Author Topic: The Early Years  (Read 3644 times)

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Offline Zorgn (OP)

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The Early Years
« on: July 13, 2010, 05:53:12 AM »
"Ok, it's been four months, and it's now painfully obvious we're alone out here. So, status reports, everyone.

Kevin Stalworth cleared his throat and began his part. "We have 500 automated mines on B-III, and 64 here. I recommend we move all automated mines to B-III to take advantage of the wider array of minerals provided there. Also, I'd like a geological survey team formed to do a deeper analysis than the Schrade survey ships were capable of. A bit of bad news I've discovered is that we don't have copies of the geosurveys for anything but our colonies, so we'll eventually have to do that on our own."

"Don't expect that any time soon, though," chimed in Leroy Pettingil, self appointed flyboy representative to the growing Robia government. "We have no shipyards. Those will need to be built, retooled, expanded, painted, you name it. That's the easy part, by the way. The hard part is when we you have the ships built, and discover that the system is about a light year across. Our little Ion drives won't get us very far. Maybe if we had hyperdrives. Norm, please tell me we have hyperdrives."

Chief Scientist Norman Reay flung his hands up in the air, "Pfah! No, we don't have hyperdrives. The emergency tech package Schrade left in the hands of the colony AI," he pointed at the ceiling for emphasis, "is smeg. We have no Biotech, but we don't need it, really. We're getting, what, twenty tons per mining facility? Yes, yes, so we're not horrible there. Our research labs are slightly better than bare-bones. I have no idea how to quantify that, though. Defensive tech is smeg. Crystal-collapsiwhatever armor is a long way off. We lucked out in missiles. Schrade really wanted giant explosions, and I helped get them there." Norm beamed for a moment before launching back into his speech. "Thanks to that, we have fusion-boosted nukes. It doesn't tear holes in the fabric of reality, but it's better than a slap in the face. Our engines, as stated earlier, are Ion. We lucked out and ended up with tech that will allow us to run our engines with half as much fuel, so if you're willing to take it slow, long distance flights aren't so impossible. Oh, yes. Our energy weapons are smeg, and we're damn near blind with the sensor tech we have."

Son Percella sighed and began issuing orders. Mines were to be moved to B-III. Construction was to begin on a commercial, followed by a naval, shipyard. Max Chopp (ooc - O_O; ), the sensor specialist was to take 5 labs and concentrate on improving their active sensor strengths. Norm was to take 10 labs and design a faster reloading missile launcher. Anderson Asbell was to take the last lab and design a bigger meson cannon.

"We're going to be stuck in this place for a decade, aren't we?" grumbled Leroy.

- - -

What had originally been a corporate governed colony became by that January a self governing Oligarchy of sorts. Leaders of various fields presented themselves and were included for the betterment or Robia. Son Percella, no longer dealing with her corporate overlords, became the unofficial head of Robia's civilian sector, and thus the entire group, largely by being the only one who wanted the job and knew how to do it. Kevin Stalworth as well became the head geologist by being the only qualified person who wanted the job. Leroy Pettingil, being the oldest and best pilot was the natural choice to lead what was shaping up to be the Robian navy, if they ever got a ship built. Norman Reay, though not the smartest scientist on staff, was the best administrator, and well qualified to lead the scientific community. The red haired stepchild of the group was Zane Flegle, Police Chief of a largely law abiding world, and potential General if the govenment ever got around to converting the police into an army. Unfortunately his dreams of sending people to blow stuff up was deemed secondary to improving the economic position of Robia.

- - -

On July 6th, Norman Reay completed research into Missile Launcher Reload Rate 2, and was immediately sent back to the lab to improve on it.

By July 14th, the two Galcia class cargo ships finished transporting automated mines from B-IV to B-III, and were given orders transport all minerals mined back to the main colony.

On the 26th of July, Robia's first commercial shipyard was completed. The Shadow Hawk, a 2100 ton geosurvey design that had been recently finalized was laid down, and construction began on a second slipway.

After nearly ten months of work, the Evette Sanchez Geology Team discovered a 100kt uridium deposit on B-IV. Unfortunately, they also concluded the survey, and were rushed to B-III aboard the next cargo flight.

New Year - 2737

On January 9th, Max Chopp completed research into what he deemed 'Active Grav Sensor Strength 12'. Immediately after reporting this, he went back to chewing nails and thinking of new ways to improve Robian sensors.

On February 20th, Robia's first naval shipyard came online. Seeing as there wasn't much need for it at the moment, work began to add 2000 tons of capacity to it in preparation for future needs. As well, work began on a second commercial shipyard which was expected to be needed soon after it was finished.

July saw the completion of an improved missile reload mechanism. As the smallest missiles still could not be rapid-fired with this new component, Norman Reay was thrown back into the lab to try again.

On August 14th, the Shadow Hawk, first of its kind, and first ship ever built by the people of Robia was completed. The small geosurvey vessel was given into command of Valencia Delcaro, pilot of the ship that had warned Robia of the Empire's defeat.

On the 19th of October, work was completed on Robia's second commercial shipyard, and several mass drivers took its place on the construction list.

Construction of three mass drivers was completed on December 9th. One was shipped off to the B-III mining colony to take some of the burden off the cargo task group.

New Year 2738

August 16 marked the end of a long and mostly fruitless geological survey of the B-III mining colony. 100kt of Sorium was discovered, and added to the 1.6 million tons already on record. Nobody was really impressed, and the geology team was disbanded due to lack of interest.

December 21 marked the completion of 'Active Grav Sensor Strength 16' by Max Chopp and his jolly band of scientists. Max moved away from active sensors, and towards gravitational survey sensors for his next project, citing 'a boring three years' as his reason.

New Year 2739

Norman Reay completed research into a new kind of reloading mechanism for missile launchers on February 16th. He still failed to get it to the point where he could rapid fire tiny missiles. Unfortunately for him, he was overrule by the other heads of the Robian government and ordered to delve into economic research since their hope for an academy grad specializing in non-weapons research grew slimmer every year. (OOC: what the hell, RNG?) This disagreement went on for several days, but eventually Norm began looking into ways to increase factory construction speeds.

May 16th saw the end of the long life of the research project into 12cm Meson cannons. Norm quickly snatched up the freed labs in his quest to brute force the economy into being awesome so he could get back to designing new ways for things to go boom as fast as possible.

June 21st ended, for the most part, the geosurvey of the Robian inner system. All non asteroids within 200 billion kilometers had been surveyed, and the task group was headed back to Robia-B to sweep the single field in range before heading home. All in all, the survey was a huge success. Within acceptable distances, there were huge deposits of all known trans-newtonian elements, enough to last the Robian survivors a century or more and build ships rivaling the Empire in size, if not firepower. Even the rarest of elements had tens of millions of tons available. The only problem would be getting them out in a reasonable amount of time.

- - -

OOC:
This part took longer than I hoped, and nearly nothing happened, but such is life. More posts to come in this thread, probably detailing the times up to the first jump, maybe a bit later. Basically the boring startup bits before I start blowing stuff up.
 

Offline Zorgn (OP)

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Re: The Early Years
« Reply #1 on: July 28, 2010, 03:02:01 AM »
Ok, I decided that the last post's format sucked. Here's hoping this one is better. Next post is going in a new thread, so this one's open to comment.

- - -

The ruling council of Robia slowly shuffled into the conference room that had become their unofficial meeting room over the years. Aside from the handful of aides that flitted around the room, little had changed since their first meeting. Those who had feared luxury spending would get out of hand with the fledgling government had been pleasantly proven wrong.

Once Norman Reay, the last member to arrive, seated himself, Son Percella called the meeting to order.

"Alright, it's 2742, and we have work to do while all other good girls and boys have their new year's party.  We've been at this six years now, and we've come far. Unfortunately, we have a long road ahead of us. Aside from the expected potholes, we have a race of aliens who have, at the very least cut us off from the Empire, and most likely killed everybody else. You know how many one-planet races there were out there as well as I. They're probably extinct now, and I for one refuse to join them. So... Let's recap the last three years or so."

Clearing her throat, Son Percella, poked at a small tablet computer before continuing.

"As you know, construction has been slow. We've beefed up our construction capacity on all fronts, but things are slow, and that doesn't look likely to change without major manufacturing research. We have been adding factories and mines, but they won't be any great factor for a while. Anyway, Leroy, hit us with the naval update."

"We've completed one Outreach class Gravsurvey ship, and so far it's discovered five jump points, so we're in no way cut off. As soon as it finishes its survey, it will be scrapped due to range and maintenance concerns. The big news on my front is the completion of our first Petae class Jump Gate constructor ship. It's been all over the news since its completion three weeks ago, so I've taken the liberty of mailing the specifics to each of you."

Quote from: "Leroy Pettingil"
Petae class Constructor Ship    32600 tons     462 Crew     971 BP      TCS 652  TH 750  EM 0
1150 km/s     Armour 1-90     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 1     PPV 0
Maint Capacity 19 MSP    Max Repair 38 MSP
Jump Gate Construction Ship: 360 days

Ion Engine E0.5 (5)    Power 150    Fuel Use 5%    Signature 150    Armour 0    Exp 1%
Fuel Capacity 200,000 Litres    Range 220.8 billion km   (2222 days at full power)

This design is classed as a commercial vessel for maintenance purposes

"The first ship of this class has been sent to the nearest jump point. It'll take a while to get there, and even longer to finish the gate. No rush, right? Anyway, since we now have the technology to (hopefully) move between star systems, I've been polishing our exploration protocols. We don't have the tech for everything yet, but Norm assures me it's on the way. Briefly, we jump into a system with a small ship, and immediately fire off a long range drone or ten to various points around the system. This drone, reaching the destination, releases a large sensor buoy. If lucky, the buoy will sit around for a year, scanning the area, and generally being damned hard to ignore. If we spot anything in the system, or if the buoy is destroyed, we leave, and come back when we can fight. It's a bit expensive making a dozen or so buoys for each system we jump into, but better than losing an entire ship every time we end up in a precursor system."

Leroy sat quietly, occasionally poking his computer, and eying Norman Reay, before the scientist got the hint. "I suppose it is my turn. We've completed research on gravitational survey sensors, construction improvements, jump drive related tech, a small military jump engine, and jump gate tech, although we're woefully slow in the building of the gates. Currently we're designing a sensor buoy for Mr. Pettingil there, codename 'Looking Glass'. And I'm proud to report that we've finally had a scientist join! The only problem is, he works in my field, and I'm better than him. Here's to Pete Sopoko, a damned huge disappointment."

Son Percella stared for a moment at the grumbling scientist, before taking control of the meeting back. "Geosurveys and reports on mining expectations are boring as hell. Sorry Kevin. Still, they're being mailed to you all. That's what you have to work with. Notice the lack of Vendarite. There's no more construction factories until we get some. Other than that, the recap's finished, so we can get on to planning this year."
 

Offline UnLimiTeD

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Re: The Early Years
« Reply #2 on: July 28, 2010, 10:01:01 AM »
The years in which nothing happens can be used to add background and atmosphere.
Quote
Norm quickly snatched up the freed labs in his quest to brute force the economy into being awesome so he could get back to designing new ways for things to go boom as fast as possible.
This one for example, quite humorous.
 

Offline Zorgn (OP)

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Re: The Early Years
« Reply #3 on: August 06, 2010, 04:49:21 AM »
Well, that's one campaign down. Had an encounter with a wormhole that did not end well. The fact that I lost a few years worth of research to a faulty drone system didn't help either. Still have no idea how I'm supposed to fire a drone at a planet from a billion or so kilometers without an active sensor lighting up the ship like a Christmas tree. >:|

Since I did not get around to telling what exactly knocked off the empire, I'll see if I can save those baddies and put them in a future campaign.
 

Offline symon

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Re: The Early Years
« Reply #4 on: August 06, 2010, 06:40:16 AM »
Pity, but it's why my campaign is on hold until 5.2. My experience is that wormhole in your home system equals death, (or complete campaign distortion at best).

I also need to get Organism names into my database. Fred Blogs is not a suitable name (grin).
"You fertility deities are worse than Marxists," he said. "You think that's all that goes on between people."

Roger Zelazny, Lord of Light. 1971.
 

Offline UnLimiTeD

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Re: The Early Years
« Reply #5 on: August 06, 2010, 06:43:04 AM »
Sad.
Always do backups.
Generally, for RPing, I have a cheat force somewhere ready so when something goes completely out of RP, I can vanquish that threat with a maximum tech meson destroyer.