Author Topic: Planets/Systems on the fringes of Periphery states -- come and go?  (Read 18155 times)

abou

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Looking at the maps of the Periphery across the history of the universe, I noticed that the Outworlds and Magistracy shrank quickly, but then after 3050 they began expanding into systems that disappeared from the map. In the Outworlds, I thought those lost systems were mostly apathy and abandonment, but now I'm not sure.

Were these systems abandoned, seceded, lost... recolonized? I just can't find any info on them.

Adacas

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Looking at the maps of the Periphery across the history of the universe, I noticed that the Outworlds and Magistracy shrank quickly, but then after 3050 they began expanding into systems that disappeared from the map. In the Outworlds, I thought those lost systems were mostly apathy and abandonment, but now I'm not sure.

Were these systems abandoned, seceded, lost... recolonized? I just can't find any info on them.

Many were lost by the wars of succession and a combination of factors, terraforming problems with water treatment plants, raids, ceased to be economically attractive and strategically important and the abandonment.
Search ISP3 there is a good collection of neighboring systems Canopus and other states abandoned to their fate, some villages and others do not

glitterboy2098

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given the populations required to even show up on the maps, i suspect that the abandonment was more political than literal.. the government left them to their own devices when a world became too difficult to keep around.

odds are this means that a lot of those worlds went through a "Postman" period where tech regressed to locally sustainable levels with pockets of more advanced stuff, and the planetary governments went through upheavals as they restructured themselves to be on their own. (assuming any planetary governments survived at all, and the worlds didn't regress back to city-states and such.)

Adacas

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given the populations required to even show up on the maps, i suspect that the abandonment was more political than literal.. the government left them to their own devices when a world became too difficult to keep around.

odds are this means that a lot of those worlds went through a "Postman" period where tech regressed to locally sustainable levels with pockets of more advanced stuff, and the planetary governments went through upheavals as they restructured themselves to be on their own. (assuming any planetary governments survived at all, and the worlds didn't regress back to city-states and such.)

It is quite possible your point of view, some of the background that lei for example Kleiwert in Canopians Ruins, when a large number of runaway slaves end up joining arrives with a group of old people who remained isolated on the planet.

The same could perhaps be in worlds agricultural base that are breathable atmosphere, societies regress to a pre-industrial level, but if they had a number of people may well survive their way through casual contact, free traders or pirates or explorers

Natasha Kerensky

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Looking at the maps of the Periphery across the history of the universe, I noticed that the Outworlds and Magistracy shrank quickly, but then after 3050 they began expanding into systems that disappeared from the map. In the Outworlds, I thought those lost systems were mostly apathy and abandonment, but now I'm not sure.

You should get the new First Succession War sourcebook.  It deals with this topic better than any other canon source.  Specifically, the nature and causes of "Lost Worlds" are covered on pages 105-107.

In short, ComStar generally removed planetary systems from maps when their population fell below 10K.  But there were exceptions to this, say, if a system had an important resource (like a recharging station), if a larger population was in hiding/relocated on-world after a major act of war or nature, or if the ComStar cabal was just up to their sneaky shenanigans.

The new First Succession War sourcebook also covers the specific loss of Outworlds Alliance systems in some detail.  In short, there were no acts of war in the Alliance, but the war caused investors to withdraw from terraforming efforts in the Alliance and forced merchants to reduce or eliminate their trade with dependent Alliance worlds.  With a weak central government and little investment/trade/help from the Inner Sphere, populations died off as their ecosystems and/or supply chains failed.  Whether any small remnant populations remained when the Outworlds began recovering some of these worlds in the 31st/32nd centuries is probably covered in ISP3 (I don't recall) or up to the GM.

The Taurian-Concordat war is also covered, and the fates of specific systems like Detroit, Spencer, and Portland are detailed.

Hope this helps.
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...(Because they're being 'rescued' by a Deep-Periphery civilization with no interest in leaving witnesses to tattle to those loser Successor States.)...

No idea.  Really.
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abou

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Hmmmm... I was hoping for something more specific. I have ISP3 and the 1st SW historical. I was hoping the topic would have been mentioned elsewhere.

Dang.

RunandFindOut

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Or just as likely most all those worlds are still there and habitable and still have human populations on them, some pretty sizeable.  Unless they were specifically noted as rendered uninhabitable they are still inhabitable.  Which means they are likely inhabited.  Thing is those were all worlds that by nature were not advanced and didn't produce anything the interstellar economy needed.  So when times got tough the central governments just stopped calling and tended to bigger problems at home.  So yes all around the fringes of the periphery states you'd have many, many independent planets often with fairly sizeable populations.  And they're completely unimportant because none of them can produce anything more advanced than the early 20th century so nobody cares and they don't interact with the larger interstellar economy. 

During periods when things get better for the periphery states they might pick a few of them back up as they return and tell the population they're part of the state again and put them back on maps.  But nothing really changes because the people there don't have anything anybody wants.  And the periphery states don't have the resources to change that in any systemic way.  So they'll make a PR stunt out of putting them back on the map and making them a "part of the nation" once more.  Maybe send out some people and inexpensive materials to move them from "still using fire-tube boilers" to "produce primitive planes and internal combustion engines."  But nothing really changes and sooner or later things will get tough again and they'll be abandoned once more.
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Korzon77

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Note, for exmaple, the ISP 3 says that some ofthe Outworld Wastes worlds have substantial populations, and an early 21st century technology*-- and yet are still not listed because they're just not that important.

*btechs 21st century tech, not our 21st century tecth.

SCC

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Slight problem with that, it's been repeatably stated that moving food, and essential food at that, consumes a not insignificant portion of all interstellar trade.

Also those worlds would have self-sustaining economies and could easily expand production of anything they do produce for export. Sure it would be crap by normal IS standards (I think, Herb has stated that the Abrams has BAR 7, Tech Level C armor) it's better then nothing, which is what most people in the IS have on offer.

HABeas2

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Nope. Abrams would be BAR 6.

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Korzon77

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Slight problem with that, it's been repeatably stated that moving food, and essential food at that, consumes a not insignificant portion of all interstellar trade.


I don't believe that's the case anymore-- I think Cray stated that staple foods were not a major part of interstaller commerce.  In any case, it can't be, without breaking the setting completely. The amount of imported staples, for say 2 billion people eating 5 pounds of food a day, would require five million tons of food-- every day. If we assume a notational "perfect dropship" of 10,000 tons cargo capacity, that's 500 full dropships load, a day. Then add in the fact that it takes jumpships to transit it, and many of them to factor in the recharge times-- there's absolutely no way that the interstellar shipment of food staples works at all, given the assumptions of battle tech.

Archangel

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And the fallout of Fasanomics continues.  The attempts to clean up issues regarding to food import dependency have only been partially successful.  According to the USILR, planets with an Agricultural Rating of C, D and F are dependent upon food imports.  The degree of dependency ranges from marginally dependent (C) to heavily dependent (D) to critically dependent (F) upon food imports.  During the FedCom Civil War, Katherine Steiner-Davion attempted to bully Galax and its people into supporting her regiment by restricting food shipments to the planet.  Fortunately, due to the generosity of nearby planets, "Galax remained supplied with the food its people needed." (HB:HD, p94).

Unfortunately for planets in the Periphery, limited transportation capability as well limited number of agriculturally strong worlds plus the economic collapse of many planets' economies after they were suddenly cut off from their primary source of income (the Star League and the member-states) resulted in many worlds suffering from famine in the early Succession Wars.  It didn't help that neither the periphery governments nor the planetary governments were prepared for the crisis.
« Last Edit: 11 June 2016, 20:00:53 by Archangel »
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glitterboy2098

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hmm.. could you quasi-retcon such incidents away by having the imports be shipments of fertilizers and other chemicals needed to support agriculture in a semi-hostile environment (be it soil treatments, or stuff to build greenhouses/hydroponics to expand such faster than the population does?)

RunandFindOut

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Just ignore it and change the numbers.  No planet that needed food imports to survive could have because there was NEVER enough shipping even at the height of the SL to support it on even a handful of planets.  So it's not true and never was, just more disinformation planted in the source in-universe by C*.  Then you just alter the USILR numbers to reflect this.
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Archangel

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hmm.. could you quasi-retcon such incidents away by having the imports be shipments of fertilizers and other chemicals needed to support agriculture in a semi-hostile environment (be it soil treatments, or stuff to build greenhouses/hydroponics to expand such faster than the population does?)

Not really because then you would be negating a portion of what made the fall of the Star League so tragic and the Succession Wars (especially the 1st and 2nd) so devastating.  Not to mention that would not only mean the governments were prepared but would cost a lot of resources (especially money) to set up on so many planets (far more than any periphery state had available) and in some cases would require SL tech that they no longer had access to.
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wanderer25

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And the fallout of Fasanomics continues.  The attempts to clean up issues regarding to food import dependency have only been partially successful.  According to the USILR, planets with an Agricultural Rating of C, D and F are dependent upon food imports.  The degree of dependency ranges from marginally dependent (C) to heavily dependent (D) to critically dependent (F) upon food imports.  During the FedCom Civil War, Katherine Steiner-Davion attempted to bully Galax and its people into supporting her regiment by restricting food shipments to the planet.  Fortunately, due to the generosity of nearby planets, "Galax remained supplied with the food its people needed." (HB:HD, p94).

Unfortunately for planets in the Periphery, limited transportation capability as well limited number of agriculturally strong worlds plus the economic collapse of many planets' economies after they were suddenly cut off from their primary source of income (the Star League and the member-states) resulted in many worlds suffering from famine in the early Succession Wars.  It didn't help that neither the periphery governments nor the planetary governments were prepared for the crisis.

Direct quote from  the USIIR  table.
Agricultural rating C: Modest agriculture. MOST food locally produced, through some agricultural needs rely on imports.

So a world rated C could survive. It might not produce enougth milk to go around so Ice cream would be inported  or grapes dont grow  there for X reason and wines are imported. This to say a C rated world is NOT dependant on food imports, just better off with them. D and F tought are screwed. In the case of D you could see a die off till either the population goes to what  is available  could support ( C rating) or the  food production goes up  to C level or better.   


From what I recall a about generating  woulds in the outworld waste all surviving world  have AG ratings of B or A . From the above you could make an argument  for a few C's depending on population. (say a few 100k) In the real world you would call it  subsistance agriculture. You make enought to stay alive with out any excess to sell/export.




 


Archangel

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Ice cream would be considered a luxury.

A planet with a C rating wouldn't be able to meet a certain part of their population's dietary needs or would only be able to meet a portion of the planet's population's needs.  For example, an arid/desert world might only be able to support a limited number of cattle.  That herd can only provide a limited amount of milk and an even more limited amount of meat while remaining at sustainable levels.  Hunting can only supplement the needs for meat to a limited degree even without bringing sustainability into the picture.  The remaining need/demand for meat and milk is filled at least partially by off-world imports.
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RunandFindOut

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Yes, which is why I don't have ANY worlds that aren't B or A agriculture except small outposts with a very good reason for existing and for the parent House to divert dropship traffic to keep them going.
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Archangel

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Yes, which is why I don't have ANY worlds that aren't B or A agriculture except small outposts with a very good reason for existing and for the parent House to divert dropship traffic to keep them going.

Works fine in your alternate universe but not in the canon universe, which is what we are discussing.
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Iracundus

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We have in AToW an example of a high population C agriculture world, Ovan.  Population 5 billion.  The diet is said to be limited mostly to simple staples like rice and soya, producing a population that is short and lean.  The nobles and wealthy non-nobles are the ones that might be able to get slightly plump.  C agriculture does not mean you necessarily starve but your diet might be monotonous.  Traded interstellar foods are luxury foods, not staples (see the retcon of Drozan from providing 5% of Confederation food to 5% of Confederation luxury foods).  So the nobles might not be able to get their space quinoa or rich marbled steak...but the population is sustainable for the long term at C.

 

RunandFindOut

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Works fine in your alternate universe but not in the canon universe, which is what we are discussing.
Or possibly the canon universe doesn't actually exist.  It's just a mess of contradictory statements over 30+ years and attempts to retcon them into working.  We already have statements by devs that with the exceptions of a few small outposts settled worlds do not require imports of food to survive, interstellar food trade is in luxury goods.  This isn't a case of an AU, this is a case of the canon contradicting itself and requiring us to edit out the contradictions.
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Korzon77

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Works fine in your alternate universe but not in the canon universe, which is what we are discussing.

The problem is, unless we assume that all non-self-sufficient worlds have tiny popuolations-- under a few million for all of human space the canon universe cannot, full stop, end of argument, work.  The entire system is based on limited FTL transport with no real way to increase it until well after the Jihad.  The Mule is listed as one of hte most common dropships and it carries about 8144 tons of cargo.

That is...tiny compared to even small cargo carriers in actual service, most of which mass over 50,000 DWT (many, such as the Maersk Triple E container ships Mass a lot more -the Triple E can carry up to 18,000 TEUS).

Okay, so to simplify things, I'm going to go with the traditional 4ish pounds of food that every person eats per day. So, a world with 1 million people, needs four million pounds of food per day!
4,000,000/2000=2000 tons per day.
Okay, not so bad, about 1/4th of a mule's cargo load. 
Now let's multiply it by 365: 730,000 tons of food per year.-- over 89 dedicated mule trips per year. 
And that's the bare minimum, if someone misses a flight we starve, level of shipments. For one world.  one world with 1,000,000 people.
IF the world was important, and on a major trade route and NO house lord EVER diverted shipments, it might be doable. 
But a world with one billion people?
1,000,000,000x4, 4,000,000,000/2000=2,000,000/8144=245.5 Mule equivelant shipments.
Per day. 27 of the largest civilian jumpships ever built would be required for every day, so you'd actually be talking hundreds of jumpships and thousands of dropships  that would have to be always in motion.

Save for a few tiny worlds that also have something very important on them, there is no way any world in Btech can be dependent on food shipments. 
And this really runs into problems because as late as the Jihad series, you had Buenos Aires which stated: "Buenos Aire’s food found its way to 25 billion customers on six
diff erent worlds—no more."
But even if we assume that you're only talking a pound a day, that's,  12,500,000 TONS of food shipping per day.  If you drop it to one ounce of food stuffs per day (and note that the food was specifically described as things like grain and meat), thats still over 781,000 tons of food.
Per day. 

Now you can drop it lower-- but at that point, Buenos Aire's is no longer a food exporter, but a world that occassionally sends a few shiploads out-- certainly not a world that anyone would talk about having 25 billion customers for food.


glitterboy2098

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Ice cream would be considered a luxury.

A planet with a C rating wouldn't be able to meet a certain part of their population's dietary needs or would only be able to meet a portion of the planet's population's needs.  For example, an arid/desert world might only be able to support a limited number of cattle.  That herd can only provide a limited amount of milk and an even more limited amount of meat while remaining at sustainable levels.  Hunting can only supplement the needs for meat to a limited degree even without bringing sustainability into the picture.  The remaining need/demand for meat and milk is filled at least partially by off-world imports.

ohh.. that could be a partial explanation. they aren't shipping in food itself.. they're shipping in vitamins and supplements to make up for something the world's own Flora lacks, or which the introduced earth species can't provide enough of.

Archangel

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Or possibly the canon universe doesn't actually exist.  It's just a mess of contradictory statements over 30+ years and attempts to retcon them into working.  We already have statements by devs that with the exceptions of a few small outposts settled worlds do not require imports of food to survive, interstellar food trade is in luxury goods.  This isn't a case of an AU, this is a case of the canon contradicting itself and requiring us to edit out the contradictions.

As I said before they were only partially successful in cleaning up the mess of FASAnomics.  Unfortunately cleaning up all the contradictions would in turn other contradictions.  Truly cleaning them up would require a massive rewrite if not a reboot.  As far as those statements by the devs are concerned, they are frequently contradicted by materials subsequently released which invalidates the statements under 'new material trumps old'.  And as far as your edits go no matter how well-intentioned or researched they are still not canon.
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Korzon77

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That is a problem. I mean, I would like a completely rewritten setting that tries to work all of this in...but, it runs into two problems.
1.how many people would like to spend the next 5+years getting "updated material" that goes over stuff we generally know.
2. Would enough people even buy it? The Pen and paper battletech game functions on a fairly tight margin, I believe. 

Kovax

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The situation probably lies between the extremes.  Korzon77's math, with 4 pounds per day, assumes that the planet grows almost none of its own food, and virtually everything is imported.  glitterboy2098 gives a counter-example of shipping in vitamins and food supplements.

My own "take" on it is that any inhabited worlds with sizable populations are going to need to grow their own "bulk" food, because it's virtually impossible to feed them from outside, BUT those planets may be dependent on importation one or two specific amino acids or vitamins that can't be produced locally.  The shipment of modest quantities of one or two specific "bottleneck" items, possibly as food additives or vitamin supplements, could be done for fairly sizable populations, because you're talking about milligrams per person, not bulk protein or carbohydrates.  That could mean a Mule dropship load twice a week or every other month.  In other cases, the machinery to produce those bottleneck items is dependent on parts or unusual raw materials from elsewhere.

The places where "bulk" food is imported would be limited to a few thousand in population, mainly mining outposts, research or monitoring stations, or other cases where it requires a few people stationed there to tend the machinery, but permanent "settlement" and agriculture are not possible.

Anything beyond that falls into "luxury" items, some of which may consist of exotic foods and spices.

wanderer25

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ohh.. that could be a partial explanation. they aren't shipping in food itself.. they're shipping in vitamins and supplements to make up for something the world's own Flora lacks, or which the introduced earth species can't provide enough of.

Had the same idea them tought the above would work in the IS but in the periphery maybe not so much depending on traffic  frequency. If you only get a tramp trader a year or so, maybe!  You might run out of vitamin C  before the next shipment unless you have fruits growing in a sealed green house.

After my 1st post I went back to read the ISP3 refere section on the Outworld waste and it stated surviving world had Ag ratings of A to C. So I think the   supplemental imports cant be something too critical for the world to survive longterm. Production shortfall in some areas makes more sence. Say mostly a vegetarian  diet with little meat.
Or maybe the opposite, a mostly meat diet thanks to local  thamed fauna but greens limited to hydroponics and a few heavely process native plants.


 
« Last Edit: 13 June 2016, 22:30:10 by wanderer25 »

Iracundus

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As I posted earlier, C is about the minimum long term sustainable agriculture rating for a sizable population.  The AToW example of Ovan shows what this might be like: a simple diet of staples and a short, lean population. 

Space traffic cannot be super rare if we are talking nutritional supplements, because the human body reaches depleted levels within months (rate depends on what nutrient is being talked about).  For the really really isolated worlds, any imports would have to be an issue of diet variety, rather than any essential nutrient. 

snewsom2997

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I figure that unless it is on a major trade route, any planet with a sizable population will be relatively self sufficient enough to feed the populace. Any planet not on a major trade route that cannot routinely feed itself isn't going to have a large population it will be a mining outpost or something like that. All the planets with large populations that couldn't feed themselves died in the 1st and 2nd SW.

Without an amount of trade that FASAnomics doesn't allow, planets post Star League have to be self sufficient, have to be on a trade route, or have to have something hideously important. Important enough to pay billions just to have medicine, food, and water transported back and forth every month. If the planet sucks, with the exception of the CC and DC, the free people will leave, you basically have to either handsomely reward people to stay on bad or marginal worlds, or you have to conscript them.

 

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