Lots of SciFy channel in there
Setting up new colony
- Thread starter rancke
- Start date
Lots of SciFy channel in there
vitalis6969
SOC-7
Depends on how much Mega-crock/Damn-Big-Snake/Ice Spider/Mansquito/Sharktopus/Chupacabra/WWE silliness you add. Leave that kind of stuff out, and you could have a sharp, dark adventure on your hands. Or, you could throw it all in and leave your players wondering just what happened to you.
o:
o:vitalis6969
SOC-7
Depends on how much Mega-crock/Damn-Big-Snake/Ice Spider/Mansquito/Sharktopus/Chupacabra/WWE silliness you add. Leave that kind of stuff out, and you could have a sharp, dark adventure on your hands. Or, you could throw it all in and leave your players wondering just what happened to you.
Well, I didn't mention any of those things, so I'm guessing I won't add them...
-V
Depends on how much Mega-crock/Damn-Big-Snake/Ice Spider/Mansquito/Sharktopus/Chupacabra/WWE silliness you add. Leave that kind of stuff out, and you could have a sharp, dark adventure on your hands. Or, you could throw it all in and leave your players wondering just what happened to you.
Anyone ever read The Legacy of Heorot and the sequel Beowulf's Children by Niven/Pournelle/Barns?
It is about setting up a colony on an earthlike planet. One of my all time favorites. I think you may find it interesting.
http://www.amazon.com/Legacy-Heorot-Larry-Niven/dp/0671640941/ref=pd_sim_b_1
Read the first one.
You are correct, sir. An excellent book (most anything by any of those three authors is usually an excellent read), which should be a good resource. Haven't read the second one yet. (There is, of course, NEVER enough time for gaming, much less reading!)
Allen Steele's Coyote Series aren't too bad either.
It really does depend on how much, if any, further contact is expected.
Heorot is basically a one way trip story. Well, it's actually a story about the biology of the life they encounter and happen to be trapped there as colonists as well. But there's no expectation of any follow up in that story, and it's a small colony (<200 people I think?).
Coyote does have followup with an initial colony followed by more population, but the travel time is enough that you can't "radio back for supplies" on the next ship. Rather the ships are all in flight by the time the first ship arrives.
But it does give them a stream of tech over a few year period (if your fusion plant breaks down, another one at least is on the way in the short term, for example).
The initial colony is quite small, the followup start bringing in the masses.
It really does depend on how much, if any, further contact is expected.
Heorot is basically a one way trip story. Well, it's actually a story about the biology of the life they encounter and happen to be trapped there as colonists as well. But there's no expectation of any follow up in that story, and it's a small colony (<200 people I think?).
Coyote does have followup with an initial colony followed by more population, but the travel time is enough that you can't "radio back for supplies" on the next ship. Rather the ships are all in flight by the time the first ship arrives.
But it does give them a stream of tech over a few year period (if your fusion plant breaks down, another one at least is on the way in the short term, for example).
The initial colony is quite small, the followup start bringing in the masses.
Gray Lensman
SOC-13
"Coyota" is an interesting example of what happens when the follow up ships come from a different regime, as well.
Peter Schutze
SOC-12
> was 10-12 years old, which is about the youngest a kid can contribute useful work to an agrarian society
I beg to differ, especially if it is an agrarian focussed society
a team of 6 year olds with one of your 10-12 year olds can easily be productive in vegetable garden and small animal herding type functions .... my fathers family and the neighbouring farm (between him and the school) in 1930s Germany jointly ran that way for about 3 years. 5 kids between 6 and 10 tended about 15 pigs / goats / dairy cows and enough vegetable garden acreage for both families with enough excess to sell to pay for their schooling. The mothers were too busy with skilled farmwork like plowing and food storage/ preservation to do that stuff.
In many poor countries herd animal tending is a job you have *until* around 12 when you can do "real work" like hunting, plowing and tree felling
I beg to differ, especially if it is an agrarian focussed society
a team of 6 year olds with one of your 10-12 year olds can easily be productive in vegetable garden and small animal herding type functions .... my fathers family and the neighbouring farm (between him and the school) in 1930s Germany jointly ran that way for about 3 years. 5 kids between 6 and 10 tended about 15 pigs / goats / dairy cows and enough vegetable garden acreage for both families with enough excess to sell to pay for their schooling. The mothers were too busy with skilled farmwork like plowing and food storage/ preservation to do that stuff.
In many poor countries herd animal tending is a job you have *until* around 12 when you can do "real work" like hunting, plowing and tree felling
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agree with Schutze.
A lot of the standard used here are 20th-21st century western/techno, with a long educationnal period, "let child be child" attitude, a concern for quality time in family and a good mesure of leisure for the parent. A 1 caretaker and 1 worker for 4 children type of familial structure is quite comfortable and why not, it would make the colonist happy. But it is far from an absolute ceiling.
In family as large as my father's family, (he was the eldest of 15 children, born before wwii) the older kids would help with the kid and the farm and a family unit of 10 (mother, father, 8 kids two years aparts aged from 2 to 16 with schooling until 14 and leaving the nest at 18-20) would get in practical term 2 workers, 2 caretaker, 2 self-supporting (break even contribution/demand) and 4 kids.
I agree that a large volume of genetic seeding material should be brought in, to be used as needed. Is a frezeer for 500 ova that much larger than a cryo-berth for a single colonist?
By the way, a fisherman community could start to support itself without need to clear land, sow and wait for the harvest. Of course, diversification of food supplies would involve the developpement of farming and or gathering. However, most colonization scheme are presented as nearly exclusively land based, with at least a year of food.
Selandia
A lot of the standard used here are 20th-21st century western/techno, with a long educationnal period, "let child be child" attitude, a concern for quality time in family and a good mesure of leisure for the parent. A 1 caretaker and 1 worker for 4 children type of familial structure is quite comfortable and why not, it would make the colonist happy. But it is far from an absolute ceiling.
In family as large as my father's family, (he was the eldest of 15 children, born before wwii) the older kids would help with the kid and the farm and a family unit of 10 (mother, father, 8 kids two years aparts aged from 2 to 16 with schooling until 14 and leaving the nest at 18-20) would get in practical term 2 workers, 2 caretaker, 2 self-supporting (break even contribution/demand) and 4 kids.
I agree that a large volume of genetic seeding material should be brought in, to be used as needed. Is a frezeer for 500 ova that much larger than a cryo-berth for a single colonist?
By the way, a fisherman community could start to support itself without need to clear land, sow and wait for the harvest. Of course, diversification of food supplies would involve the developpement of farming and or gathering. However, most colonization scheme are presented as nearly exclusively land based, with at least a year of food.
Selandia
Xerxeskingofking
SOC-13
my arguement for keeping them out of the workforce was that we need these first few "new" generations to have the same educational standards as thier caretakers. they need to have the knowledge of how their farming machines work, how to fix them, and, most importantly, how to make more of them when they break.
the colony as a high TL socity will last as long as the tools do. the point were it become totally self substaining is when it can produce it's own machine tools and other manufacturing tools, so that i can build new vehicles, buildings, and more machine tools when the first set wear out. until it can do that, it's not self substaining, merely holding off its fall when the machines fail.
by the time the last test tube children reach maturity, the caretakers are going to be too old to run the colony. thierfore, the first few generations would need to be capable of taking over day to day chores and maintainace. this means they need to have the knowledge base to operate, miantian and repair very high- tech equipment. that means an extended learning period.
we're not raising kids to drive tractors and sow corn. we're rasing kids to fix broken fusion generators and debug software.
Peter Schutze
SOC-12
>we're not raising kids to drive tractors and sow corn. we're rasing kids to fix broken fusion generators and debug software.
what a load of ..... 21st century liberalism
most of the graduates and especially engineering types I know personally put in a couple of hours most days on "productive" activities. Didn't really matter whether they were city or country folk, you had work to do before school and again before dinner
if the colony is going to be so high tech and automated so quickly i would still expect the early generation preteens to be responsibile for the "low end jobs" like checking all the telltales in case the automated systems havent flagged it etc ..... basically like how my employer used outsourcing - theres 10-20% of most jobs that are low skilled or repetitive enough that someone else could do it so we didnt have to keep putting in 10+ hour days
what a load of ..... 21st century liberalism
most of the graduates and especially engineering types I know personally put in a couple of hours most days on "productive" activities. Didn't really matter whether they were city or country folk, you had work to do before school and again before dinner
if the colony is going to be so high tech and automated so quickly i would still expect the early generation preteens to be responsibile for the "low end jobs" like checking all the telltales in case the automated systems havent flagged it etc ..... basically like how my employer used outsourcing - theres 10-20% of most jobs that are low skilled or repetitive enough that someone else could do it so we didnt have to keep putting in 10+ hour days
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... but before you can plow a field, you will need to conduct an envirinmental impact study, file the report and have it independently verified by government officials - we dont want adverse impacts to our terraforming efforts because your growth hormones harmed the emerging ecosystem.
Do you really want to trust that to 12 year olds with raging hormones?
Do you really want to trust that to 12 year olds with raging hormones?
... but before you can plow a field, you will need to conduct an envirinmental impact study, file the report and have it independently verified by government officials - we dont want adverse impacts to our terraforming efforts because your growth hormones harmed the emerging ecosystem.
Do you really want to trust that to 12 year olds with raging hormones?
I'd say i like the SST sanctuary model where genetically engineered flora and fauna move in and the local stuff just can't compete. Also by then we will have removed the Bovine Growth Hormone... so the raging hormones will have quieted down.
"Terraforming: we move in the local stuff goes extinct"
Unless you pack a major university in your colony ship's hold, they will not have the same educationnal standard.
Unless you pack the mining material needed to extract every mineral needed to make the spare for that fusion generator, as well as all the ore processing and refining needed to make advanced metallurgy possible, as well as make the route needed to connect all those ressources, you will not repair that fusion generator from that world's ressources. A few thousands of colonists could not self-support a global renewable high TL society with diversified lifestyle offering, build from the ground up within the lifespan of the original colonists.
Actually, you raise them to drive horse team (self reproducing traction power), build water and wind mills (renewable mecanical energy) extract coal coper and iron from surface deposit and process them at the local blacksmith to enjoy an early steam age from which to build your population and techno base.
Selandia
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A)
Contemplating this tread, I figure the basic question is: What is that colony for?
Need to build a subsector capital for your expanding empire or are you just seeding humanity through the star as a service to your heirs?
To copy and paste a self sustaining High TL society capable to seed a sub-sector would require the movement of a coherent set of ressources involving millions of peoples deployed over the many years required to build and link the ressources gathering facilities and factories that would form a coherent whole. This would be a HUGE effort I could not even start to compute.
To have a colonisation fleet create a sustainable late medieval or even early steam age society with the knowledge base needed to reach space age in few generations -even if left on his own- would be a much easier task.
B) in the high tech debate we are having, another questionnable assumption is: high tech is sustainable only in a high tech society. It is true that time traveller would hardly be capable to repair their microwave oven in the middle age (given you can use it). However, a corrugated iron Nissen hut (mdl TL) built alongside the Pyramids would still be there, (with wooden accessories replaced many times). Just think about the current debate on the lifespan of garbage. The "space age" plastic version (environmentalist hate those things that need a million years to bio degrade) of the Nissen hut (or most High TL non machine object) could likely survive long enough for the TL required to replace it to be acheived, given a XVIII century starting point and the know how in library. If accidentaly destroyed, low tech replacement could be built for most objects.
Furthermore, talking about objects, in the realm of unstated questionnable assumption: when issued high tech items, the colonists would be issued low cost mass consumption garbage with a planned lifespan of 5 years. Wrong assumption. Higher knowledge may be used to make things more powerfull, more user frendly or more durable (or any mix of the three) if you are willing to pay for it. A horse drawn plough and matching harness made of high tech materials with no cost spared, may last generations, allowing a high performance low tech colony. Hand to hand combat is as old as the hand. Are soldiers using alloy steel knifes or rocks, given the choice?
Selandia
Contemplating this tread, I figure the basic question is: What is that colony for?
Need to build a subsector capital for your expanding empire or are you just seeding humanity through the star as a service to your heirs?
To copy and paste a self sustaining High TL society capable to seed a sub-sector would require the movement of a coherent set of ressources involving millions of peoples deployed over the many years required to build and link the ressources gathering facilities and factories that would form a coherent whole. This would be a HUGE effort I could not even start to compute.
To have a colonisation fleet create a sustainable late medieval or even early steam age society with the knowledge base needed to reach space age in few generations -even if left on his own- would be a much easier task.
B) in the high tech debate we are having, another questionnable assumption is: high tech is sustainable only in a high tech society. It is true that time traveller would hardly be capable to repair their microwave oven in the middle age (given you can use it). However, a corrugated iron Nissen hut (mdl TL) built alongside the Pyramids would still be there, (with wooden accessories replaced many times). Just think about the current debate on the lifespan of garbage. The "space age" plastic version (environmentalist hate those things that need a million years to bio degrade) of the Nissen hut (or most High TL non machine object) could likely survive long enough for the TL required to replace it to be acheived, given a XVIII century starting point and the know how in library. If accidentaly destroyed, low tech replacement could be built for most objects.
Furthermore, talking about objects, in the realm of unstated questionnable assumption: when issued high tech items, the colonists would be issued low cost mass consumption garbage with a planned lifespan of 5 years. Wrong assumption. Higher knowledge may be used to make things more powerfull, more user frendly or more durable (or any mix of the three) if you are willing to pay for it. A horse drawn plough and matching harness made of high tech materials with no cost spared, may last generations, allowing a high performance low tech colony. Hand to hand combat is as old as the hand. Are soldiers using alloy steel knifes or rocks, given the choice?
Selandia
Seed Colony
Back to the Ops Question
50,000 fertalized ovaum will do ..in 100 one liter freezers...of the surviving freezers expect 20% failure (due to what ever catastrophe) and of the surviving eggs expect only 50% survival to adult hood ..giving you 20,000 different sets of starting Genetics..
needed 100 wombs .assumption each womb will provide one child per year and need a few months of mainetatence to be reset ....and 200 caretakers...
After 25 years of operation the wombs will no longer be needed..at this point you should have a solid population of around 2000..and plenty of natural wombs
Needed 100 large artificial wombs for beasts of burden...
Assumption the Artifical wombs will wear out long before the eggs run out ..but by then you have a childbearing age population..
Basic hand tools handcrafted by the finest smiths so they have a life expectancy of 6-10 generations.this is based on a hand-smithed on coal forged high carbon steel tools.not mass produced drop forged junk .(broad axes, Mauls, Maddoxes, picks , mauls, portable forges and portable kilns.. etc...)
High mass low volume..
High Volume Low mass ..this part is the most important
Complete HARD COPY Library printed on something akin to clay nano-sheets bonded with polyvinyl alcohol http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/10/071004143114.htm. with the print built into the resulting transparent material .can be set up to be read with a standard microfiche reader (easily replicated with basic blacksmith, basic carpentry and basic glass grinding techniques .. so it takes up less volume than books would
..hard copy primer books ... basic language primer and how to use the microfiche readers ..take 100 or so of them and use the same material your using for your microfiche as the optics so takes up less mass and is far less fragile than glass, wood , and metal replacements will be..
basic hand powered old style school printing presses to convert microfiche to print once you can make paper from whatever native fibers you can get ..
..Computational devices
Slide rules, Compass, Protractors, sextants, astrolabs etc ..as these are just as accurate (and in many cases more so ) than their electronic counterparts and less prone to failure ..a good slide rule made of wood and properly maintained will last 200-300 years or so and can be duplicated with hand tools ...
Tech will look steam punkish ..Muscle, Wind, water, sun and limited steam right out of the gate..within one hundred years electricity from renewable sources and a population in the 200 thousand range and the start of a hydrogen based economy ..skipping the fossil fuel infrastructure in favor of the easier to get hydrogen and ethanol stills..
By year 200 we will have a population in the 10 million range ..solid infrastucture and economy
By year 300 we hit the 1 billion pop marker and the tech is back up to full fusion ready to send out a colony ship...
Back to the Ops Question
50,000 fertalized ovaum will do ..in 100 one liter freezers...of the surviving freezers expect 20% failure (due to what ever catastrophe) and of the surviving eggs expect only 50% survival to adult hood ..giving you 20,000 different sets of starting Genetics..
needed 100 wombs .assumption each womb will provide one child per year and need a few months of mainetatence to be reset ....and 200 caretakers...
After 25 years of operation the wombs will no longer be needed..at this point you should have a solid population of around 2000..and plenty of natural wombs
Needed 100 large artificial wombs for beasts of burden...
Assumption the Artifical wombs will wear out long before the eggs run out ..but by then you have a childbearing age population..
Basic hand tools handcrafted by the finest smiths so they have a life expectancy of 6-10 generations.this is based on a hand-smithed on coal forged high carbon steel tools.not mass produced drop forged junk .(broad axes, Mauls, Maddoxes, picks , mauls, portable forges and portable kilns.. etc...)
High mass low volume..
High Volume Low mass ..this part is the most important
Complete HARD COPY Library printed on something akin to clay nano-sheets bonded with polyvinyl alcohol http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/10/071004143114.htm. with the print built into the resulting transparent material .can be set up to be read with a standard microfiche reader (easily replicated with basic blacksmith, basic carpentry and basic glass grinding techniques .. so it takes up less volume than books would
..hard copy primer books ... basic language primer and how to use the microfiche readers ..take 100 or so of them and use the same material your using for your microfiche as the optics so takes up less mass and is far less fragile than glass, wood , and metal replacements will be..
basic hand powered old style school printing presses to convert microfiche to print once you can make paper from whatever native fibers you can get ..
..Computational devices
Slide rules, Compass, Protractors, sextants, astrolabs etc ..as these are just as accurate (and in many cases more so ) than their electronic counterparts and less prone to failure ..a good slide rule made of wood and properly maintained will last 200-300 years or so and can be duplicated with hand tools ...
Tech will look steam punkish ..Muscle, Wind, water, sun and limited steam right out of the gate..within one hundred years electricity from renewable sources and a population in the 200 thousand range and the start of a hydrogen based economy ..skipping the fossil fuel infrastructure in favor of the easier to get hydrogen and ethanol stills..
By year 200 we will have a population in the 10 million range ..solid infrastucture and economy
By year 300 we hit the 1 billion pop marker and the tech is back up to full fusion ready to send out a colony ship...
Icosahedron
SOC-14 1K
Some good points there, Morfydd. I imagine you could get some electricity within a single generation. How do you convert the Microfiche output to actual size in order to input it to the printer?
Lithography would probably be the easiest. Worse comes to worse the colonists could make their own movable type and eventually their own Linotype machine. That would mean copying each page of the microfiche onto type that could make a plate.
