Colony Tech?

[Hal]

Hi Guys,
Suppose you have the following situation:

A TL 12 Mother World.
A colony transport of 1,000 people
A concentrated colonization effort with fleet support


What would the tech level would that world be considered to be?

If the homeworld retains its colony as part of the political process, would the colony world be treated as TL 12 as well despite the fact that it is severely limited in what kinds of TL 12 goods it has available? Would it be considered to be TL 11 if the bulk of cheap goods were sent to the colony because that is all it can afford?

Just speculating...

You know, that adds another question overall. If a world is not permitted to have colonies or other worlds as part of a coalition while it is a member of the Imperium - what world in its right mind would even want to create colonies? Or is it that the Imperium states that no world may retain its colony indefinitely - and that colony worlds until recognized by the Imperium, are the domain of their parent worlds? Hmmmm...

 

[Psion]

Well, Traveller's formal defnition is a little hazy, but the definition of TL I find most practical is the standard of living enjoyed by the populace. Definitions that rely on local ability to produce all or a significant portions of the tech at the given TL don't make much sense if you start applying it to worlds in the OTU Imperium.

I would think what TL a colony initially enjoys might have to do with how much trade/support their is from the main world, but it seems almost any small colony without major financial backing will experience an immediate drop in TL, due to the fact that the populace will immediately not have available to them the resources of their homeworld.

 

[daryen]

Here is my take:

For a colony that will continue to be supported by its main world, the default TL I would use is motherworld TL-1. The exception to this is if the colony is deemed extremely important, then it could be at the full motherworld TL. This is the precident set down in Book 6, and I haven't really seen it broken since.

If a colony is intended to be left on its own, then its TL will be set by the colony organizers. It can be anywhere from motherworld TL on down. The most common would seem to be 8 (to keep some spaceflight tech), 5/6 (for an industrialized society), and 3 (back to nature). But really, any can be picked up to motherworld TL.

For your last question, I don't see anywhere the Imperium prevents extra-world colonies. Just look at Garda-Vilis, which is a wholely-owned "colony" of Vilis. There are several others in the Spinward Marches.

Finally, I have a question back at you. Assume (like in your scenario) the motherworld is fully committed to establishing and growing this colony. Let's even go with your intial number of 1000 colonists. How big will it be in 10 years, 50 years, and 100 years? (Remember, the colony is not on its own, and is fully supported by the motherworld and its government, so new colonists can be added as desired/can be accepted/are willing to go/can be transported.)

 

[savage]

actually we don't have enough information to make these decisions. They moved 1000 people...will they be adding more at any rate 1000/yr might prove its an important TL12 project. What infrastructure was delivered with it. Do they have a TL12 manufacturing infrastructure or did they deliver an easier to maintain TL9 manufacturing infrastructure... lotsa questions. Do they have any population control or quota attempts. If I sent 1000 people I'd want to be certain they were capable of breeding and willing. But you don't want population growth to reduce the total workforce or outstride food production and medical supplies.

 

[Malenfant]

I'm not sure why TL would be that much lower for a colony than the originating society. if they're high tech then they're surely going to be packed along with the same stuff that the parent society is capable of producing, as well as the means to produce them (3d printers, nanofactories, autofacs etc that are probably small enough to carry in the colony ship).

 

[savage]

Simple reason malenfant,
complexity. Do they send the cutting edge vehicles that are relatively automated or do they build them simple to repair.

Realistically, they'd determine what needs to be high tech and what doesn't. Simplicity and ease of repair are also important.

 

[Malenfant]

Well, I can't picture us sending a colony to Mars with TL 5 equipment, put it that way . I guess it depends on available resources - if it's on a habitable earthlike world then lumber and so on is probably available to build things with. If it's on a rockball then the TL will be higher because they'll need lifesupport tech and the know-how to survive there.

 

[savage]

agreed. But remember 1) the moon buggy was as simple as they could functionally build it. 2) It also depends on how close the colony is in regard to being resupplied in emergencies.
It takes a lot of matured infrastructure to make a society. If a small manufacturing plant requires retooling every few days (to keep up with repairing parts) that's all its going doing. So, if the TL12 society is working on a habitable world they might choose to have a significant quantity of TL10-9 100% reliable equipment. Not to mention the low tech axes and other equipment.

Savage

 

[alanb]

A lot depends on what kind of colony we are talking about.

A colony can either be "a thousand people are dropped on the world to fend for themselves", "a thousand people are landed on a world to explore it and identify economically exploitable resources" or "a thousand people are landed on a world to mine a previously identified economically exploitable resource".

The latter two will probably initially lack much manufacturing (as opposed to repair) capability, but will be equipped with the best available equipment for their job.

The first category will be forced to try and carry everything necessary to build a society from scratch. The other categories will simply carry the requirements for a research station or mine.

 

[rancke]

Originally posted by Malenfant:
I'm not sure why TL would be that much lower for a colony than the originating society. if they're high tech then they're surely going to be packed along with the same stuff that the parent society is capable of producing, as well as the means to produce them (3d printers, nanofactories, autofacs etc that are probably small enough to carry in the colony ship).

The TU doesn't have nanofactories or autofacs. T4's Central Supply Catalog had a TL 10 'Mobile Fabrication Facility' that could manufacture devices up to the size of... I forget precisely what, I think a small grav vehicle... But it needed a supply of special alloys, plastic, and ceramic raw material to function.

A colony that is within trading distance of its parent society can (and probably does) have the same TL, but if it is cut off, it has to rely on its own resources. If (as I assume) a certain number of people are necessary to maintain a given tech level, then an isolated colony can easily slip a few tech levels at first.


Hans

 

[Psion]

Originally posted by Malenfant:
I'm not sure why TL would be that much lower for a colony than the originating society.

Because if you forgot to pack it with you, you can't go to the local Loew's (a division of General Products [tm] ) and buy it. Even if you do assume some portable manufacturing capability, it's not likely to be able to produce the same sorts of technology that takes large factories and dedicated processes to create. Such a thing would be a post-scarcity setting, which Traveller ain't.

 

[Malenfant]

This may boil down to what TLs are defined as. I would say that a Mars base in 2050 (or whenever we end up going there, if it ever happens) would still be TL8 even if they didn't have the means to fabricate computers or mobile phones or any other such tech stuff, because the technological foundation is TL8. Even if you had foldable mars buggies equivalent to the lunar buggies, those would be TL 8 because of the power systems and other technolgies used. Plus the general techological know-how would be TL8, not TL6 - so the colonists would know TL8 principles for doing things rather than TL6 principles (plus they'd have the knowledge of a TL8 culture behind them and probably included on data disks and so on).

I would assume that just because you *could* make the general technology at a lower tech level, that doesn't mean that you have to classify the planet as having that lower TL.

 

[Psion]

That's part of the reason why I think "standard of living" is the only tenable definition of TL. As an example of the sort of thing you talk about, JTAS had an article "primitive but not stupid" that talks about things you could do in a low tech setting "if you only knew", like boiling water to prevent the spread of disease. That's not (directly) reflected in TL AFAIAC.

 

[Malenfant]

Thing is, it's pretty hard to deliberately forget centuries of knowledge. Some backwards primitivist group might deliberately do so (though I strongly doubt that any truly primitivist group would survive long after being dropped on a habitable world with an ecosystem. I'd bet that the fauna and local diseases would wipe out the initially small number of colonists very quickly), and you may lose a lot of tech through war or some other kind of damage - though with external help usually available when disaster strikes that won't be much of a problem usually.

So chances are, even if you want to deliberately live a TL 3 lifestyle, you'll still be aware of basic principles of hygiene, medicine, and so on that you know from your parent culture. So I'd actually veer away from using 'standard of living' as the benchmark and more towards 'things that you know'.

 

[Hal]

Originally posted by daryen:

<SNIPPED A LOT OF DARYEN'S STUFF>

Finally, I have a question back at you. Assume (like in your scenario) the motherworld is fully committed to establishing and growing this colony. Let's even go with your intial number of 1000 colonists. How big will it be in 10 years, 50 years, and 100 years? (Remember, the colony is not on its own, and is fully supported by the motherworld and its government, so new colonists can be added as desired/can be accepted/are willing to go/can be transported.)

Sorry about the period of silence, I was away on vacation. I'm catching up on the reading though

 

[Hal]

Hi Guys,
When I originally sparked this thread, I was thinking along the lines of an actual colonization attempt by a world. Keep in mind that the mother world isn't just dumping 1,000 colonists on the world and washing its hands of the colony - it is keeping in touch with said colony. Just out of curiosity, how many different kinds of colonies can you guys identify?

Penal
Mining
Resource harvesting
Market
Political prestige

 

[Malenfant]

If you're listing Penal here then there's also the Fleeing Religious Persecution colony...

 

[mike wightman]

Agricultural, or do you include that in resource harvesting?
Research
Merchant waypoint that grows
Military outpost that grows
Tourism/recreation

 

[Elliot]

and the opposite of fleeing persecution is setting up a colony of pure believers. Pure racial colony experiments are another feature of historical colonies.

 

[malek77]

Just out of curiosity, how many different kinds of colonies can you guys identify?

I'm new to Traveller, but IMsfUniverses, there are some unusual Colonies that crop up regularly.

Pirate Colony
Pirates end up with lots of loot, slaves and gear that they can't really carry everywhere in their ships.
So they dump it somewhere, like good ole' buried treasure.
The slaves on the planet generally have access to lots of gems, gear, weapons and junk, but no food or ag equipment.
Sometimes, 'retired' Pirates will remain to keep order, other times the impromptu Colonists just live in eternal fear of their masters returning for R&R or repairs. Think tribal, despotic society.

Generally only works on human-life supporting planets, and the 'Colonist Slaves' will recieve some form of support (as in more slaves, stolen equipment) in return for keeping 'house', landing pad upkeep or base construction.

Generally, this 'human capital' will have some compelling value to the pirates too, else they'd just be executed or spaced. A Nobles relatives? Dancing girls? Captive Engineers for complete overhauls?


Illegal Colony
Imagine a large empire has spent billions on terraforming a planet, and is waiting for the ecology to settle before landing a select advance guard of Colonists on the Empire's new paradise world...only to find that a wandering bunch of refugees has taken to squatting there. Having weathered the planets settling stages, they now have a strong feel for the place and are likely to be aggressive if they are told to move.

Their support is going to be irregular and smugglerish, or may be from a hostile neighbour trying to stir up trouble and insurgency.