Sirius Business - a C# Aurora forum game. v2.5

[randakar]

Also, 1.1^30 works out to almost 17.5. I think that's plenty.

1 child every 10 years. On average, 3 children in 30 years for every pop. Works out to 6 per couple. But if you take into account that some of the population is too young or too old that number is actually higher, because couples don't live 30 years, they live closer to 90 or more years depending on quality of medical care and such. So, it's likely as high as 18 children over each couples lifetime.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Oh sorry about the abbreviations, they are mostly Aurora ground combat terms. In the game, you design a ground unit between static, infantry, light vehicle, vehicle, heavy vehicle, super-heavy vehicle and ultra-heavy vehicle. The classification decides what armour levels are available for the unit and how many modules it can carry. The modules can be weapons or utility things. This system allows for maximum RP factor for players to imagine/visualise their units the way they want.

CAP is crew-served anti-personnel, HCAP is the heavy version, LAV is light anti-vehicle, LAC is light auto cannon, LB is light bombardment and so on.

So AA is of course anti-air and it is useless because AI currently does not use ground support fighters. SHAV is super-heavy anti-vehicle and it is also useless because AI currently does not build ultra or super heavy-vehicles, which are the only ones capable of carrying armour strong enough to require SHAV to penetrate it. This is why building an invasion force consisting solely of UHVs is considered gamey because no NPR can deal with that outside of an extreme tech difference. HB is heavy bombardment and while it is deadly to all units it also causes far too much collateral damage to be used when the whole purpose of invasion is to capture as many facilities and as much of the population as possible.

Heavier weapons penetrate more armour but use more supplies and take up more space. CAP and HCAP get the most shots. Auto cannons are a compromise between anti-vehicle and anti-personnel weapons in that they are inferior in both roles but better if the unit has to do both. Strictly speaking, bombardment units are not necessary but LB is a good force multiplier for frontline and MB can speed things up as counter-battery formation but don't assign it to support your frontline as that will cause lot of collateral damage. MB, MBL and HB will always do counter-battery automatically as long as they have the sufficient range.

Finally, bigger formations are better than smaller formations due to the breakthrough mechanic but the difference is small enough that even a single difference in tech level completely negates it and commander bonuses that are more plentiful for small formations also help. But bigger formations are also easier for the players to create and manage as the micromanagement gets pretty insane when you start building your army from the platoon level. I know, I've done it and I ask myself why. Hope this wall of text helps your decision making process.

 

[Nikolai II]

Why can't we get higher than 10% growth rate?
In real life when encountering virgin lands people have 6, 8, 10 children.
That's a growth rate of 300 to 1000% or more every 20 years.

In real life they had that also when not encountering virgin lands, and it was mostly because those kids would die in droves.

 

[son of liberty]

Also, 1.1^30 works out to almost 17.5. I think that's plenty.female fertility

1 child every 10 years. On average, 3 children in 30 years for every pop. Works out to 6 per couple. But if you take into account that some of the population is too young or too old that number is actually higher, because couples don't live 30 years, they live closer to 90 or more years depending on quality of medical care and such. So, it's likely as high as 18 children over each couples lifetime.

Not really. Unfortunately, women only have a limited number of years where they are "fertile". Men can make babies at any age but women effectively have roughly 30 years or so. Really less than that depending on morality and such. Do you really want 13 year girls breeding? So, 20 years is more realistic for a civilization like our current one. 18-38 and even 38 is considered "geriatric pregnancy" fraught with perils like autistic children or other birth defects. It is also somewhat more dangerous for the mother as she gets older.
female fertility

 

[randakar]

Not really. Unfortunately, women only have a limited number of years where they are "fertile". Men can make babies at any age but women effectively have roughly 30 years or so. Really less than that depending on morality and such. Do you really want 13 year girls breeding? So, 20 years is more realistic for a civilization like our current one. 18-38 and even 38 is considered "geriatric pregnancy" fraught with perils like autistic children or other birth defects. It is also somewhat more dangerous for the mother as she gets older.
female fertility

Obviously this game is using a completely fictional annual growth rate. Your point only makes it more so.
To be fair your population might consist entirely of intelligent bunnies. Who knows.

 

[randakar]

Funnily enough, it doesn't actually end up mattering. Whether a woman is fertile for 20 or for 30 years, I mean. You still need to produce 2 times 9 children if the average lifespan is 90 years to get to an average of 0.1 child per year. Doesn't matter what period of time you do it in. More if people live longer, less if the average lifespan is shorter. But even in a case where we have midieval conditions and people don't live beyond 40 they *still* have to bear 8 children, on average, to get to that 10% growth rate. 10 if you factor in that the parents die off at some point.
And if the lifespan is that short, children's survival chances will be low, too.

Nope, if anything, a 10% growth rate is incredible and not achievable without technological assistence, for humans. Think things like cloning.

 

[blue emu]

To be fair your population might consist entirely of intelligent bunnies.

Wot's 'ee gonna do?

Nibble me bum?

 

[blue emu]

In about a day and a half, the majority of our fleet will be gathered at planet Harmony for refueling and resupply.

Gunships, PD vessels, Carriers, Sabre squadrons, all will be there.

Unfortunately no shore leave is possible since the population was massacred by the Modrons.

We should be able to launch Operation Armageddon II in two or three days.

 

[blue emu]

In the mean time, a pair of Intel ships are en route to the jump point into the Neutral Zone.

They will be followed later by a second pair.

---

Intel ships have no jump drive. And the Modrons destroyed the Portal.

An Island-class military jump tender is on the way from planet Harmony, to let the Intel ships through the jump point.

 

[RowanOfElton]

Funnily enough, it doesn't actually end up mattering. Whether a woman is fertile for 20 or for 30 years, I mean. You still need to produce 2 times 9 children if the average lifespan is 90 years to get to an average of 0.1 child per year. Doesn't matter what period of time you do it in. More if people live longer, less if the average lifespan is shorter. But even in a case where we have midieval conditions and people don't live beyond 40 they *still* have to bear 8 children, on average, to get to that 10% growth rate. 10 if you factor in that the parents die off at some point.
And if the lifespan is that short, children's survival chances will be low, too.

Nope, if anything, a 10% growth rate is incredible and not achievable without technological assistence, for humans. Think things like cloning.

To really bring this home, wouldn't a growth rate also be the amount the population is growing after accounting for deaths? To put it in mathematical terms, the growth rate would be the birth rate minus the death rate, wouldn't it? Which means the birth rate would have to be even higher than 10% or are deaths handled in a separate calculation?

 

[blue emu]

The game is pretty highly abstracted.

The immigration rate (shipping colonists in from Earth, in cryogenic sleep) is even more outrageous than the birth rate.

When you first start a colony on the Moon or Mars, for example, it only takes a few months to get it up to around a million people.

Literally, months.

 

[blue emu]

As the action dies down at the Neutral Zone jump point, it starts to pick up again at the Lernea jump point.

Our Sabre squadron is now 35 million km from the next squadron of enemy Freighters.

The New Hope class Colony ship moves in to rescue our own survivors and pick up enemy prisoners for interrogation.

The ten Freighters in the two Freighter squadrons are carrying part of a Spaceport. Each Freighter can carry 1/40th of a Spaceport.

 

[GarfunkeL]

To really bring this home, wouldn't a growth rate also be the amount the population is growing after accounting for deaths? To put it in mathematical terms, the growth rate would be the birth rate minus the death rate, wouldn't it? Which means the birth rate would have to be even higher than 10% or are deaths handled in a separate calculation?

As Emu pointed out, the game does not really model anything like that. Small colonies breed more than big colonies but that's it. The game allows you to ship 7 billion people off Earth and dump them into a certain death at Venus, if you so decide. The colony/planet/world side of the game is there to support the detailed space fleet combat game, not the other way around.

 

[randakar]

To really bring this home, wouldn't a growth rate also be the amount the population is growing after accounting for deaths? To put it in mathematical terms, the growth rate would be the birth rate minus the death rate, wouldn't it? Which means the birth rate would have to be even higher than 10% or are deaths handled in a separate calculation?

That's part of the average lifespan. All you need then is to account for the parents dying.

Average 40 is not even unreasonable if half the children die in childbirth and everyone else lives to 80. Surely in an advanced society mostly everyone lives to some high number of years though.

For simplicities' sake I'm more or less pretending everyone lives to the same age but of course it doesn't have to be that way.

 

[randakar]

As the action dies down at the Neutral Zone jump point, it starts to pick up again at the Lernea jump point.

Our Sabre squadron is now 35 million km from the next squadron of enemy Freighters.

The New Hope class Colony ship moves in to rescue our own survivors and pick up enemy prisoners for interrogation.

The ten Freighters in the two Freighter squadrons are carrying part of a Spaceport. Each Freighter can carry 1/40th of a Spaceport.

View attachment 1279849

Very nice. What is this called? Operation surrender or die?

 

[blue emu]

Our Gunship force still has more than 75% fuel and about 90% spare parts.

... so I'll change my mind and instead of sending them to the new fleet rendezvous, I'll use them to blockade the Harmony => Neutral Zone jump point.

 

[randakar]

Sounds like a good idea. Keep them from sending reinforcements or fleeing.

 

[blue emu]

Do we really need any more captured Freighters? Or should I just blast them?

Capturing the ship has one big advantage: more components recovered because you repair the prize before dismantling it.

Wrecking the ship instead forfeits most of the components (and most of the research benefits), but gives captured crew for interrogation and doesn't require as much logistical work (a Tug back home to a drydock).

 

[randakar]

70-ish engines or reactors. 10 engines in the troop transports. this will be similar. So 5-ish should be plenty

 

[blue emu]

First-salvo hits for everybody!