will collapse and we can spread with ease? Just a thought.

 

[RaptorusMaximus]

No, that Action needs the full 30 to be paid by you.

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Hm, annoying, but understandable.

...but seriously, that is a 30 Actions Action, it's not serious.

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Lol

Cooky: Provides a crazy high number for the actions needed to complete a project, fully expecting it to be disregarded.
Thread: Nods. "Seems reasonable." Starts planning around how to get it done.
Cooky: Nervous sweating.

We spent 10 actions on that one world while we were far, far smaller and for much less concrete rewards Cooky, you should have expected this.

 

[10ebbor10]

It should be noted that we have absolutely no reasonable model for what the heck reforming a Hive World looks like, when it has a population of 700 billion.

There's never actually ever been a country in the history of world that's more ACTUALLY overcrowded rather than metaphorically or practically or economically overcrowded.

Click to shrink...

We don't, but we do know the vibes of what Warhammer considers a Hive world.

They're places where life is short and cheap, where most of the population is impoverished, and most crucially, they're all described as population positive. Unlike a medieval or industrial revolution era city, or the other typical examples of "overcrowded places", the Hiveworld does not derive it's population from massive immigration from the countryside. In fact, there is no countryside to immigrate from. A hive's population is homegrown, and often to such a massive degree that "people" are one of it's major exports, even if they're a bit malnourished.

So, with those vibes estabilished, the idea that the population will grow massively once everyone stops dying all the time is obvious.

 

[Walliseatscheese]

No, that Action needs the full 30 to be paid by you.

...but seriously, that is a 30 Actions Action, it's not serious.

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Okay but what if it was serious?

And we pulled the trigger on the industrial mobilization that you said could churn out Task Fleets per turn back when we were doing ships per turn?

 

[Mostlyblue]

I think we need to accept that unfucking a Hive World is going to be a work of centuries and look into finding a way to make living there non-awful at least. Hiring Irrita to rebuild it's biosphere is one, but we can also try to repair the Hives themselves - yes, they are misery engines right now (apparently exactly what Heresy-era High Lords wanted, according to lore), but many of them a built on the bones of DAoT-era arcologies.

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I still think repairing the biosphere is important, it'll give us more space to build more arcologies so we can spread the population out, It has a moon right? Can't we hire the Irrita as a long term project and have them terraform it? It can serve as the main food production in system.

Repairing the hives is good, maybe we'll get nice tech we can apply to the rest of our worlds from learning how they work while repairing the hives.

 

[The Laurent]

We don't, but we do know the vibes of what Warhammer considers a Hive world.

They're places where life is short and cheap, where most of the population is impoverished, and most crucially, they're all described as population positive. Unlike a medieval or industrial revolution era city, or the other typical examples of "overcrowded places", the Hiveworld does not derive it's population from massive immigration from the countryside. In fact, there is no countryside to immigrate from. A hive's population is homegrown, and often to such a massive degree that "people" are one of it's major exports, even if they're a bit malnourished.

So, with those vibes estabilished, the idea that the population will grow massively once everyone stops dying all the time is obvious.

Click to shrink...

Is there even the space for it? Throughout human history, people who saying a country is "overcrowded" or can't fit more people have usually been either wrong, bigoted or classist, or both.

...whereas it might actually literally be true with a Hive World.

 

[10ebbor10]

Lol

Cooky: Provides a crazy high number for the actions needed to complete a project, fully expecting it to be disregarded.
Thread: Nods. "Seems reasonable." Starts planning around how to get it done.
Cooky: Nervous sweating.

We spent 10 actions on that one world while we were far, far smaller and for much less concrete rewards Cooky, you should have expected this.

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It's not just 30 actions though.

You also need to build 58 000 FP worth of transport vessels.

Is there even the space for it? Throughout human history, people who saying a country is "overcrowded" or can't fit more people have usually been either wrong, bigoted or classist, or both.

...whereas it might actually literally be true.

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Planets are big. The population density of this world, averaged over it's surface and the multilevel infrastructure of a hive, is likely less than a modern suburb.

 

[The Laurent]

It's not just 30 actions though.

You also need to build 58 000 FP worth of transport vessels.



Planets are big. The population density of this world, averaged over it's surface and the multilevel infrastructure of a hive, is likely less than a modern suburb.

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That's... not a very good argument in terms of facts.

But also, there's not actually an alternative. It's not the case that, if we don't choose the option of explicitly doing so, we'll make sure to keep the people starved and uneducated in order to prevent their population from increasing, lol.

 

[Alectai]

Is there even the space for it? Throughout human history, people who saying a country is "overcrowded" or can't fit more people have usually been either wrong, bigoted or classist, or both.

...whereas it might actually literally be true with a Hive World.

Click to shrink...

Nothing about Hive Worlds makes any sense.

A starving, high mortality, high crime, low wealth and zero mobility location should be population negative and needing constant shipments to just stay afloat. Somehow, not only is it population positive, but it's aggressively so to the point where they can export a functionally limitless supply of warm bodies across the galaxy on top of everything else they do even with their massive attrition and "One delayed shipment from a mass famine" logistics.

Just that somehow it all works because, presumably Grimdark Magic lets them ignore the physical impossibilities of this as long as you're Evil enough? That people just Don't Starve To Death as long as they think they're getting enough nutrients, and it just makes you a little weedy even though you're getting a fraction of the calories that a human being should need just to achieve basic survivability status, and can reproduce violently despite being on a starvation diet.

 

[Mishar]

Throughout human history, people who saying a country is "overcrowded" or can't fit more people have usually been either wrong, bigoted or classist, or both.

...whereas it might actually literally be true with a Hive World.

Click to shrink...

Closest thing I can think of is the Walled City of Kowloon which had 50,000 residents within its territory of 2.6 hectares (26,000 m2​). So that's 1.92 people per square meter. I'd assume a hive city would be even worse with possibly 5-10 possibly even 50 people per square meter. Between 1987 and 1993 the population grew from 35,000 to 50,000 so a growth of 2,500 a year.

 

[10ebbor10]

Nothing about Hive Worlds makes any sense.

A starving, high mortality, high crime, low wealth and zero mobility location should be population negative and needing constant shipments to just stay afloat. Somehow, not only is it population positive, but it's aggressively so to the point where they can export a functionally limitless supply of warm bodies across the galaxy on top of everything else they do even with their massive attrition and "One delayed shipment from a mass famine" logistics.

Just that somehow it all works because, presumably Grimdark Magic lets them ignore the physical impossibilities of this as long as you're Evil enough? That people just Don't Starve To Death as long as they think they're getting enough nutrients, and it just makes you a little weedy even though you're getting a fraction of the calories that a human being should need just to achieve basic survivability status, and can reproduce violently despite being on a starvation diet.

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Get enough psyker humans in one area that the warp bends, and violent streeturchins spawn as if they were spontanous demons.

Closest thing I can think of is the Walled City of Kowloon which had 35,000 residents within its territory of 2.6 hectares (26,000 m2​). So that's 1.34 people per square meter. I'd assume a hive city would be even worse with possibly 5-10 possibly even 50 people per square meter.

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Funnily enough, 1.34 people per square meter is exactly (if you round towards the nearest 100 billion) the population density of Vox Primus, if you assume an earth sized planet.

I suspect the QM used that figure for the estimations.

 

[HeroCooky]

So, realistically, we should either of 2 things
- Sustain a population of 2 trillion souls
- Achieve 75% civilian casualty numbers during the revolt.

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That is the most brutal and hilarious sentence you could have written. +1 Star Child Point.

Okay but what if it was serious?

And we pulled the trigger on the industrial mobilization that you said could churn out Task Fleets per turn back when we were doing ships per turn?

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Your people would tell you to go eat a back of dicks. They are okay with activating the option that establishes the office of Tyrant for fifty years max if you are under active threat. They are not okay with you doing that to prepare for something that will likely not happen within the next century/century-and-a-half.

I still think repairing the biosphere is important

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Unless you can lower the pop to 200 Billion, and clean up 40 Actions worth of toxic waste, there won't be any biosphere to repair that isn't already adapted to living in a place where lead in your water means you got working water filters.

Is there even the space for it?

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Some dude did the math for how many people a Hive can hold, reduced the final number by, like, 80%, and still ended up with around 2 Quadrillion people in a single standard Hive, IIRC. So there should be, if you start unfucking the Hives with Actions.

Edit: He also calculated that an Imperial Battleship can easily have a crew of 2.3 Billion with half the ship used for machines.

 

[Pempelune]

Some dude did the math for how many people a Hive can hold, reduced the final number by, like, 80%, and still ended up with around 2 Quadrillion people in a single standard Hive, IIRC. So there should be, if you start unfucking the Hives with Actions.

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Is that what we should do, then, or is it also a boondoggle mega project?

 

[HeroCooky]

Is that what we should do, then, or is it also a boondoggle mega project?

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It means James Workshop does not know math. And no, that would basically reduce you to 2 Actions for eternity.

 

[blankmask]

They are not okay with you doing that to prepare for something that will likely not happen within the next century/century-and-a-half.

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Ok so we've got some time. I thought this was a "next 5 turns or so" thing. We've got 15, that's enough to make a start.

We definitely ought to infiltrate the agriworlds.

 

[Neablis]

We don't, but we do know the vibes of what Warhammer considers a Hive world.

They're places where life is short and cheap, where most of the population is impoverished, and most crucially, they're all described as population positive. Unlike a medieval or industrial revolution era city, or the other typical examples of "overcrowded places", the Hiveworld does not derive it's population from massive immigration from the countryside. In fact, there is no countryside to immigrate from. A hive's population is homegrown, and often to such a massive degree that "people" are one of it's major exports, even if they're a bit malnourished.

So, with those vibes estabilished, the idea that the population will grow massively once everyone stops dying all the time is obvious.

Click to shrink...

Nothing about Hive Worlds makes any sense.

A starving, high mortality, high crime, low wealth and zero mobility location should be population negative and needing constant shipments to just stay afloat. Somehow, not only is it population positive, but it's aggressively so to the point where they can export a functionally limitless supply of warm bodies across the galaxy on top of everything else they do even with their massive attrition and "One delayed shipment from a mass famine" logistics.

Just that somehow it all works because, presumably Grimdark Magic lets them ignore the physical impossibilities of this as long as you're Evil enough? That people just Don't Starve To Death as long as they think they're getting enough nutrients, and it just makes you a little weedy even though you're getting a fraction of the calories that a human being should need just to achieve basic survivability status, and can reproduce violently despite being on a starvation diet.

Click to shrink...

Naww, the answers to both of these are the same. As human civilizations develop they through they go a process of low->high->low population growth.

This is oversimplifying to the point of criminality, but w/e. In the first phase is bare subsistence living, where their population is kept low through plagues, absurdly high child mortality and famine despite a high birth rate. The second phase starts when you have the smallest amount of sanitation, medical care and industrialization. With those things all of a sudden more of your children start surviving and the population goes exponential. Eventually that transitions to your developed society where people choose to have fewer kids and plan out their families instead of "whoops another baby" all the time.

What the Imperium has managed to do with Hive worlds is freeze them in that second, usually transitory phase in order to farm people as soldiers or whatever. And with a high base population that's stuck in an exponential growth phase they've got people to spare.

So elevating their standards of living is the natural, humane and correct way to fix this. It's just going to be a hard problem. That requires sacrifice. *Points to title of quest*

I honestly think the best way might be to aim for all-X before we integrate Voxx, get that next level of slumbering Titan.

 

[Alectai]

I don't disagree, that honestly feels like the best move we could make for this.

 

[Weaving_Dreamer]

Conquering the Black Ash Clan has a bit more merit, but we can't just roll over them, we would need to weaken the defenses at Ultima Sigritta first. Maybe we can do it after building fixed defenses?

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... My whole point is that the Sector Battle groups are needed to fight off threats and the fact we need two of them at Ultima Sigritta was a waste and we could reduce that but having static orbital defenses to take the place of one of them. I don't mean right this turn or next turn but after we do it and have a SBG stationed there while we use the rest of the SBG's to bumrush the Black Ash Clan. Hell we don't even have TWO Full SBG's yet.

Actually, instead of that I would prefer to wait until we take Voxx Primus and the neighboring Agri-worlds THEN just build up a fuckton of defenses in Voxx Secundus, make that the place where we hold the line. Well, that or Echish in the Breskal Subsectors we can have a foothold and not make the place where we're holding the line be where all the food is at.

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No, you miss the entire point. Yes that would be fine in future if the goal was chock pointing the entire sector. That is not the point or goal of this in my statement. the Point is that we need two SBG stationed there at all times just to Stop the Dutchy from trying scout or probe, then bumrush Ultima Sigritta. We don't even have two of them ready yet and we would tie down two of them just as guard duty. The Point was to make enough static defenses we only need to keep ONE SBG there instead of two and the fact we might not take Voxx Primus for ten or more turns. If we do expand and need to draw away SBG at least it won't change things too much for Ultima Sigritta. And we get Citadel Defense Stations for the write in that was One action.

As long as I am showing it to you on a map, you can infiltrate.

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Oh shit, seriously? so we could try infiltrating any world we see? even if its at the end of another sector? maybe we should boost more infiltration to worlds further into the dutchy or to the black ash clan. Good to know this.

Does that mean we can try to absorb the three planets linked via archeotech? like an action to do that, we get three new worlds and try to either fix or reverse engineer that tech?

Cooky: Provides a crazy high number for the actions needed to complete a project, fully expecting it to be disregarded.
Thread: Nods. "Seems reasonable." Starts planning around how to get it done.
Cooky: Nervous sweating.

We spent 10 actions on that one world while we were far, far smaller and for much less concrete rewards Cooky, you should have expected this.

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Wait, that was a joke for the survivors of the Orks invasion? I view it as worth it, long term goal shows its worth it as it gives us more then just the development points.

We can just make a write in to make an ISC or something to get it started with other write ins to help us with it. Hell I'm pretty sure mobilizing our people can shorten it, no not by using the Tyrant power for 50 years, but as a general collective goal to works towards with people donating time, labor, resources and the like for getting it done. I mean its not too far out there and it can work.

That is the most brutal and hilarious sentence you could have written. +1 Star Child Point.

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It really is 40k essence isn't it? reasonable first option and then the 180 other option with complete disregard for human life for the sake of easier logistics and because you can afford those loses.

Unless you can lower the pop to 200 Billion, and clean up 40 Actions worth of toxic waste, there won't be any biosphere to repair that isn't already adapted to living in a place where lead in your water means you got working water filters.

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Bet. Alright people we have a goal. We have a few billions deaths in the revolt, relocate the rest across worlds until we hit 200 Billion and then do the actions to clean up the Hive world via asking the Plants to help us with that, a write in regarding research into this stuff, and lastly a Song designed to heal and recover. I mean, 40 actions is an ask but that can be cut down via creative write in's.

 

[RaptorusMaximus]

It's not just 30 actions though.

You also need to build 58 000 FP worth of transport vessels.

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Only if we absolutely have to export the entire population in a single turn. As long as genuine progress is being made to rehome people I imagine we could just let it tick away in the background as we shuttle folks to waiting orbital infrastructure throughout our territory while we're fistfighting the Free Duchy.

Wait, that was a joke for the survivors of the Orks invasion? I view it as worth it, long term goal shows its worth it as it gives us more then just the development points.

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That option 100% wasn't a joke, and it was worth it. I was just saying, we willingly sacrificed a third of our national output for a century for little more promised reward than 'this is the morally right thing to do.' We got a pretty good bonus for it at the end (Dirge for the Lost) but we didn't know we'd be getting it when we started.

Compared to that, Cooky jokingly offering an option to sacrifice 1/3rd of our national output for 30 turns minimum (less if we offer more output) in exchange for 5 levels of both Void and Heavy industry plus the solution to the upcoming Population Crisis on Vox Prime seems like a decent enough deal to me and several others, when Cooky intended it as a joke.

They should have known us better lmao

 

[10ebbor10]

Only if we absolutely have to export the entire population in a single turn. As long as genuine progress is being made to rehome people I imagine we could just let it tick away in the background as we shuttle folks to waiting orbital infrastructure throughout our territory while we're fistfighting the Free Duchy.

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If we don't shuttle people in a single turn, we also have to spend however much actions are needed to get them food where they currently area, or build the freighters to get them food.

 

[RaptorusMaximus]

If we don't shuttle people in a single turn, we also have to spend however much actions are needed to get them food where they currently area, or build the freighters to get them food.

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Yeah? I'm going into this assuming we're gonna take the 3 agri worlds already supplying Vox Primus with food in the same operation where we kick off the Boogaloo on Vox Primus, so our existing civilian infrastructure can take over the food shipments, picking up the slack for whatever elements of the Free Duchy Civilian Trader vessels which are managing the current supply operations are destroyed or flee instead of being taken by our navy.

Like we don't have to actively micromanage the entirety of our nation's civilian shipping.

 

[The Laurent]

If we don't shuttle people in a single turn, we also have to spend however much actions are needed to get them food where they currently area, or build the freighters to get them food.

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We're both going to be using the Agri-Worlds, and also, again, because people seem to be forgetting, having them construct and build out their own local food supply. People keep on forgetting that that's in fact part of the grind, and the reason we took the Research Action for Hive Agriculture in the first place, even if we may need follow-up Research/etc to improve it even further.