To Slowly Go ... (Aurora)

[Brian Swartz]

It truly is a tragedy of epic proportions that there has never been an Aurora dynasty around these parts. I shall have to change that.

Aurora is a freeware indie 4x game. It has been called, accurately in my opinion, the Dwarf Fortress of 4x games -- you could also call it a 4x text-sim. For the detail-oriented player who doesn't mind micromanaging, it is fabulous, definitely more in-depth than any commercial 4x I've ever played.

Like almost all other 4x games, it doesn't pretend to use Newtonian physics, but rather space fleets behave much more like their Earth-based naval counterparts. You can begin with the more advanced Trans-Newtonian setting, but I prefer the Conventional start, which is roughly analogous to modern-day technology.

There is no official backstory, and I won't bore the forum by attempting to write a bad one. Generally though, it does begin in the fairly near post-apocalyptic future. I like to envision a combination of WWIII for the purpose of securing Earth's dwindling resources, and a comet strike such as in the movie Deep Impact combining to create the public will to unify around the goal of taking space exploration seriously.

For anyone not epically bored already who is interested in more info about the game -- I haven't played it very much as I just recently discovered it, but I've become a quick addict and will answer any questions I can.

[Brian Swartz]

2.21.2051 -- London

This is effectively the start date of our story. Young Benjamin Sullivan(22 years old) and his research team have announced the completion of the technological leap that makes serious exploitation of interstellar space a real possibility, dubbed Trans-Newtonian Technology.

EARTH, BY THE NUMBERS

Population: 514.4 million
Manufacturing Work Force: 102.9m, 60m available. The lion's share, 37.5m, are currently employed in construction.
Industrial Capacity: 750 Conventional Industry*
Shipyards: 1, with a single 1000-ton slipway.
Starfleet: None
Research Labs: 4

*Conventional Industry gives way to Construction Factories/Mines/Refineries/etc. with the advent of Trans-Newtonian Technology. The difference is massive: an equivalent number of specialized facilities will effectively quadruple industrial output. Converting the existing CI immediately becomes a top economic priority.

Resources

Aside of course from the peope themselves, there are 11 resources to concern ourselves with. Each is listed with the size of the deposit(in tons), accessibility(as a deposit diminishes, mines produce less for the same amount of effort as it becomes more difficult to reach the remaining veins. 100% amounts to virtually picking it up off the surface, the other extreme being 10% which essentially involves a lot of deep core drilling), years to depletion, and currently available stockpile.

Duranium: 110 kt, 90%, 163y, 768t
Neutronium: 10.1 kt, 50%, 27y, 427t
Corbomite: 15.5 kt, 100%, 21y, 854t
Tritanium: 9.83 kt, 20%, 65y, 171t
Boronide: 11.1 kt, 20%, 74y, 171t
Mercassium: 12.3 kt, 30%, 55y, 256t
Vendarite: 24.4 kt, 70%, 46y, 598t
Sorium*: 24.3 kt, 80%, 40y, 262t
Uridium: 9.83 kt, 20%, 65y, 171t
Corundium: 32.3 kt, 215y, 171t
Gallicite: 18.4 kt, 90%, 27y, 768t

* Sorium is the only one presently being consumed before we do anything, as the CI is refining a good portion of this into fuel.

All mines contribute to gathering all resources across the board -- the only way to increase the rate is to increase the number of mines by building more, or by researching more advanced mining technologies.

[Brian Swartz]

SHIP TECH

Our immediate strategic concern is to begin exploiting off-world resources and expand our footprint in the Sol system beyond earth. However, this is something which is really impossible to do at our current level of advancement.

The biggest size ship our shipyard can construct is 1,000 tons, which by comparison is just over twice the size of the International Space Station. The ISS would qualify merely as a reasonably large fighter in galactic terms, however(fighters being any vessel 500 tons or less). We have the base technology that would allow us to design conventional engines that could propel a 1,000-ton ship at a max speed of 90-100 km/s, or about 5 times as fast as the Voyager/New Horizon missions that are the peak of present-day NASA's achievement to date. The sensors that would be required to search for gravitational anomalies that would allow us to jump to other systems, or to properly survey moons, planets, and asteroids for resources, etc. have yet to be researched. And our weapons tech are far from being able to mount anything useful in a space-faring sense. So while we are capable of building some starting ships, they wouldn't be able to do much more than 'sail' around the solar system -- we don't have the components for them to accomplish any useful mission.

LEADERS

We have a number of leaders in four important categories: Naval Officers, Ground Forces Officers, Civilian Administrators, and Scientists. The Naval and Ground Forces are not so important until we have significant military forces in those areas, but it is still useful to note who our top leaders are in those areas at this point.

NAVAL OFFICERS

Rear Admiral Abigail Black(F, 29) begins as the commander at our Fleet HQ, a hilarious title since we have no fleet, but that will not always be the case. Abigail hails from a wealthy family and notably has a bonus to Fighter Operations. Her top subordinates are Captains Morgan Summers(M, 27) and Ellen Bradley(F, 33).

GROUND FORCES OFFICERS

Brigadier Generals Kian Cooke(M, 26) and Rebecca Brown(F, 29) are the notables here. Kian Cooke excels at diplomacy and ground combat, and is candid, a good motivator, a problem-solver, and personable. Rebecca Brown also has laudable skills in ground combat, and is known for her arrogance. Kian is unquestionably the better of the two officers.

CIVILIAN ADMINISTRATORS

At this point, one of humanity's important decisions is electing a governor of Earth. In game terms, we simply appoint one, but I prefer to RP the game as much as possible and four of our initial five candidates qualify for the job:

Louise Jennings(F, 22)
** Good health, Courageous, and Dispassionate
** +20% Political Reliability, +15% Factory Production, +10% Terraforming, +10% Population Growth, +10% Ground Unit Construction Speed

Sarah Parkinson(F, 22)
** Excellent health, Combative, Insightful, Organised, and Problem-solver
** +25% Xenology, 10% Mining

Lauren Baker(F, 22)
** Excellent health, Cold manner, Punctual, and Subjective
** +20% Espionage, +10% Shipbuilding, +10% Wealth Creation, +10% Ground Unit Construction Speed

Taylor Naylor(M, 22)
** Excellent health, problem-solver, psychological problems, strange medical condition
** +20% Mining, +15% Wealth Creation, +15% Logistics, +10% Political Reliability

Overall, there is no question Jennings is both the most qualified and best candidate. People are fickle, however, and instead her top rival was narrowly elected. Barring a disaster of some kind, Sarah Parkinson will be governor of Earth for the next four years(Tours of service for all leaders can be anywhere from 1 month to 5 years). Her Xenology bonus will have little use or impact -- we have no knowledge of any alien ruins. The mining focus is much more immediately beneficial. Of course, it also means that the deposits will be depleted sooner. The first mineral we are slated to run out of, Corbomite, is now expected to be depleted in less than 19 years instead of 20+.

LEADING SCIENTISTS

All scientists have a primary field of specialization, in which they get a significant bonus to how quickly they can research a new technology, and an administration ability, which impacts how many research labs they can effectively use on a project. All research requires a top scientist and a number of labs(anywhere from 1 to their maximum) to develop.

Benjamin Sullivan you've already been introduced to: his primary field is Power and Propulsion(10% bonus), with a maximum of 25 labs. Another Power and Propulsion scientist has recently been promoted, James Gibbs(15%, 25 labs), and Eleanor Watts(10%, 5 labs) specializes in Energy Weapons.

In addition to those two fields, there are six more: Biology & Genetics, Construction & Production, Defensive Systems, Logistics & Ground Combat, Missiles & Kinetic Weapons, and Sensors & Fire Control. With two of our three top scientists in the Power & Propulsion field, we can clearly see that this will be a focus of our research efforts.

[sabotai]

Giving the game a look now.

[Brian Swartz]

INITIAL RESEARCH

** Eleanor Watts starts working on a Microwave weapon design(focal size 10cm). We could also look into torpedoes, or laser/meson weapons in this field, but microwaves sound cooler to me at the moment. Yes, that's really the only reason. With a single lab at her disposal, this is currently slated to take more than three years to research.

** James Gibbs is now our best in the favored Power & Propulsion field, and to begin with he'll work on designing some conventional engines, beginning with the military variety. He'll get a pair of labs to use, and since the underlying technology is already known to us -- this is just a component design, meaning translating the concept into a specific blueprint and therefore much easier -- that will only take a little over a month.

** Benjamin Sullivan will be assigned to work on sensors, beginning with geological survey sensors. There are other kinds which are important for different things, but resources are the top priority.

INDUSTRY

As already mentioned, converting the conventional industry is a big priority. Fortunately, we can work on more than one project at once by simply assigning a percentage of the industrial capacity. So to begin, we'll do the following:

** 25% converting CI to construction factories(increasing industrial output)
** 25% converting CI to mines(increasing mining output)
** 25% building research labs(our scientists can handle a total of 55 labs, and we have a pathetic 4)
** 25% building a few refineries to build up a stockpile of fuel.

Research labs are going to be a problem. We won't be able to build that many of them. They take a long time to make, but even if we ripped every gram of mercassium out of the crust tomorrow, they require 1.2 kt each which means we'd only have enough for 10. This underscores the need for off-world resources. There's no ships we can usefully build yet, but as soon as we can ...

TEAMS

There is also the possibility of finding more resources on earth. Four kinds of teams can be formed from the leaders in our 'empire': Xenology, Espionage, Diplomacy, and Geology. We have no alien ruins which makes Xenology pointless right now, and we have no contact with any extra-terrestrials which means Diplomacy and Espionage would be of little use. However, a geology team might be able to uncover something on Earth that we have missed so far.

Captain Morgan Summers will lead the team, and after selecting an additional four members they get to work. Anyone with the relevant skill(Geology in this case) is eligible.

That's it for our initial introduction, time to get this show on the road.