Destroying colony pods

[Urban Ranger]

You can always divide the number by 10 and drop fractions

[Commy]

Originally posted by Googlie
Well - when your size-1 base commissions its first terraformer, (f you're like me and invest that first row of minerals in a terraformer), you are immediately tying up over 1/3rd of that base's population if it's just 1000.

That is true, but also note that if you continue snooping around in that file, you will see that all units have certain amounts of people...terraformers also weren't built in the very, very beginning, as you can see in the stories of SMAC, but it took about 1 or 2 years...long enough for the population of SMAC to easily double, considering the age of most of the people...

I forgot the name of the file, but it'd be nice if the staff on the colony pod was posted as well...

[Straybow]

Back when SMAC first came out I was hoping that the flavor of struggling in a hostile environment would more thoroughly permeate the game.

I saw it as a terraformer was literally one set of machinery, crew and support personnel, perhaps 50-100 people. Same with military units, more like platoons rather than Civ-esque battalion+ sized.

[Googlie]

here it is:

extracted from flavor.txt
#COLONY MODULE
Complement: 1000+
Composition: Prefab plastic
Hydroponics rating: indef.
Armament: Sidearms only
Armor: Passive (Applique)

[Straybow]

Destoying a Pod doesn't mean killing 1000 people, only destroying their equipment for setting up a colony. The people then make their way to whatever shelter they can find.

[Senethro]

Yeah, because without their equipment and miles from the nearest base, they're just going to make oxygen out of thin air

[Chaos Theory]

Actually, the air on Alpha Centauri is pretty thick, and contains a half-decent amount of oxygen.

[Senethro]

yeah, but nitrogen narcosis is fun too.

[Chaos Theory]

It might be at that, as suggested by the word "narcosis". However, I'm sure that it's quite toxic.

[Kataphraktoi]

without roughly the air supply % we have here on earth,you would quickly die afaik. rasing the % would raise your metabolism(with - effects) and less would make you sleepy and ineffective

[Chaos Theory]

People can survive, after acclimatization, on about .07 atmospheres partial pressure O2 (which is about what the top of Everest has). Planet has .15 atmospheres partial pressure O2, higher than many high-altitude places where people live on Earth, so oxygen's not the problem, at least at sea level. Nitrogen is substantially more prevelant, at 1.6 atm partial pressure vs .79 atm on Earth, but I'm not sure what the effects of that concentration are. It doesn't seem high enough to cause serious problems. CO2 concentrations are lower on Planet, of course, and the only other gas listed is argon, which is inert.

[Illuminatus]

As Chaos Theory already pointed out, Chiron’s atmosphere is denser therefore exercising a partial pressure of 1.6~1.8 atmospheres. When we take percentage of oxygen into account this leads to partial pressure of oxygen roughly 70% that of our own. Chiron’s atmosphere is breathable, albeit barely at sea level. Without breathing equipment or genetic enhanchment Chironians should have difficulty breathing so I think they would wear air masks.

Another consequence of increased gravity on Chiron (1.31 of Earth gravity) is that partial pressure of oxygen decreases quickly with altitude. Colonists who would work on high altitudes would certainly need more breathing equipment if not oxygen supply. This effect also decreases the likelihood and danger of fires on planet which is probably why we never sight forestfire events.

[Senethro]

Would the pressure at sea level not be enough that nitrogen diffuses into bloodstream, then forms bubbles?

[Illuminatus]

If the pressure can't cause nitrogen narcosis, I don't believe it can cause such an effect.

[Chaos Theory]

Senethro: you're referring to the bends, which results from decompression when a large amount of nitrogen is already dissolved in the blood. If you were to remain at a constant pressure, no amount of atmospheric nitrogen could cause the bends, since there would be no decompression.