Last Turn:
6x Dragon Rail
1x Housing Factory
3x Housing
1x Expand Adult Education
2x Missile Modernization (this actually creates stuff to put into our boats)
1x Ship Design Tweaks (the naval designs are very ambitious, giving more resources to make changes after we've gotten further in the design and testing will save a lot of headache later)
1x Cuba
I was thinking it would have good synergy with the Chinese Refugee Outreach, and it is time-sensitive: well-educated Chinese people who wish to flee are going to do so now, not in 6 months.
Oh, we need 3×6 actions on Dragon Rail after the reduction from the factory, and we are still short on the consumer goods factories?
I feel like I need to start spread-sheeting this (or even write some proper tool to do Gantt charts, OR / combinatorial optimization, etc.) to track all the moving parts, it's far too much to retain in my brain.
I'm guessing the choice of Sea Forest is to get more food now, rather than facilitate future growth?
Do you think we can postpone aid to Nicaragua to instead capture the "brain drain" that's going to happen as people flee China? I suspect this is going to be a very time-sensitive opportunity.
Next Turn: [...]
Last Turn: [...]
2x Missile Modernization (this actually creates stuff to put into our boats)
1x Ship Design Tweaks (the naval designs are very ambitious, giving more resources to make changes after we've gotten further in the design and testing will save a lot of headache later)
1x Cuba
Nothing to add about the plan about next turn, it's all pretty good (assuming I missed what I think I missed, in my first proposal)
Regarding the last, is there a reason we need the military spending in this 5YP?
Reading through the quest, I feel like HC has been hinting for a while that we are missing some major information about what's going on in the country, so I think it would make sense to get the improved reporting / Statistics Bureau before commiting to the next 5YP, and the improved reporting about public health seems like a natural (and extremely useful) extension of it.
-[X] Heavy Industry
--[X] Build Rolling Stock And Rail Factory Complex (Harmful) (+1 Reputation) (Reduced Actions For The Dragon Rail)
--[X] The Dragon Rail (Mega-project - 6/18) (Helpful)
The rolling stock factory knocks off 4 actions, and the rest are what we need to build it on time.
-[X] Agri-, And Aquaculture
--[X] Expand The Sea-Forest Project (Mega-Project - 6/6 Actions) (-3 Reputation) (Extremely Helpful)
Our food rating isn't bad but it's declining fast. This project is marked as Extremely Helpful, and only costs -3 Rep. It's the best agri project we have.
-[X] Political
--[X] Yoink Chinese Specialists and Intellgientsia (+3 Reputation)
Grab them while they're available. We have a bottomless need for more and more specialists as we develop the means of production.
-[X] CyPac
--[X] Freedom's Cry (+5 Reputation)
Good rep gain, and will hopefully secure the Cape of Good Hope for CyPacm which continues to expand CyPac's geopolitical influence over major international marine bottlenecks, which is nice to have. Also secures the Southern Front in Africa, since South Africa is a rather developed nation with lots of industry.
-[X] Wei Jungming
--[X] Personal Action (Write-In two things he does within the next six months.)
---[X] Went camping with the family, taught the children about the stars, plants and animals, harvesting food, bushcraft, told them the legends and stories of the country, in short, had a good time
---[X] Started writing, mainly but not only Steamy Romance Novels with your wife (as subject, co-author or both varies from one novel to another), what is this nonsense of "pen name"?, if someone has a problem with your books they can come and tell you to your face
--[X] Lover Action
---[X] Participated in various sporting competitions together, perhaps an aquatic triathlon
Thanks, I updated the o.p... and promptly saw I might need to ask how to retract a proposed plan? I'm guessing just editing it away?
I was thinking it would have good synergy with the Chinese Refugee Outreach, and it is time-sensitive: well-educated Chinese people who wish to flee are going to do so now, not in 6 months.
Oh, we need 3×6 actions on Dragon Rail after the reduction from the factory, and we are still short on the consumer goods factories?
I feel like I need to start spread-sheeting this (or even write some proper tool to do Gantt charts, OR / combinatorial optimization, etc.) to track all the moving parts, it's far too much to retain in my brain.
I'm guessing the choice of Sea Forest is to get more food now, rather than facilitate future growth?
Do you think we can postpone aid to Nicaragua to instead capture the "brain drain" that's going to happen as people flee China? I suspect this is going to be a very time-sensitive opportunity.
Nothing to add about the plan about next turn, it's all pretty good (assuming I missed what I think I missed, in my first proposal)
Regarding the last, is there a reason we need the military spending in this 5YP?
Reading through the quest, I feel like HC has been hinting for a while that we are missing some major information about what's going on in the country, so I think it would make sense to get the improved reporting / Statistics Bureau before commiting to the next 5YP, and the improved reporting about public health seems like a natural (and extremely useful) extension of it.
Yeah, I just realized the plan goal was specifically about consumer goods factories rather than consumer goods actions, I've added in more of them into the plan now:
I switched stuff around to grab the Chinese specialists, yeah.
I had hoped to do the missile stuff because we designed ships but made no provisions for actually arming them, but It's going to have to wait for the next plan at this rate. It's only been about two to three years since we did the ship design action, and we still have to build the GSMC to even start building the frigates, so I doubt we've cut steel on anything heavier than the OPVs, and the archronal nature of how our actions work means that we've got wiggle room even there.
Also you can see a lot of housing because it would both make people happy and reduce the strain from the significant immigration programs everyone seems to want.
[X] Plan: The Worker's Plan for Revitalizing the Veins of the Glorious Democratic People's Republic of Guangchou Both Economic And Literal Through All-Encompassing Healthcare and Popular Production, And The Stabilization Of Communism In Our Allies
-[X] Intend To Achieve:
--[X] Stabilization of the communist sphere through economic, scientific, and military cooperation
-[X] Goals:
--[X] Repair and restore our healthcare system to make it befitting the Light of All Humanities.
--[X] Vastly expand the civilian economy.
--[X] Continue to advance the cyberization of the economy to reduce dangerous work.
-[X] Focus: Development of our healthcare.
-[X] Focus: Cyberization of the economy.
-[X] Concrete Promises: --[X] Complete Healthcare Reform, Found Department of Public Health, and Found Nutritional & Pharmaceutical Standards Agency
--[X] Improve Healthcare to Lacking.
--[X] Construct 10 different consumer goods factories.
-[X] Threats:
--[X] The claws of the Iron Tigers will lash out at anyone that threatens the stability of the Comecon. Regardless of if the threat comes from within or without, Guangchou will be right alongside our Comrades to defend the freedom of the Worker.
Would it be worth it for one of the turns to do an extra action, potentially getting a malus (I believe it was -1 to all projects). In exchange of actually doing another action and seeing if our natural limit has grown. Saying with how tight we are it might be worth not having as good as success's then just getting the thing out.
It's best to do it on turn four or so after the pron focus bonus is no longer in play so we don't waste it. That way we have leeway if things go amiss.
Yeah, I just realized the plan goal was specifically about consumer goods factories rather than consumer goods actions, I've added in more of them into the plan now:
What's "Imm. Set. Serv." ? If we can swap it and the Twin Hammers R&D to the last turn, we can alleviate the need for more housing earlier, which should have (a slight) knock-on effect on public health etc.
I had hoped to do the missile stuff because we designed ships but made no provisions for actually arming them, but It's going to have to wait for the next plan at this rate.
Also you can see a lot of housing because it would both make people happy and reduce the strain from the significant immigration programs everyone seems to want.
What's "Imm. Set. Serv." ? If we can swap it and the Twin Hammers R&D to the last turn, we can alleviate the need for more housing earlier, which should have (a slight) knock-on effect on public health etc.
Yes, I was also having some thoughts along those lines, esp. depending on our "faster" engines and whatever space-stuff we develop
HC has said that a 3 action megaproject for it will eliminate the need to keep doing refugee settlement actions to reduce friction and integrate new immigrants.
Given the need for more and more immigration to keep up with our need for trained specialists, it seems a good thing to bundle in.
Space stuff isn't likely to have an much impact on naval stuff - but I've been running the numbers and I realized that we can actually mount SMRs an all our ships, and they should be quite affordable.
Because of the way that MSRs work, with power output being based on cooling capacity, we can use the same reactor vessel for all our needs from 20 MWe to 80 MWe, and is suitable for marine and land use as both an electrical power source and a thermal one for process heat.
And SMRs live and die by mass production, so using common components like that actually makes it economically viable.
It also means that we have to do *less* turbine development, because we can reuse the same closed cycle turbines as the submarines instead of designing new gas turbines for surface ships. Which will save us $$$ in R&D cost even before you factor in the cost of fueling a naval ship with hydrocarbons (something like half the operating cost of the ship).
AND it means we can eliminate the air ducting and exhaust stacks, which alongside eliminating fuel bunkerage frees us *so much* volume that can be used instead for making the ship nicer to serve on or expanding mission capabilities. And the reactor and shield are mounted down low which is good for stability.
In fact, for our frigates, installing the reactor leads to a case of Suffering From Success.
Because it removes so much fuel weight that it cancels out the stability improvement, and we need to move stuff around and put the heavier equipment lower, into the space that used to be occupied by fuel bunkerage to fix that.
Then there's going to be a second 1 GWe design for actually supplying grid power which well mount on floating platforms.
Btw, I'll go back and answer more effort posts as I have the spoons, I haven't forgotten about them.
Edit: you should only copy the name of the plan you're voting for, in case stuff needs to be edited. For instance, I just realized I had to switch 0/6 to 6/6 got the Expand Sea Forest bit.
Like so:[] Making The GM's Life Easy
Right now you also have an extra X in front of the plan name.
-[X] Commiewood:
Tales of Humanity
A series presenting throughout episodes factual history, fairy tales, legends, and myths from all over the world and from all eras (although the first episodes focus on stories from Guangchou dear to the animators). Unlike Disney and other modern producers, it was chosen not to sugarcoat the stories but to reproduce them much more faithfully (although a segment at the beginning of the episode putting the story in its context was added in cases where the story would have aged badly from a moral point of view, would be racist, etc.) in all their tragedies, joy, horror, exaltation, anger, strangeness, because sometimes things go wrong, sometimes the story doesn't end well, sometimes there is no good or justice if people don't all fight for it, and that's a good lesson to teach.
[X]plan dragon rail + time sensitive stuff
-[X] Infrastructure
--[X] (WRITE-IN) :Make preparations for the apocalypse permanent.
In the last round we spent three actions for this preparation for the apocalypse, this aims to make these preparations permanent and to keep them up to date (kept the reserves stocked, maintain/modernize the bunkers and underground tunnel networks, if necessary build them more) so next time (nuke,earthquake,tornado,war,tsunami,etc) we don't have to take any action, this mission can be added to the task of an existing department,also if next time we don't get a warning it would save us.
(cost:free)
--[X] (WRITE-IN) :creation of a department which will be responsible for maintaining and creating new commemorative monuments (going from big disaster like the curent one to adding a plaque on a building in memory of a worker who died in an accident while passing by searched the old battlefields (battleseabed in our case?) of the second war to search for bodies to add to the appropriate cemetery/monument)as well as responsible for taking care of corpses/deaths/cemetery in general so that they have more to do (if somebody is already responsibe of corpse/emetery just at comemorative munument on the list of his responsability),their first job is making one for the nukes incident.
(cost:free)
-[X] Heavy Industry
--[X] Build Rolling Stock And Rail Factory Complex (Harmful) (+1 Reputation) (Reduced Actions For The Dragon Rail)
--[X] The Dragon Rail (Mega-project - 8/18) (Helpful)
-[X] Social
--[X] (WRITE-IN) Social Espionage in Japan: the disappearance of the 13500 citizens of guangchou at the hand of the japan during the war has always been like a wound in the mind of the country unable to mourn without certainty of their fate since the japan refuse to say anithing about them, it being worsened by suspicion when the involvement of unit 735 when at their end, it's time to try to put an end to this, find out exactly what happened to them and according to the result, grieve, file a complaint for a crime of war / against the humanity on the Japanese and if you are very lucky bring home any survivors.(if they can find evidence of other war crime the japan comited on us then denied it would be nicetoo).cost :-7 Rep for all the costs involved, takes 2 turns (still one Action), and may not yield anything.
-[X] Political
--[X] Yoink Chinese Specialists and Intellgientsia (+3 Reputation)
-[X] CyPac
--[X] Freedom's Cry (+5 Reputation)
If people prefere africa to south america then ok
[X] Wei Jungming - (RP)
-[X] Personal Action (Write-In two things he does within the next six months.)
--[X] Went camping with the family, taught the children about the stars, plants and animals, harvesting food, bushcraft, told them the legends and stories of the country, in short, had a good time
--[X] Started writing, mainly but not only Steamy Romance Novels with your wife (as subject, co-author or both varies from one novel to another), what is this nonsense of "pen name"?, if someone has a problem with your books they can come and tell you to your face
-[X] Lover Action (Write-In one thing Wei Jungmin and Wei Mai do together in the next six months.)
--[X] Participated in various sporting competitions together, perhaps an aquatic triathlon
Space stuff isn't likely to have an much impact on naval stuff - but I've been running the numbers and I realized that we can actually mount SMRs an all our ships, and they should be quite affordable.
Because of the way that MSRs work, with power output being based on cooling capacity, we can use the same reactor vessel for all our needs from 20 MWe to 80 MWe, and is suitable for marine and land use as both an electrical power source and a thermal one for process heat.
And SMRs live and die by mass production, so using common components like that actually makes it economically viable.
AND it means we can eliminate the air ducting and exhaust stacks, which alongside eliminating fuel bunkerage frees us *so much* volume that can be used instead for making the ship nicer to serve on or expanding mission capabilities. And the reactor and shield are mounted down low which is good for stability.
Right, I had realised our MSRs are smaller than nuclear teakettles PWRs, and had thought about ships being comparatively smaller and/or going longer between (re)provisionning, carrying more mission payloads etc... but just being less cramped and nicer to serve on is a pretty huge plus.
Don't worry, and please feel free to tell me to slow down on the questions etc. if you need or want.
I also have pretty limited spoons, and it's pretty surprising I've been able to sink so much into this quest so far.
Edit: you should only copy the name of the plan you're voting for, in case stuff needs to be edited. For instance, I just realized I had to switch 0/6 to 6/6 got the Expand Sea Forest bit.
Thanks, and done. I was dumb, just used the editor's "vote" button =^.^'=
P.S.: I forgot to ask, do you think we could fit the improved SB before the next 5YP? I'm mildly dreading what HC has been hinting we are missing, and it will most likely affect our priorities
Thanks, I was utterly failing to expand the abbreviation :3
Absolutely. I meant for the missile design, and I'll try to gather my thoughts about that in a bit.
Sure, that I had followed/intuited when you mentioned the nuclear power park having good synergy with building up our navy.
Right, I had realised our MSRs are smaller than nuclear teakettles PWRs, and had thought about ships being comparatively smaller and/or going longer between (re)provisionning, carrying more mission payloads etc... but just being less cramped and nicer to serve on is a pretty huge plus.
Don't worry, and please feel free to tell me to slow down on the questions etc. if you need or want.
I also have pretty limited spoons, and it's pretty surprising I've been able to sink so much into this quest so far.
Thanks, and done. I was dumb, just used the editor's "vote" button =^.^'=
P.S.: I forgot to ask, do you think we could fit the improved SB before the next 5YP? I'm mildly dreading what HC has been hinting we are missing, and it will most likely affect our priorities
Sorry for the double post, but I really needed to sit down for a while (got pretty car sick on my way home)
So, I was thinking missiles like the Exocet are already kind-of old technology (development started '67, production in '74 OTL) but are still regarded as really effective, and ours could serve in a "multirole" sort of function:
basic version is a sea-skimming missile that can be launched from the surface, air, sea, or even a submarine if we build launch capsules ;
basic guidance is inertial, until final approach when it switches to active radar ;
compact-enough for our fighters or helicopters to carry a fair amount, payload is "designed for attacking small- to medium-size warships, although multiple hits are effective against larger vessels, such as aircraft carriers." (quoting the WP article about the original)
(Edit: not sure why I included helicopters, since I don't see a scenario where it would make sense to equip it there)
once we get a decently-precise positioning system (around Guangchou or globally) it could be upgraded to doing inertial + radio-based positioning to fly much-more precise trajectories... at which point making it into a cruise missile capable of flying nap-of-the-Earth should™ only require a software upgrade and precise topographical data (which our space program could produce)
Moreover, our take on it could have some pretty unique advantages, especially for the time period:
we have much-fancier electronics, so it could
have radio comms to do in-flight trajectory updates, making it much more useful at long range (100+ km)
recognise the target (and its orientation) based off the radar returns, and aim for preset points like a carrier's airplane lift or bridge;
function entirely without active radar in (at least) 2 cases, making it much harder to detect and shoot down:
as an anti-radiation missile, homing in on enemy communications, radar, or ECM (like radar jamming etc.)
if we have beyond-the-horizon radar illuminating the target, the missile could use passive radar
there's great synergy with our existing AWACS and ships, and with the fancier radars from my earlier effortpost ;
we have fancier engines, so we should get better range/speed tradeoffs ; I don't have much concrete info on our current engines, but how fast could we realistically make it cruise, and (potentially) make it accelerate at the end?
terminal speed is pretty important, as it dictates how long the target has to detect, acquire, and shoot down the missile after it crosses over the radar horizon; for instance, assuming a 19km horizon, the Exocet would be potentially-visible for a minute flying at Mach 0.93, whereas an hypersonic missile flying at Mach 6 would be visible less than 10s, in addition to being much-harder to hit.
if it's sufficiently zoom-y, it could be quite useful to take down aircraft that aren't too maneuverable: not fightercraft, but enemy AWACS and C&C aircraft, tankers, cargo airplanes etc.
that would be a massive intelligence and logistical issue for any enemy trying to land forces on Guangchou, or even just trying to bomb it:
if their airbases etc. aren't in range of Guangchou, they'll have to use either aerial refuelling, allied airfields, or aircraft carriers
the first is directly vulnerable to tankers being shot down, while the later require vulnerable logistics to ressuply airfields or carriers
AWACS and other ELINT platforms would likewise be pretty vulnerable: they might remain outside the effective range of land-based missiles, but surface ships or submarines could get in range long-enough to fire
FWIW, hypersonic missiles wouldn't even be anachronistic either: for instance, the Soviet R-37 (now infamous due to the war in Ukraine) has a
top speed of Mach 6, operational range up to 200km, while designed in the early 80s and first produced in '85 OTL. 😇
P.S. I was thinking about it in a mostly-defensive posture, but I guess cruise missiles that current tech can't detect early-enough to matter are a pretty-effective deterrent even with conventional warheads: military and political leaders that know signing off on a war with Guangchou might get them blown up, might be less willing to recommend escalating things.
Granted, that won't work for US leaders, given that Washington D.C. is a tad far from the island, but they hopefully won't be too keen on getting into another war in Asia, especially if we can make invasion way too costly between the IT/SP, missiles, ridiculous levels of air defense, etc. (assuming them using nukes isn't politically viable)
Ministry of the Ecology and Environmental Protection for the Upkeep and Conservation of Guangchou's Natural Spaces, Ecosystem, Habitats and the Reduction of Pollution of All Types Wherever Practicable for the Worker's Health and Enjoyment and the Long-Term Good of the Country and the World.
Lets be honest, people are just going to call it MEEP.
Not likely though considering that OTH radars use frequencies that are low enough that getting decent targeting resolution is a problem.
Bistatic/multistatic systems might be more doable but you need good synchronization between the transmission source(whether environmental(ie radio broadcasting/etc) or artificial(ie you have an emitter active)) and the reciever in order to have decent results.
Not likely though considering that OTH radars use frequencies that are low enough that getting decent targeting resolution is a problem.
Bistatic/multistatic systems might be more doable but you need good synchronization between the transmission source(whether environmental(ie radio broadcasting/etc) or artificial(ie you have an emitter active)) and the reciever in order to have decent results.
Yes, the AWACS usecase would be more properly a bi- or multi-static radar, and so was the radar from the effortpost.
The point about frequency selection remains (over-the-horizon propagation is typically skywave or groundwave, which don't work at high frequencies) but I don't expect it to be that bad:
an actively-homing device mostly needs the relative direction to the target (i.e. angular resolution) and not so much distance to the target ;
we already have phased array tech, which I was assuming we'd use to get decent angular resolution ;
(I can precisely math it out once I am more awake and took my ADHD meds)
the closer it gets to the target, the less angular resolution is needed to be on target ;
we can improve resolution with either purely radar techniques, or using additonal sensors (e.g. IR or UV cameras, lidar, etc.)