A Space colonization mod?

[Heraclitus]

Originally posted by GeoModder

Not necessarily. The Soviet Union was a nuclear power too when it collapsed. No nukes were used in that "revolution".

The Soviet Union had lenient leadership at the time, there was no civil war. I can't imagine a US president lenient enough to let the US break up without a civil war.

Originally posted by GeoModder

You mentioned the beginnings of a space elevator. At present, the only suitable location for such a structure is Mt. Kenia in the Kenia (Africa). So I think its reasonable to assume a rising economic African spacepower in that area.

Or that Kenya is a colony again.

The base station designs typically fall into two categories—mobile and stationary. Mobile stations are typically large oceangoing vessels,[26] though airborne stations have been proposed as well.[citation needed] Stationary platforms would generally be located in high-altitude locations, such as on top of mountains, or even potentially on high towers.[5]

Mobile platforms have the advantage of being able to maneuver to avoid high winds, storms, and space debris. While stationary platforms don't have these advantages, they typically would have access to cheaper and more reliable power sources, and require a shorter cable. While the decrease in cable length may seem minimal (typically no more than a few kilometers), that can significantly reduce the minimal width of the cable at the center, and reduce the minimal length of cable reaching beyond geostationary orbit significantly.

In any case I imagined it being a mobile station.

[GeoModder]

Originally posted by Heraclitus
The Soviet Union had lenient leadership at the time, there was no civil war. I can't imagine a US president lenient enough to let the US break up without a civil war.

You never know. The "stern grandfather type" of presidents the US seems to sprout so often might have come to an end 60 years from now. Besides, with over half the military being from non-anglo descend (aren't the poor demographic groups over represented in the army anyway?) any president might not be able to rely on a military solution.

Originally posted by Heraclitus
Or that Kenia is a colony again.

Please! Even todays "colonies" indebt the homecountry more often then not in the face of relentless opposition!
That will only become worser in times when economies are even more ramshackle and available weapons for guerillas more lethal/destructive.

Originally posted by Heraclitus
In any case I imagined it being a mobile station.

[Heraclitus]

Originally posted by GeoModder

Please! Even todays "colonies" indebt the homecountry more often then not in the face of relentless opposition!
That will only become worser in times when economies are even more ramshackle and available weapons for guerillas more lethal/destructive.

Now, now neocolonialism is alive and well. And China is showing remarkable talent for it. A country can be independent and still be a colony for all intents and purposes.


A major piece of infrastructure needs not be built in a developed country. The Panama and Suez canals are a good example. Built by foreign imperialist powers, they remained under their control for decades before the local population managed to gain some control and even after that it was forced to allow concessions to the previous owners.

[GeoModder]

Originally posted by Heraclitus
Now, now neocolonialism is alive and well. And China is showing remarkable talent for it. A country can be independent and still be a colony for all intents and purposes.

And another neocolonial power, the USA, is running a huge deficit because of this.

[Impaler[WrG]]

Theirs not reason a space elevator need be built on the top of a mountain, thats just something Clark put in the book to provide a justification for the Shrilanka like setting. Any equatorial site is adequate, even attacking to a floating platform at sea.

As for Southwestern US succeeding to become some kind of bilingual state, thats 10 years behind the times because Hispanics have gone EVERY WARE in the US, its not just regional now (one of the main reasons for the surge in anti-immigrant sentiment) also theirs no logical reason for the Hispanic population of the region to want to break away from the federal government, the feds provides practically all welfare services as the southwest (outside of California) has exceedingly stingy state governments. The predominantly poorer Hispanic population isn't going to screw itself over like that.

[Heraclitus]

Originally posted by Impaler[WrG]
Theirs not reason a space elevator need be built on the top of a mountain, thats just something Clark put in the book to provide a justification for the Shrilanka like setting. Any equatorial site is adequate, even attacking to a floating platform at sea.

As for Southwestern US succeeding to become some kind of bilingual state, thats 10 years behind the times because Hispanics have gone EVERY WARE in the US, its not just regional now (one of the main reasons for the surge in anti-immigrant sentiment) also theirs no logical reason for the Hispanic population of the region to want to break away from the federal government, the feds provides practically all welfare services as the southwest (outside of California) has exceedingly stingy state governments. The predominantly poorer Hispanic population isn't going to screw itself over like that.

That is why I proposed that he whole of the US becomes a bilingual country. But GeoModder has some persistent fantasy about a breaking up the US.

[GeoModder]

Originally posted by Impaler[WrG]
Theirs not reason a space elevator need be built on the top of a mountain, thats just something Clark put in the book to provide a justification for the Shrilanka like setting. Any equatorial site is adequate, even attacking to a floating platform at sea.

There's a very good reason to built a space elevator on top of a mountain as long as your materials technology isn't mature enough: the mass of the whole thing. Those last 5 vertical kilometers can make the difference for the whole structural integrity.
Another reason a mountain is preferable would be the atmosphere itself. If things indeed go haywire with global warming there's no telling how the weather in the relatively calmer equatorial regions will develop. For all we know super-Katrina's will be born right on it, sweeping any floating platform beneath the waves. And since typically hurricanes spread out several hundreds of kilometers a platform can hardly avoid those...

Originally posted by Impaler[WrG]
As for Southwestern US succeeding to become some kind of bilingual state, thats 10 years behind the times because Hispanics have gone EVERY WARE in the US, its not just regional now (one of the main reasons for the surge in anti-immigrant sentiment) also theirs no logical reason for the Hispanic population of the region to want to break away from the federal government, the feds provides practically all welfare services as the southwest (outside of California) has exceedingly stingy state governments. The predominantly poorer Hispanic population isn't going to screw itself over like that.

The feds provide wellfare services today. Would they still do so 2 generations from now. Or even be able to do so. Is it so impossible that Anglo-resentment about Hispanic migration hits the fan and explodes somehow?

Originally posted by Heraclitus
That is why I proposed that he whole of the US becomes a bilingual country. But GeoModder has some persistent fantasy about a breaking up the US.

Blame Heinlein in his "Friday" novel.
Bottom point is, it might look cooler to have a whole new set of "superpowers", or significantly altered ones, in a future Colonisation setting. But in any case whatever the "powers of the day" are, it shouldn't have a tremendeous impact on the Lunar setting itself. It's just backstory fluff.

[Heraclitus]

I think I agree with your last point, we should drop the story for now and talk about the mod's economy and what it will be about.


I'm in favour of starting out with a copy cat of Colonizations economy and then tweaking it so it makes sense and is more interesting.


Perhaps we should drop simulating just the Moon and focus on an asteroid colonization mod? That could be easier to do, since it would basically be "islands floating in space" and potentially more interesting since several map scripts could be made, the Moon could be reserved for a scenario whit very short travel times to earth and a giant blob instead of several small rocks.

[GeoModder]

Originally posted by Heraclitus
I'm in favour of starting out with a copy cat of Colonizations economy and then tweaking it so it makes sense and is more interesting.

Originally posted by Heraclitus
Perhaps we should drop simulating just the Moon and focus on an asteroid colonization mod? That could be easier to do, since it would basically be "islands floating in space" and potentially more interesting since several map scripts could be made, the Moon could be reserved for a scenario whit very short travel times to earth and a giant blob instead of several small rocks.

I'd be in quite in favour of an asteroid colonization mod if a mapscript could be created with orbiting planets/moons/asteroids around a central point (the sun).
But nothing I read on the engine sofar says that's possible. At least not the orbiting part.
A Final Frontier graphics port seems possible, but that encompasses several solar systems.
A classical mapscript of a moon/planet is where the game itself is based upon, but I don't know if in civ4:Col a mapscript can be made round (units moving over the westside appearing on the eastside of the screen).

On an interstellar colonization level, I'd be hard pressed to find tradeable commodities that Earth would need. Not metals, that's for sure. Some native flora/fauna, data, rare exquisitive foodstuff/beverages for the rich at home,... Bulk food wouldn't be economically feasable, that's for sure.
On a solar system level, commodities are easy: metals and composites of all kinds, data, He³, perhaps even waterice.
And the Moon is of course mostly the same as asteroids qua resources.

[Heraclitus]

I can think of Dilithium crystals.

So for now we are stuck with a solar system space colonization mod? That can be fun too. Now maybe we could avoid the orbit problem if we take the ringworld and combine that with the suggestion of Imapler to make space ships launcable in every space square


We would just have to ignore or lock out the full out zoom and it would be identical to an orbiting asteroid field. Its drawback is that we won't be able to have both a moon and and asteroid field in the same map.

Sun + Inner solar system = S
X = Asteroid belt

XXXX
X s X
XXXX

[Heraclitus]

Wouldn't it be possible to steal the space terrain graphics from Final Frontier Blue marble? The asteorids could also be used as minor asteroids. The terrain for the major asteorids (The ones you can settle) we could perhaps steal from Song of the Moon?


I know C4C isn't compatible with civ4 and civ4 BtS but there surley must be a way to convert the graphics?

[Heraclitus]

I just had an idea on how to model the planets (Mars, Mercury, ect). . But it uses a few tricks and may be hard to make look nice. Also only one owner per planet could be allowed.


W = asteorid belt
S= high movement cost
M = Mars
... = orbit

.............................SSS
.............................SMS.................. .......................
.............................SSS


XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX


The planets would be the same as in the mod I linked, they would be surrounded by slow space terrain (S). And since nothing could stand in their way and since there would be so few of them, we could make them orbit. The idea is that they seem to be distant rather than small one plot planets. And if the turns where merely 3 months long we could have them and the "slow space" (which represents distance) "skip" at each turn's end.

[snoopy369]

Is there actually interest in developing this mod for real (as opposed to blueskying about it)? If so, we can set up a subforum for it. We'd need some resources:
* Programmer - I can do SOME of this, but probably not all that is needed, in the c++ particularly
* Artist
* Someone with the actual game
* Designers (everyone is involved in this, to some extent)
* Testers (in addition to the developers)

We'd also need to know to what degree, if any, Impaler would be permitted/willing/able to help given his Firaxis commitment. (And if Firaxis had any interest in making this an officialish mod with some official support, similar to what happened at the start of Civ4 with Dale/Locutus/Isak, though they are much more talented developers than any of us I suspect, so I'd assume that is a no barring something changing).

So ... who's doing what?

[Maniac]

Originally posted by snoopy369
Is there actually interest in developing this mod for real (as opposed to blueskying about it)?

Personally I would be very surprised if it actually happened...

But since we're blueskying...

Personally I don't think a space colonization story per se needs to assume that all Earth powers have become undemocratic to explain a willingness to secede and claim independence. It seems to me that people simply feeling they no longer share a common identity with the motherland is sufficient reason. And that's a natural evolution from the moment some people start being born in space instead of on Earth. Plus you can also think of all sorts of economic reasons. The space colonizers don't profit enough of the resource extraction or something.

Also, Heraclitus, I consider your future view of the European Union unrealistic. In order to assume there can be a European space colonizer, there needs to be a strong European political entity. I doubt this could arise in an unstable world with nuclear wars and all that. I also doubt the European Union would survive its member states becoming undemocratic.

In addition, to assume a willingness of a European organization consisting of many member states to actually suppress any revolts, I think one needs to suppose nationalistic feelings among the Earthbound Europeans, a shared identity. I doubt this can happen in the next couple generations if more and more states join the Union, and if the current Eurosceptic states remain in.

Therefore I think the most plausible scenario would be to assume that by the time of the game, the European Union has become little more than a free trade zone. However in reaction to this, several member states went ahead and formed their own stronger union, the European Federation, of which the citizens over time do form a certain common identity. Such a Federation would most likely include France, Germany, Italy and Spain, thus still providing enough economic weight to make space colonization plausible. It should not include Eurosceptic states such as the UK, Poland, Turkey or Czechia though.

[Maniac]

Also, people have been trying to get cities to move for years without success. I don't think you'll be able to succeed now either. You should set less ambitious goals you can do on your own.