So you want to be a colonist...

[Grand Cadfael]

It's a short story. Not realy proofread. just something I thought up as I planned placement of colony pods. Feel free to comment, critisize, complain, and compliment

[Grand Cadfael]

Chapter 1# Introduction:
So you want to be a colonist? We all have our reasons: Land, Duty to the motherland, Desperation, 85 credit colonization bonus... The first thing to do is find a outbound colony pod. This is essential. You can not get anywhere unless you have transportation, and you can not do anything with out a group.

Picking your Colony Pod:
Obviously you should pick you colony pod well. Here are some signs to look for: The podcaptn (leader) should show signs of the 3C's: Confidence, Capability, and (most importantly) a Crew. Remember: leaking fluid anywhere is very, very bad. The crew should be healthy, it should not have no more then 35% of it's members drawn from a prison or correctional facility.
A random survey will give a good idea of quality, all though you may get a bad sample, if you have any reason to believe you have gotten a bad sample then disregard it. After all you never know if your going to find another pod. Also remember to stick to your sample. There’s always another pod.

Chapter 2# The Great Trek:
So your on your way. You have good crewmates, a solid (relatively) pod. Now what? Remember: Colonizers live and die by three rules:

The Mindworm is NOT your friend
He (or she) is an evil fiend bent on your destruction. Very few like being eaten alive! But then very few are dumb enough to wander around and risk getting eaten, fried ,shot at, starved, and various other painful, frightening and sometimes deadly situations. So you should be just fine J Avoid Xenofungus like the plague (which is a lot less deadly) not only is it the spawning ground of worms (and that’s a big not only), there are numerous other things that will hold up your passage and kill a few crewmen, although they are unlikely to wipe out your unborn colony , the very slow Grazers with their grinding molars, Carbon Monoxide producing Frostmonkeys And the thieving, airborne Katas. That covers the worst. Don’t panic though, you should mostly be dealing with them around noon, when indigenous life forms are most active.

Every thing goes easier if you keep up the routines.
Patrol the area for natives even if it five minutes from Morgan Industry’s, Dig a moat every night no matter how tired you are. Don’t pilfer the emergency energy credits no matter how badly you need them. You just never know when a bunch of Gaian yahoos with lasers are going to show up.

Your site choice is important!
No one wants to live in a dustbowl. Pick a nice site by a river or the sea, no one likes constant rain, but on the other hand, watching your kids make dust castles is depressing. Use your vote on where to settle, go around chatting about the nice climate to make others do likewise but don’t press it on people.


Chapter 3# Your New Colony
Ahh….You’ve settled in a nice (or not so nice) place, Now the first thing to do is pick a name this is important. As a long time colonizer I know first hand that many will kill over whether to call a base “Hawk of Chiron” or “Lucky Autumn” it demonstrates you loyalty to your Faction, mindset of the citizens, and creative talent. or lack there of.
Now for the other stuff: First things first, Contact HQ and get orders to disregard. They don’t know what’s going on, you do. Obviously mind worms are still going to be on your trail so equip the rougher types with gun and teach them about the end with the hole(avoid giving guns to anyone with a history of murder)
Lets see about a base facility: as a rule of thumb: if you have a lot of young children with you build a crèche for them, if you have a lot old people with you build a recycling tank for them, you may need it
Now you’ve settled down for a few months, The morons are out collecting planet pearls and burn marks while the young and old are going to their respective processing units. Options options. If the roughs are clamoring for weapons that go BOOM louder, make some lasers and synthmetal armor and let them play.
If you feel a need for some R&R or you next door neighbor is being vocal about his need then build a recreation commons of some sort. Even if it some home nodes cobbled together to get a decent computer, a quicklink to the rest of the world, and a Recon Rover Rick watchvid or two for the kids. You would be surprised at how such measures work.
Now for the fun with Bureaucracy, So Headquarters has sent someone to meld your little one rover town to the rest of the empire and see where the backup funds went? Well let him speechify and sniff around. Then elect a town governor (or whatever your faction calls that post) and he can brush him off, Sending him off on a worm hunt if necessary.


Well I think that’s all you need to know to find a colony pod, Get to a site in one piece and survive once your there. After that you’re living in a small town.
-So you want to be a colonist. Anonymous author
Datalinks

[Grand Cadfael]

Man. 96 views and not one comment. Was it that bad?

[Rand Al'Tor]

Nah, not at all, it was pretty good. Just people not having much to say likely. The 'find HQ and get orders to disregard line' had me chuckle loudly.