 January 31, 2014 - 7:35pm | I was walking the streets of Chelsea Ma today and walked a functioning coble stone str. and tar mac street. Cobble stones are of course old school but the road remains and often as not is in better condition than the other roads in its vicinity (which is mostly zoned industrial) and they all take a beating from tractor trailer rigs. It got me thinking about space colonies. Forget the Frontier for a moment where the fruits of an advanced industrial civilization are just a few void jumps away, but think about a 40 LY expedition from earth- Expedition will have a certain ammount of space and mass dedicated to support and set up of the colony but over time that colony will run out of the fruits of advanced industry and turn to different methods. In a sci fi setting you'd get the amazing "ceramacrete" streets poured at the founding then you could have dirt roads or cobble stones or what ever the local industry can produce. Its a huge impact on the setting. clearly its more desirable to have your dwelling on the ceramacret street as apposed to the dirt road or the highly durable but rather noisy and hard on the vehicle cobble stone. Everything is impacted, housing, utilities, vehicles etc. its even more so impacted if the original materials are the product of "super science" I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 February 1, 2014 - 2:43am | Yes, I use that very idea on my colony planets. I try to keep the tone of being remote, and not having all the conveniences of the Core Worlds. |
 February 1, 2014 - 12:24pm | Also besides the mix of tech, you would have environment conditions to think about, big flying preditors for instance might require a variety of adaptations both low, mid and high tech. "Never fire a laser at a mirror." |
February 1, 2014 - 2:35pm | Environment is a big factor. On some planets, the people might have to live underground, or in pressurized domes. |
 February 2, 2014 - 6:48pm | A one way colony ship would come prepared to build the majority of it's infrastructure from local resources. They may bring a fair sized nuclear reactor to run the first settlement, a prefabbed hospital, agricultural machineary, machine shop, and processing facility, mining equipment, foundry equipment, and other basic infrastructure building functions. The colonists would then set up an iron mine, cement factory, and farms to start. The mine and cement factory would produce materials to build any facilities they needed. First I could think of would be a water treatment plant, sewer system, and food processing and storage plant. All other things are going to receive lesser priority and colonists would build from local resources on their own time to get extra homes and businesses. The generation first born on the colony would be the most free to build outside of the colony plan as they are the ones not necessarly trained and dedicated to a colonizing job. Colonies would likely encourage population growth and innovative expansion by the initial generations. Thus the first generation born will have some kids that don't take te jobs of their parents and start new businesses, explore, homestead, etc. The buildings these people leave for the future generations will likely be built with local materials, wood, stone, etc. -iggy |
 February 3, 2014 - 2:25am |
The local culture would dictate a lot, then there is the local law, environmental impact and availability, Tec h level, and other variables. If we assume cultural divergence from the host culture then the later dependents would prefer the local best practice, be it local made or a commonly accepted import. I'd prefer to live in a building made by my own efforts, on my land, on a newly settled world. Use high tech to build low impact, high efficiency, sustainable productivity. |
February 4, 2014 - 2:32am | I am liking this thread so far. Great ideas. Awesome. |
 February 5, 2014 - 1:25am | I think it matters what the purpose of the colony is. Greeks sent out colonies when their cities became too populous and the colony generally but not always was on good terms with the mother city. Australia was a penal colony. Ford set up a colony in Brazil to manufacture rubber. And of course we all know about colonies established in the New World for resource extraction or by people fleeing persecution (or looking for a place where they could be the ones in charge) I think the purpose of the colony, the relationship of the colony to the parent state, and how easy travel is between the two are going to influence what a colony is like. If travel is easy and there's a good relationship, the colony needs less initial support as it can resupply. Colonies that are expected to produce a resource need extra initial help until they become profitable. Colonists with no choice may have to deal with little or no support, initial or continuing. |
February 5, 2014 - 6:49am | Fordlandia give me an idea: PCs are sent to investigate what happened to a recent colony expedition but find the colony deserted.creepy horror themes could be explored with this. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
February 5, 2014 - 11:14pm | The Basic D&D/ Rules Companion Domain rules might be a decent place to start for colony founding and running rules. The retroclone Dark Dungeons has a somewhat cleaned up version of those rules under the OGL if anyone wants to look it over for inspiration. |
