[Game] Generate a military sci-fi setting

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by TGLS

Just kicking around some thoughts: I think one of the examples that were given of what a Human hab would be like was Tokyo metropolis; At 2,187.66 sq km, that would mean a hab would be huge! I figured it would be unclear to recent arrivals that they were in a spaceship, so artificial gravity in a large box (1 km?) is probable.

You don't actually need artificial gravity here, unless the species had wildly different requirements. These ships can accelerate constantly and turn by shifting the virtual gravity well about, so the inhabitants are always falling in the same relative plane. They need only be in free-fall if in orbit (or station-keeping in another gravity well).

[Daigoro]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Given the way we have the drives working, the bow-front field is going to be equivalent in virtual mass to a very large multiple of the SM-mass equivalent. I can probably do the math later. The matter part of the ship is just the part you see.

Given the hypothetical question of how long a ship would need to be in GURPS Spaceships to house 1 billion inhabitants (a figure I was considering before 125 million was stipulated), we get SM+24. Spaceships provides the mass for that size, but the question was more about spatial length and volume.

Originally Posted by TGLS

Just kicking around some thoughts: I think one of the examples that were given of what a Human hab would be like was Tokyo metropolis; At 2,187.66 sq km, that would mean a hab would be huge!

They wouldn't have to provide all of Tokyo, just a sample of it to demonstrate high-density living. But on the other hand, given 100 million of each species, that would be 3 Tokyos each. And for 2200 sq km, we'd need more than Manila's 40,000 people per sq km to fit them in. But as ericthered has been saying, it's not population density that's the problem, more "agricultural density".

It is possible that some products could be shipped from Hab to Hab, planting false memories into the teamsters.

With their strict isolation policy, this would be a better job for the ship's robots.

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

You don't actually need artificial gravity here, unless the species had wildly different requirements. These ships can accelerate constantly and turn by shifting the virtual gravity well about, so the inhabitants are always falling in the same relative plane. They need only be in free-fall if in orbit (or station-keeping in another gravity well).

Occupants of a ship falling toward a virtual gravity point would be constantly experiencing free-fall.

The ship would either need to provide spin gravity or have local gravity generators for each pod, each of which would have to be symmetrically balanced against another gravity generator with the opposite vector to avoid adding any net lateral force.

[(E)]

Answers 50, 51

The United Nations Territorial Authority and the Luna Transit Management center are the two bodies that are responsible for governing disputes relating to planetary property and orbital locations respectively. However over the years there have been several nations and individuals that have laid prior claim to chunks of the system. The exodus from earth has caused the exact status of many of these nations to be in limbo adding to the confusion. This combined with layers of treaties and legal precedent means that many areas are in dispute, legally or otherwise.

Before the arrival of the Ark a group of Americans and Europeans bought a prime orbital spot around Venus through the appropriate agencies and began harvesting resources from Venus' atmosphere. They had a permanent population and had begun the process of becoming a recognized state. Exodus caused a great wave of expansion to cope with the requirements of supplying the space bound human race. Liberal and affluent the collection of habitats developed their own identity (Aphrodites) just about the time the exodus fueled economic boom ended. The space around Venus entered a second economic boom as it's proximity to the sun combined with the resources harvested from the atmosphere made it the bread basket of the system. The great glass habitats that where built to grow the food for the system where occupied by a range of people who were from generally conservative and religious backgrounds. This group became known as the Hallowed as a reflection on their perceived respect and dedication to their job.

The two groups never got on well together and a dispute over who had the rights to the most efficient orbital positions for atmospheric harvesting led to armed conflict. While the Hallowed had the numbers and the political support the Aphrodites had an advanced technical base and sought to leverage this to their advantage by making the first weapons of mass destruction based on the technologies gleaned from the Arc. The Gravitaically lensed nuclear device (Glenda) was developed as a habitat busting weapon, using a microsecond of intense gravity to direct an atomic blast so that the majority of the energy released is directed at single target. This was far more effective than a standard nuclear device which looses much of it's energy into the surrounding vacuum.
Political backlash at the use of atomic weapons resulted in General Felicity May starting the development of the Gravitaically initiated nuclear device. Using a carefully structured initiator that was imploded by gravity rather than being triggered by conventional explosives an incredibly clean blast was possible.
Irregardless of this development public support fell behind the Hallowed and soon a fleet of ships was sent to annex the Aphrodites' habitats. Towards the end of the bloody engagement around the capital habitat Anchises the Aphrodites triggered the last device in their arsenal the Nuclear assisted gravity pulse. The surviving members of the Aphrodites' military where quickly tried, found guilty of war crimes and executed. A Colonel Ocean Hammon escaped and was branded a war criminal and a terrorist. He laid the foundation that led to the next stage in the Aphrodites' struggle.

Question 53
What kind of biological/Xenological warfare do the Martians like to use

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by TGLS

Question 35
What weapons are used on space craft and Mechs?

Long distance weapons exchanges in space are done with energy weapons, with the occasional stealthy slug/warhead. occasional. Its just so hard to be sneaky in space. The kinetic kill vehicle is possible, but is easy to dodge if you're not stuck to a planet or something.

Mechs are a different matter, fighting at closer ranges. They tend to use a mix of projectile weapons and beams. Beams are mostly used as long range weapons against exposed but fast moving targets, such as a aircraft.

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I've updated my post on the ark size, including finding my big error where I multiplied by people instead of square miles. I still need an answer to the ark population before figuring it out completely.

I think most the remaining questions are mine, so I'll hold off on another one.

[(E)]

Assumptions
Artificial gravity
Ultratech hydroponics/psuedo native environment.

Running two outer spin gravity floors at about 10 meters in height and 160 floors of similar height oriented with up and down towards the ends of the cylinders. We end up with a population of something like 55000 per cylinder or an area of 5.8 square miles of floor space per cylinder. For arguments sake let's say cryo sleep etc enhances the first generation's growth rate to 1000% which counters out a 90% reduction due to loss of life as a result of the Ark's destruction as well as unoccupied space. That gives us about one million cylinders required. Arranged as a series of rings with 3141 in each ring it is about 320 miles long and 500 miles across with a lot of empty space in the middle.

If people agree with these numbers I'll edit the older posts to match.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by (E)

Running two outer spin gravity floors at about 10 meters in height and 160 floors of similar height oriented with up and down towards the ends of the cylinders. We end up with a population of something like 55000 per cylinder or an area of 5.8 square miles of floor space per cylinder.

I'm getting an area of 31.5. Most of which is the 160 up and down floors. What dimensions are you using for the cylinder? I'm using a radius of a half mile. even with a quarter mile I still get around 8 square miles of floor.

I get closer to your numbers if I use 16 levels instead of 160.

Also, we don't have a firm number on what percentage of the space was unused.

[(E)]

Originally Posted by ericthered

I'm getting an area of 31.5. Most of which is the 160 up and down floors. What dimensions are you using for the cylinder? I'm using a radius of a half mile. even with a quarter mile I still get around 8 square miles of floor.

I get closer to your numbers if I use 16 levels instead of 160.

Also, we don't have a firm number on what percentage of the space was unused.

Yeah I mixed up my conversion to square miles (I think in metric)
Using that floor layout one, two or even three hundred thousand per cylinder seems reasonable. So between two hundred thousand and five hundred thousand Ark cylinders.

For unused space I would say that the Ark was close to full capacity (80%?) at the time of arrival and was expecting to add more habitats using the resources found in system.

[Daigoro]

Originally Posted by (E)

Using that floor layout one, two or even three hundred thousand per cylinder seems reasonable. So between two hundred thousand and five hundred thousand Ark cylinders.

As in habitats? We had 31416 habitats put forward to start with- I'd say it's easier to increase the capacity of the pods by ten-fold than have ten times as many habitats.

For unused space I would say that the Ark was close to full capacity (80%?) at the time of arrival and was expecting to add more habitats using the resources found in system.

Perhaps as the Ark was approaching, as they were transmitting tech know-how for grav drives, SQIDs and whatever, they also told us how to build a pod and efforts toward that were underway, so that it was ready to be hooked up on their flyby.

[(E)]

Off the top of my head does that make each Ark habitat about 2.5 miles long by 1.25 wide?

Edit
Or to put it another way 400 levels to clear when going floor by floor

[(E)]

Answer 52:

A: what percentage of the ark was full of intelligent species?
B: What kind of gravity was used, and how common were exceptions?
C: Where multiple floors used in habitats?

Every sentient species on the Ark had representatives that stayed conscious and minded to the rest of their sleeping race. The species that lacked sentience spent the journey in cryo sleep or as stored genetic material. The Ark was about eighty percent full when it arrived in the system. Automated drones had been sent ahead to begin the manufacturing process for new Ark habitats. This work was centered around Pluto and included the gathering of several extra solar objects for material. The drones work in an intense area of SQID interference that also contains high speed material delivery. Detailed examination of this area has so far produced reports that have been highly classified.

Each Ark cylinder is about two and half miles long and half that in width. There are two floors inside the skin of each module these seem to serve as a safety feature should the artificial gravity fail. Some 400 floors are built orientated with up and down pointing towards the ends of the cylinder. Some species who have different gravitational requirements are found in cylinders with a different internal layout, though these exceptions are uncommon.

Question 54 What's happening on Pluto now the Ark is no longer functioning?

Question 55 What is a typical upbringing like for a human growing up in a habitat?