[Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

First response is, what happened to Habitability 7-8? Did you really not have even 0.1% of systems with worlds of Standard or Dense (but not Marginal) atmosphere, hydrographic 60-90%, and Chilly, Cool, Normal, Warm, or Tropical climate? Given that you report 10.5% with Habitability 2-6, I find this hard to believe. Earth is Habitability 8, not 7 -- did you miss the +1 for non-Marginal atmospheres?

Second answer is, look at the Affinity Modifiers Table on p. 91. RVM averages to 0, so on average Affinity is equal to Habitability. All other things being equal, a world with Habitability 8 (like Earth) can support ~62.5 times as many people as one with Habitability 2. You could interpret this several ways, depending on the specifics:

* Only 1.6% as much land is actually habitable (mountain-tops, polar islands, microclimates)

* Only 1.6% of the potential population is able to adapt to conditions, either physically or culturally

* The land surface as a whole is only 1.6% as productive.

The actual answer is probably some combination which results in 1.6%, e.g. 10% of the land is habitable, 40% of the population can adapt, but the land is only 40% as productive.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

He only ran it 200 times; 0.5% is the increment for that.

Let me also suggest to Agemegos: If you can arrange your data into a more manageable format - when I did a sheet for First In world and system generation, I made it a point to put all my system data (minus world and moon data) into a single column, allowing me to easily grab the data and copy it where I wanted, or even generate numerous systems at once by grabbing the handle and dragging it over until I had as many columns as I wanted.

So my advice to you is, put your data into a single column (or row), then select it all and do a massive copy and paste (should take about 3 seconds). Then you can generate data for up to about 250 systems at a time (or 65000 if you go for rows). Your final columns (or rows) will be to count up each result. A simple average is easy to find, but if you wanna know the numbers, you'll have to use something like the COUNTIF function, and may need numerous additional columns.

But with judicious use of copy/paste and some thought about how to count up the results, you could probably generate 10,000 systems at a time (for data-mining purposes, as you did above) with a LOT less total effort and time spent.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

I am also wondering why there wsn't more of a curve in the results, with low-hab worlds being more numerous, but I suppose you may have manually adjusted the curve so we weren't wasting so much time on crap worlds. (I don't have the new Space yet.)

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

You probably die just as fast. Habitability 2 worlds are probably worlds with Suffocating atmospheres and oceans. However they are worlds where you can introduce plantlife that can survive without much help which helps provide food for your domes.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

My second post was more directed at Thrash (or whoever wrote the book), since he's the one responsible for the formulae and their results.

And my suggestion for your data management whatever was purely for the purpose of selecting everything at once and drag-pasting so you could perform your calculations 100-10,000 times at once, purely for the purposes of getting a larger sample of hab distribution data. You wasted an hour or so running your sheet 200 times, when you could have made the computer do the work for you.

I'm NOT saying you should make that your distribution; who really wants to generate that many systems at once?

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Probably many M0 or dimmer stars. I suggest you add an option to generate habitable star systems, as per p.101...

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Looking at Space p.88 I think we can say:

Any world with an acceptable atmosphere (standard or dense, non-marginal)and temperatures between Chilly and Tropical is 6+.
Cold or Hot reduces this by 1.
OTOH any hydrographic percentage from 1-99% is +1 or +2.

So roughly earthlike worlds will be at 6-8. 5 will be a marginal case, I guess at best as habitable as alaska or australian deserts. After all, the atmosphere alone gives us 4, and 5 means either 1-99% Hydrographics plus Very Cold or Very Hot (or worse), or 0% or 100% Hydrographics plus Cold or Hot. 4 or less means serious problems with the atmosphere and/or extreme temperatures.

Then again, these are planetary averages. A 5 might have an acceptable atmosphere plus 91% Hydrographics plus Very Cold, with the 10% land at the equator being significantly warmer than the average, or Very Hot, with the 10% land at the poles being significantly cooler than the average.I assume this is unlikely, so only a small percentage of 5´s will be reasonably habitable.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Need to pay more attention, obviously. I tend to approach the problem analytically, by working through the probabilities, rather than empirically.

http://www.io.com/~thrash/firstin.html

The procedure in GT: First In is conceptually similar to GURPS Space 4/e. The key observation is that the definition of "habitable" is based on Earth, so each characteristic forms a distribution around that central value. It may be a tailed distribution (e.g., because atmospheric density is correlated with size), but over a large enough sample the combination should be a bell curve with a peak in the mid-range (maybe 6-7?).

Ideal population distribution is a function of diffusion and affinity: people spread out as far as possible, consistent with the resources available.

The simplest method is to take the figures at face value, calculate carrying capacity directly, divide by transportation costs, and distribute population (or at least, initial colonies) proportionately. There are very few places on Earth so harsh that no one has ever settled there; even places like Antarctica might have been settled by Inuit-analogs, if (e.g.) the process of Polynesian expansion had continued for a few thousand years. Habitable planets are similar: that breathable atmosphere is a huge advantage.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Well, if it's a system sheet, you need system data. The central star's characteristics, if it has companions, then you need their characteristics and orbital info. Then you need to know orbital slot info (forbidden zones, snow limit, hab zone, orbit slot distances, etc).

That right there is a lot of information, about 20-40 pieces of data (iirc from when I did this for First In).

Are you talking about developing and displaying planetary information for each object in an orbital slot (including moons)? Each body is going to need around 20-60 pieces of information (more if it's habitable and has its own life, less if it's just a belt or giant) all on its own, which you're obviously wanting to put most of it on a seperate detail sheet, but each piece of into you want on the system sheet, that's a lot of extra info to add to it. Are you making a graphical display?

What i'm getting at is: don't go overboard. You've got the right idea to only want to display the most important information, but you've listed a lot of things that really don't need to be put on the system sheet. I'd guess at most you'd put the World type and Hab rating (I'd also put blackbody, because I'm awesome/weird like that). Maybe orbit characteristics (orbit time, eccentricity, inclination, perigee point, current position) because it affects how the system is drawn graphically, in case someone wants to do that. Anything else is really just world detail.

Color-coding for Hab would be neat, as would having a particular graphic for each world type.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

I have a PHP script to generate systems as per GURPS Space, with a very few minor tweaks (Agemegos' revised tidal formulae and aging the system in 0.1Gy blocks to track changes over stellar evolutionary timescales). I use the chart in G:S to generate stellar types instead of real-universe data. Also, I use all the rules except for brown dwarf and flare star generation.

I've generated a total of 16977 systems this way (I have a perl script that creates whole thousand-system sectors at once). The habitability breakdown is as follows:
(Without diving into the tables right now, I suspect that the NULL values are from systems with nothing but gas giants and belts.)

I'm at work and without my books, but I was under the impression that you didn't even generate carrying capacity for Hab 0 planets -- the assumption was that Hab 0 systems would only ever have outpost-type residents (miners, military, etc.).

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

I am perhaps confusing the population rules in Space with those in GT: Interstellar Wars.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Which is why I haven't done it, either.

Yes and no. The range for each variable is already constrained because we're necessarily talking about habitable worlds. As long as the bins are wide enough, the combinations will still result in a jackpot fairly frequently.

I don't think so, unless I missed something important.

What we have is two categories -- hostile (habitability 0) and habitable (habitability >0) -- with a probability function to choose between them, e.g. f(0) = 0.9. Within the habitable category, there is a roughly bell-shaped distribution of habitability with a central peak defined by how wide are the bins (i.e., how likely are the optimum results) in each variable.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Hmmm. On review, you're right. This is a significant departure from earlier uses of "habitability," and a flaw in the system in my opinion. I don't see the point of discussing or measuring the "habitability" of any world which cannot support human life in the open somewhere on its surface. Sealed habitats and life support are pretty much the same, no matter where one goes, and it's pointless to assign them a "natural" carrying capacity.

As for worlds with Toxic or Corrosive atmospheres, the answer is that one would not "colonize" them at all, when it would be simpler and safer to construct an orbital habitat or one on a nearby asteroid or moon. If there were valuable resources to exploit or interesting aliens to contact, one would build an outpost instead, which does not depend on carrying capacity (p. 93), and support it from a colony somewhere more convenient.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Ah, of course, you're right. I'm just the kind of guy that likes to know that kind of stuff, I suppose for "error checking" purposes or what have you, but it shouldn't be in the final output. My bad.

When it all comes down to it, information about the star system is mostly irrelevant anyway; that's pretty much why most Traveller maps show only the main world's name, whether it's high pop, and the fueling, repairing, and trading possibilities. If you're looking to map out an unexplored section of space, you want to know spectral type to help narrow down where good worlds are more likely to be (and how far from the sun to look for them), and if you're in charge of sending out colony ships and have to make a report to the Emperor, you're not going to show him tons of details, you're going to show him a few pieces of information and ask him to point to the ones he wants colonized.

Or something like that.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Why is that so bad ? Such a world would have a breathable atmosphere and temperate climate. The water may be frozen, but you only have to get ice to warmer areas to have sunshine melt it. That´s a lot better than what we have on mars for example.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

It's not totally pointless; which resources and hazards are present in the environment makes a big deal on how challenging life support is.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Is Habitability calculated before or after length of day?

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Is raw vacuum in orbit "habitable"? If not, then assigning a "habitability" rating to worse conditions is pointless.

My objection is that GURPS Space 4/e altered the commonly accepted definition of "habitable," one that has been used consistently in previous SJ Games products. "[A] summary of all the factors that make a world pleasant to live on," should, in fact, imply that it is even possible for humans to live on the world, as opposed to in artificial habitats that happen to be located there.

The proper place to include the relative difficulty of living on uninhabitable worlds is in the calculation of affinity. GURPS Space 4/e unnecessarily confuses the two.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Dumb question time:

Could the Hab rating be the best you can make it with the aid of some terraforming, rather than the way you found it? I mean, it seems to me that the Hab4 ball just described could have an atmosphere built and regenerated, and the humans inhabit it on the twilight edges. Sure, the atmosphere escapes over time, but that's not a problem for anyone currently alive.

With the twilight band having a tolerable level of atmosphere and heat, maybe in a few hundred years some of the day heat will transfer over to the night side and release the water. So long as the atmosphere-making machines are running, it could become a regular, habitable, tide-locked world, up to whatever Hab4 means.

The alternative seems to be then, that there are even fewer habitable worlds.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

It has a habitability of 0. But that doesn't mean it's pointless to keep track of the fact that you'll need more equipment to live in even worse places.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Interesting. So it looks like the big factor on having a habitable system might be solar mass. If I'm reading these results correctly that is.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Contraception and limited family sizes are a passing fad? Edumacation becomes cheaper past TL8? Interstellar cosmic radiation causes mutations that make humans (even more) horny?

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

I'm not saying it's realistic, but it fits in with my space strategy game experiences. In most games I know - Master of Orion 2 comes to mind - it pays off to settle anything which even remotely looks like a planet. And if earthlike planets are very rare, you'll have to colonize something, I guess.

Though I admit that orbital habitats may make more sense in some cases.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

I'm not sure that's so odd, though.

As long as there are sufficient resources to survive and possibly get rich, you'll find people who will settle there, even if a place is totally godforsaken. And once the colony is established, other people will go where the jobs (or other opportunities) are.

In a hundred years, we will have the technology for people to go to most places in the solar system and survive; if people an see opportunity there, I think some of them will go, even though others might consider such places fairly hellish.

Seriously, Brett, look at the histories of our own countries. Isn't that proof enough? :)

Mark

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

I was, as I'm sure you're aware, not being entirely serious in my previous post.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Only of course if the system is considered to be in occupied territory. There's a circularity to that. If the system isn't colonised, then there's no real reason to consider it to be within occupied territory, but if it is colonised, whether or not it has a positive affinity world determines whether it can pay for itself and therefore has a true colony rather than just an outpost. Note that the basic world generation system produces something like 1 Garden world for each 3 barren or exotic worlds but the extended world generation system has ratio that is probably about 1 in fifty at best, and over half of those systems will possess some kind of airless rock with a positive RVM.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

There's no reason why you can't. But given TL 9+ and a solution for the gravity problem, there's also no reason why you can't have a reproducing population in an artificial environment that has a resource to keep things funded. The spaceport isn't going to be very temporary because planets are big. Real big. A +1 RVM planet isn't going to be "mined" out by anything except a gigantic civilisation on the planet for a very long time.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

In my universe, colonies end up where the transportation resources are. That means some places where there's no sensible reason to be there, other than that's where the wormholes are. There are religious kooks who have a planet more suited to human habitation than earth is, but because there's no way to get there easily (round trip to the nearest populated system is about a year) there are only a couple hundred thousand people there. In the setting I'm trying to start a PbP game in (see the sig) one of the richest polities is a deep-space transfer point. If it weren't for having the nearly densest collection of wormhole routes in known space, there would be outpost stations at best on the wormholes.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

[QUOTE=Agemegos]That's one option, although a troublesome one for a number of reasons overlooked by space-hab enthusiasts. A simpler one is to have a barren world that happens to be large enough to have decent gravity in the first place.


That is why the only barren systems I had colonised were ones that were on the way between two or more habitable systems. That way the ships could stop there for repairs, refueling, offloading and reloading without going out of their way. However that reasoning does not apply to barren resource-rich worlds in the same system as a habitable world. The difference in distance between interplanetary and interstellar is so great that it seems to me that there must be a large cost savings to counterbalance the increase cost of opportunity.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Not an issue with this generation system. In all the systems I've seen, I've never seen a solid planet with positive affinity and gravity higher than 1.5 gs and I haven't seen many with gravity higher than 1.2.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

High gravity requires lots of mass, which also attracts hydrogen, and suddenly we have a gas giant.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

I am, too. For one thing, the type of star travel used will have such a huge influence on settlement patterns that the book's system simply can't be applied to everyone's universes as written. About the only time such an implementation would be useful would be for making a Traveller style universe.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

Agreed. In fact, I must admit I never even really read those parts. I want rules to design the physical systems. Social aspects are setting dependent.

Re: [Space] How habitable is my universe?
 

I'm with you on this. Give me rules that tell me what the planets are like and I'll put colonies there, or not, as it fits my campaign world. Having said that, I would not be surprised to see a lot of colonies in fairly inhospitable places, simply because the technology will make it possible and the opportunity for big profits will make the colony a viable concern.

In many cities today, it would be easy to spend almost all your time in your apartment, a subway, an office, or a place of recreation like a museum or a dance club, without ever spending much time outside. It also isn't that hard to create a small indoor park. It's not a big jump to assume people would be content to live in colonies that were self-contained networks of buildings where someone NEVER has to go outside (which is a good thing, as outside is...well...Titan or Mercury or Ceres or some other cheerful place).

If you have space habitats, the colony might move from asteroid to asteroid, mining one until the mine runs out of ore, etc., and then moving on to a new asteroid. All you have to do is deploy a solar sail and you're on your way. (Although, frankly, if you have a big asteroid you won't need to move very often. A 10-km. asteroid masses about a trillion tons. Even if only 1% of that is useful, a space colony with a few thousand people could live off the resources it would provide for a long time. And there are a LOT of 10-km. asteroids. And even more 10-km. cometary bodies in the Kuiper Belt.)

Mind you, I'm not sure I'd want to live in a place like this, but there are plenty of people who would probably love it.

I also agree some colonies will be outposts; they'll flourish for ten years or twenty years and then be abandoned. But others will endure. Either the resource they're mining won't go away--mining Helium 3 from Neptune means your colony on Triton will NEVER run out of a reason to be there--or they will become a center of commerce, etc. Individual mines will play out, but the warehouses and banks on (or in) Ceres will be there forever.

Mark