Hello OA!

[Jargal]

Hello all!

I was a reader of the OA site for years, but somehow haven't found this forum until recently. Now I finish the reading of "setting discussion" subforum and start to think about writing something myself, so there are some questions:

1. I have an idea of space habitat that seem interesting to me, but I'm not ready to create full solar system for it. I've seen some habitat articles without system description in EG, but they are very old. Is it possible to write habitat article and then somehow place it in suitable system from already existing?

2. I undestand what in developed systems economy is post-scarcity and automated, but how about the system in the first years of colonization? Obviously even then sophonts will only be overseers of neumann swarms and other automated industry, byt how many time and attention will they need to devote to the process?

3, unrelated to previous. For an archeologist as myself dead peoples are often more interesting that live peoples. In OA how often does a colonized system or major habitat/habitat group die out to the last sophont for whatever reasons? Not in the Sephirotics or other civilized places, of course (or maybe even there), but somewhere on the Periphery?


P.S. English isn't my native language, so I apologize in advance for any grammar and syntax errors, which, undoubtedly, I will make a lot.

[MacGregor]

Welcome to OA!

1) Absolutely! If you have a system in mind great, if not list the article and I’m sure we can find a suitable place for it.

2) I can’t really answer this one. Maybe one of the other editors/admins have an idea.

3) I would think complete extinction is probably rare but not unheard of. If you have an indea for an article or story along these lines I say go for it.

Looking forward to seeing your contributions. Cheers!

[Drashner1]

Hi There - Welcome to OA!

1. I have an idea of space habitat that seem interesting to me, but I'm not ready to create full solar system for it. I've seen some habitat articles without system description in EG, but they are very old. Is it possible to write habitat article and then somehow place it in suitable system from already existing?

Sure! What MacGregor said. This is no problem.

2. I undestand what in developed systems economy is post-scarcity and automated, but how about the system in the first years of colonization? Obviously even then sophonts will only be overseers of neumann swarms and other automated industry, byt how many time and attention will they need to devote to the process?

Basically it would come to down to what the colonists wanted. At one extreme, the neumann swarms and bots could create all needed infrastructure before the colonists arrive or while the colonists are held in biostasis after arrival. So the colonists would arrive/wake up and everything would just be there waiting for them. The biggest challenges they would face might be how they want their homes decorated or what beverage they'd like waiting for them when they arrive/wake up to commemorate the experience.

On the other extreme, the neumanns and bots could create just enough infrastructure to provide minimal support for the colony and then shut down/move on/disassemble themselves. The colonists would then be on their own - in the case of prim or ludd colonies, possibly being left with little more than a terraformed planet, hand tools, and hopefully some skills to make more. In more advanced colonies whatever level of tech and infrastructure the colony decided it wants - which might still be staggeringly advanced and wealthy by our RL standards, but quite simple and 'rough' by Y11k standards.

And of course there is a huge range of options in between the two extremes. Some colonists just want to be in a new place and don't want to bother with all the set up. Others want some degree of challenge and may set things up to provide it, at least initially. That could include non-post scarcity economic systems as an option (possibly the only option in the NoCoZo).

Perhaps the level of infrastructure and 'challenge' is something that is worked out during initial colony planning or a potential colonies send out something like a prospectus that lays out how the colony will be set up, including the level of challenge. Potential colonists would then look these over and decide which mission meets their desires and decide to 'invest' their time and effort with it.

3, unrelated to previous. For an archeologist as myself dead peoples are often more interesting that live peoples. In OA how often does a colonized system or major habitat/habitat group die out to the last sophont for whatever reasons? Not in the Sephirotics or other civilized places, of course (or maybe even there), but somewhere on the Periphery?

To be honest, I don't think that's a question we've ever directly considered before. Congrats on hitting us with something new right out of the gate

Archeology certainly exists in the setting, but to date I think we've pretty much only ever considered it in relation to ancient xenosophont civilizations and even then I don't think we've directly spoken in terms of archeology - although that is what is actually happening. OA has a bunch of vanished alien civilizations lying around and logically the information about them in the EG had to come from a form of archeology (xenoarcheology).

Speaking in terms of Terragen civilizations - The closet we currently come to archeology in this area is again a matter of logical inference rather than direct descriptions and is in relation to the aftermath of major disasters in the setting. The Gehenna Incident, the Surreal Rash, and Cinder Systems presumably all result in the remains of multiple civilizations that might be studied for reasons that shade into archeology (possibly mixed with the civilization equivalent of figuring out what happened after a plane crash to hopefully prevent it happening again). Like some types of archeology this may occasionally also run into issues with survivors or descendants objecting to things being studied due to religious concerns or issues with 'desecrating' the dead or the like.

There are also a number of mentions of the remnants of the works of ancient Ahuman AIs being left behind in various star systems after they were forced out the Solar System early in the timeline. But again, although this might fall under the umbrella of archeology, it isn't described that way for some reason.

Looking beyond these examples - Logically, there should be some number of failed colony missions over the history of the setting, especially in the earlier part of the timeline when the technology and know-how for setting up a new colony wasn't as developed. We do make passing mention of failed missions here and there in the EG, but seem to mainly treat these as 'the ship never made it to the system' without providing details or talking about colonies that failed after arrival. And as you say, colonies in the Outer Volumes and Periphery - where we explicitly say things are more dangerous - should fail from time to time.

The upshot of all this is that you have pointed out an area of OA that is not as fully developed as it should be. You (and others if they are interested) can think of this as a giant blank canvas waiting to be painted on, if you feel like it. If that feels too much like 'bringing your work home with you' and you'd rather spend time and attention on other aspects of OA, that's perfectly fine as well

P.S. English isn't my native language, so I apologize in advance for any grammar and syntax errors, which, undoubtedly, I will make a lot.

That's no problem. We have quite a few members here for whom English is not their native language. Plus we have three different versions of English in play on the site (British English, American English, and Australian English) and our membership includes a wide range of experience with writing, regardless of the language it's done in. We like to think that we help people get better with practice

Hope this helps and once again - Welcome to OA

Todd

[Jargal]

If you have a system in mind great, if not list the article and I’m sure we can find a suitable place for it.

I have some minimum requirements for the system in mind, but they are very general and, as far as I understand current OA canon, easy to meet.

Basically it would come to down to what the colonists wanted.
...
Perhaps the level of infrastructure and 'challenge' is something that is worked out during initial colony planning or a potential colonies send out something like a prospectus that lays out how the colony will be set up, including the level of challenge. Potential colonists would then look these over and decide which mission meets their desires and decide to 'invest' their time and effort with it.

So it's acceptable for the colonist in the, let's say, "Year 32 from The Arrival" to think: "Ok, we have build all the needed starting infrastructure, let's think about something more creative and interesting". Ok, it suits me for my idea.

Archeology certainly exists in the setting, but to date I think we've pretty much only ever considered it in relation to ancient xenosophont civilizations and even then I don't think we've directly spoken in terms of archeology - although that is what is actually happening. OA has a bunch of vanished alien civilizations lying around and logically the information about them in the EG had to come from a form of archeology (xenoarcheology).

Speaking about xenoarcheology. Universe is old, xenosophonts are rare, this I understand. But youngest xenos remains in OA, as I've found, are tens of millions years old. Is there some principial rule that no extinct xeno civilization can be found, ceased to exist only hundreds of thousands/1-2 millions of years ago? If we talk about Low-tech (maybe up to Middle-tech) society, after just a million of years even on our single planet finds happen only by chance. Not very archeologically friendly situation :-)

There are also a number of mentions of the remnants of the works of ancient Ahuman AIs being left behind in various star systems after they were forced out the Solar System early in the timeline. But again, although this might fall under the umbrella of archeology, it isn't described that way for some reason.

It's looks like a sort of "industrial archaeology" with additional challenge of industry being ahuman in origin.

Looking beyond these examples - Logically, there should be some number of failed colony missions over the history of the setting, especially in the earlier part of the timeline when the technology and know-how for setting up a new colony wasn't as developed. We do make passing mention of failed missions here and there in the EG, but seem to mainly treat these as 'the ship never made it to the system' without providing details or talking about colonies that failed after arrival.

For me this is looks like the largest area of archeology in the current era. Even with all available data storage technologies, records are written by sophonts, and sophonts can lie and make mistakes. Artefact can't lie, it can only be misinterpreted, and this is why you need professionals :-)

The upshot of all this is that you have pointed out an area of OA that is not as fully developed as it should be. You (and others if they are interested) can think of this as a giant blank canvas waiting to be painted on, if you feel like it. If that feels too much like 'bringing your work home with you' and you'd rather spend time and attention on other aspects of OA, that's perfectly fine as well

There are pro and contra... I'll think about it all.

[Rynn]

Welcome to the group

1. I have an idea of space habitat that seem interesting to me, but I'm not ready to create full solar system for it. I've seen some habitat articles without system description in EG, but they are very old. Is it possible to write habitat article and then somehow place it in suitable system from already existing?

That's completely fine, there's no need to create a whole system backdrop just for a habitat

2. I undestand what in developed systems economy is post-scarcity and automated, but how about the system in the first years of colonization? Obviously even then sophonts will only be overseers of neumann swarms and other automated industry, byt how many time and attention will they need to devote to the process?

Automation in OA is basically complete. Software as intelligent as people exists (as well as software that is much better). For any job a person, or sophont, can do there is software that can do it as good or better. Even on a new colony people don't have to work, the machines can simply supervise themselves and go about making more machines and infrastructure. Some colonists might like to wait in stasis (physical or otherwise) whilst others may choose to be awoken as early as their is habitat space for them.

3, unrelated to previous. For an archeologist as myself dead peoples are often more interesting that live peoples. In OA how often does a colonized system or major habitat/habitat group die out to the last sophont for whatever reasons? Not in the Sephirotics or other civilized places, of course (or maybe even there), but somewhere on the Periphery

It depends what you mean. If you mean everyone died that would be pretty rare....however even pretty rare events can happen with enough numbers. Even if the chance of one system dying out (through war, blight or other) is one in a million each year there will be dozens of dying systems, thousands throughout history.

However it's worth considering that many systems might just be abandoned as fashion sways. A relatively low populated system whose neighbour a few light years away gets a nexus might slowly start losing its people, as more migrate to be closer to the nexus link. Now systems becoming completely abandoned might be rare, but there are likely thousands of systems within which there are extensive habitats with no inhabitants, the habs in low power mode awaiting the arrival of visitors (or defending against anyone not already registered).

Finally it's worth considering how much virtual archeology there is to do. 99.9% of terragens spend most of their time in virtual worlds. The sheer quantity of historical data of events, popular environments, popular rule sets etc boggle the mind. So much to sort through and discover.

[Jargal]

Now systems becoming completely abandoned might be rare, but there are likely thousands of systems within which there are extensive habitats with no inhabitants, the habs in low power mode awaiting the arrival of visitors (or defending against anyone not already registered).

Sometimes archaeological sources want to explore you
Now it starts to sound familiar. In the 50-45 BT there was 3 most valuable things in Middle-Volga Archeological Expedition: horse, cart and Mauser C-96.

Finally it's worth considering how much virtual archeology there is to do. 99.9% of terragens spend most of their time in virtual worlds. The sheer quantity of historical data of events, popular environments, popular rule sets etc boggle the mind. So much to sort through and discover.

If the virch is still functioning it's more "information source criticism" than archeology, but "excavation" of virtual reality may be quite interesting, I suppose.

[Madine]

One other observation - recycling technology is extremely advanced in OA, and likely was so fairly early in the timeline, seeing as being wasteful of resources during the Technocalypse or the earliest colonization missions was courting extinction. If a group of people no longer want to use or maintain a structure, they may simply break it down for raw materials and build something else (see the snipped "Saying goodbye to Outrun Habitat" in creative writing for an example). Thus, even if a particular system is abandoned, the archaelogical record may be fairly truncated/skewed towards only the most recent artifacts and structures (assuming you're considering only physical evidence and not records of various kinds).

[Jargal]

One other observation - recycling technology is extremely advanced in OA

Yeah, we will not have such pleasure as an stratigraphically undisturbed cultural layer. This challenge is all the more interesting then.

[stevebowers]

Welcome to the group

[quote='Jargal' pid='54299' dateline='1581330493']If you mean everyone died that would be pretty rare....however even pretty rare events can happen with enough numbers. Even if the chance of one system dying out (through war, blight or other) is one in a million each year there will be dozens of dying systems, thousands throughout history.

Hi!
I was going to say the same thing. Thousands of colonies have become depopulated for various reasons, mostly because of shifts in fashion or popular culture, but sometimes due to disasters of various kinds, or as the result of conflict. Any depopulated colony should be treated with caution, since some of these depopulations may have happened as the result of very well-hidden and subtle attacks using advanced weapons, including (but not limited to) memetic weapons.

[Jargal]

Any depopulated colony should be treated with caution, since some of these depopulations may have happened as the result of very well-hidden and subtle attacks using advanced weapons, including (but not limited to) memetic weapons.

The power of memetics is a thing that I don't quite understand in OA. If I don't come in the direct DNI contact with any digital remains - how big the risk is?