Okay, rolling. I made a second post to bump the thread.

EDIT :
Sorry Harzipan, but this RtD doesn't have a waiting list. It's not possible for another colony ship to arrive in the system, what with the back story and all. However, it is still possible for you to get into the game if Tomaster chooses you to lead one of his branches.

EDITx2 : And God said, "Let there be roll," and there was a roll.

Some music to set the mood.


1st January, 2062. One month since planet fall.

Game Event

[4] Medium event. Player affected? [2] : The Chernogradost-Golgotha Popular Directorate. Additional players affected? [Tails, no additional player affected]

----

Supradynamics United - CrazyMLC
[5] The SKY-W Frontier maneuvers to a re-entry angle and fires the communications satellite to be in a geosynchronous position directly above where the vessel would land. With a series of burns, the large ship comes in for reentry, the hull shining like a meteor. The heavy landing struts slide out of the lower part of the ship once most of the heat is dissipated. With yet another maneuver, the ship's engines rotate to allow for a vertical landing. Several seconds later, with a thud, the ship hits alien soil. Four thousand citizens are thawed out of suspended animation. The advanced mainframe passes a message to the bridge terminal. "Landing successful. Awaiting new commands."
"Welcome to Planet, citizens. We have a long road ahead of us, but together we'll achieve greatness!
Now get moving. We can't just leave those 26,000 waiting."
The colonists stretch after their long journey and grab masks so they can breathe in the dusty atmosphere of their new home.

[10] The colonists head to the ships belly, the cargo bay. Large flat pack self assembling buildings sit there in crates. More than enough for half the currently thawed number of colonists. They move them over to the cargo elevator using some of the industrial machines to move them into place. They are lowed onto the surface of the planet and towed into position with the machines and in no time at all, the prefabricated buildings are set up and loaded with oxygen, water and food. The weather calms and most of the dust in the area settles to the ground, allowing the solar panels to deploy from the roofs of the houses to start charging the batteries. Under the power block, a hatch is opened and cables extended to allow the houses to be linked with the ships reactor.

[8]With the houses set up, the ATVs are lowered down. They've sat still in the ship for a while, so it takes a little time to get them moving. But, after an hour waiting, the ATVs are ready to roll out. Ten colonists are loaded onto the five ATVs, two for each ATV and they set off from the landing site. They travel up the river and find a place where they can ford the river. To the crews surprise, they find what looks like fish and reeds growing along the river. On top of that, they find a number of mineral deposits leading up to the crossing.

Colony Stats :
4000 colonists.
Housing : Enough for 2500 people. 1500 people are without a home.
Food : Colonists are eating the food from the colony ship. 20,000 - 4000 = 16,000.
Water : Colonists are using the water from the colony ship. 50,000 - 1250 = 48,750 - 3000 = 45,750.
Power : 100 - 1.25 (housing) = 98.75 units of power. Two units of heavy metals have been depleted.
Production :
None.
Morale : 75% : Good.
Base morale : 50%
Morale modifiers :
A new home! + 10%
Native life? Is it delicious? + 10%
A speech! + 5%

SKY-W FRONTIER


Chernogradost-Golgotha Popular Directorate - Kebbit
[10] The Overcaptain taps a few commands into the ships onboard computer, and the machine complies. It starts deorbit maneouvers and, by the end of the day, the ship is re-entering the atmosphere directly next to the colony site. Unlike the other colony ships, this one doesn't try to rotate the engine but instead plots a landing maneuver like a fighter jet. The landing struts deploy out of the hard hull and the Crown of Thorns skims across the surface before coming to a stop, putting it right next to the cave entrance. Four thousand colonists are thawed out of cryogenic suspension and are greeted with the voice of their Overcaptain addressing the situation.
"Not one step back. Many gave their lives so you, the strongest ones could be here; you are under a debt. I do not expect cowardice in the face of the storm or pity for ideological enemies or a single tear shed for home. The others knew precisely what they were doing."

"We will make a world for you to be happy. But first, we will steep the iron in blood of martyrs and sweat of workers. I believe in you."
As usual in the directorate, cheering erupts.

[7] After the cheering dies down a little, the Overcaptain starts giving out orders. "Strip unnecessary metal from the ship's frame. Begin drilling ranks of habitation modules and hydroponic gardens into the sides of the cave. Now. Base shelter and nutrition must be the priority. " The colonists gear themselves up with masks with a few taking some firearms to guard the rest of the work force. They march down to the cargo bay and move ten of the machines onto the elevator platform, lowering them to the surface to begin excavation work in the cave. Mean while, most of the colonists are at work dismantling unimportant parts of the colony ship for metal. They start with the engines, since the colony ship wouldn't be able to get back into orbit anyway.

At the same time, the colonists to excavate the new habitation block and hydroponics farm enter the cavern, the armed colonists in the lead. The front of the cavern is well lit by the sun, but the rest of the colonists have to use flashlights. The industrial machines are tooled for mining and set to work drilling into the cavern walls. Good progress is made by the motivated workforce. Atleast until a thud is heard from the end of the cave. Thud. A group of armed colonists move to investigate the noise. They move deeper into the cavern into a place where the cave balloons outwards into a roughly spherical shape. They look around the cavern to find the source of the noise. Thud. They look towards the source of the sound and find a second tunnel and get a slight glance at something that seems to be darting around the cavern. Thud. The colonists turn the safeties off on their weapons, and one of them keeps their flashlight facing the tunnel. Several taps and thuds are heard from the ceiling of the cavern, the squad of colonists look up and finally get a visual on the thing. No, things, that are in the area. One of the colonists grab speak into a radio. "Sir, we've found some kind of life form, looks like a very big scorpion, they are like rust. Wha-", cut off in mid sentence as one of the creatures dives from the ceiling directly on top of him, crushing him before the rest of the creatures dive down to attack with pincers. The cavern is lit by volleys of rifle fire and echoes with shouts, screams and gunfire. the colonists at the cavern entrance scramble back to the ship to grab more firepower. But by the time they are armed and return to investigate return, the battle is over. Only one colonist of the team is still alive, huddled against a rock unconscious. The rest of the team has vanished, but the blood trails into the tunnel suggest what's happened. A few corpses of the...creatures are found inside the cavern near the one survivor, riddled with bullet holes.

[3] Before the situation changes again, the Overcaptain issues some more orders. "Take ten of our armoured reconnaissance vehicles, fill them with our highest-quota Stakhanovite labor-leaders and use them to tow along a quantity of stripped metal and tools; direct all of them to the nearby lake and set a hydrological outpost with the beginnings of a pipeline home. Set a quantity of industrial machines to follow and begin mass hydraulic work." The remaining colonists who aren't busy with the excavation or dismantling the engines set to his orders on the double, off loading the ARVs from the colony ship, boarding them and taking some of the firepower from the colony with them, learning from the recent skirmish with...whatever the hell those things were. They take some of the stripped metal and equipment from the colony, in addition to twelve industrial machines. They head out to the large lake and find it filled with tiny fish and a few reeds surrounding it. The colonists start deploying the machinery, but make poor progress due to the dust in the air reducing visibility and causing a few break downs as the dust gets inside the machinery. However, they do succeed in converting one of the industrial machines into a water pump.

Colony Stats :
3996 colonists.
Housing : 3996 people are currently homeless.
Food : Colonists are eating the food from the colony ship. 20,000 - 4000 = 16,000.
Water : Colonists are using the water from the colony ship. 50,000 - 8000 = 42,000.
Power : 100 units, none consumed. Two units of heavy metals have been depleted.
Resources :
900 units of metal.
Production :
One more turn to complete excavation.
One more turn to complete construction of pump, if no further delays occur.
Morale : 65% : Good.
Base morale : 50%
Morale modifiers :
A new world to conquer! + 10%
Yes my Overcaptain! + 10%
What's that sound? - 5%


United Fourfold Commonwealth of Nundinates - Foa
[3] The Helmseer commands the Bellowing Nautilus to launch a communications satellite before commencing landing procedures. The advanced mainframe crunches the numbers on the landing vector in several seconds, firing the communications satellite to reach it's position at the same time as the colony ship does. The ship powers it's drive for the last time as it comes in for reentry. The ship seems to be pulling to one side for some reason, but the advanced mainframe adjusts the engine burn rates every millisecond to account for the problem. A monstrous bang is heard and a series of alarms and red lights flash across the alarm board. The helm seer buckles in after the Advanced Mainframe alerts her to do so. The mainframe temperature is rising and it overclocks itself to maintain a stable landing vector. It deploys the landing gear and the emergency parachutes packed into the top of the hull to try and slow the ship down, and they succeed in slowing the ship down enough for a rough landing. The heavy ship lurches forward hard as the ship skids across the landing zone. The advanced mainframe passes a message to the console. [color=4080FF]"The advanced mainframe would like to apologize for the rough landing and would recommend a damage inspection. Engine block four is not responding and contact with the sensors for engine block four has been lost. Possible causes - Power failure, damaged control module, faulty instrumentation are considered the most likely."[/color]

[10] After the rough landing, the Helmseer returns to her cryogenic pod to don the customary shroud before returning to the bridge. She starts the thawing process for five thousand colonists. She updates the bulletin for them for when they awaken with the following message.
"As it stands, Projects: Pathfinder, and Exodus were a success, and the Bellowing Nautilus has found adequate home on top of an intricate cave network.

Five Thousand [5000] Diameters of One-Fifty [150] to Two Hundred [200] of primarily First and Second Wealths will be Thawed. You are to, at first, assess the situation in the wake of the Two Advanced Formers, and to assist with the start up of Agriculture, and penetration Downwards.

The air on this foreign planet is semi-breathable with filtration.

- Helmseer "Irel" ****logo "
She then orders the mainframe to prep the landing site. The formers power up and detach from the wall remotely controlled while the colonists thaw out. The advanced mainframe drives them to the elevator where they are lowered down and begin preparing the site for the colonists. One former moves north of the colony ship, guided by the planetary sensor array and the advanced mainframe.

[4] By now, the five thousand colonists are full defrosted and equipped. They head outside and take a nice long look at their new, dusty home. A dozen check the back of the ship to find out why the ship had such difficulty landing. It doesn't take them long to notice why. "Helmseer, the fourth engine block is missing. It seems it was ripped off the hull while the ship was reentering." Nearly a hundred meters away from the craft, bits and pieces of the fourth engine block are scattered across the surface. The soil is rough, rocky and generally unpleasant, but the advanced mainframe and planetary sensor array are analyzing the soil to find the ideal crop to be grown. "Helmseer, one of the automated formers has commenced work on an irrigated field ready for planting. Sensors indicate that directly adjacent to the field location is the underground river. It appears to connect with the tunnel directly below the Nautilus before going out to sea. The gene vault is ready for your orders. The second former is currently flattening the terrain to create an optimum road surface for the colony."

Colony Stats :
4000 colonists.
Housing : 5000 people are currently homeless.
Food : Colonists are eating the food from the colony ship. 20,000 - 5000 = 15,000.
Water : Colonists are using the water from the colony ship. 50,000 - 10000 = 40,000.
Power : 100 units, none consumed. Two units of heavy metals have been depleted.
Production :
Morale : 65% : Good.
Base morale : 50%
Morale modifiers :
A new world to explore! + 10%
That was a close landing + 5%

Supreme Ark, Bellowing Nautilus


ThraxoCorp - Tomaster
[8] Before landing the colony ship, one of the communications satellites are fired from the colony ship, into a geosynchronous position with the crater with the second being fired minutes after into a position above the ocean to allow the colony to communicate with any other colonies that are near the ocean and have their own communication satellite. The colony ship then starts a deorbit burn to land in the crater, following the order to land directly in the crater. It aerobrakes in the atmosphere as it orbits the planet, reducing it's speed just enough to force it into a landing position at the crater. A few hours later, the ship approaches the entry point for the burn and after another hour, touches down without a hitch onto the crater. The CEO gave the employees a few motivational words before they got to work. "Welcome Employees, to the newest HQ of ThraxoCorp!"

[8] The CEO started the defrosting of four thousand employees to begin work on the colony. It didn't take long for them to be up and ready. An hours wait or so and they were ready for action. They use the industrial machines in the cargo bay and pick up the prefabricated housing and take it to the elevator platform where it is driven outside to the edge of the crater which the Planetary sensor array determines to be the least rich of precious metals. With the machines in use, it doesn't take long at all for all the houses to be ready and hooked up to the ships reactor.

[8 (what? Is Random.org busted?)] The five ATVs are unloaded from the colony ship and crewed by ten colonists. They take with them some mineral sampling equipment. They drive around the crater and in the center the deposits of precious metals that the planetary sensor array initially detected. It looks like gold. A lot of gold. The edges of the crater are too steep for the vehicles to climb, unfortunately. But not too steep for people to climb. An ATV team drives their vehicle as far up the slope as it can possibly go, then climb the rest of the way to the top. It's a long way down from the top of the ridge, but they have a clear view for miles! The ocean can be seen quite clearly, along with what looks like a rocky outcrop near it. But in the far distance, so far away that the colonist has to use binoculars to see, is what appears to be...grass? That can't be right.

Colony Stats :
4000 colonists.
Housing : 4000 people are currently housed, with room for another thousand
Food : Colonists are eating the food from the colony ship. 20,000 - 4000 = 16,000.
Water : Colonists are using the water from the colony ship. 50,000 - 2000 = 48,000.
Power : 100 units, none consumed. Two units of heavy metals have been depleted.
Production :
Morale : 85% : Good.
Base morale : 50%
Morale modifiers :
A new world, with plenty of resources! + 10%
That's a lot of gold! + 10%
More than enough housing for everyone + 10%
The new HQ ain't half bad, if a bit dusty +5%


Kyran Allegiance - Halo117
[5] The Exodus, with a few taps on it's control board by the commander starts a deorbit burn for the river delta. It takes only minutes for the large colony ship to rotate and start burning to the position. The ship feels a little worn by the journey here, but there is no damage, just a few breakdowns in unessential systems. The ship buckles as it enters the orange atmosphere of the planet below and deploys the landing skids and starts burning again to lower the velocity of the impact. Coming in at horizontal, the ship skids across the round with the landing gear so hot from the reentry that some of the sand it landed on turned to glass. After a turbulent minute of skids, it settles, right in the heart of the delta. The commander starts the thawing process for five thousand colonists. After an hour or two, they start climbing out of their pods. The commander walks over to the intercom and grabs the microphone. "If you're hearing this, then you're chosen to help set up a colony here on this mysterious planet. Once you touch down on the planet's surface, stay together and be careful, we don't know what's out there."

[3] The commander orders the deployment of an outpost at the coast further down the delta, on the beach with an ATV accompanying it. The outpost truck starts moving with the fifty crew members going along with it, but the fine sand keeps bogging the wheels down. It's hard to keep the vehicle moving for any reasonable time span before it bogs back down. It's gonna take a while before the outpost can reach it's destination, but the ATV accompanying it isn't having any issues at all and could probably go off on it's own if needed.

[3]The commander orders two thousand colonists to be thawed out for an expedition north. No one questions his orders and after an hour, they are geared up and ready to go, carrying a portion of the colony's armament and food supplies to be dragged in sleds so they at least don't starve to death. They wave good bye to their loved ones before heading north with the supplies. They maintain radio contact, but a sandstorm starts to kick up and contact is lost with the group. After three days, no one knows what happened to the two thousand who went north.

Colony Stats :
5000 colonists.
Housing : 5000 people are currently homeless.
Food : Colonists are eating the food from the colony ship. 20,000 - 7000 = 13,000.
Water : Colonists are using the water from the colony ship. 50,000 - 14000 = 36000.
Power : 100 units, none consumed. Two units of heavy metals have been depleted.
Production :
Morale : 55% : Good.
Base morale : 50%
Morale modifiers :
A new world, it shouldn't be too hard to live here! + 10%
Beach front property, anyone? + 5%
Where did the 2000 go? - 10%


Minds of the World Combined - Unwoundpath
[5] The Galactic Mind starts a series of burns and rotations to allow the ship to land directly south of the huge mountain, minutes after firing the communications satellite to commence a rendezvous with the landing location. The large vessel churns as it turns, the long voyage has done it no good, but the advanced mainframe reports that there should be no problem with landing the ship. A series of burns later, the heavy ship starts to enter the atmosphere. While the planetary sensor arrays were originally designed with soil scanning in mind, they still have some capability to act like normal sensors. The Planetary Sensor Array detects another colony ship in the area, landing in front of the huge mountain. The Galactic Mind steers clear and lands on the southern side of the lake from the mountain to prevent resource conflicts. The advanced mainframe lowers the landing gear and rotates the engines to allow for a vertical landing. The ship bounces slightly as it lands, but there is no damage and the Research Director starts thawing three thousand people, it doesn't take long for them to be up and about checking instruments. She speaks over the radio, to get their attention and get them to work on the colony.

"Congratulations people, if you're hearing this, You're part of the initial team of explorers and scientists to set foot on the newly discovered habitual planet! The FTL drive worked better than expected! Now, the ideal landing site is south of a mountain near a lake, yes, a lake, there is water here. It's yet to be seen if it is drinkable or not, but we can easily filter it. Our first step should be to set up a workable infrastructure before waking up many of your fellow workers to help with this maiden voyage."

[8]She next orders the advanced mainframe to take the five ATVs to scout the local area. The mainframe takes remote control of the vehicles and decouples them from the docking port before moving them over to the elevator platform where they are lowered onto the soil. They split up and each go in a separate direction to cover the most terrain, with one moving along the side of the lake finding a number of colonists from the other ship building something. It then moves away to avoid revealing it's presence before driving back to the colony ship to recharge. After all the findings are tallied, the ATVs have mapped most of the local area and found fertile soul around the lake edge, with the lake itself apparently harboring fish along with what appears to be a large deposit of metallic ore to the north of the lake. The colonists are happy with glee at the mention of native life.

[6]The colonists, eager to get to work almost start dismantling part of the colonys ship by themselves, but the Director manages to keep them waiting till the advanced mainframe chimes in with a good layout. After a brief scan of the area, it decides that the most efficient layout is to have the houses placed along the beach to allow easy access of the lake for water, food and transport, aswell as giving a pleasant view of the lake. It doesn't take long for the colonists to split up into teams and start dismantling the engine block, giving 1000 units of metal suitable for producing a large number of homes.

"Hello Director! I've got a few friends of mine together and we think that we could use the parts from a few industrial machines to make a better multipurpose machine. It'd be much better at dealing with the rough terrain and probably be much more hardy. What do you think?"

Colony Stats :
3000 colonists.
Housing : 3000 people are currently homeless.
Food : Colonists are eating the food from the colony ship. 20,000 - 3000 = 17,000.
Water : Colonists are using the water from the colony ship. 50,000 - 6000 = 44000.
Power : 100 units, none consumed. Two units of heavy metals have been depleted.
Resources : 1000 units of metal.
Production :
Morale : 75% : Good.
Base morale : 50%
Morale modifiers :
A new world, with plenty of new things to study! + 10%
Native life?!? + 10%
Can we go for a swim? + 5%



I'm still working out how many units of metal equal a building, but I should have it figured out by the next roll. Just for everyone to know, one unit of food is enough to sustain a citizen for one month. 2 units of water are used when it comes to water per person per month, but can be reduced to one unit by water rationing in exchange for a morale penalty.

LEGEND
> Minor Action.
> [?] Is this a Minor Action?.
> Major Action.
" [Special Conditions to Flavor Text] Flavor Text, Probably going to use this for mostly communication. "
Flavor Text, Probably going to be things someone or something does.

Roll


I keep on forgetting, some rtds are about minmaxing with flavor text, rather than a predominately story experience. I submit myself to moronicism.

How versatile are these industrial machines? If I wanted to start excavating a path to the crater to reduce the slope of the side so vehicles can make it to the center, would I need to design a new machine, or will the current machines work for now?

Most joyous of occasions!

1> At this rate, we'll run out of food very shortly. Get some colonists working on exploiting that river for some food. Consult the advanced mainframe to make sure it's safe to eat.

2> Get working on some housing. Those 1,500 could use some homes, too. Consult the mainframe on efficient placement.

3> Use the industrial machines to produce industrial machines specialized in creating other industrial machines (50 units). Use produced machines to assist production in a rapidly accelerating cycle.

?> Continue rover exploration.

It's known in the parlance of the strategic RTD fan as "carefully elaborating on what you want to do". Vague actions or anything based primarily on rule of cool (see "trying to arc lighting off your body when your only ability in Cavecricket's rigidly arbitrary skill system lets you throw one modest bolt") don't really fly in a strategic thing. If I was capable of writing for Afterlife without collapsing into a beaten-down heap of sludge after realizing how scientifically unrealistic my idea for a starting organ was, I wouldn't let that fly either.

This isn't Blue or Unknown Lands. There's no need to complain because the command style is different, and calling it moronicism is a really ♥♥♥♥ awful thing to say about a project Caek puts love and effort into for us to have fun.

In the end your actions worked fine, you just rolled a little low on some. Peace.

That's not very nice

I do plan to tell a story with the RtD, but it's hard to tell a story from a 4x perspective, especially this early on. I don't even know what some of the terms from your post are.If you could inform me what Diameter and Wealth mean in the context you are using, I'd be grateful and I assume the people reading this would be too.


They are pretty versatile. They were built to be used in some pretty nasty climates. They can most certainly do what you are asking by making a tunnel through the ridge, but they are slower than a dedicated mining machine.

Think sort of like a tractor. You can add stuff to it to give it functions.




Mostly, anyway.

Seriously Foa, how many 4X games do you know that have an actual storyline and plot? The story comes from our actions, rather than railroading us along a specific path. If you want your nation to have a plot, make it that way. Use your imagination.

> Send 50 industrial machines to begin excavation through the crater walls to allow access to the gold and other resources.

> Send the ATV-R's out in search of food and clean sources of water, to sustain our colony.

> Allow for the formation of rudimentary corporations, and submit a request for specialized excavation/tunneling machines.

"In order to facilitate the expansion of ThraxoCorp, and increase efficiency, we've begun diversifying our corporation by creating child companies. Anyone qualified to be a CEO should quickly submit a resume. A manufacturing company would be most appreciated.

(in response to the person at the end) "Go ahead, it sounds like it will work well as were near the mountains, so take all you need." >Have the start to work on the multipurpose machine.

>"Ok, time to get some research done! Get that mobile lab up and running near the lake for quick access to the water and local life. Start researching anything you see, or anything you want."

>"Alright, start building the houses like the mainframe stated, we need some housing from the environment."

Also, a map would be nice so we could see where we all are in relation to each other.

I'll probably get round to making one tomorrow, since I've been thinking the same.

Okay, I learned some things today.

1. I'm not that good at art.
2. Camel is a good color for terrain.
3. There's such a thing as Yonder blue.
4. How much I hate the letter X.

But after a while working, the map is finished.



It's not very nice looking, but I plan to improve with each roll and add more features to the terrain as they are found.

The red hexes mean mountain ranges. I'm gonna need everyone to pick a colour so I can do a few tweaks.

green

Gimme dat red.