Author Topic: The Islands  (Read 3018 times)

kato

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The Islands
« on: 06 January 2016, 18:07:36 »
The Islands were built as floating terraforming tools, vast complexes of mobile structures built for a single purpose: To seed the oceans of inhabitable planets with a bioreactor, prompting the required oxygenation event that'd make these worlds habitable within mere decades.

Structurally, they built on tried designs: Like some of the oil platforms that were built on Earth centuries earlier, The Islands essentially consisted of thousands of hexagonal prisms cast from local ferroconcrete to become the floatation devices and construction basis upon which equipment was later mounted. Including these concrete bases, the average Island was designed to displace in the region of 15 megatons, becoming some of the largest man-made objects to be built on the surface of other planets.

To remain adaptable in the terraforming process and to easier serve in later use, Islands were built from dozens of individual structures, each constructed with an identical highly self-sufficient fusion-based power system and ruggedized motive system that allowed slow but steady movement across the seas. Invariably, the equipment mounted on top would be environmentally sealed to ease work for the hundreds of people who served on them.

Most Islands were taken apart after filling their purpose; their power systems in particular tended to serve for long times as generators for outlaying villages and bases established on the very same worlds, while the concrete structures themselves were often sunk as breakwaters at new-built ports or even served as pillars for bridges across coastal waters.

Islands came in any number of configurations during their usage; often more dependent on how many places on the planet were seen concurrently as optimal, only a number of standard configurations could be made out.

The Island

The standard configuration of an Island consisted of 35 mobile structures semi-permanently linked together, resembling an oval of over one kilometer length on its longer side.

The vertical construction of each mobile structure was highly similar:

Level 1-3 : Lower Concrete Structure, empty
Level 4   : mounting 40-ton fusion generator and 20-ton motive system
Level 5-7 : Upper Concrete Structure, filled with 662 tons "tankage"
Level 8   : equipment deck, containing six 65-ton linkage systems and other equipment
Level 9-10: top levels

The "tankage" employed consisted of bundles of insulated tubes, forming hundred of kilometers of length lit by high-powered lamps within its insulation, within which water was circulated and algae and plankton would be grown. This "tankage" was used for the main purpose of the Islands: fast-growing genetically modified biomass from imported dry seed to the point where it could be flushed into the ocean. Further "tankage" would be installed topside on Decks 8-10 of over half of the Islands structures.

Three of the structures of the island formed its spaceport, covered entirely directly above deck 8 with blast-resistant landing decks that gave the Island enough room to even accomodate multiple dropships, a capacity rarely used.

Buildings covered a number of the structures; while each structure did have its own simple accomodations for the crew, there was typically a housing complex mounted over three structures, providing small individual apartments for the Islands nominal 4300-strong crew, as well as housing a number of passengers; the other a similar-sized combined functional bloc that housed both cargo bays for spare parts and communications and control equipment along with the officer's housing and a small separate aviation facility.

The remaining structures - forming a 60m-wide spacing between topside tankage and landing decks - were often seen to be used to stow bulk cargo or containers; some islands were seen to carry up to ten-thousand containers stacked on this open space.

Stats

Number of Mobile Structures: 35
Modular Structure Linkage Systems: 6 per structure

Type: Fortress, Hardened
CF: 130
Hexes covered: 665
Structural Height: 10; 5 levels underwater

Motive: Naval
MP: 2.0

Equipment mounted across Island:
Code: [Select]
26,600 tons - Power Systems (665 hex individual, fusion)
 13,300 tons - Motive Systems (665 hex individual)
  8,645 tons - Environmental Sealing (665 hex individual)
 13,650 tons - Modular Structure Linkage (210 systems)
 28,500 tons - Landing Decks (3x 19-hex)
  1,000 tons - 2x Helipad
    800 tons - 4x Small Craft Bay
    800 tons - Light Vehicle Bay, x16 (50-ton boats deployed by Lift Hoists)
    200 tons - Light Vehicle Bay, x4  (Cargo Handling Vehicles for Top Deck)
     30 tons - Distributed Communications Equipment (on two structures)
     12 tons - 2 MASH centers with 1/4 operating theaters
     18 tons - 6 Field Kitchens
    455 tons - 455 maritime lifeboats (in drop chutes on Deck 8 edges)
     96 tons - 32 Lift Hoists
 28,000 tons - Quarters, 2nd Class (4000)
  9,000 tons - Quarters, 1st Class ( 900)

519,330 tons - Discretionary Insulated "Tankage"
114,000 tons - Open Cargo / Container Cargo
 40,064 tons - Spare Parts and Small Cargo (Deck 8 Stowage)
 60,000 tons - typically unused free capacity, on tankage structure edges


Other Configurations

A smaller configuration seen occasionally splits the above standard configuration into three identical smaller units of ten structures, leaving five tankage structures behind when performing other tasks such as when aquafarming bays and other inshore areas to create a wider maritime biosphere. Similar configurations, sometimes more spread out, have seen use as cargo turnover bases for airships seeding larger islands or less accessible small continents.

The largest configuration of Islands once saw three of the above standard configurations joined up, forming a 46-megaton Megastructure for over fifteen years while its components were disassembled.

Edit: And just to confirm, yes, the standard configuration covers four mapsheets.
« Last Edit: 06 January 2016, 18:10:29 by kato »

kato

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Re: The Islands
« Reply #1 on: 06 January 2016, 18:34:09 »
As PS:

This came about when rolling up a planet in system generation that had everything a nice, comfy Earth analogue should have. Actually pretty close to Fomalhaut in-universe. Except a biosphere. And oxygen. So... terraforming. First idea was a small fleet of ships - well, second idea, after a quick calculation showed that i'd need somewhere on the scale of 10^8 fusion reactors to do it the hard way. Except with ships i'd have to have some hub-and-spoke delivery system from a land-side spaceport. And port infrastructure, and all that. So, why not put it all out to sea, as mobile structures? And then... why not pack em so that my terraforming target (using some crude back-of-the-envelope calculation with units such as "isotons of oxygen" and "femtomols per cell production") could be reached with only a few of them? It's not the Department of Mega-Engineering for nothing. And, in fact, the above ain't that hard to build in-universe. Just needs some investment.

For playing it's really more usable as a map than as a mobile structure moving on one. Might be fun for ATOW or similar, perhaps taking over one using a full company of troops plus BA. Lots of hiding spaces imaginable.

Deconstructed, individual structures could also be used as naval forts equipped with some medium weaponry. Or imagine the section with the landing decks serving as a seaside spaceport for a coastal city that has the option of moving itself out to sea.

 

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