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You are also ill... very ill.
You may be getting a new character soon, if this one keels over.
I freaked out for a second, "Lieutenant Commander? What kind of rank is that?", Then I remembered you can have different themes (Mine is Kapitanleutnant!)
June 17th, 2026. The Battle Fleet has completed its overhaul, recalled its crews, and boosted out for further training patrols. By the time they return, we may have the first set of improved missiles ready for testing. Dr Holmes has been doing an excellent job converting Professor Mosberg's inspired designs into actual hardware... like Bo, she is a Power and Propulsion expert, not a Missile Scientist, so she's had to work outside her own field of expertise... but even so, she's managed to get four of the five missile designs translated into hardware in the past four months. Only the largest... and presumably the most difficult... missile model remains on the drawing boards. The ordinance factories are gearing up now for the new production run. It will take some time to create the proper jigs and dies to manufacture these new models, but I expect to see the factories back in operation by October.
The terraforming of Mars continues as planned. The fifth Martian terraforming facility has come on-line, and the global mean temperature has crept up to 1.4 degrees above nominal. Factory production continues, and the third home-built Martian factory is now operational, with more on the way. The population of Mars has reached four million.
Our efforts to master the financial crisis are beginning to bear fruit. Since the beginning of the year, we've built six new Financial Centers employing a total of 300,000 experts in business and finance. That's just about all that we've built... until the economy is under control, we must watch every penny. Fortunately, another one of the shipyards has completed its expansion, relieving some of the strain on the treasury.
It was one of the Naval Yards. Captain Arjyla will be pleased... we now have the capability to build 15,000-ton warships. That's nearly big enough for a Light Carrier.
The terraforming of Mars continues as planned. The fifth Martian terraforming facility has come on-line, and the global mean temperature has crept up to 1.4 degrees above nominal. Factory production continues, and the third home-built Martian factory is now operational, with more on the way. The population of Mars has reached four million.
Our efforts to master the financial crisis are beginning to bear fruit. Since the beginning of the year, we've built six new Financial Centers employing a total of 300,000 experts in business and finance. That's just about all that we've built... until the economy is under control, we must watch every penny. Fortunately, another one of the shipyards has completed its expansion, relieving some of the strain on the treasury.
It was one of the Naval Yards. Captain Arjyla will be pleased... we now have the capability to build 15,000-ton warships. That's nearly big enough for a Light Carrier.
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So we are solving the financial crisis and expanding capacity at the same time? Excellent.
Reagan rolls in his grave.
But also, why not expand the economic capabilities of the empire more so than now, rather than pour all of those reasources in to the military? Not to say don't have one, but if nothing else, those ships will almost certainly be obsolete by the time you meet any intelligent life (even presuming it shoots back.)
Aside from our three at-start warships and our initial build of six more warships (set up on the first day of the game), we haven't put anything further into the Military. We built some missiles to arm them... but it's taken for granted that if we build Missile Cruisers and Missile Destroyers, we will also build some missiles to put in their launchers. We've expanded all the dockyards once... but that would have to be done anyway and it's such a slow process that if we wait until we find aliens before expanding, it would be several years before we could DO anything about them. I plan to build another set of missiles to the new designs, because they're almost twice as fast, which translates to roughly 50% better to-Hit chances. Considering how cheap missiles are, building them only makes sense.
I agree that we should focus mostly on expanding our economy and capabilities. I'm doing just that. But there are two classes of military preparations that I feel should be included in our plan, and in our budget.
1) Long term preparations that cannot be left until after "first contact" without running unacceptable risks. Eg: expanding the shipyards.
2) Very cheap preparations which yield an immediate increase in our capabilities. Eg: new missiles that are 50% more deadly.
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August 3rd, 2026. The financial situation is slowly coming under control. In January of this year, our monthly deficit was averaging -1,250 Megabucks. Now in August, it's down to -450 Megabucks. I'm not sure that I'll actually be able to deliver on my promise to balance the budget by the end of the year... but we've made substantial progress at any rate. One key solution to the problem has been re-orienting our private sector towards finance and investment at the expense of production. This is a move that would have to be made eventually; as planet Earth gradually runs out of resources, it makes sense to ship the mines and factories out toward the expanding frontier and replace them with training facilities, research labs and investment banks. I'm not certain that we are really ready for this step, though, not yet... at the moment, the "frontier" only consists of one small colony of less than five million people.
Fleet Ops Survey contacted me today with some very interesting news. Thought-provoking, to say the least. It seems that Commander Schuermann of ESN Copernicus has finished Grav-Mapping the Wolf 359 system... and found no exits. None at all. It has only one jump point, which leads directly here. In other words, as long as we control the Sol system, we control Wolf 359 as well.
The system has only one other interesting feature... but that feature is interesting indeed. The sun itself is a miserable little Red Dwarf, so dim that even the innermost planets are at sixty degrees below zero; it has a couple of semi-frozen Gas Giants, a few worthless lumps of rock and ice... and six hundred and twenty three Asteroids. There are more Asteroids in the Wolf 359 system than can be found in all the other systems we've discovered, all added together... including our own.
And it's totally isolated. No-one can reach it without going through our home worlds. Sounds like a pretty good place to set up an Asteroid Mining operation. A big one.
Fleet Ops Survey contacted me today with some very interesting news. Thought-provoking, to say the least. It seems that Commander Schuermann of ESN Copernicus has finished Grav-Mapping the Wolf 359 system... and found no exits. None at all. It has only one jump point, which leads directly here. In other words, as long as we control the Sol system, we control Wolf 359 as well.
The system has only one other interesting feature... but that feature is interesting indeed. The sun itself is a miserable little Red Dwarf, so dim that even the innermost planets are at sixty degrees below zero; it has a couple of semi-frozen Gas Giants, a few worthless lumps of rock and ice... and six hundred and twenty three Asteroids. There are more Asteroids in the Wolf 359 system than can be found in all the other systems we've discovered, all added together... including our own.
And it's totally isolated. No-one can reach it without going through our home worlds. Sounds like a pretty good place to set up an Asteroid Mining operation. A big one.
The Logistics Department would be delighted to ship a frickload of equipment there. Awaiting your orders, Sir.
First we'll need either a Jump-capable Freighter... or a Jump-Gate Constructor ship.
Does anyone see any reason why we can't set up a jump-gate to Wolf 359? Nothing's likely to come swarming out of it... there's no way INTO the system except from this end.
It has been determined that adding "Nuclear Pulse" paint to the coolant fluid leaves the reactor critically unstable.
While what remains of the staff move into undamaged buildings Im setting up a schedule for experiments with cooling
gas instead. Interesting to find out what properties "Nuclear Pulse" paint has in aerosol form.
Also I must protest the accountants claim that I "waste money and kill off the staff". I do nothing of the sort. It is a frugal operation here, but one cannot expect to do miracles without breaking eggs, and this third explosion at the site is only a minor setback.
I shall make that bloody reactor go FASTER yet.
While what remains of the staff move into undamaged buildings Im setting up a schedule for experiments with cooling
gas instead. Interesting to find out what properties "Nuclear Pulse" paint has in aerosol form.
Also I must protest the accountants claim that I "waste money and kill off the staff". I do nothing of the sort. It is a frugal operation here, but one cannot expect to do miracles without breaking eggs, and this third explosion at the site is only a minor setback.
I shall make that bloody reactor go FASTER yet.
how do i assign a planetary governor???
EDIT: my screen is not big enough
EDIT: my screen is not big enough
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Ah so we've started outsourcing at interplanetary scale? Splendid. Soon all our appliances will be "made in Mars" I just hope costumer service isn't transferred too or the lag in communications would be terrible, could you imagine it?
Hey it's difficult for me to improve on orbital stations designs, when all I've got is 1 measly lab in which I keep seeing Discovery Channel's documentaries about MIR and the former International Space Station and one scale model made out of toothpicks...
Meanwhile my colleague Bos gets several labs to explode. I need lavish funding for my research too!
I just hope costumer service isn't transferred too or the lag in communications would be terrible, could you imagine it?Hey it's difficult for me to improve on orbital stations designs, when all I've got is 1 measly lab in which I keep seeing Discovery Channel's documentaries about MIR and the former International Space Station and one scale model made out of toothpicks...
Meanwhile my colleague Bos gets several labs to explode. I need lavish funding for my research too!
We have warning signs all over the place, so I formally renounce any responsibility! You won't prove me anything!!
And BTW I don't want Mars to be terraformed! Did I kill Douglas Quaid for nothing?
About bloody time! Goddamn civilians and liberals are holding back our fleet expansion!
