Colonisation: OPERATION DELTA, then OPERATION RIVARINE
Research: PROJECT BREADBASKET, then SLATER
Culture: Energy
Decision: Not on their fucking lives.



Chair-people of the board, I cannot disagree more with Aekiel. On only one subject do we concur - that a war this early with New Babylon would be too costly for us. Yet.

But by every god on Mount Olympus, I may abide our neighborly thief, but I abhor the thought of abetting them. Other opinions may differ, but the only export deal I am interested in opening to New Babylon is revolvers - enough for every larcenous one of them to eat of.

Further down the line of disagreement lies Chairman Aekiel's strangely non sequitur desire for networking. I certainly miss the Web as much as any of us, but I feel we should wait before we are strong in our Food surplus before we dare to call it a strength. Breadbasket will turn our mere ambition of a plantation empire into reality, my good people - the Gene Vault in particular being vital. And Slater, afterwards, will put our many people work, as well as net us a significant Energy bonus once our cities are connected.

Which brings me to my next point: Energy. I must actually say I don't disagree on this point with Aekiel - I merely think he confuses the steps. Our factories will not run in the dark. Before our Industry can flourish, we must have the energy to power it, as well as the energy to buy units, and buildings outright, as well as sustain them.

I'm a businessman like you, men and women of the Board, and like any, I hunger not for linear growth, but exponential.

On my final point - Settlement locations. We have already had one location stolen out from under us - I shall not abide another. Delta will secure us a diverse array of resources, all of which are vital to a growing society, and give us a foothold in securing the treasure trove of Rivarine, a cornucopia of every resource required for us - on an anvil of will - to forge our dreams into reality.

My earlier points of focusing on Food will only explode the growth of these colonies further, turning from outposts into full on Settlements in barely a year, if my hunch is correct.

We have the udder of our agricultural dynasty in hand, gentlemen. If we want the milk, we have to squeeze.

 

Chairpersons. As a first point, I would like to submit myself as overseer of trade from our capitol. Within that, i wish to submit several proposals.

The first of these is simply that we are here to grow. To trade. Our city has access to four trade routes- I suggest we use them. To our south we have the encroachers. They who have insisted upon our territory. My response? Bleed them dry. Establish a trade route with them. Settle first with OPERATION RIVARINE to establish a northern foothold, and then follow with the Farmer's Bill- Operation Hedge. With the north and west secure, we can pursue Operation Delta at our leisure. Once we are ready, we can alter our trading pattern with New Babylon. I'm not frond of revolvers though. Fire and salt. We make an example of them on a permanent basis. But in the meantime? Why not take advantage of the little cusses.

As far as future research, I do like the way Aekiel's mind was going from a Research and Development standpoint, but we have determined that this world is an aired and unfriendly one. Food. Let us move forward with it. And again, I agree with Senator Locke, that we must develop Energy. Do not let us forget the Golden Rule: He who holds the gold makes the rules.

To summarize: Settle to the North first, then to the west. Establish trade routes to take advantage of a key strength of ours. (Yes, even with the southern bastards. Till we slit their throats.)
Research Breadbasket- though I would also like preliminary understanding of ecology. I want to know about theses beasts better, so that we can better defend the lifeblood of our fledgling empire.
Our cultural direction: Overall I lean to energy, but Director Aekiel's proposition into industry as a way to broaden our culture as a whole is fascinating, and I am willing to back it, if only just the tip of industry. We are first and foremost businessmen, and I wish to grow in energy management.

 

I would like to support Lamora's strategy at this juncture.

 

Machines had chosen men's routes for them since landing day, and now was no exception. I reclined in the autocab, smoked my e-cig, and watched all the pretty lights go by. They sequenced my route through the city.

Score. High road. I smiled at the apparent success of my team's decker, Rabbit. One day we'll probably be irrelevant, but for now, some of us can still reach in and fuck with the heart of those machines. And for the rest of us... Well, we have our own ways of changing the world.

I began to piece together my rifle. "Four Winds", our department calls the design. Guess where the pieces get flung to after I'm done with the job? I mean, it wasn't very accurate out past a certain range, but the trick was always to use the appropriate tools for the tasks given.

I had been assured by the Director that this would be a simple task. Just another night at the opera. So I had left most of my kit at home. Sadly, mind you-- I really missed my grenades.

The autocab jerking to a halt snapped me from my thoughts. I was standing still in the middle of the highway, causing the entire nervous system of the city to strain, redirecting traffic around me. Law enforcement and a tow truck would be coming soon, but I needed very little time at all.

I'd always been told that, for my kind of shadowrunner, it's all about the appropriate use of force. You don't want to cause a scene, and you don't want to kill more people than you have to. Luckily, it's not that hard to get a clear shot when you're parked right outside the window of your target. I aimed, sighted, and fired. Sparks flew from a device on the side of his head, and my target dropped to the floor, rolling behind his desk. I laughed and fired until the clip ran dry to scare the shit out of him, then sat back and watch. As the dust began to clear I saw the target leap out of his office entirely in one motion.

I hadn't been aiming for his skull. In fact, him living was required for me to get paid. That dongle I shot off the side of his head? Primitive MMI stolen from our cybernetics labs. The target will have suffered an immediate hit to his mental capabilities from losing access to stored information and systems he depended upon, but more importantly, the rolling physical damage will continue to affect him as time goes on.

A week or two from now, he'll look like an early onset Alzheimer's patient. It's unlikely most of his assets will be retrieved from his estate by other parties. Better yet, it'll make the little hippie shut the fuck up. Sometimes, I love my job.

I relaxed and poked the autocab's radio. No response. One second went by, then two. The chime of my smartphone broke the tension, and I checked the text. "Cab broke. Hardware locked."

Fuck Rabbit sometimes, and fuck this world we're building out of principal. I sighed, shaking my head, and reloaded my rifle. The thing about being a shadowrunner is that it's rarely ideal. No one does this who hasn't bitterly tasted misery and failure. More relevantly, no one kills people if they haven't had things get truly fucked on them.

So I put the weapon aside, and gave myself half a minute to survey the options. The authorities were arriving shortly, and the identity I had currently assumed meant that I wasn't even an Ares citizen employee. I was on an elevated highway with a broken vehicle. I could freehand down the side, probably, but it'd take me long enough that the exercise would be pointless. Same for hitch-hiking to the next exit. I needed a vehicle.

And then, the world answered my thoughts. I looked up and saw one of the very few manually operated vehicles on the road-- A petrochemical cargo hauler. Smirking, I snatched up my rifle, and shot the driver through the windshield on reflex. He slumped forward onto the horn.

The vehicle's automatic braking brought it to a halt right in front of me. I stepped up on the board, pulled open the door, shuffled around with the corpse, and punched in the code to stop the alarm. Then I hit the gas, and fished my smart-phone out of my pocket. The text I sent to the Director was quite short and to the point-- "Fini."

I suppressed a laugh of joy as I drove away from my crime. I knew I'd be paid. Robots watching the news with access to one's bank account make excellent bagmen. Even more than I am, they are highly deniable and highly reliable.

---

​

Trahj Aiden, Director of Community Operations, shrugged sheepishly and excused himself from the room as his smartphone's text alarm went off right after Senator Locke's latest press address. After reading the message, he flagged down an aide, and asked for a small delivery from his office. Then he walked around to the backstage area of the press room and relaxed in a chair, breaking his stillness only to receive the package from the earlier addressed aide.

As the senator ended his speech and walked through the backroom, Director Trahj was unboxing a bottle of whiskey. He offered it casually.

"A gift, senator. Today seems to be a red letter day for Project Breadbasket."

 

Current votes, including Coyote's which he sent to me on Skype:

Colonisation: Three votes for DELTA, two for RIVERINE, one for HEDGE

Project: Four votes for BREADBASKET, two for AL GORE

Cultural: Four votes for energy, two for industry.

Trade with New Babylon: Tied at three votes each.

I'll leave the vote open for a tie-breaker or a sudden swing for the next hour, and if it's still tied then I'll decide whether we trade or not.

Edit: Voting closed. Update's on it's way.

---------- Post automerged at 07:54 ---------- Previous post was at 06:00 ----------

OPERATION DELTA and PROJECT BREADBASKET have been given the greenlight, as has the cultural manipulation to emphasize our fledgling economy. As no consensus has been reached on our policy for dealing with New Babylon, the Board no longer has a say in the matter. I shall make the decision once OPERATION DELTA is complete.

The colony-tank, mostly staffed by the most active members of the Sino-Ganaian cultural bloc, has set off. Once the new city is established and emigration begins, I expect that cultural tensions in Aristos Achaion will ease considerably, especially since the fourth round of unfreezing is due to begin in four months.

February 2602: Our chemical research has struck gold - black gold. Significant oil deposits have been found on the outskirts of Aristos Achaion's southern desert and neighboring the site of OPERATION DELTA. This will be a huge boon to our economy in the coming years.

Our research into genetics has begun. Early benefits are expected to be almost entirely medical.

March 2602: Our secondary survey team has discovered a crashed satellite next to a severely damaged resource pod. The pod itself contained further cultural artifacts - an incredibly heavy-duty programmable loom, pre-loaded with data on Malay fashions through the ages. Investigation of the satellite is beginning.

April 2602: The Franco-Iberians have arrived.



They are too far inland for us to worry about having to share control over the Sea of Ares, which has been called that due to OPERATION DELTA giving us near-total control over it.

Speaking of, OPERATION DELTA is completed.



The locals are still debating over what to call their new city, but in a continuation of their industrious (if undirected) nature, they have armed and equipped a squad of their own to serve as the first of the new generation of Knight Errant Security Services.

As per previous agreements, Zombie has been deployed to lead the squad, and Senator Lamora will be handling their day-to-day affairs. They are being deployed north to finish the scouting of our side of the Sea.

In a final note, stage four of unfreezing has been a success, and our population now stands at just under fifty thousand.

June 2602: ARC has arrived.



Like us, they are a corporate entity, rather than a geopolitical one. They have a reputation for espionage and will likely be a dangerous foe. It is likely fortunate that geography will keep the bulk of their attentions elsewhere.

July 2602: Well, this is a concern.



The industrial juggernaut that is the PAC has landed right on our doorstep, on the fertile southwestern edge of the continent. This may prove incredibly problematic in years to come.

Auguest 2602: The satellite excavation has completed - evidently it was meant to drop the pod and then stay in orbit, but some sort of malfunction caused the pod to fail to decouple properly, and the pod dragged the satellite down.

What is interesting is that the satellite is made of a great deal of material that is very hard to replicate on this planet. We have already used part of it to complete the first ship of our trade fleet, which is already making runs to our fledgling colony. The rest of the material is just waiting for a use to be found for it. One leaps to mind.

OPERATION LANDGRAB proposes the construction of a second colony-tank using the satellite materials as a foundation. At current levels, it would take eighteen months for such a construction. Using the materials from the satellite would shave that down to ten - possibly less, as our new colony would be able to provide some material support towards the end of construction. At which point a colony will be founded at the location of OPERATION HEDGE.



This location has potential to play host to an industrial megacity, with fertile lands, edible fungus, xenomass, coral reefs and algae fueling a population working nearby hills, as well as local deposits of silicon and copper. PAC, more than any other faction, would be a nightmare should it be able to leverage this. I propose that it is our duty to our shareholders (ie, ourselves) to not allow such a resource to slip through our hands. Furthermore, taking this location will allow us to keep PAC from the lands north of us, whereas if they were to take it they could move up the coast towards the location of OPERATION RIVERINE. However, this combined with our long-term plans for OPERATION CORINTH would likely cause a great deal of tension with our new neighbour, and if we shy away from this confrontation I must admit we will likely not have competition for settling further north.

Decision: OPERATION LANDGRAB: Yes or No?



Author's note: Short update, so voting probably won't be open for as long this time - just long enough for a consensus to develop. I will also accept suggestions for the name of our new colony, as well as the one OPERATION LANDGRAB would found, should the vote swing that way.

 

No time for a long post this time.

Operation Landgrab: Yay

 

​

MASS TEXT TO THE BOARD VIA PRIVATE LINES:

I urge you to consider Operation Landgrab. More to come. Office mixer now. Free drinks. L8r.

--Trahj

 

I fully support operation Landgrab. Anything that increases our total number of cities has my support. On that note, I take offense to the fools that have graced our southern shores. Once we have three cities, may I recommend a short term build of enough units to remove them? Humans they may be, but as the children sing:

"This land is our land,
It isn't your land...

I have no desire for them to take our location as a canal city.

 

A military build-up will be an option at the Third Board Meeting - right now our military is quite literally incapable of taking PAC's capital, regardless of numbers. However, I will be deploying military south to peacefully blockade the isthmus.

OPERATION LANDGRAB seems to have overwhelming support (factoring in an additional vote from Mishie I received from other channels), and it will be proceeding.

 

Let us plant our spear in the sand as the son of Peleus once did. Here and no father, PAC.

As for a name, how about Dirus Ulixes, after Troy's name for Odysseus? The name of a hero with cunning and strength in equal bounds, suitable for a land with what seems to be a little of everything.

 

September 2602: Already tensions are rising, as Elodie protests our excavation of the satellite - which began before she even made landfall.

A new and hugely less geographically offensive minor power has arrived, with Hekima Station splitting from PAC to set up on the eastern side of the Sea of Ares. They seem to specialize in ultra-high density crop growth, especially of spices. Opening relations with them will be a priority once OPERATION LANDGRAB is completed.



December 2602: Cultural caches from resource pods continue to flow in, as both our northern survey team and one deployed to investigate an island chain to the south have discovered more of them. It has reached a point where instead of creating distinct cultures within our population, they are merely adding to the metropolitan omnicultural blend that is developing in Aristos Achaion.

February 2603: OPERATION DELTA is complete, and the city of Kuombi Saleh (named after the historical capital of the Ghana Empire) has been founded. Already a steady flow of food and goods has begun, and they have thrown their weight behind OPERATION LANDGRAB, shaving another month off the completion of the colony-tank.

Construction has also begun on the first oil well, deep in the desert to the south. Additionally, excavations of another ancient to the north have completed Lead Surveyor VanRopen fell victim to yet another case of memetic infection, this time relating to mining at an unimaginable scale. Luckily, the recording devices from last time are still in good order, so all the data will be archived until we can make sense of it.

May 2603: The first stage of OPERATION LANDGRAB is complete, and the colony-tank has set out to the west, escorted by security personell under Zombie's command. Construction has begun on the core of what I hope to be a world-class scientific quarter to accelerate progress on PROJECT BREADBASKET.

Additionally, Kuombi Saleh's population has received it's first cargo of newly-defrosted settlers. While I predict some culture shock, they should settle in nicely.

June 2603: Stage one of PROJECT BREADBASKET is finished, and work has begun on the full genome mapping of all life-forms brought from Earth.

September 2603: Despite the delay caused by OPERATION LANDGRAB, our population continues to grow in leaps and bounds, exceeding one hundred thousand unfrozen employees between our two cities.

OPERATION LANDGRAB has been a rousing success, as the colony-tank has arrived without incident. Kuombi Saleh is beginning construction of a trade convoy to support our new settlement. The coming months, or even years, will likely be relatively uneventful as we allow our infrastructure to catch up with our rapid growth.

October 2603: Sadly, one of our exploration teams was lost while investigating the island chain to the south, which appears to be abundant with both hostile lifeforms and valuable resources. Once we have established ourself on the mainland, this chain will require further investigation.



Construction of the oil well has finished, and already oil is flowing in to our warehouses. With the newfound funds, we were able to outsource construction of a trade vessel to establish trade with Hekima Station. Access to their food and spices has already added very welcome variety to our meals.

We have also finished the laboratory, and construction immediately began on adding a medical wing, which will provide reams of scientific data... and, I suppose, improve the health of the employees.

February 2604: While the early arguments about native megafauna were mostly theoretical, the problem has reared itself in a much more real way as enormous wormlike creatures have been sighted burrowing through the ground near our territory. While a few potshots have been taken with our rocket defense systems, it has had little real effect. For now they seem to be content to ignore us, but this does make the question of trade between us and New Babylon impossible until the creatures wander off - we would already be cut off from Kuombi Saleh and Hekima Station if our trade was by land instead of water.

April 2604: The medical wing of our research facilities is completed, and work has begun on a cytonursery for small-scale cloning of plantlife - this will allow growth of medicinal plants from tissue samples we brought from Earth, and aid our research teams in countless ways.

July 2604: The blatant land-theft by minor powers continues, as Fort Barca splits from ARC and claims the lands covered by OPERATION RIVERINE.



A chain of miasma-ridden lands makes trade with them impossible, so we don't even get to benefit from their presence.

January 2605: Stage 2 of PROJECT BREADBASKET is completed, and construction has begun on one of the twin centerpieces of what will be our agricultural dominance - a massive vault filled with pure, uncorrupted samples of every terran life form we have access to, and eventually every one we can buy, clone, or steal from the other nations that have arrived on this planet. Access to such a massive library will greatly improve our grasp of agri-sciences.

October 2605: We have established the Ares Development Fund, an investment fund that will utilize our vast energy reserves to begin generating a profit. As this marks the completion of the Energy mandate, I have begun the Industry one, which was second most favoured by the board.

December 2605: The Gene Vault is complete.



Towering over the bay, it will serve as a monument to our supremacy over agriculture.

May 2606: The final stage of research in PROJECT BREADBASKET is complete, and as soon as construction is completed on the pharmaceuticals laboratory in our science quarter we will begin the Ectogenesis Pods.

While PROJECT BREADBASKET wraps up, our research will be concentrated on improving our current situation - investigation of the possibility of titanium nearby and petroleum refinement facilities.

August 2606: Long-range scans indicate a new city has been founded to the north, near the proposed location of OPERATION RIVERINE. While frustrating, I believe that between the still-unfounded Corinth and the possibilities in the island chain to the south, this is not too large a setback.



Basic research into engineering has revealed subsurface titanium deposits near Landgrab, further cementing it's possibilities as an industrial juggernaut.

June 2607: The Ectogenesis Pods, and thus PROJECT BREADBASKET, are completed, a vast array of artificial wombs able to bring forth any known life-form from a single fertilized egg and vastly accelerate the pregnancy process. Vast herds of artificially-born cattle are already marching forth from the pods to grow fat on our farms and add much-needed variety to our diets. Preliminary trials on using the Pods for human life have already been successful, with the first generation being adopted out to unsuspecting families as we speak. We just made pregnancy obsolete.

With that, people of the Board, I bring the Third Official Board Meeting to order. Soon we will have a summary of the state of the world, and then we will discuss our options over the coming years.

---------- Post automerged at 11:05 ---------- Previous post was at 10:43 ----------



Aristos Achaion, our capital and site of our landfall upon this world. Home to over eight hundred thousand employees of Ares Macrotechnology, more people call this city home than in the other four capitals on this continent combined.

With the newborn herds of food animals being distributed along the farms of the River Styx, our population is about to explode. Once our studies into ecology is completed and our science quarter is expanded to include vivariums and greenhouses, even the most barren desert will be transformable into viable farmland more fertile than the banks of the Styx were when we landed.

As well as the breadbasket, Aristos Achaion is the hub of our growing empire. With trade routes to New Babylon for media and Hakima Station for spices, our control over our populace grows stronger and more subtle every day.



The result of our first experiments with cultural manipulation, Kuombi Saleh may not be the Corinth we hoped for but it has definitely proven it's worth. Though entirely reliant on imported food, the oil deposits, fiber plantations and fungus farms combine to make the city near equal to our capital in sheer industrial output. Once our research into biochemistry is complete, it should be able to feed itself from farming fish we released into the Sea of Ares. Research into Ecology will further lessen it's dependence upon the capital, allowing farming of the land along the lower half of the Styx.



Newly renamed by Senator Lamora, Dirus Ulixes is already showing vast potential. It has opened trade relations with two independent powers on the other continent, the Red Sun vaults and the Omoikane farming commune, and both food and energy are flowing in. Though it is currently relying on overland trade routes for continued growth, as proper development of the surrounding land continues, it will transform into a mighty industrial juggernaut.



The PAC are feeling the squeeze, founding a third city before the second (which, you may remember, is squatting on the proposed site of OPERATION RIVERINE) has become a full-fledged city. Though the lands around their capital are fertile, the rest of their land is anything but due to the success of OPERATION LANDGRAB. As claustrophobic as they must be feeling, I cannot predict where they will try to expand next - a second city to our north, to the continent to the west, or around the site of OPERATION CORINTH would be the best three guesses I could give.



Franco-Iberia, the Slavic Federation and the African Union are scrambling for land. The Slavic Federation are stuck between Franco-Iberia, an alien-infested forest and a desert, while Franco-Iberia is stuck between the Slavs, the ocean, and the desert. Only the Africans have room to sprawl.

---------- Post automerged at 12:00 ---------- Previous post was at 11:05 ----------

COLONISATION

The scramble for land is coming to a close. The coming two or three years will likely see the borders drawn, after which nations will fight over the few fertile patches of land. As such, we should grab what we can while we don't have to do so with a gun in our other hand. Vote for how many cities we will grab in our second wave of expansion, and which ones you favour. We can comfortably support one more, uncomfortably support two, and with a bit of luck maybe three.

OPERATION RAINBOW CORINTH: We could have an army able to take down New Babylon deployed inside of six months. Let's finish this.



OPERATION HEART OF DARKNESS aka 'Operation Okay Wow Maybe This Is Kinda Not Okay': Well, it wouldn't be the first time a group of incredibly rich assholes stole a bunch of land from Africans.

Copper, oil, silicon, titanium, and most of all fertile land is the bounty offered in the natural site of Africa's fourth colony. We could claim it before they do.



OPERATION TURNABOUT: If we move fast, and expend a fair amount of energy on border expansion, a city in the tundral forests north of the site of OPERATION RIVERINE would be able to stake a claim on all three firaxite deposits and much of the tundra without a single shot being fired in anger.



OPERATION HYDROCARBON: This island chain is home to a lot of oil, and algaes that can easily be turned into oil.



OPERATION NORMANDY: The large island to the south where one of our exploration teams was wiped out, this island is home to a lot of aliens, a lot of aliens, oil, xenomass, and God only knows what other valuable resources. I have faith in our military's ability to carve out a beachhead for a colony tank.




RESEARCH

Since last we convened, our research facilities have expanded from a few guys in the ship's laboratory to an entire campus in our capital, with smaller but still impressive facilities in Kuombi Saleh. As such, pick two or more options from the following list - the top two will be followed, and possibly the third, depending on circumstances.

PROJECT AL GORE: While time has marched on since this was first suggested, it still is available - though there is a small but real possibility of being beaten to the punch. This would also allow us to both engage in and defend against espionage. [Computing > Autonomous Systems > Artificial Intelligence > Synthetic Thought]

PROJECT ICECREAM: Let's double down on- what's that? We already did? Okay, Let's triple down on agricultural output. [Biology > Vertical Farming]

PROJECT SAGAN 2: While the original PROJECT SAGAN is not compatible with our current emphasis on farming, PROJECT SAGAN 2 compliments it. We make the weather our bitch, turning our oil and titanium deposits into weather-control satellites and thus greatly increasing our agricultural output. [Terraforming > Climate Control]

PROJECT TERMINATOR: Did someone say robot armies? Because I thought I heard someone say robot armies. [Robotics > Tactical Robotics]

PROJECT FORD: While it's not quite as flashy as the other projects, this would greatly increase our industrial output from both oil and titanium deposits, as well as allowing maglev networks to be built throughout our empire. [Fabrication + Organics]

PROJECT PERFECTION: With the next round of expansion, the health of our people will become a major concern. A little genome tweaking would remove said concern. [Transgenics]


SUPERPROJECTS

In case we're feeling ambitious. Pick at most one.

OPERATION CONQUISTADOR




The other continent is larger and less populated than ours. If we started now, a colonial fleet and escort could be constructed and arrive in time to find unoccupied land and act as a third expansion wave... probably.

We are completely ignorant of the other continent and this would likely double the number of factions we need to keep an eye on, and the journey would be long and very possibly fruitless, but without this we will likely not have many options for a third wave of expansion.


OPERATION SEEK PEACE

Perhaps you had your heart set on OPERATION RIVERINE. Perhaps you're worried the PAC is already sizing us up. Perhaps you're just paranoid. Whatever your motivation, we could expand our security apparatus into an entire PMC.

Make no mistake, building an army at this stage would be a superproject. Every gun produced could have been a girder for a factory or a laboratory or a colony-tank. Energy would flow into soldier wages instead of our investment funds.

If you pick this option, also mention what the troops are to be used for.

 

Operation Heart of Darkness
Project Ford
Project Sagan 2


Moar oil and titanium, magrails are amazing, and we can make those farms even more profitable. Creation of new basic resources doesn't hurt either.

New Babylon and the expansion of Knight Errant can wait until the unclaimed land grab is truly over. Firaxite to the north is really tempting...but if we are going to end up in conflict with PAC anyways, might as well clear them out and set up our ideal city instead of a rushed site.

 

Operation Heart of Darkness
Project Ford
Project Sagan 2

We are reaching a point where our cultural adjustment activities are limited more by our infrastructure than our synergy with the zeitgeist. We need to realign operations to a new paradigm. I propose we focus on cleaning house and solidifying our power base.

 

Heart of Darkness, Project Ford and Project Sagan 2.

However, I also move that we press forward with the superproject CONQUISTADOR.

Why? Why not? He who dares, wins, and our own continent is getting awfully crowded. Start sending Explorers to scout the area now - at worst, if we find nothing of interest, the colony-tank and fleet can be repurposed for one of our older ambitions, such as RIVARINE. I cannot speak for you gentleman, but my lust for Firaxite is not nearly slaked.

 

OPERATION HEART OF DARKNESS (and if that land should get taken by somebody else-OPERATION RAINBOW CORINTH)

Because what could be better than getting new resources while preventing the enemy from getting them?


PROJECT PERFECTION and PROJECT ICECREAM

Superproject - CONQUISTADOR.

Getting foothold on the new continent while we are still able to do so would allow us more freedom in choosing what to do next.

 

Colonisation: OPERATION HEART OF DARKNESS (aka Operation We're Not Racist, Really!)
Research: SAGAN 2 (aka If the Allies could do it, we can too)
Superproject: CONQUISTADOR (aka Fuck Those Guys Too)

 

PROJECT FORD and PROJECT SAGAN 2 are clear winners, as is OPERATION HEART OF DARKNESS. If resources permit, OPERATION TURNABOUT and OPERATION CONQUISTADOR will also be pursued.

Update will come after I finish waking up.

---------- Post automerged at 18:21 ---------- Previous post was at 16:10 ----------

July 2607: Both the Africans and the Slavs object to some excavations of fallen satellites our explorers performed in the eastern edges of the continent, indicating the rising tensions over land.




As the new mandate is implimented, our security forces are being redeployed to watch over the site of OPERATION HEART OF DARKNESS.

May 2608: Peaceful expansion continues, as water refineries come online in all three of our cities, making the relative infertility of the land even less of a factor. Our merchant navy has also been expanded to five ships to facilitate trade with PAC's city of Quyen in the north and our new colony soon to be established on Africa's border.

July 2608: To the despair of our PR department, OPERATION HEART OF DARKNESS is complete and growing fast thanks to regular shipments from Aristos Achaion.

October 2608: The research phase of PROJECT FORD Is completed, and the plans for a network of magrails stretching the length of the Styx and beyond to Dirus Ulixes have been approved and sent to our work teams.

January 2609: Our forces near OPERATION HEART OF DARKNESS report worrying movements from the African military.



Not pictured: another armoured unit and a unit of marines. They may just be passing through the area, or they could be... not. Knight Errant is deploying in support of our new colony, just in case.

March 2609: The forces were forced back by an attack from a seige worm, but their intentions were worrying. Perhaps they were simply moving through the area, but unless they were going to war against New Babylon or PAC the only targets in this direction are us. Therefore, I bring the Fourth Meeting of the Board of Directors to order.

Between OPERATION HEART OF DARKNESS and excavations in lands they decided were theirs (despite them being mere kilometers from Slavic territory), the Africans are almost certainly pissed at us - though official channels are not openly showing it. Our emphasis in recent years on peaceful expansion of infrastructure and an ever-tightening grip on the throat of agrisciences have left our security forces arguably understrength. Additionally, OPERATION LANDGRAB and their lack of land to expand to leads me to be leery of the PAC, though their official stance is friendly due to a mutually profitable trade route between Kuombi Saleh and Quyen, the city built on the site of OPERATION RIVERINE.

DECISION: Do we move to a war footing? If so, what emphasis do we take?

DEFENSIVE, AKA PROJECT TOMAHAWK: Our current defences are the same we arrived on this planet with. Updating our rocketry from man-portable missile launchers to fixed rocket pods and the construction of a defensive perimeter would make our cities able to hold off all but the most concerted efforts of our enemies, and could be deployed within the year. Recruitment will begin in all cities, with the goal of a team of rangers providing long-range fire support in every city.

GREATER DEFENSIVE, AKA PROJECT STAR WARS: As per defensive, but we also implement the earliest stages of PROJECT AL GORE before moving to a focus on Communications, allowing the defensive abilities of an entire city to be unified in a single command center and act as a single angry being. This will take a total of three years. This also involves the construction of a navy in both the Sea of Ares and the ocean to provide fire support.

OFFENSIVE - ROBOTIC, AKA PROJECT TERMINATOR: Current projections give us a society and the technological ability to deploy robot armies within four years, using Firaxite deposits on the island off Kuombi Saleh and pursuing research goals that would shape our society to be more accepting of robot armies.

OFFENSIVE - AI, AKA PROJECT AL GORE 2: We dust off PROJECT AL GORE and focus on just the military aspects. The force multiplication aspects of each soldier having a shackled AI whispering advice in their ear cannot be underestimated. ETA on completion would be four years, but the benefits would begin after two and a half. We will also begin rapid expansion of Knight Errant and construction of a navy to provide fire support to them.

DECISION: Do we attempt to patch relations through trade?

Our new city's early years will be focussed on internal trade with Kuombi Saleh and Aristos Achaion to accelerate growth. Should we instead open trade with the African cities of Magan, Ayaan and Thabo, the mutually beneficial trade may allow for relations to remain civil - but the profit will be minimal and this will slow the growth of our new city.

Additionally, the city of OPERATION HEART OF DARKNESS will need a name - otherwise, I'm going to go for the low-hanging fruit and call it Kurtz.

 

What are Knight Errant's current assets?