Post by: Steve Walmsley on March 19, 2010, 10:36:19 PM
Homo Articus
Breathable Gas: Oxygen
Ideal Temperature: 7C Temperature Range: -17C to 31C
Ideal Oxygen Level: 0.18 atm Oxygen Range (50%) : 0.09 atm to 0.27 atm
Ideal Gravity: 0.8G Gravity Range (70%) : 0.24G to 1.36G
Development Cost for Project: 8000RP
A new installation, the Genetic Modification Centre (GMC), has been added as well. This installation will modify members of the original species to the new species, creating (or adding to) a new population of the modified species on the same planet. Colony ships can then transport colonists from this new population. As well as creation via the GMC, the new species will increase naturally through population growth. One GMC will cost 2400 BP and require 300 Duranium, 1200 Corbomite, 600 Boronide and 300 Mercassium. I haven't made my final decision yet on the conversion rate but I am working on 250,000 per GMC per year. So 20 GMC would convert five million population humans (Homo Sapien) per year to Homo Articus. Assuming you can find five million volunteers/dupes/convicts, etc
. Any species created in this way is flagged as a genetically modified species and cannot be used as a basis for further modification. You can also only convert non-modified species and you can only covert to another species if it is a derived version of the current species.This provides an alternative to terraforming and adds some interesting fiction possibilities as humanity (or other species) diversify over time to meet the needs of different environments. At some point I intend to also add military-related genetic modifications that will affect the capabilities of ground troops. I am keeping the genetic changes simple at the moment but I will expand on them once the existing system is playtested.
Steve
Post by: UnLimiTeD on March 20, 2010, 07:24:00 AM
thank you, Steve.
Post by: waresky on March 20, 2010, 07:36:49 AM
Homus Articus..u have read some pournelle or Earth Empire (Sauron revolt in Falkenbergs Universe..CoDominium then later MOTIES encounters..
..)
Post by: Charlie Beeler on March 20, 2010, 09:05:48 AM
Yes, I read Baened books
Post by: Aldaris on March 20, 2010, 09:18:03 AM
Post by: sluissa on March 20, 2010, 02:25:25 PM
Quote from: "Aldaris"
Abusing the gravity characteristic to make asteroids habitable could make for a VERY interesting game. Especially if you RP any conflicts between Homo Terra and Homa Astra.
Are asteroids habitable at all, even with incredibly low gravity tolerances?
Post by: Venec on March 20, 2010, 02:35:53 PM
Post by: Shadow on March 20, 2010, 05:42:11 PM
Quote from: "sluissa"
As far as I know, no, they're not.Quote from: "Aldaris"Abusing the gravity characteristic to make asteroids habitable could make for a VERY interesting game. Especially if you RP any conflicts between Homo Terra and Homa Astra.
Are asteroids habitable at all, even with incredibly low gravity tolerances?
PS: Commission!
Post by: The Shadow on March 21, 2010, 12:38:57 AM
It does seem a lot faster than terraforming a planet, though.
How would you see the colony cost of a world from a sub-race's perspective?
Post by: Vanigo on March 21, 2010, 11:20:41 AM
Quote from: "UnLimiTeD"
:shock:Yeah, being able to engineer people for chlorine resistance and the like would be nice additions to this.
WOOHOO!
*breaks out in frenetic jubilation and slams into the closest wall*
I'm amazed! Now we just need a way to modify breathable gases
thank you, Steve.
Edit: Oh, and shouldn't you at least be able to modify subspecies back to the base species if it comes up? And is there a way to move installations and the like between populations on the same planet without needing cargo ships?
Post by: Steve Walmsley on March 23, 2010, 12:50:30 AM
Quote from: "sluissa"
No, I am going to cap the min gravity tolerances. If asteroids become habitable, all the body suitability checks in the code are going to kill performance.Quote from: "Aldaris"Abusing the gravity characteristic to make asteroids habitable could make for a VERY interesting game. Especially if you RP any conflicts between Homo Terra and Homa Astra.
Are asteroids habitable at all, even with incredibly low gravity tolerances?
Steve
Post by: Steve Walmsley on March 23, 2010, 12:51:46 AM
Quote from: "The Shadow"
Thumbs up! Though I'm not sure about Genetic Modification from a roleplaying perspective.Faster than terraforming if you have the new species in place. The research costs for the various tech lines in Genetic modification are quite expensive.
It does seem a lot faster than terraforming a planet, though.
Steve
Post by: Aldaris on March 24, 2010, 05:14:22 PM
In my current game I've had a five slipway commercial yard pump out terraformers constantly for over two decades. I have more than 60 ships overall. Terraforming is free once the modules are in place, and the fuel costs are neglicible. All you're saving with GM is a year or two in time.
Post by: UnLimiTeD on March 24, 2010, 06:14:19 PM
Post by: Aldaris on March 25, 2010, 08:37:13 AM
Post by: UnLimiTeD on March 25, 2010, 12:33:47 PM
And if Jump Engines are able to bend space around a ship to the point of being able to jump on La Grange points, it should be possible to make a planet look heavier than it is.
Low Gravity is also in no way lethal, you could circumvent arising problems with 'weight suits' or similar.
In the end, I just think too LOW gravity should drastically contribute to colony cost, but it shouldn't make a planet entirely uninhabitable.
On the other side, just like terraforming, stripmining a planet could gradually reduce it's weight.
If ships can travel at lightspeed while still communicating and staying combat capable, realistically someone should have found a way to do it....
Post by: Father Tim on March 25, 2010, 06:01:49 PM
Quote from: "UnLimiTeD"
Low Gravity is also in no way lethal, you could circumvent arising problems with 'weight suits' or similar.
In the end, I just think too LOW gravity should drastically contribute to colony cost, but it shouldn't make a planet entirely uninhabitable.
The problem is a sufficiently low grav tolerance - one that makes every little rock and asteroid habitable, even at ridiculously high colony costs - WILL KILL THE PROGRAM. When you start filling asteroid belts with anything other than ColCost = N/A Aurora dies, taking minutes to run even the simplest 5-second update.
So no matter how much you want it, or how logical it may be, it's not going to happen.
Post by: UnLimiTeD on March 25, 2010, 08:04:27 PM
Or, I don't know, exclude all Asteroids?
Example: The moon.
Could be a nice place to set up a colony, why ever one would do that.
It's gravity is roughly one sixth that of earth, I think thats pretty habitable. Below a certain point, which to my knowledge no or at best a few asteroids in the solar system reach, you could pretty much jump into space with a car or the like, which would certainly lead to the loss of quite some people.
And something actually needs a sufficient size for a population, which on asteroids is not a given.
There can always be a limit.
Aside, adding an option to terraform gravity would still work, if you want to inhabit that specific body, and be it an asteroid, you have to make it that way first. Limits the amount of habitable asteroids to the number your able to grow to reasonable size within one game, which will probably be no more than 2.
In my current game, I set gravity tolerance to 85% at a .9 base, and it still works. Also comes way closer to real human tolerances.
Though, well, I agree I sort of remove the problem by that
I just would want to have extra cost on small moons. But this is not the topic.
This is the place to celebrate Steves newest invention.
Post by: sloanjh on March 25, 2010, 10:30:20 PM
Quote from: "UnLimiTeD"
Yeah, right, and it's totally impossible to set a lower limit to .1 or exclude everything that isn't a moon or a Planet.Just to be clear, populated colonies on the Moon are possible now - I've got one in my current game (the Moon had good minerals). Steve expressly lowered the minimum limit (to 0.1, I think) when I asked for it for exactly that reason. Any lower, though, and as Father Tim says it will break the program.
Or, I don't know, exclude all Asteroids?
Example: The moon.
John
Post by: Steve Walmsley on March 25, 2010, 10:53:03 PM
Quote from: "UnLimiTeD"
But you can't change the gravity, why ever that is.Two reasons
1) Realism: Adding or removing atmosphere is a lot easier than changing the size of a planet or altering its mass. Earth has undergone some huge atmospheric changes in its history. it hasn't changed its gravity. While having gravity in a ship through some type of artificial gravity would be reasonable, you can't cover a planet in gravity plating.
2) Gameplay: Having every asteroid as a potential habitable planet would absolutely kill performance in many areas of the program due to the large number of checks that are made each turn in relation to colony cost. Gravity is a very simple way of excluding 99% of system bodies from those checks.
Steve
Post by: Steve Walmsley on March 25, 2010, 11:04:17 PM
Quote from: "UnLimiTeD"
You could crash some asteroids into it.Just to check, you do know the solid crust is only 30 miles thick and the other 8000 miles of diameter is the stuff that comes out of volcanoes? The temperature in the mantle (below 30 miles) varies from 500 to 900 °C. Also, where would you put the material you stripmined? The mass of the Earth is 6,580,000,000,000,000,000,000 tons so it may take a while with mass drivers.
And if Jump Engines are able to bend space around a ship to the point of being able to jump on La Grange points, it should be possible to make a planet look heavier than it is.
Low Gravity is also in no way lethal, you could circumvent arising problems with 'weight suits' or similar.
In the end, I just think too LOW gravity should drastically contribute to colony cost, but it shouldn't make a planet entirely uninhabitable.
On the other side, just like terraforming, stripmining a planet could gradually reduce it's weight.
Quote
If ships can travel at lightspeed while still communicating and staying combat capable, realistically someone should have found a way to do it....[/i]Believe me, getting a ship to travel at 5,000 km/s per second will be child's play compared to changing the gravity of the Earth. We could already do the former with current technology - it would just take a lot of money and a lot of acceleration time. We can also manufacture gases using 19th century chemistry. As far as I know, there are no current studies with regard to changing Earth's gravity.
Steve
Post by: UnLimiTeD on March 26, 2010, 05:45:53 AM
Yep, thats basically it, everything is just an extension of current technology, and then bumped up to ridiculous heights.We have no way currently, or probably the next few thousand years, to mave mass at light speed, without time freeze and using more energy than a star could provide.
Ultimately, if this is possible, I think it's not too far off to change a planets gravity, or, say, create a Dyson's Sphere, after all. (not a shell)
(It would make for awesome stories in campaigns, atleast that much I'm sure of^^)
Though this is not really a matter of my personal concern, so let's just leave it be.
One can always make stuff up with SM functions after all.
(Is it actually possible to alter a Planets gravity with SM functions? Never tried...)
Post by: Steve Walmsley on March 26, 2010, 08:34:23 AM
Quote from: "UnLimiTeD"
*smirks* :)). There are no physicists talking about changing the gravity of planets. Besides, as I mentioned earlier, with current tech and lots of money/fuel/acceleration we could build a near-light speed spacecraft right now. The fundamental physical laws that Aurora breaks with TN Physics are not speed-related but momentum-related.
I think we had better agree to differ
Steve
Post by: Andrew on March 26, 2010, 08:55:01 AM
Quote from: "UnLimiTeD"
*smirks*I have to say that changing a planets gravity is almost inconsievable. Ignoring that is is much more unlikely than the rest of the tech in this game have you considered the secondary effects?
We have no way currently, or probably the next few thousand years, to mave mass at light speed, without time freeze and using more energy than a star could provide.
Ultimately, if this is possible, I think it's not too far off to change a planets gravity, or, say, create a Dyson's Sphere, after all. (not a shell)
(It would make for awesome stories in campaigns, atleast that much I'm sure of^^)
Though this is not really a matter of my personal concern, so let's just leave it be.
One can always make stuff up with SM functions after all.
(Is it actually possible to alter a Planets gravity with SM functions? Never tried...)
Planets are the shape and size they are due to the interaction between their materials and their gravity , you would cause the liquid elements of the planet to shrink, and heat the core this would cause massive tectonic effects wrecking the planet.
Next the planets gravity would now pull more strongly on all the celestial bodies in the system, although probably not relevant in the time span of the game this would result in things like the moon(s) hitting the planet, increased asteroid impacts and if you changed the gravity of a big ehought body such as Jupiter pulling other planets out of their orbits (Jovian or larger planets may under a higher gravity initiate fusion and turn into short lived stars)
Decreasing the gravity would cause the planet to lose atmosphere and again cause changes to the inertior of the planet , massive tectonic activity and result in things like the moons heading off on their own.
I presume that some degree of gravity manipulation technology is available allowing local manipulation of gravity which explains how crews can be confortable on ships and allows for the small outposts you can build on hostile gravity planets .
On the moving things at Light speed , there is at least 2 good theoretical methods of moving objects at apparent speeds comparable to that of the speed of light (of course like all theoretical FTL Schemes they are probably wrong). With current teachnology 8-12% of C is practical with Orion Drives
Post by: UnLimiTeD on March 26, 2010, 09:09:37 AM
It's an unimportant side discussion, and keeps the important people from doing the important stuff^^.Gravity after all would be a late techline anyways, and that means people will hardly get there.
SM functions can probably simulate a good part of it anyways.
Btw, if you start about secondary effects of gravity, without the moon, an earthday would be around 5 hours, it's also slowly escaping right now and will probably leave us in a billion years or two, resulting in shorter days (The biological clock of humans is genetically set to 25 hours for most individuals, and a few billion years back, the moon was so close that the tides raised the LAND by several meters), and Mars lost all of it's atmosphere because of the solar wind, and probably would again without constant terraforming, even venus is streaming atmosphere constantly, earth is an exception because it has a magnetic field.
Btw. I've already thought about the possibility of turning a Jovian into a Star, that would be awesome for a Campaign. Is that possible with SM functions?^^
Post by: Andrew on March 26, 2010, 11:12:53 AM
Quote from: "UnLimiTeD"
SM functions can probably simulate a good part of it anyways.
Btw, if you start about secondary effects of gravity, without the moon, an earthday would be around 5 hours, it's also slowly escaping right now and will probably leave us in a billion years or two, resulting in shorter days (The biological clock of humans is genetically set to 25 hours for most individuals, and a few billion years back, the moon was so close that the tides raised the LAND by several meters), and Mars lost all of it's atmosphere because of the solar wind, and probably would again without constant terraforming, even venus is streaming atmosphere constantly, earth is an exception because it has a magnetic field.
quote]
I know.
Post by: praguepride on March 29, 2010, 08:28:53 AM
And wouldn't atmospheric pressure simulate gravity? If you've got 10 atm's pressing down on you, you're not going to jump like michael jackson any time soon (if you don't get crushed outright...)
What I think base gravity should do is alter how many gasses stay in the atmopshere. So low gravity worlds leech out atmosphere, eventually reducing atmosphere pressure and thus lowering gravity again...
/shrug. just a though...
Post by: Shadow on March 29, 2010, 08:48:52 AM
With 10 atm, I think breathing would be a problem, but you could probably fly/glide unassisted.
Post by: The Shadow on March 29, 2010, 08:57:44 AM
And no, a thick atmosphere is not a way to simulate a change in gravity. A light body like an asteroid can't hold onto an atmosphere anyway.
Spinning up a heavy planet would indeed make you feel lighter at the equator (no change at the poles)... but there would be a lot of problems, to say the least.
Post by: praguepride on March 29, 2010, 08:00:06 PM
Another alternative would be to set up orbital colonies, but space stations would probably be a whole new suggestion (that has already been suggested before)
Post by: The Shadow on April 16, 2010, 02:59:25 AM
1) How can you tell how many Genetic Modification Centres a colony has? I can't seem to find it anywhere. I know I have some because I built them.
I am assuming that the number of GMC's controls how fast people are converted to the new race?
Also, a target number for population of the new race (similar to the "Maximum Atm" for terraforming) might be nice.
2) New races seem to really resent being a minority on a planet. Is there any way to make them happy short of moving troops onto their colony?
3) Will baseline humans resent being a minority on a planet settled by a new race?
4) ...I was going to ask how many cargo holds a GMC takes up, until I just tried it, and found that GMC's are not listed as possible to be loaded?
Post by: Steve Walmsley on April 16, 2010, 10:14:48 AM
Quote from: "The Shadow"
OK, I've been playing around with species modification in the newly-minted 5.10, and I have a couple questions:
1) How can you tell how many Genetic Modification Centres a colony has? I can't seem to find it anywhere. I know I have some because I built them. :). I missed it because I used SM Mode to add some GMC for test purposes. Use SM Mode for now to add the GMC you built and the fix will be in v5.11 which I will release later today.QuoteI am assuming that the number of GMC's controls how fast people are converted to the new race?Yes. Its 250,000 per GMC per year.QuoteAlso, a target number for population of the new race (similar to the "Maximum Atm" for terraforming) might be nice.They don't just resent being a minority on the planet. They resent being a minority in your Empire. This is only a problem though if their Xenophobia is over 50%. Perhaps I should add some characteristics to species design as well as just tolerances. The amount of unrest is based on their percentage of the population, with smaller amounts causing more unrest, and their xenophobia, with higher xenophobia causing more unrest. Once they grow beyond 10% it is no longer a problem. I think with the introduction of the new species creation I will drop this to 5% for v5.11, as there are likely to be quite a few minorities.
2) New races seem to really resent being a minority on a planet. Is there any way to make them happy short of moving troops onto their colony?
3) Will baseline humans resent being a minority on a planet settled by a new race?Quote4) ...I was going to ask how many cargo holds a GMC takes up, until I just tried it, and found that GMC's are not listed as possible to be loaded?They can be loaded (once they are built
Steve
Post by: UnLimiTeD on April 16, 2010, 10:29:51 AM
I mean, just imagine a giant space republic with dozens of races, every single one will be a minority!
You could just calculate genetic modifications as a sub entity of the base race, I mean, with reasonable genetic modifications, 5% of your empire of 80% humans being genetic modifications would not really feel like a minority, but those immaterial lizardmen will surely feel like one, and they will count the genetically modified humans to "Aliens".
Post by: sloanjh on April 16, 2010, 10:37:39 AM
Quote from: "UnLimiTeD"
I mean, just imagine a giant space republic with dozens of races, every single one will be a minority!Yep :-) ).
John
Post by: Steve Walmsley on April 16, 2010, 10:45:12 AM
Quote from: "UnLimiTeD"
Shouldn't the "minority threshold" be based on the % difference to populations over a specific amount of population %, or maybe just the biggest?That's a good point. I have changed the 'minority' threshold to 5% of the population of the most populous species in the Empire
I mean, just imagine a giant space republic with dozens of races, every single one will be a minority!
Quote
You could just calculate genetic modifications as a sub entity of the base race, I mean, with reasonable genetic modifications, 5% of your empire of 80% humans being genetic modifications would not really feel like a minority, but those immaterial lizardmen will surely feel like one, and they will count the genetically modified humans to "Aliens".Think of all the trouble we have now because humans of the same species have a slightly different skin colour or worship a slightly different version of the same God. Now imagine what would happen if you have a species of human that is designed to live on cold, high gravity worlds with dense atmsopheres. I am sure they would blend right in
Steve
Post by: The Shadow on April 16, 2010, 12:56:56 PM
Post by: Steve Walmsley on April 16, 2010, 01:52:44 PM
Quote from: "The Shadow"
Er... If I don't really have any GMC's, then how is it that I'm managing to convert people to the new race? Is there some small baseline amount of genetic modification even without a GMC?Oops! I wrote out all the code for the GMC production and tested it. I just forgot to include the number of GMC
so the code is assuming one. I guess there will soon be a v5.12Steve
Post by: UnLimiTeD on April 16, 2010, 01:59:36 PM
They are not going to appear and they are not doing anything if we create them.^^
Steve is always trying to improve this game, this time he gave us nothing to protect us from bad things :D
Post by: Steve Walmsley on April 16, 2010, 02:07:00 PM
Steve
Post by: UnLimiTeD on April 16, 2010, 02:12:09 PM
Must... resit... urge ... to... download it.! grahhhh! ..can't .
Post by: bobusdoleus on May 16, 2010, 07:23:40 PM
To some sort of menu that concerns asteroids, have a little check-box in a corner of a menu somewhere that says 'Consider this as a candidate for colonization.' Have the game ignore asteroids, as before, with the specific exception of asteroids the player explicitly states they may want to colonize. Since this will be a much more finite number, the game shouldn't crash, especially if players remember to un-check asteroids they no longer care about.
Mmm? Mmm?
Post by: Beersatron on June 20, 2010, 09:53:01 PM
Every 5-day increment sees the Marians grow unrestfull and that unrest is put down by the Garrison I have on planet.
Would it be possible to lower the minority flag from a Species that is based on the Stock species and has a large population on a planet? i.e. the population is over 25million and no longer a default destination of colonist.
29million people on a planet populated by just them shouldn't be a minority imo.
Post by: UnLimiTeD on June 21, 2010, 04:17:26 AM
I'm sure theres a group of 29 million people in china feeling very much like a minorty^^.
Just the unrest I don't quite get.
Post by: Beersatron on June 21, 2010, 04:00:16 PM
I re-read some of Steve's responses and seen a reference to xenophobia level so went and had a look. Humans rolled with a 95 this game, I lowered it to 35 for both human and Martian and the minority status went away.
I don't normally look at that aspect of the race screen otherwise I would have lowered it at the start.