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Little House on the Red Prairie

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Fri, 2015-05-15 22:52

thepedant

Little House on the Red Prairie

Anyone ever considered a campaign based around trying to make it as a farmer on Mars? Obviously, each session isn't going to be, "wake up, roll Profession: Farmer, go back to sleep," but what happens when farming stops being run of the mill, e.g.:

Something came out of the TQZ; stop it from eating your farmhands/crops;
Neighbors' daughter is a little too into the Movement, you'll have to stop her from making a suicide bombing "statement" at the Olympus space elevator both out of neighborliness and to keep the authorities from tearing up your settlement;
Your local credit union thinks the most recent ice asteroid bombing's going to really screw up the weather next cycle, so they're not going to front anyone in your region more credits for planting until the weather restabilizes. This means you have to find out another source of cash for the next crop or go to the big city to beg for seed and fertilizer money from one of the Consortium banks, with all the politics and big city dangers that entails;
Banditry.

Sat, 2015-05-16 21:48

Lazarus

thepedant wrote:. . .Banditry

thepedant wrote:
. . .

Banditry.

I swear by my pretty floral bonnet I will end you.

—

My artificially intelligent spaceship is psychic. Your argument it invalid.

Mon, 2015-05-25 23:27

Askew

It would be neat to play as a

It would be neat to play as a crew of "troubleshooters" helping out honest folk out in the badlands. Of course when I say troubleshooter, finding trouble and then shooting it is a likely scenario. What with typical player character behaviors and all...

Tue, 2015-05-26 01:45

MrWigggles MrWigggles's picture

Your local gene clinic supply

Your local gene clinic supply of the Ruster Morph dose, has been robbed, and now the local community, dang close to five hundred are gonna have morphs that are gonna start gonna funny unless you can get those doses back.

Thu, 2015-05-28 10:55

especifismo especifismo's picture

You could run a plot that

You could run a plot that revolves around hypercorp or ranger investigations into the local farming community that are looking into Barsoomian sabotage, only the PCs discover first that it is actually farmers secretly knocking out corp infrastructure. Maybe the corps are sending drones a little too close to a hidden farming dome where illegal crops (either drug-related or patented crops with no license) and someone has been knocking these drones out of the sky. If they intervene on the side of the corp, the PCs might draw retaliation from the farmers, and if they intervene on the side of the farmers, things might get tricky with dealing with hypercorp thugs showing up at doors. This leaves it up to the PCs to figure out how they deal with it - and possibly pick up a corporate enemy along the way? For a real world influence, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CU_project_controversy#.22Bolt_Weevils.22

Thu, 2015-05-28 14:05

VorlonJoe

Askew wrote:It would be neat

Askew wrote:
It would be neat to play as a crew of "troubleshooters" helping out honest folk out in the badlands. Of course when I say troubleshooter, finding trouble and then shooting it is a likely scenario. What with typical player character behaviors and all...

I can see a bunch of PCs who have decided to retire only to find that the Universe has other ideas . . . Some of the threats may be cranked down a few notches from what they're used to, or not (thinking of the TQZ), but there are threats none the less.

Thu, 2015-05-28 20:06

MrWigggles MrWigggles's picture

Where would the farms be? I

Where would the farms be? I cant decide if they would be near the polar regions or near the "tropical" hotter spots on mars? ---- Also sunward talks about the martian train lines, is it just an oversight there it doesnt talk about martain canal system?

Thu, 2015-05-28 20:38

UnitOmega

No, because I think canals

No, because I think canals are impractical. You have to dig out and move all that earth, and you need a steady flow between locations, plus, once you build one it's a huge pain to "unbuild" it when terraforming plans change or something. I'm not sure the water cycle on Mars is stable yet. What do you need a canal for? Honestly, where doesn't really matter. There's no reference to wide open spaces of farming on Mars. There's no huge pastures filled with Rust Cows, most growing is done in mentioned "agridome" settlements, which I assume are smaller versions of the city-sized hab domes designed for agriculture or maybe even aqua culture. There's a lot going on for farming, you'd need the right temperature, atmosphere, water and nutrients - which I'm not sure if the martian soil is yet in a state where you get much out of it. So you build an environmentally controlled dome instead, take advantage of the most basic functions of nanofab to produce fertile soil from off world in smaller amounts and spaces, and use tech to supplement your environmental conditions.

—

H-Rep: An EP Homebrew Blog http://ephrep.blogspot.com/

Mon, 2015-06-08 07:14

Noble Pigeon Noble Pigeon's picture

UnitOmega wrote:

UnitOmega wrote:
Honestly, where doesn't really matter. There's no reference to wide open spaces of farming on Mars. There's no huge pastures filled with [b]Rust Cows[/b]

How dare you shoot down my dreams of becoming a redneck farmer on Mars and having genetically engineered Martian cows on my plot of Martian land. This is going to be my goal, you can keep your sterile, boring domes!

—

"Don't believe everything you read on the Internet.” -Abraham Lincoln, State of the Union address

Mon, 2015-06-08 12:59

#10

Lazarus

Take my love, take my home,

Take my love, take my home, You can keep your sterile dome, I don't care, cause I'm still free, You can't take my cows from me.

—

My artificially intelligent spaceship is psychic. Your argument it invalid.

Mon, 2015-06-08 13:48

#11

thebluespectre thebluespectre's picture

The possibilities of Cow

Rust cows on mars, basking in the dim light…. amphibious sea cows with watertight hides, peacefully drifting in the shallows of Europa… spherical cows with predictable physics, shackled to Luna's microgravity… Platonic cows with perfect meat, bred in a secret farm in Xiphos… Those secret exoplanet labs that made the Chickcharnie try their hand at the Bonnacon and the Rollin' Calf… demented planimal cows deep in a Scum swarm, one third cocoa plant and one third sugar cane, dispensing chocolate milk… synthetic cows built as a mockery of life, with specialized soy milk Makers in their udders… virtual simulspace cows that demand that you harvest from them at the allotted time, lest the milk go sour and the crops wither… Venusian cows filtering sulfuric acid with their uncanny lungs, excreting unknown (yet very trendy) beverages… a Mercurial's secret cow project, brought halfway to sapience and cursing its lack of hands… an inexplicable fossil of a common Earth cow, preserved under an Ikotomi ruin and carbon-dated to BCE 1,400… a TITAN bioweapon cleverly disguised as a cow, standing "inconspicuously" in an open desert waiting for enemies that will never come… a skydiving Titanite cow, who lives only to attract tourists to Uranus… the last two cows within an ark ship's belly far past Pluto, whose starving inhabitants never learned of Earth's Fall… a frozen, irradiated cow that just collided with your spaceship's bow, set adrift from some oligarch's private paradise habitat… I could keep going all day.

—

"Still and transfixed, the el/ ectric sheep are dreaming of your face..." -Talk Shows on Mute

Mon, 2015-06-08 16:53

#12

Noble Pigeon Noble Pigeon's picture

The true Eclipse Phase

The true Eclipse Phase experience!

—

"Don't believe everything you read on the Internet.” -Abraham Lincoln, State of the Union address

Tue, 2015-06-09 20:49

#13

Chernoborg Chernoborg's picture

Hey! Them Rust cows ain't fer

Hey! Them Rust cows ain't fer eatin' ! The amount of methane they put out and the ...er...soil ..enrichment. Terraformin' is what Rust cows are good fer! In a setting with cryogenically adapted caribou (cryobou?) I can see Rust Cows being a thing. Although they'd likely be more like yaks or musk oxen than regular cows- Rust Yaks! And now I've got the visual of a Nomad morph decked out in full cowboy gear like a mash up of the Marlboro man and Joe Camel! Hellas Planitia - it's flavor country!

—

Current Status: Highly Distracted building Gatecrashing systems in Universe Sandbox!

Wed, 2015-06-10 00:25

#14

Trappedinwikipedia Trappedinwikipedia's picture

They'd be *really* weird

They'd be *really* weird lifeforms though, as I don't think much of mars has anything growing on it yet. Still, long term life support is pretty powerful stuff. The biggest problem is probably the near complete lack of carbon in a Martian regolith, which means that anything engineered to live there probably needs to be silicon based, which I'm not sure Transhumanity can pull off. I'm not sure they can't though. Of course, we don't actually know much about the regolith on mars, so this could be completely off base, and there is supposed to be some frozen carbon dioxide around, which could be the carbon source needed to sustain life. Its that or the carbon is shipped in and the cows are basically mobile self replicating soil creating machines, which could be cool.

Thu, 2015-06-18 09:58

#15

jackgraham jackgraham's picture

Reality XP show a la Alaskan

Reality XP show a la Alaskan Bush People where city Martians follow Rednecks around filming them. Add exsurgents for comedy.

—

J A C K G R A H A M :: Hooray for Earth! http://eclipsephase.com :: twitter @jackgraham @faketsr :: Google+Jack Graham

Thu, 2015-06-18 10:01

#16

jackgraham jackgraham's picture

Noble Pigeon wrote:UnitOmega

Noble Pigeon wrote:
UnitOmega wrote:
Honestly, where doesn't really matter. There's no reference to wide open spaces of farming on Mars. There's no huge pastures filled with [b]Rust Cows[/b]
How dare you shoot down my dreams of becoming a redneck farmer on Mars and having genetically engineered Martian cows on my plot of Martian land. This is going to be my goal, you can keep your sterile, boring domes!

You can always cheat and make Mars in your game warmer, wetter, and atmospherically thicker. This has implications for the timeline and the tech level, but you can get away with it if your players aren't going to obsess over it too much.

—

J A C K G R A H A M :: Hooray for Earth! http://eclipsephase.com :: twitter @jackgraham @faketsr :: Google+Jack Graham

Thu, 2015-06-18 17:11

#17

CodeBreaker CodeBreaker's picture

jackgraham wrote:Reality XP

jackgraham wrote:
Reality XP show a la Alaskan Bush People where city Martians follow Rednecks around filming them. Add exsurgents for comedy.

Great, now I want to see Survivorman: Pandora Gate, where a survivalist is dropped onto a xenoplanet with his morph, some cameras, and a few essentials.

—

Thu, 2015-06-18 17:34

#18

Chernoborg Chernoborg's picture

jackgraham wrote:Reality XP

jackgraham wrote:
Reality XP show a la Alaskan Bush People where city Martians follow Rednecks around filming them. Add exsurgents for comedy.

Or a Deadliest Catch: Uranus, following several cloud skimmer crews as they sweep the blue-green skies for the aerostats filled with the helium-3 the rest of the Solar system needs.

—

Current Status: Highly Distracted building Gatecrashing systems in Universe Sandbox!

Thu, 2015-06-18 17:42

#19

Lazarus

jackgraham wrote:. . .

jackgraham wrote:
. . . You can always cheat and make Mars in your game warmer, wetter, and atmospherically thicker. . . .

I'm not actually sure that you even need to cheat like that. Mars has enough atmosphere that characters with Enhanced Respiration are able to survive (SW p. 161). It doesn't seem that inconceivable that there would be genetically modified animals able to do that as well.

—

My artificially intelligent spaceship is psychic. Your argument it invalid.

Thu, 2015-06-18 18:36

#20

R.O.S.S.-128 R.O.S.S.-128's picture

Carbon Sources

Trappedinwikipedia wrote:
They'd be *really* weird lifeforms though, as I don't think much of mars has anything growing on it yet. Still, long term life support is pretty powerful stuff. The biggest problem is probably the near complete lack of carbon in a Martian regolith, which means that anything engineered to live there probably needs to be silicon based, which I'm not sure Transhumanity can pull off. I'm not sure they can't though. Of course, we don't actually know much about the regolith on mars, so this could be completely off base, and there is supposed to be some frozen carbon dioxide around, which could be the carbon source needed to sustain life. Its that or the carbon is shipped in and the cows are basically mobile self replicating soil creating machines, which could be cool.

Well, Mars' atmosphere is 95.97% carbon dioxide. I could potentially see the idea of genetically engineered plants designed specifically to perform "carbon fixing": pull CO2 out of the air, use it to grow, die/get eaten and deposit the resulting carbon on the ground. Reduces the atmosphere's CO2 content and fertilizes the ground at the same time. That could even be what the farmers' "crop" is, since it would be beneficial to the terraforming effort there's no particular reason it has to be edible as long as they're getting paid by the acre (though being able to sell some kind of byproduct on the side would be a nice benefit). Edit: that's Mars right now of course, EP's partially-terraformed Mars probably has a good deal less CO2 and more O2 considering it meets some definitions of breathable.

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End of line.

Thu, 2015-06-18 21:10

#21

MrWigggles MrWigggles's picture

EP Mars co2 content and o2

EP Mars co2 content and o2 content must be different. Rusters don't suffer from o2 toxicity when they leave mars.

Thu, 2015-06-18 21:43

#22

Chernoborg Chernoborg's picture

I think at this stage they'd

I think at this stage they'd be just introducing plants more advanced than lichen. Probably something like a beach grass or bristlecone pine. Stuff that gets by with only a little water and no soil . Even then it's going to be in the lowest of the lowlands- Hellas and Valles Marineris. As for atmosphere, the conditions seem only a bit harsher than the top of Mount Everest. Which is still plenty deadly! There actually can't be that much CO2 left otherwise it would sink and displace the lighter oxygen and (presumably) nitrogen making any breathing impossible.

—

Current Status: Highly Distracted building Gatecrashing systems in Universe Sandbox!

Fri, 2015-06-19 03:15

#23

UnitOmega

Quote:Rusters don't suffer

Quote:
Rusters don't suffer from o2 toxicity when they leave mars.

This is actually because of how Enhanced Respiration works. It gives you the ability to breathe appropriate amounts of oxygen from the range of like .5 atm to 2 atm IIRC?

—

H-Rep: An EP Homebrew Blog http://ephrep.blogspot.com/