Borehole discussion thread

[smacksim]

Originally posted by HongHu
Did you read my post on this at the offsite forum? Too bad we've lost it and I didn't save what I typed.

Anyhow I was advocating another way to RP the Gaians.

In other word, the planet is our friend. We maximize its potential. Employ those mindworms! Use boreholes and encourage fungas pops! Raise water level to submerge the enemies! They use the advanced techs to fight us. We use the planet to fight them. Something like that.

That's meta-playing though, not real role-play. I think a planet-friendly faction would conclude that angry MWs mean they are pissing planet off and should stop. But I totally agree that it's a good Gaian strategy to win the game. On this matter I'm willing to go either way. I wouldn't mind at all playing the Gaians to the hilt for RP purposes, win or lose. Its fun to do so. If we want to win and role-play in hindsight, that's fine too.

-S

[Chaos Theory]

Since our planet rating is always positive, everything we do is green! We drop green boreholes and when we provoke fungal pops, we meant to!

[Snowflake]

Well I'm not a Gaian now so I can't take part in your decision of roleplay/gameplay style. I was merely pointing out there is another way to interpret the Gaians, as what I laid out when I was a Gaian.

Others are afraid of the planet. They are afraid of the fungus and the mindworms. But the Gaians love the planet, they love the fungus and the mindworms. Fungus is native to the planet, forests are foreign. Ecodamage is earth thinking, not planet thinking. When fungus pops, others think the planet is angry. But Gaians encourages fungus pops, they eat fungus, use fungas, they even plant fungus. They do not seek a green planet, they seek a red planet. Others fear mindworms. They panic when mindworms spung out. The Gaians cheers when they meet mindworms. They capture mindworms, use mindworms, hunt mindworms, they even brood mindworms.

I know this is novice thinking about the Gaians. Perhaps nobody has ever viewed Gaians this way. But if you do not want to lag behind in game and still want to roleplay the Gaians, this could be an interesting way to go.

[smacksim]

I agree HongHu, that this is a convenient way to view the Gaians. I'll take this discussion over to the general Gaian strategy thread....
Strategy Thread

-S

[Hydro]

I will have to respectfully disagree with our former Gaian H2, and now valued moderator. In my opinion there are certain types of terraforming that are counter to a Gaian philosophy, and those are they types of terraforming that cause large amounts of terraforming eco damage. This is Planet’s way of letting you know that you are transgressing and that it is annoyed, and that if you don’t stop it will ameliorate the problem with a little fungal bloom that wipes out some or all of the offending terraforming.

By contrast, forests (although non-native to Planet) are actually good terraforming. Earth and Chiron life can and will co-exist. Just because a forest is seen on the map doesn’t mean that Chiron life has been wiped out. What it means is that there are enough forest-related resources to be useful to humans. These resources are augmented with the advent of Tree Farms, and then even more when the Chiron-related life in these sectors is harnessed by Hybrid Forests.

Below is my list of good, low, moderate, and high ecodamage terraforming. I’d suggest that good and low terraforming be allowed wherever needed, moderate terraforming done with discretion, and that high ecodamage terraforming not be built without a very good reason:

Good: forests, kelp
Low: tidal harnesses, solar collectors, roads
Moderate: mines
High: soil enrichers, boreholes, moisture condensers

Winning is one thing, but if we are to role-play Gaians that act like Morganites then what is the point?