Couple of minor questions please (object size, terraforming, colonies)

[shireknight (OP)]

How can you tell how big something is?

I told my transporter to ship a terraformer from Earth to Mars and then found the ship had to take it in parts because it was too big to fit in the ships cargo bay, is there a way to see how big an object is before you try and ship it somewhere?

Do terraformers need people to operate them?

I have ten terraformers on Mars with instructions to remove Carbon Dioxide however they have been running for almost a year and Mars's stats have not changed at all -is that because there is no-one on the planet to operate them?

Is there an option to build sealed domes on a planet?

Speaking of people to operate stuff is there a way to research colony domes so I can put a small population on Mars to start building factory's and things in preparation for when the terraforming is completed?

[smokeyser]

1.   The wiki has some sizes listed in terms of cargo holds required in the commercial shipping tutorial.    A terraforming installation requires 25 cargo holds to move in one piece.    hxxp: aurorawiki.  pentarch.  org/index.  php?title=Commercial_Shipping

2.    Yes, you'll need to start moving colonists there before the terraforming actually begins.   If you hit f2 and look at the summary tab for mars, it'll tell you how many colonists are needed to operate your terraforming installations on the left side.

3.    I like to think that's exactly what they're doing with the infrastructure that you send them. 

[oleg]

Go to the F2 window called economy and look up mars. You'll see in the main tab the amount of infrastructure required per million population.

In the same screen you'll see the amount of people required to operate your terraformers.

Build infrastucture with the industry on your homeworld and ship it with a freigther to mars. Use a colony ship to move population to mars for your terraformers.

Try as well the forum since lot's of newbies, like myself as well, ask the same questions and no question remains open.

Have fun

[shireknight (OP)]

Sorry guys I just can't see where it says how many people I need 

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y77/Shireknight/Terraforming.jpg

Try as well the forum since lot's of newbies, like myself as well, ask the same questions and no question remains open.

You mean I should have looked around more and I would have found the answer? -sorry 

[welchbloke]

I've just used SM mode to create a new colony with a small pop and terraforming installation.  It appears that a single installation requires 250k colonists.  It alos appears that the F2 screen won't show you that until there are people on the planet.

[shireknight (OP)]

Excellent 250k per terraformer, thanks for doing that, I'll start building some colony ships 

[Ziusudra]

(ninja'd) It only shows once you have some colonists there. But that is where it will be, between the population and tectonics lines.

By the way, you can terraform without colonists by using ships with terraforming modules rather than shipping terraforming installations. You could also provide people to run installations by using orbital habitats rather than infrastructure. Though once you get some infrastructure in place your civilian lines will provide more.

[Thiosk]

Why are the terraformers removing CO2?  The trouble with mars is the thin atmosphere.  Unlike pathetic regular humans, aurora humans are not poisoned by C02.  So you should dump CO2 into the atmosphere post haste.

Its stats will take a LONG time to change.  I have 90 terraforming ships-- yes 90, and it still takes forever to terraform a planet.

[shireknight (OP)]

Why are the terraformers removing CO2?  The trouble with mars is the thin atmosphere.  Unlike pathetic regular humans, aurora humans are not poisoned by C02.  So you should dump CO2 into the atmosphere post haste.

Its stats will take a LONG time to change.  I have 90 terraforming ships-- yes 90, and it still takes forever to terraform a planet.

Hmm I was just going to change Mars atmosphere into a duplicate of Earth's aka

79% Nitrogen
20% Oxygen
1% Argon

and see what happens.

My first step was to remove all the CO2 and add 20% Oxygen.

[shireknight (OP)]

Excellent 250k per terraformer, thanks for doing that, I'll start building some colony ships 

Oh wow I haven't even finished building a colony ship yet and civilians have already built their own and have started shipping colonists to Mars -this game is incredible and yes the civilians are putting me to shame 

[smokeyser]

Hmm I was just going to change Mars atmosphere into a duplicate of Earth's aka

79% Nitrogen
20% Oxygen
1% Argon

and see what happens.

My first step was to remove all the CO2 and add 20% Oxygen.

Keep an eye on the surface temperature.   You'll probably just end up replacing the co2 with other greenhouse gasses to get the temperature up.   And as others have pointed out, don't underestimate how slowly it'll change.   There's really no such thing as too many terraformers.   I usually drop 25 - 50 installations first, then start adding infrastructure to support enough colonists to run them.   Even then, it takes years for a simple job like fixing up mars.

[Zed 6]

I tow orbital habitat terraformers around. 4  habitats with 50 terraforming modules each. Sure travel is slow but terraforming goes quicker. Mars is now earthlike with temp at 2.7C and colony cost 0. Did several others and now working on Titan. There colony cost is down to 1.3 at the moment. No CO2 and a small amount of safe greenhouse gases.

[shireknight (OP)]

Ok I haven't got a clue what I'm doing, Mars has

26% Nitrogen
22% Carbon Dioxide
21% Oxygen
29% safe greenhouse gasses

and yet it's temperature is still -44 Celsius and if I stop adding or taking away gas then the temperature stops changing 

I'm off to find a tutorial 

[Brian Neumann]

It is not just the percent of gasses in the atmosphere but the total amount.  One way to see what will work is to enter sm mode after writing down the current AMOUNTS (in atmospheres of pressure) that is present.  Then in the population and production screen (F2) enviroment tab (top left) enter in different amounts of greenhouse gasses and oxygen ect.  use the sm button to change the atmosphere without waiting and then look over at the summary tab to see what the habibility index has changed to.  Remeber also that the percent of oxygen in atmosphere needs to be below 30% or it becomes a toxic gas as well.

Brian

[Thiosk]

Auroraling humans require 0.1 atm partial pressure of oxygen to breathe.  Thats the minimum.  They can survive if the pressure is less than 4 atmospheres total.  So .1 atm of oxygen and make the rest greenhouse gas to get the temp up.  Then dump in nitrogen as necessary to fill out other requirements.