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[Gwolfski]

dont dump anything. is there a way to detect it outside of humans?

[tryrar]

If it is a fungus, it should be spreading by spores, so yeah, we should come up with kits for detecting spores so we can trace the infection. If we have to, we'll clean and restock hydroponics, but let's leave dumping anything until we've ruled it as the infection vector. One other thing we can do is craft some improved biofilters for the Life Support, so that at the very least the spores for the fungus can be filtered out if it's airborne.

Other than that, I was thinking we should have our engineers start working on a modified swarm logic for bot mechs, so if there's more than one on the same task they can link together and work more efficiently.

As for disease name, I suggest Grayson Syndrome

[10ebbor10]

Well, we shouldn't dump anything, stuff's already out. Fungi are hard to get rid of though,...

[Aseaheru]

 Dumping stuff would be sub optional...

 Also, the life support systems really should be able to filter out the spores as it is, unless they are like .3 picometers... The ship should have atleast as good air filters as a surgery room, yes?

[VoidSlayer]

Flight Phase 2101-2105

[43+20-2-8=53] Morale Marginal Success
[7+8-3=12] Maintenance Critical Failure
[20] Heavy Bot Swarm logic Failure

The ship is searched for other locations of the fungus, the life support system is scrubbed and many areas are found where condensation and heat combine to make living areas for bacteria and other fungus, but none of the supposed disease vector.  Hydroponics, the ship interior and the bodies of the crew proves a fertile area for other microbes, but the one seen before is not cultivated successfully from any samples.

It also almost certainly did not come from the biodiversity bay, as it is fully sealed and was never loaded with those types of fungus.

The presence of a not intended, though not unexpected, ecosystem worries some of the crew and they insist further research should be done on the ecosystems that develop in long term enclosed habitats.  Although there was a wealth of early data from the decades in space travel before, no experts are present on the ship.  Closed System Ecosystems research available.

The good mood of the crew before has been significantly deflated by the disease and it's aftermath.  Even switching over to a partially new shift and all four of the victims returning to cryo during normal cycling does not bring back the spirit of cooperation and optimism that characterized most of the flight.  Disputes break out and some people stop talking to each other outside necessary duties. -1 morale ongoing

The routine shutdown for extended maintenance is set on scheduled despite this, plans drawn up to fix further damage to the superstructure and begin repairing or replacing worn out parts.  The order to shut down the thruster and cycle down reactor 1 starts out smoothly enough.  Then sudden warning signs flash over screens throughout the ship, an explosive bang is heard somewhere and power cuts out, ship wide.  Emergency lighting flickers on and backup radios are hastily fished out of closets unopened for 25 years.

The crew works quickly to assess the situation, rivalries put aside as professional training takes over.

The Magnetoplasmadynamic Thruster is offline.

The Fusion generator switched to backup systems and manual control, 2 crew were there at the time and saw what happened.  The autopilot set both generators to maximum output and overloaded the ship power grid.  One is now offline, but undamaged thanks to backup systems, the other is at half power and burning electricity through a specialized system set up for this eventuality.

There is a fire somewhere in the Multipurpose Care and Habitation Bay, 4 crew are inside part of the medical bay where there is no fire.  The status of the 15 cryogenic pods are unknown.

The Optronic Autopilot was manually severed from the ship by a technician when he realized it was sending random orders to ship systems.

One of the orders was to load and launch a satellite.  A Survey Sat is now hurdling away from the ship at high speeds, never to be seen again.

Backup power systems for the life support and other cryo pods seem to be working correctly.

The recreation commons and medium cargo bay appear undamaged, most of the crew are in those areas.

Other areas, including the large cargo bay and external cameras and sensors are not responding or have no one in them.

Crew Distribution: 2 in Fusion Core Controls, 4 trapped in medical bay, 8 in vac suits, 8 in common areas, 2 missing

How do you want to proceed with damage control?

[10ebbor10]

The Optronic Autopilot was manually severed from the ship by a technician when he realized it was sending random orders to ship system

Open log files and try to find out what more it screwed up.

There is a fire somewhere in the Multipurpose Care and Habitation Bay, 4 crew are inside part of the medical bay where there is no fire.  The status of the 15 cryogenic pods are unknown.

Depressurize to 0.8 atm, then back fill with pure nitrogen. Repeat until the oxygen percentage can no longer sustain the fire. (Should be within a few cycles). Being in a medical bay, there should be respirators the trapped crew members can use to prevent suffocation.

Since the pressure never drops too much, there should be no serious atmosphere loss, nor any depressurization damage against humans or equipment.

One of the orders was to load and launch a satellite.  A Survey Sat is now hurdling away from the ship at high speeds, never to be seen again.

Not on my watch. Note direction of departure and delta-v. After the crisis is all over we can do a minor deviation of our course to get it. It's not like it's going anywhere. It's course is completely predictable.

Other orders

Take Note: Check emergency radio's more than once every 25 years.

[tryrar]

+1 to 10ebbor's plan

[Aseaheru]

Ebbors plan is good. +1.

Although, we also have two missing crewmembers...When we check the log, see where they where last.

[VoidSlayer]

Flight Phase Oct 2104

[??]

The crew starts cycling air out of the Habitation Bay while a team in suits moves in for damage control.  Power is restored to the life support systems in this specific area with a few switches thrown and soon specific information about where the fire is comes through, it started in the cryogenic bay.  After four cycles of air the crew breaches the room and finds blackened walls and damaged lighting.  All of the pods sustained some level of damage, and even worse emergency unfreezing procedures were started, before the fire even began.

It becomes clear looking through the logs that this was at the behest of the autopilot, part of a garbled and mismatched series of emergency commands which were somehow activated.  A dozen people work through fixing the damaged pods and dropping the inhabitants back to deep sleep to avoid as much damage as possible.  One of the pods proves to have been the cause of the fire, a liquid oxygen tube ruptured from excess pressure, jetted into and broke open circuitry and it went up in flames from there.  The pod's inhabitant is however still alive thanks to quick access to the medical bay, the body is kept at low temperatures and replacement fluids are pumped in to replicate the cryogenic conditions, what damage her brain might have sustained and other injuries resulting from the disaster are unknown. +14 injured crew members, +1 critically injured crew member

The missing crew members are found in the large cargo bay, they had been doing a check of conditions before the blackout and were trapped.

Once external sensors and radios are enabled the sat is directed to change it's heading to rendezvous with the ship.  It is found to be in good condition although some of it's onboard fuel was used to redirect it back to the ship, dropping it's likely life span by about 25%.  As it is a backup and expected to run for years it is not too great a concern.

The crew gradually restores power to the rest of the ship as the autopilot logs are looked over.  Maintenance resumes on the fusion cores and thrusters, they turn out to be fine, safeguards worked correctly and they can be powered on when needed.  The autopilot is another issue.  It appears that part of the optronic circuitry blew out about a year back, forcing the system to reprogram itself to reroute critical functions around backup buffers.  This loaded a series of garbled emergency protocols into a buffer.. Normally the crew would be altered of something like this, but the logic that controlled this was either part of the damaged area or the reprogrammed area.  It was filed in a routine log without comment and when the maintenance was started the garbled commands were uploaded rather then the routine protocols.

It is clear from what happened that the system is far too untested and experimental to have been included, optronic decision making is still stuck in the same problem of not being able to respond to novel issues.  A team of four people take over looking after the autopilot functions as it is gradually hooked back up to the ship, direct control is removed and human input is now necessary for any actions to be executed.

The data on swarm logic was unfortunately also thoroughly deleted thanks to one of the autopilot's commands, apparently a contingency plan for infiltration of the system by a spy.  The crew who were working on it still have a bit of the basics of what was being worked on though.  Two heavy bots could work in unison for a small increase in manpower, three would as well, however more then that proved difficult, the bots simply work better on their own.  While additional machines would not hamper each other, it would prove no more efficient then working separately.  It was clear from the early data that specialized bots, dedicated to necessary tasks and built in teams would prove much more effective then the generalized robots brought on board.  Work could resume on the heavy bot swarm logic at any time however. +10 to heavy bot swarm logic.

Decisions will have to be made on what to do with the injured sleeping crew member as well as how to handle the autopilot situation.

Injured crew member:
A. Repair the cryo chamber and place her back inside, significant portions need to be rebuilt. (-.1 advanced and basic parts, maintenance roll)
B. Run slow defrost procedures manually and wake her up (medical roll at -10, -.1 medical supplies, -.1 food and air per turn for running the life support systems over capacity)
C. A + B, put another crewman in the rebuilt cryo chamber to avoid air and food loss
D. Pull the plug, she is probably brain dead anyway. (-1 crew member, -? moral)

Optronic Autopilot
1. Make repairs and let it resume it's activities with increased supervision (-.1 advanced parts, 2 crew needed)
2. Use the the current system, four crew review each decision before it acts (4 crew needed, all bonuses removed)
3. Take the system off decision making and use it for data and sensors only, build a manual control computer (-.2 basic parts, 8 crew needed to pilot the ship, all bonuses removed)
4. Rebuild the autopilot based on the lessons learned and upgrade and reprogram it for better autonomy (-.2 advanced parts, 2 crew needed, roll for upgrade)

Do you want to try and pull the partially woken up crew members out and check them up before arrival?

Other orders for the next turn (I am just gonna go strait into it)?

[crazyabe]

A, 4, Yes

[Aseaheru]

I would cay C, 4, and yes.

[tryrar]

I would cay C, 4, and yes.

+1

[VoidSlayer]

[62] Cryogenics bay repairs Success
[25-10] Medical check Failure
[83] Optronic Autopilot Success

[??] Wake up injured crew members

Full repairs are made to the cryogenics pods, damaged components are replaced on all the damaged pods and some ideas on what exactly broke down are put forward.  The room still has scorch marks but it is otherwise up to full capacity.

The extra pod proves unnecessary as Prëta Celaj never recovers from the wake up procedure.  The damage done to her body was far too extensive to be healed in the limited facilities available.  Extensive damage was done to the circulatory and endocrine system with whole organs rendered unusable.  With the most advanced facilities on Earth, including organ cloning and cybernetic systems, she might have stood some chance.  Even remaining in cryogenics would have simply been a slow death.  While the mood is sedated on the ship the fact that everything possible was done to save her comes as some comfort to the crew.  Her body is preserved in the unused cryogenics tube until it can be given a proper burial.

The experience gives a further reason to get the remaining victims out of stasis to see if anything can be done for them.  A careful wake up procedure done on two crew at a time successfully brings all 14 out with no long term injuries detected.  It is decided they will not be placed back inside for fear of cumulative damage building up so awake crew are cycled in after the pods are given a further check, and the fire victims will join the initial outpost.

Work on reconfiguring the autopilot proves a difficult challenge, as it involves applying theoretical designs to experimental technology.  The behavior of reprogramming itself is integral to creating a completely autonomous system and the error was an expected side effect.  Human oversight is simply too slow to allow the expert systems to make full use of their capabilities.  A simple patchwork solution is to create a small, separate expert system to test and oversee the existing one.  This is an opposite counterpart to the swarm logic being developed for heavy bots and could represent a new method to build more intelligent and complex expert system by having multiple machines overseeing and networking with each other.

Despite the backup system, a pair of humans remain to oversee and troubleshoot the autopilot and companion computer, thanks to the extra manpower available.  Autopilot restored. +10 to autopilot damage control.  2 optional crew allowed.  Networked oversight expert system research available.

Flight Phase 2106-2110

[69+20-3-8] Morale Success
[42+8-3] Maintenance Failure
[24+10] Heavy Bot Swarm Logic Failure

The crew becomes obsessed with a new colony building simulation developed for the heavy bots, it is quite entertaining and versatile; unfortunately it is also not very realistic or useful to ongoing research, although morale improves.  Plans for expanded VR simulation pods are bandied about for more access on planetfall while time for VR research is compromised by extensive use for virtual buildings of various types.  +5 to ongoing heavy bot research.

Maintenance work does not suffer, but more structural issues are found both inside the superstructure and on the outer armored hull.  The three decades of acceleration have been weathered admirably but the age is starting to show.  -1 to maintenance.

Team Cobra has reached Procyon 2

[escaped lurker]

Team Cobra has reached Procyon 2

The Procyon system is a binary system with a primary larger, hotter and younger then Sol.  It's companion is a white dwarf which burned out and deposited large cold and hot dust rings in the system.  5 planets have been observed, at least two in a habitable zone.  The system is likely rich in minerals but to have significant debris.  A third dim star or large gas giant may be present at some distance.

Well then.. time to get a better look at Procyon?
After that, we can choose which of the presumed two options looks best, send out the sattelites, and so on.

[VoidSlayer]

Working on the system write up.

Overall the system has two stars, A is more massive, brighter, but with about the same activity as Sol.  It has 5 rocky planets and 1 small gas giant. 

B rests at between 10 AU and 17 AU and is a white dwarf which puts out considerable UV radiation.  It has one planet at 3 AU, presumably blasted during the star's red giant phase.

There is also a super-massive gas giant at 27 AU.

The system has an extensive comet system and two dust rings, one between B and the gas giant and the second further out.  Estimates are that dozens of dwarf planets may exist similar to Sol.