Extension idea: moon colonizer.

[Blake]

Actually Helium3 (an isotope of helium) is an entirely valid resource for the Moon to have. It is very rare on Earth, but fairly abundant on the moon.

Altough scientists don't yet know how to build a economical fusion reactor, it is possible that helium3 may by the key to cheap fusion power.

So building a moon base (either on a moon-map, or as a small wonder) would enable the construction of Fusion Plants, which would give more production and eliminate most pollution.
It would ALSO become the pre-req for the spaceship, because I seriously doubt a spaceship to AC could be made to work without a fusion reactor to power it. Moon bases could potentionally make orbital construction cheaper, because of the relatively shallow gravity well (and many metals and oxygen can be mined on the moon), altough a space elevator would make construction a lot cheaper again.

An interstellar spaceship is more of a 5th age thing anyway than a 4th age. Reaching the moon is childsplay compared to reaching AC

And sending food from the Earth to the moon is not nessecary... the moon base can grow it's own using hydroponics or greenhouses, and in any case the rations which they get sent from earth would barely qualify as 'food', only nutritionally, anyway .

And yeah, a new game, moon colonization, but instead of colonizing the "new world" from Europe, you colonise the Moon from Earth, and can choose to start as any world power.

[sabrewolf]

Originally posted by Blake
Actually Helium3 (an isotope of helium) is an entirely valid resource for the Moon to have. It is very rare on Earth, but fairly abundant on the moon.

Altough scientists don't yet know how to build a economical fusion reactor, it is possible that helium3 may by the key to cheap fusion power.

So building a moon base (either on a moon-map, or as a small wonder) would enable the construction of Fusion Plants, which would give more production and eliminate most pollution.
It would ALSO become the pre-req for the spaceship, because I seriously doubt a spaceship to AC could be made to work without a fusion reactor to power it. Moon bases could potentionally make orbital construction cheaper, because of the relatively shallow gravity well (and many metals and oxygen can be mined on the moon), altough a space elevator would make construction a lot cheaper again.

An interstellar spaceship is more of a 5th age thing anyway than a 4th age. Reaching the moon is childsplay compared to reaching AC

And sending food from the Earth to the moon is not nessecary... the moon base can grow it's own using hydroponics or greenhouses, and in any case the rations which they get sent from earth would barely qualify as 'food', only nutritionally, anyway .

And yeah, a new game, moon colonization, but instead of colonizing the "new world" from Europe, you colonise the Moon from Earth, and can choose to start as any world power.

He3 isotope on the moon in high concentration? wow, i didn't know that

ok, we can build fusion-powerplants, but can't really have many factories to use the energy... so it's time to invent cordless power transmission

[Iskandar Reza]

Originally posted by sabrewolf


He3 isotope on the moon in high concentration? wow, i didn't know that

ok, we can build fusion-powerplants, but can't really have many factories to use the energy... so it's time to invent cordless power transmission

Beam it to earth with microwaves, you know like in SimCity.

[Blake]

Well, actually the helium3 would be mined on the moon and shipped back to earth (it's helium, it's light!, which makes it another ideal moon resource). So the presence of a moon base would allow the construction of fusion PP's on earth (which has a virtually limitless thirst for energy).

[Palleon]

It's not like we need the moon to create fusion reactors, they've made fusion reactions here on Earth with materials, just not self-sustraining, or cost efficient yet. Within 20 years my friends, we'll see a fusion reactor on Earth. I guarentee it.

[Blake]

Pretending for the moment that helium3 is required for a self-sustaining reaction, on earth the cost of Helium3 would be very very high, the cost of extraction (or alchemy) would possibly be greater than the energy created. Tho no doubt they could still scrounge enough He3 for a prototype demonstration "Look we have a self-sustaining fusion reaction".

So what I'm not saying is that He3 (from the moon) would be required for a self-sustaining fusion reaction, but it may be needed for economical fusion reactors.

And the reactors would be built on the earth! not the moon. The energy yeild of He3 (plus hydrogen extracted from water) would be so high that it would be more economical to ship the He3 back to earth, than trying to beam the energy.

[steamthunk]

Who says the moon has to be like Earth's real moon? It's not like the main map is a duplicate of Earth anyway (well at least not normally).

[Palleon]

But it is patterened after Earth. Maybe not geologically, but the elements that occur on it are Earthlike, and it's earth cultures, therefore we can assume the moon would be quite similar to our own.

[Iskandar Reza]

I thought the moon is made of green cheese.

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

Damn, seems like someone beat me to it! My idea was that, with the advent of Sattelite tech, you should be able to build an improvement called "Commercial Launch Platform" or even a "Mass Launcher" (which, by itself, would increase the cities science and commerce). After Integrated Defence, you would then have a tech called either "Extraterrestrial Exploration" or "Intrasolar Exploration", which would allow you to build the small wonder "Extraterrestrial Colonization" (requiring about 5 Commercial Launch Platforms), which would grant you a civ-wide bonus to research and production (as well as reduce all population and improvement based pollution). Most of my other ideas are really options dependant on how flexible the new editor is!
Option 1: The new tech allows helium-3 and zero-g alloys as new strategic resources. Helium-3 is needed for fusion reactor, and helium-3 and zero-g alloys would be needed to build a variety of high-tech units and improvements (such as Power Armour, Hover tank etc!)

Option 2: The small wonder enables construction of Fusion reactor and high-tech units, without mention of the specific resources!

Option 3: The small wonder causes you to have access to the aforementioned resources (Best option, but Highly UNLIKELY!)

Option 4: Small wonder enables the construction of a Helium-3 enrichment plant and a zero-g manufacturing plant (improvements or small wonders?) which, in turn, allows you to produce all the aformentioned, high-tech, improvements and units!
Anyway, there are a few options which wouldn't even need ANY new maps, and could be done with the upcoming Mod capabilities (assuming the new editor patch is all we hope it to be!)

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.

[Palleon]

My only beef with this topic now is that Firaxis has pretty much said they didn't really want to get into space, or more futuristic techs like fusion, because civ deals with things that we as humans more or less have the capacity to do, with the exception of the spaceship. They said they didn't want to make anouther Alpha Centauri, which is why I think this probobly won't be implemented ever.

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

Actually Palleon, I'd say that the majority of what is suggested here, with the possible exception of Hover Tanks and PA, is within current human capacity or, at the very least, is within our grasp within the next 3-4 decades. Some argue that, had the U.S not given up the ghost, we could have had Lunar Colonies about 10 years ago, and we could possibly have even been putting our first steps on Mars by now! That, of course, is pure speculation-which is just what this game happens to be about!! Who knows, maybe even PA and hyper-advanced tanks (armed with rail-guns and armoured with zero-g alloys) could have been within our grasp by now! I probably wouldn't want to go any further into the future than this, though, or it will just start looking like CtP 1&2!

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.

[sabrewolf]

i believe so too, aussie-lurker

if the spending had been kept up in the rate of the 60's and 70's, we probably would be on the mars by now.

but i think the money was/is needed in other places more urgently...

btw: to transport He3 to the earth, it would need a refinery on the moon. and i'm not so sure, He3 would be "light" to transport: to have effective use of space, you'd need to bring it to very high pressure. but then, gas under pressure is very dangerous.

most sensitive use i guess would be for fuelling fusion-driven spaceships away from earth. advantage: to exit moon's orbit you don't need a 10th of the energy of the energy needed to exit earths gravitational pull

ok ok ok, i'm off topic ... but at least it isn't the usual political discussion

on-topic: don't think anything like this will come. except if sid uses some of these ideas for a new game.
reminds me of "ascendancy", another TBG. do you guy know it?

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

Actually Sabrewolf, as I indicated in my earlier post, so long as they give us a flexible enough editor, it should be quite easy to put extraplanetary colonies into the game as a small wonder! It would be a BIT of a fudge (i.e. you lose the city with the small wonder in it, and somehow you've lost ALL your colonies!) But it would all be do-able!
Anyway, that's how I see it, anyway.

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.

[sabrewolf]

Originally posted by The_Aussie_Lurker
Actually Sabrewolf, as I indicated in my earlier post, so long as they give us a flexible enough editor, it should be quite easy to put extraplanetary colonies into the game as a small wonder! It would be a BIT of a fudge (i.e. you lose the city with the small wonder in it, and somehow you've lost ALL your colonies!) But it would all be do-able!
Anyway, that's how I see it, anyway.

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.

talking about flexible editor: it's a shame there won't be any scripting THAT would be flexibility
and talking about the editor in general: WHEN?