[CYOA] Kepler's Island: (not) A Three Hour Tour

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > The Game Room > [CYOA] Kepler's Island: (not) A Three Hour Tour

EmpyreanFlux: Mar 1, 2013; The AUDACITY! The IMPUDENCE! The unabated NERVE!

Abyssal Squid posted:

What is your name?
C: Tabitha Genovese

What did you do during the war?
K: Strategic Planning. Probably doesn't do much to earn the admiration of the grunts, but that's what chain of command is for.

What bionics do you have, if any?
17: Reduced Nutritionary Requirements.
19: Solar Recharging System.

Resources were limited and rationed at best during the war, and logistical chains were frequently disrupted. This combination of bionics ensured that even sustained logistical disruptions wouldn't result in strategic disruptions. AKA Plan Why Don't I Poop?

[No need for a brain computer when you're in an office with access to plenty of much more powerful computers anyway.]

What did you do before the war?
Q: I was an urban planner. The nightmarish complexity of urban planning made deploying forces during the Cyber War seem like child's play in comparison.

Seconding this but also make the case for Dermal Armor or Filtration Lungs because goons are retarded and we need all the help we can get to prevent our inevitable suicide.

# ¿ Aug 24, 2016 04:29

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 07:08

EmpyreanFlux: Mar 1, 2013; The AUDACITY! The IMPUDENCE! The unabated NERVE!

Loel posted:

Yeah, I think filtration lungs would do us better in more situations than armor. I'm not expecting many gun fights, but I am expecting some toxic atmosphere and poisoning by jealous rivals

I was going to come up with a witty "but goons would get us killed by wildlife", but then I realized how terribly awful Dermal Armor could backfire in a 127 hour situation, and that's infinitely more likely with Goons. I'm just hoping us taking a lung mod doesn't convince goons 100 pages from now that we also don't need to breathe.

Also no biomechanical kidneys Olothreutes?

Changing my vote to
1. C

2. K

3. 7, 8, 17

4. Q

# ¿ Aug 24, 2016 04:45

EmpyreanFlux: Mar 1, 2013; The AUDACITY! The IMPUDENCE! The unabated NERVE!

HiHo ChiRho posted:

Well we could go with bionic arms x2 so we can hold the gate better.

Why stop there? Go for Bionic Arms x3.

# ¿ Aug 24, 2016 05:15

EmpyreanFlux: Mar 1, 2013; The AUDACITY! The IMPUDENCE! The unabated NERVE!

Diogines posted:

B, C.

For an IMPORTANT reason, like a REALLY important one!

1. We have literally nothing to do. We will go back to sleep for years when this is done. We are not using up any limited resources and have all the time in the world.

2. As the GM said....

Cryostasis is a NEW TECHNOLOGY. Our colonists, the entire human species iw counting on us. And we are a scientist with serious expertise in biology! Even if(*) of we don't have a cylon on board, we might pick up some problem with the cryostasis that the ship did not.

We are the last hope for mankind, don't just be lazy, roll over and go back to sleep.

It should only take us a few days to check all the colonists. If they are fine now they should probably be fine the whole trip so we will only need to do this once.

Fourthing this.

Also, on magnetics of the ships engine having an adverse effect on implants, how would this interact with a fully body dermal armor, and second why is there no personal superconductor shielding? We apparently have the technology to generate a miniature star to power the ship, and we can radiate heat quite well or the ship would be a swamp or blazing inferno so I assume the shielding is a superconductor that runs close to room temperature to minimize energy expenditure in areas that have poor radiative qualities - otherwise if it's using the vacuum of space to achieve superconducting (and is thus part of the radiated surface energy calculus for the ships design) then a failure in the EM shielding for the powerplant would be longterm catastrophic for everyone onboard temperature wise.

# ¿ Aug 26, 2016 19:27

EmpyreanFlux: Mar 1, 2013; The AUDACITY! The IMPUDENCE! The unabated NERVE!

Diogines posted:

Do we have a clear answer on why humanity is trying to colonize another world around another star, versus, terraforming one in the Sol system, fixing earth or building space habitats?

Given the sort of energy at play to propel this ship, don't we basically have the technology to turn asteroids into all the resources we ever need? Turning asteroids into Stuff is not hard. We have the technology TODAY, the problem is a lack of energy to let us do so. Getting Stuff into orbit to mine asteroids is hard but looks like a non issue for us?

Are we actually fleeing the Cylons, the world government just didn't want us to know?

Based on the opening, it seems humanity is taking precautions on a few points

A) Creating a diaspora across the stars should ensure longterm survival of whatever one deems "human", regardless of circumstance.
B) Longterm effects of low gravity seem to be an issue, meaning most of the solar system is unfit for human habitation. I think this is backed up by the narrow gravity variance amongst the original destinations.
C) Longterm occupation in space stations and ships has a potentially too high risk:reward factor compared to a self-regulating atmosphere and environment on a planet. If something goes wrong on a planet, like an explosion or failure in habitat/power not everyone is hosed. If anyone of among many things gets hosed on a ship or space station everyone is screwed. Both of which are weight and mass sensitive which limits the ability to effect repairs except on small or minor things.
D) Planets have natural protections vs the threats of space, such as radiation and micrometeorites.
E) It's simply too resource intensive, too time consuming in a time and resource limited window to properly terraform say Mars or Venus and have them be independent enough that they can't suffer either death by resource starvation/catastrophic failure.

I think it's basically the logic of living in the sea vs an aquarium, taking the dive into the sea is a risk but unlike the aquarium if the glass breaks you're not hosed because the environment is gone, and modifying humans to exist in a vacuum is probably taboo since you're basically making a robot.

Again this is my attempt at rationalization the situation and maybe Olo has different reasons.

# ¿ Aug 26, 2016 20:35

EmpyreanFlux: Mar 1, 2013; The AUDACITY! The IMPUDENCE! The unabated NERVE!

You can make a machine out of diamagnetic materials, it's entirely plausible and I'm kind of confused why that hasn't come up. Did the machines utterly lack in creativity in dealing with a standard steel war machines weaknesses? Do the machines even use silicon circuitry? Did they have no infiltrator models? Why aren't human bionics built using more natural and safer materials?

Loel posted:

Im assuming we have a Luddite sabotuer cult somewhere, ala Safehold.

I'm not sure ludditism would be a thing, since the war was only won with technology and rejecting it was/is tantamount to suicide. You'd get human supremacists though, people who champion being all natural and poo poo on hanzers and would likely put a bullet in our brain for it being half computer.

# ¿ Sep 1, 2016 17:54

EmpyreanFlux: Mar 1, 2013; The AUDACITY! The IMPUDENCE! The unabated NERVE!

I don't know of anything that has moving parts that's meant to run continuously for 22+ years without significant maintenance, and the engine is clearly a moving parts bonanza based on the description. It's a mechanical wonder it hasn't just exploded yet when a bearing or something blew.

# ¿ Sep 1, 2016 20:56

EmpyreanFlux: Mar 1, 2013; The AUDACITY! The IMPUDENCE! The unabated NERVE!

Olothreutes posted:

The actual reactor itself has no moving "parts." The whole thing is mostly self contained and is just a swirling pool of molten metal, stirred by magnetic fields and compressed by the same. The plasma injectors are also magnetic because otherwise it's hard to do anything with plasma at all. There are some lasers for preheating the plasma, but those don't really have moving parts either.

Now, the systems that convert reactor energy to a usable form probably have moving parts, there are ways to get a direct conversion cycle going so that you can beat the Carnot efficiency of a steam cycle, but that requires you to have most/all of your fusion products be charged (not neutrons). This is doable, aneutronic fusion is a thing that we are aware of and can do right now, we just can't get energy out of it. But assuming that you can, you could direct your fusion products out the weak end of a magnetic mirror/bottle and pass them through an induced magnetic field where they would curve and dump their energy into your collector as electric energy. It's been a few years since I took my fusion class but I recall the upper limits on the efficiency of a setup like this being ~85%, theoretically 100%, where steam cycles are super happy if they can get to 40%. It just takes A) some form of aneutronic fusion that actually works, and B) a huge area in which to have your collector. Seriously, it would need to be several hundred meters long and have an arc of something like 20 degrees, which means an the end it is also several hundred meters across. It is definitely not a compact system when you place it within the constraints of reality.

Originally sounded like there was moving parts, sorry about that.

What about thermal regulation? As the reactor outputs energy this should build up within the ship as space is a poor radiator, you don't actually want to use the entirety of the ship as a heatsink. This means pumps of some sort to direct the flow of heat energy to a proper heatsink or radiator, and failure of such a system basically turns the ship into slag.

# ¿ Sep 2, 2016 14:49

EmpyreanFlux: Mar 1, 2013; The AUDACITY! The IMPUDENCE! The unabated NERVE!

Outrail posted:

I'm not great when it comes to fusion and nuclear physics so if it's okay I'm going to continue imagining the reactor as a giant steam engine with an automated shovel bot spooning glowing poo poo into a furnace.

I mean that's a gross oversimplification of what's happening here but the principle is the same.

# ¿ Sep 2, 2016 15:58

EmpyreanFlux: Mar 1, 2013; The AUDACITY! The IMPUDENCE! The unabated NERVE!

Tubal may be relived at the idea of no methane or ammonia, but I'm personally concerned about a cyanogen heavy (relative) atmosphere now. There has to be more wrong with the planet we're going to besides potentially higher UV exposure.

# ¿ Sep 13, 2016 16:30

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 07:08

EmpyreanFlux: Mar 1, 2013; The AUDACITY! The IMPUDENCE! The unabated NERVE!

Big Boner Stacy posted:

Why would our spaceship have magma under the floor?

Well, the cooling system could fail.

E sounds pretty good.

# ¿ Oct 17, 2016 13:33

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > The Game Room > [CYOA] Kepler's Island: (not) A Three Hour Tour