IMTU: Basic Infrastructure of Colonies

I've broken down the Shipbuilding Rules into a bunch of ratios that would be useful for building a Space Colony.

labs
survey stations
medical stations
life support systems
power plants
Infra supplies
Colony demands
Commercial
Hard infra

Workshops.
Workshops are the backbone of any colony and infrastructure. These help maintain all equipment related to basic infrastructure (these have a -2 penalty for the engineer for more sophisticated and specialized needs)

• Manpower: Enough space for one engineer per shift. 3 engineers a month.
• Cost:   
• Volume: consumes 15cu.m including workspace
• Mass: 2.5 tons of equipment, 
• Energy: monthly energy consumption
• Role/Uses: Need one to support 2000 tons of the same TL of equipment per engineer. 
• Can support twice as much, 4000 tons, of TL9 equipment (workshops count as 400x more mass; can only support 4 TL9 workshops).
• Can support five times as much of TL8 equipment (workshops also count as 400x more mass; can only support 10 TL8 workshops).
• Can support 20 TL7 workshops. 
• Can support 50 TL6 workshops. 
• TL9 versions: same capacity, volume, mass, energy consumption and supports 2000 tons of TL9 equipment. 
• TL8 version: same capacity, volume, mass, energy consumption and supports 2000 tons of TL8 equipment.

Labs.
I've mentioned in a previous post that Labs are important in cultivating and developing gene-gineered organism for mining, farming and terraforming. these are basically Bio-labs.

• Manpower: 1 scientist per shift. up to 3 scientists per month.  
• Costs: $1,000,000.
• Volume: consumes 30cubic feet including workspace
• Mass: 10 tons of equipment, 
• Energy: 0.3MW
• Role/Uses: Supports the gene-geneered ecosystem of 100k sq km. 

Medical Station.
Same Stats as the Sick Bay.

• Manpower:  2 medical personnel. 
• Cost: $200,000.
• Volume: consumes 15cubic feet including workspace
• additional bedspace consumes 10cu.m. this includes passageways. 
• B242, one doctor can handle 200 patients at a time as long as there at least 1 nurse bot or nurse for every 20.  
• Mass: 1 ton of equipment, 
• Energy: 0.01MW
• Role/Uses: 1 Medical Station every 80 people.

Survey Station.
Same Stats of the Survey Module, its mean to maintain a cluster of satelites and roving survey robots. When build deep underground, the station has many and diffuse networks to protect is true location. The Survey station can help detect incoming ships.

• Manpower: Enough space for 4 scientists per shift. 12 scientists a month.  
• Cost: $15,000,000
• Volume: consumes 60cubic feet including workspace
• additional bedspace consumes 10cu.m. this includes passageways.
• Mass: 12 tons of equipment 
• Energy: 0.3MW
• Role/Uses: Detect any ship in the system.

Power Plant.
Power Plants are typically compartmentalized for Redundancy.

• Manpower: 1 engineer for every 80 tons. 
• Cost: $200,000
• Volume: consumes 15cu.m including workspace
• Mass: 4 tons of equipment per 15cu.m  
• Energy: Output 20MW (4MW at TL9, 0.2MW at TL8)

Life Support
Life Support are typically Compartmentalized for Redundancy.

• Cost: $50,000
• Volume: consumes 15cu.m including workspace
• Mass: 2.5 tons of equipment 
• Energy: 0.01
• Role/Uses: Can generate environment for 1250cu.m (88dtons) or 50 people. Provides 1/5 less at TL9.  

Infra supplies
These are equipment replacement parts. There is a mass, volume, and cost ratio for Precision Equipment, Tools and Equipment, and Bio or Medical Supplies. These are the equipment typically brought to Colonies. These also have a TL rating.  Colonies would be buying such supplies for the purposes of support, which is seperate from their own Commercial Transactions.
These materials can be used to maintain or expand a colony. Peg colony growth in ISW 2170CE at around at least 5% per year, and averaging 10% per year, and up to as high as 20-30% per year.

• Cost: Precision and Bio/med $2M; Tools $0.5; Supplies $0.2
• Density: 1dton:10 tons for Precision; 1dton: 5tons Tools and Biom/med; Supplies 1dton:3tons

Annual Maintenance and Resupply.

Take down all the Cost of the Infrastructure and multiply it by 0.0005 to get the total cost of maintenance supplies. The same maintenance supplies is used to for growth, take all the total cost of Infra and multiply by rate of growth 5% to 20-30% to get the annual amount of infra structure imports the colony needs. To simplify and average just use Tools at 1dton:5tons and 0.5M

Example, a $2,500M Colony will need about $125,000 worth of equipment to maintain themselves and if they are growing at 10% per year, $250M of supplies (500dtons of supplies a year). This is ONTOP of the Going Trade in the System.  

Note that there can be Multiple Colonies in a system. 

Note2 that the cost of 2500M for a colony is pretty cheap in our TL8 perspective, this is thanks to assumption Technology = higher level of productivity with cost efficiency. 

Commercial Demands. 

Commercial trade is up to the WTN and such rules of the game. Although its easier to simplify with Biz Net worth in Tradable goods using the same 1dton:5tons at $0.5M. 

Colony Hard Infra

Underground Infra, miles/km deep enough to survive TL10 warship bombardment, is in 25cu.m increments.This increment is reinforced with organic and sealed concrete and compartmentalized. Each unit is worth about $100 worth of time and effort assuming the most basic TL10 infra such as 20ton mining robots and a bio-lab.

Dungeon Map Generators. I used ISO mage's map generator and made each square equal to 25cu.m or 3x3m.  

Spreadsheet to simplify this to follow when I get around to it. 

IMTU: Mining = Farming

IMTU colonists use genetically engineered plants that are designed for the particular planets to trap, concentrate, synthesize, and mine mineral and chemical resources.

The turn around time for such plants really depend on the variety of nutrient and conditions in the planet. The more variety flowing around the more resources the biologists have at their disposal. The gene-gineers will be creating several varieties intent to create an ecosystem and economics. In the course of a Solar Year and enough resources, a planet like mars (barren, thin atmosphere, few resources and with little light) would have several nurseries of the plant itself.

Plants and Biological tools go as far as being part of the underground infrastructure. Living cement can help slowly reinforce underground infrastructure and naturally seal cracks and fissures. The same cement can be a medium for underground emergency lighting, life-support (air, heat, water etc.), and more farming application when there are veins of useful material.

Plant tools have the ability to create Infrastructure while the colonists are focusing their resources and energies other things. They can be left to their own devices, which an ecological plan mapped out by the gene-gineers.

Some plants can be powered, allowing powerplants to boost their growth and accelerate the process.

IMTU, in 2170CE the very active Terraforming of Venus is thanks to aggressive plants that are designed to trap dense atmosphere into a solid and liquid form. Because of how exponential plants can grow, it has been almost a hundred years of bio-terraforming that temperatures in Venus dropped by half and density by also as much. The plants have shaped much of the planets surface, creating giant tendrils all around the planets as great as canyons. Venus is a giant jungle of mega flaura.

update: added is the introduction of hydrogen through mega freighters continuously supplying venus as in the Biological Approach of terraforming Venus in the wiki. 

At around the same time, Mars surface is heavily terraformed with plants that try to increase the greenhouse effect on the planet. Much of the plants try to bring the heat and the energy deep underground. There are roots and runners in mars that act as underground rivers, that move resources and water in the vast underground network of the planet.

Because of the thin atmosphere, Mars is an underground colony and highly resistant to orbital bombardment. Mars is often intentionally the target of much asteriods diverted to add to the resources of the planet: injecting minerals and water for the plants to catch and feed deep into its underground ecosystem.

The most cutting edge biotech can be found in Sol, both in the colonies of Venus and Mars. many other planets are being terraformed like Ganymede, Io, and Titan but average at about half the amount of time being developed. Many planets in the terran systems have gene-geneered plant life that is as visible as Terra's. 

IMO the best Mental Model for Strength is Work

The best Mental Model for Strength is Work in my opinion. What I mean by work, the SI unit or Watts. There is a an amount of Work or Strength relative to what counts as Endurance.

I personally use work as a mental model of strength and endurance or constitution. It helps me in working out and planning my activities in a day. It is not that I measure every activity precisely to the Wattage, but I just have the principles in mind when I consider an activity. I know that rushing something expends more work over time, concentrating work in a limited amount of time has its inefficiencies especially given the nuances of the human body.

I also keep in mind that the body can perform certain tasks more efficiency than others. Lifting with certain muscle groups can take more effort while some muscle groups are so specialized, that we don't realize the work they do (also how the skeleton plays a role in all of this). Consider the amount of work walking vs lifting the equivalent weight as one's legs are carrying constantly.

There is a maximum work out put and there a minimum work output. By maximum, examples are an activity like Power Lifting consuming all the energy in few actions over a span of time or the same as more extreme feats of power and energy. As for minimum, there is an amount of energy that is consumed regardless of inactivity, the way a person sitting on a desk and doing light mental activity can still be tired at the end of the day (but much later in the day than a person doing a heavy mental activities). 

Other Usefulness of Strength as Wattage

• How much Watts an Oar Rower Can generate for Ships. 
• Marching and Logistics.
• Measuring Degrees of Labor for measuring PC activities. 
• Digging
• Carrying loads
• Simplifying a Variety of Work
• How much Force can be generated by an Action, and how many instances of that action can be repeated. Imagine using this to find out how much force a character can generate throw an object with variable mass and bulk. See below for various forces. 

Off the top of my head I can think of several examples of Force or Joules.

• 1-2J Legal Limit Airsoft
• 7J Paintball
• 50J Commotio Cordis
• 180J A Swung Bat or Sword
• 550J typical 9mm Pistol

More Comparisons

Anyway that is my thesis for Strength, and it applies to Endurance as well. While strength is more of Maximum Outputs, Endurance is energy Storage and replenishment ability. You will notice it in the methodology of Fatigue Saves.

I find Strength and Endurance, effort in general, is like a "cashflow problem" or what my brother-in-law calls a "money sync" situation. Having the mental model present in my thinking helps me judge activities and strategies of actions and efforts. I know this is a an "acquired taste" among gamers so I don't hard sell it to players. Still there is a benefit in being able to juggle the concept.

Updates, Opened up my Gaming Assistant Biz Notes

I made public my Gaming Assistant Notes, as well a whole set of notes related to it. My purpose is to gain visibility and hopefully crowd source some suggestions. If it gets mature enough create a self-employed package so that working students can probably provide the service as work while studying.

See my Shared Gaming Folder from my Google Drive.

Real World Work Skills/Tools useful in Gaming

I get more practice in using these tools and skills thanks to gaming, that it actually makes it a natural for me to use such tools. Although I sometime wish the data on the tools is gaming related. Feel free to add your own.

• Making Lists - More of a habit than a skill, it became a stronger habit because of gaming
• T Accounts - for Traveller and medieval economics
• Income Statement - for Traveller and medieval economics
• Mind Mapping - plotting stories, relationships, and developing complex plots
• Process Mapping - explaining complicated rules and mapping doctrine and dominant strategies. Practice makes it easier to make mental process maps.
• Case Studies - Scenario Building
• Gant Chart - Tracking my GM and World Builder Workload.
• Time and Motion - Mentally having a time budget for every activity, keeping note of various activities and looking for similarities so that I can better budget every action in time, resource, and effort.
• Negotations / deal-making - a wo
• Using Mental Models to make Forensically Determine Unknowns - I got this more from gaming and applying to work. It is working back Process mapping to understand the limitations of others.

Got this idea from Nyranth's post (its from G+ don't know how to link directly to the post).

Mental Models = RPG System

I believe an Open RPG System is almost the same thing as a Science Based Mental Model of how the world works. I'm working on an Open RPG System, there are many Open RPG systems but this one caters to the simulation-ists and those who want to use RPGs as a medium of learning real world skills. I hope my creative commons writing can create a foundation for something that can be easily shared improved on and used in education and fun.

Now I did a quick google search about gamers talking about Mental Models and RPGs and my search turned up research material instead of other gamers.

Mental Models in Learning.
There is a whole lot of merits to growing up gamer, one of these is the use of Mental Models and RPG system in creating structure or framework so that one is ready to learn, adapt and change mental models of how things works in the world. Growing up Gamer, we experience a lot of Rules which are like "Models" of how things can work out in the world. We are used to changing, learning, improving, modifying and memorizing assumptions. The experience conditions a mind to be able to quickly memorize, understand, and comprehend incredible amounts of models, by having a Core Pattern or Intuition of how things work and keeping notes of differences and exceptions.

When we to min-max we learn about how to create results by manipulating the arrangement and relationship of certain metrics. In the end we can simplify things to Quotas, Key performance Indicators, and Utilization. It becomes natural for us to stat out things and continue to manipulate the abstraction of various scores to measure, observe and track almost anything.

Mental Models and Visualization and Process

Another use of Mental Models is that you can visualize the extremes where these rules break down and exceptions begin to occur. Mental models are Imagination tools, allowing us to simulate and empathize a situation or circumstance. Mental Models allow us to Visualize, mapping out processes and events as in the order they occur and many of the possibilities that can happen in between every crucial point in time. Visualization is also an important part of role-playing and later on strategy (definition from game theory) as we navigate through options, decisions, and risks.  

Skills in ORGS, Hope they can be Considered Open Source / Creative Common 

How skills are in an Open Role-playing Game System. I'm describing more of the nature of a skill in the Real World (or RW). One can say Skills as a Mental Model for use in a game or for work.

• There is no difficulty type for skills( unlike gurps). See below why.
• Skills are made up so many sub-skills and techniques, in ORGS skills are made up of routes, routines,  knowledge, principles, mechanisms, and experiences that can be summed up as information about a specialty designed for an actor.
• Skills blend and bleed into other topics, themes and categories, because of this nature GMs and world builders have to narrowly define a skill for a specific time and scope. Over times and eras, skills may change in scope and composition but serve a similar purpose. The purpose changes slowly compared to its composition and scope.
• There is a set amount of activities, time, effort, and risk to skills that have to be defined an elaborated. There are benchmarks and assumptions in performance, as well as default or typical circumstances. 

Crucial points of skills in the RW according to my studies (mostly from how we learn from the Teaching company and all those othe lessons to many to name)

• repetition and practice. Measured in time, activities, quality, either virtual, visualization, simulation, or on-the-job.
• defining and categories. Naming and defining aspects of a skill, and categorizing it.hyhj
• Aspects of Pro or Con circumstances both Inherent in the Actor, or the environment around him, and circumstances of the past. 

As I define skills, I hope my contribution makes the content open and sharable. Slowly and with a process I'll elaborate skills at a given time and era, create benchmarks and examples, and allow for both a mental model and ORGS to arise from it.

  

Gaming Projects Monitoring Sheet

Too many projects and to many distractions from life and work, so I might as well be organize and track them all. Here is a sample project monitoring collaboration sheet we use at work. I just finished cleaning it up and I'm going to start filling it up and planning when I get the time. 

Right now Gaming Projects are in Hibernation Mode because of work needs, not just my gaming but also my studying has a definite pause. 

I noticed anything really worth doing and a relatively small project takes weeks, since we have ongoing operations day-to-day to take care off.