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[Talion]

I have been procrastinating about running this for a while now, I figure my best bet is to try running it and see if I can keep up with it.

Arms Race: War of the Rune

An arms race game inspired by a number of others, from Wands Race to War of the Cinder Spire.

Every fifty years, the goddess Eristria calls the faithful to do battle. To the victors she grants a place at her side; the defeated she bids her angels scatter to the four winds that they might regrow stronger and more worthy. There have been nine wars of the goddess. The next is due in ten years. The strongest nation; the Glorious Star, desiring a victory without contest have already exiled the Iqua and the Loji nations, using their superior martial strength. Their nations people forced aboard the vast wooden ships and escorted by warships armed with the strange fire magic metal cylinders known as cannons.

The island they find themselves on is simply not large enough to rebuild their armies and hope to displace the Star, at least not while their rivals share the land.

The Defiant Iqua
The Pious Loji

The Magic System

The magic system makes use of objects known as Runes. Each Rune is composed of a Meaning component that describes vaguely the intent of the Rune and an Element component that impacts the elemental theme of the magic cast using the Rune. This will generally be written in the form Meaning(Element). There is a fixed set of Meanings and Elements from which all the various magical effects available to design around are formed. Charging these Runes with Mana is a long and difficult process and is described using Mana costs in a design. Activating the Runes to do magic is a cheap process that can be done in battlefield time. These costs are not represented in designs but can limit the number of times each mage is considered able to cast a spell during battle.

Rules

The rules are inspired by many other Arms Race games of which Sensei’s Intercontinental Arms Race is a good reference.

This game plays out on a turn by turn basis. Each turn represents a season and is roughly three months in length. Each turn is broken up into four phases as explained below.

Spoiler: Phases (click to show/hide)

• Discovery
• Design
• Revision
• Battle

Discovery
In War of the Rune, the magic system operates on predetermined rules. Initially, both sides have only a partial understanding of these rules. During the Discovery phase, the rules are investigated in order to gradually open up the magic system and unlock new uses for it. This can be done by investigating a Meaning or Element, increasing a side’s skill related to the chosen runic component. Raising skill levels in this way will always succeed.

Alternatively, it is possible to try some combination of known Runes as an experiment with the magic system to see what happens. Sometimes nothing useful will happen, as not every combination results in something magical happening. If the result fizzles, clues as to the reason for the failure will be provided. A successful runic system experiment will unlock a magical effect, this is still only theoretical knowledge until that effect is incorporated into a design.

Investigate Runic Component: Increase skill level with the selected runic component.
Runic System Experiment: Try a combination of runes to unlock an effect usable in a design.

Design
As in a standard arms race, this phase allows players to design new pieces of equipment for the armies they are supplying to utilize. In order to use a magical effect, it must first be unlocked and then a design that uses it must be made. A side may also choose to sacrifice a design to perform other actions instead. For example, they may experiment with a combination of runes. Finally, a design may be action may be spent to create a Hero. Heroes are assigned to a battlefield to provide a bonus to that sides luck roll. As of game start, only Mortal Heroes can be created.

Create a Design: Create a new piece of equipment with which to win the war.
Runic System Experiment: Try a combination of runes to unlock an effect usable in a design.
Create a Hero: Describe a Hero who has arisen to champion your side.

Revision
As in a standard arms race, this phase is used to improve existing equipment. All revisions should list the existing piece of equipment that is being upgraded. Note that it is fine to list a piece of equipment not referenced as being in the side’s possession as long as it could reasonably be available.

Battle
This is the bit where I write a battle report. Each report covers how the two armies compare to each other, taking into consideration the equipment they each have available as well as the terrain they are fighting on and the season they are fighting in. For each battlefield, a D6 luck roll will be made for each side.

Spoiler: Heroes (click to show/hide)

Mortal Heroes provide a D2 luck bonus initially. A Mortal Hero cannot exceed a d6 bonus.

For each year (4 turns) that a Hero survives they gain in experience increasing the height of the dice, so after surviving 4 years (16 turns) a Mortal Hero would provide a D6 bonus to luck on a single battlefield. If multiple heroes are assigned to the same battlefield, only the largest bonus after rolling will apply.

If a Hero is on the losing side of a battle, they can be wounded or slain. A die of the same height as their luck bonus is rolled. 1 is slain, 2-3 is wounded, any other result is survival.

Spoiler: Resources (click to show/hide)

Land
This resource describes the amount of space available for farming and crafting a side has. This is the base resource that most things will require. Every location controlled is capable of generating land resources if properly developed.

Ore
Ore refers to various metals mined from the earth. This resource is used by things that need significant amounts of metal. Initially, ore access is limited and the island only holds a few locations that will generate more ore.

Mana
Designs that use Runes, incur a cost of mana. Initially, mana access is limited and the island only holds a few locations that will generate more mana.

Runic strength is abstracted as Weak, Medium and Powerful; costing 1, 2 and 3 mana. Thus a design that relied on three Powerful Runes would cost 9 mana.

Hint Tokens
If both sides agree, both sides can be given a hint token at any time. Hint tokens can be spent during the discovery phase to try out additional rune combinations. They can also be spent at any time for more general hints.

Spoiler: Expense (click to show/hide)

A design's resources cost is compared with a faction’s available resources to determine an expense level. This expense level helps to determine how widely available a technology is. There are additional factors of consideration that may come into play later in the game.

The Cheap level denotes that the design costs equal to or lower than the number of resources produced by the nation and the design is being produced at the maximum possible reasonable level. For standard infantry weapons, this means that every soldier is able to be equipped with them.

The Expensive level denotes that a design costs up to two resources more than the number of resources produced by the nation. This is shorthanded for standard infantry weapons as them being available to only one in ten soldiers.

The Very Expensive level denotes that a design costs between three and five resources more than the nation is producing. This is shorthanded for standard infantry weapons as them being available to only one in one hundred soldiers.

The National Effort level denotes that a design costs between six and ten resources more than the nation is producing. At this level of expense, it means that only one of these national effort type items is produced per year.

The Theoretical level denotes that a design costs over ten more resources per year than the nation is producing. At this level, no examples of the design are created over the course of the year.

The Artifact level denotes that a design has special requirements that mean that only one will be produced. The design is otherwise considered to be National Effort equivalent and this prevents the production of any other National Effort design on the turn it is created.

Spoiler: Map (click to show/hide)

[Rockeater]

You should open it in a new thread

[Aseaheru]

 Yeah. Link to it here, but shoving the OP here is a tad much.

[Talion]

It isn't unusual for this thread. See GalactiRace for example.

[Shadowclaw777]

All magic races had started with a “Bucket” system where they get to choose what initial magic they can further explore and make both side differing from the start, so one that starts with a blank canvas *could* be I tersting , but the more important thing here is the “semblance” of a map where the theatres of war are fought, and the rolling system.

Nukes 2d4, Adding Projects to the Designs which means they aren’t instantaneous and based on your wording you want design to be applied immediately so the 2d4 is a good fit.

Map is obvious, could say just basic descriptions of lands such as “Steppes”, “Savannah”, “Mountain Range”, I mean you could do more and use a graphic tool like hex-maps or paint art like pirate joe lol

[Talion]

All magic races had started with a “Bucket” system where they get to choose what initial magic they can further explore and make both side differing from the start, so one that starts with a blank canvas *could* be I tersting , but the more important thing here is the “semblance” of a map where the theatres of war are fought, and the rolling system.

Nukes 2d4, Adding Projects to the Designs which means they aren’t instantaneous and based on your wording you want design to be applied immediately so the 2d4 is a good fit.

Map is obvious, could say just basic descriptions of lands such as “Steppes”, “Savannah”, “Mountain Range”, I mean you could do more and use a graphic tool like hex-maps or paint art like pirate joe lol

There is a bucket system, each side gets to select a starting element (but it is probably less restrictive than previous bucket systems).
I would say the map is the part I'm most unsure about. I played around with Azgaar's Fantasy Map, but it was pushing me towards making an already experimental game more complicated. My current plan is to use a simple wands race-ish approach.

[Rockeater]

It isn't unusual for this thread. See GalactiRace for example.

Sorry, I misunderstood something, nvm

[Aseaheru]

 Yes, it has been done before. It has also been grumbled and griped about before.

[evictedSaint]

a simple wands race-ish approach.

[Talion]

Fine, I have provided a terrible map.

[Aigre Excalibur]

Throwing a few ideas out:

Deathworld: A PVE player faction vs planet 4x game

Core concept: A factorio-style logistical pipedream where you build the military industrial complex with a design element and a movement and combat element. I want to simulate everything from raw material collection, industrial processes to military design and colony management.

You are colonists from the evil Weyland Yutani corporation. You are sent on a very long voyage across the stars to set up shop and exploit a virgin world.

Addenum: The flavour is near-future space exploration. All the tech we have today is scaled up within foreseeable limits. Rockets are cheaper and bigger and can take our mining equipment up. Cyrogenics are working better to facilitate long distance space flight. Inter-stellar ion engines have also been scaled up and produced more cheaply. Power-suits are more practical and more common.

21st Century earth doesn't even have a practical working theory for FTL much less prototypes, so we don't get that. But everything else exists within the boundaries of existing tech and is scaled up a bit.

To do:
Costs for every item
Some intermediary processes: Ore sorting. Component making.

Game setup: Pick several starting materiel and personnel: Weight is listed because logistics. And we're sending these heavy gear into space, rocketing them for years across the stars, landing them and making them set up shop on an alien planet.

Colonists:
Technicians - blue collar workers that do the bulk of the infrastructure building. The can also be easily repurposed to crew vehicles and operating almost any machine.

Security men - Armed with old surplus AR-15s, Glock sidearms and a kevlar vest. They are barely 1 step up from unarmed mall cops. Their equipment is mostly effective against other humans, and they are mostly trained to watch buildings or cover public spaces and events. While there are some veterans who get these kinds of security jobs, their training will not have much effect on the larger pool of rent-a-armed-cops.

Horticulturalists - workers who specialize in crop production. they run greenhouses and hydroponics setups on new worlds.

Prospectors - Geologists and mining exploration specialists who look for minerals and decide on where and how to set up a mine.

All other forms of specialized labour will be abstracted into the "technicians" class of people.

Heavy Equipment:

The Bucket Wheel Excavator - Used for open pit strip mining. They consist of a series of rotating scoops attached to a superstructure. The largest weigh about 15,000 tons and can move 250,000 cubic meters a day. The amount of common ores yielded from such a method is about 0.2%, while rarer minerals are extracted at a yield of about 1 to 5 ppm.
1 cubic meter of soil weighs about 1.6 tons
Cost: 15,000 tons Steel

Rotary Drills - Drills have 2 major applications - taking samples before an open pit mine is built, and possibly for underground mining. A large drill that goes down about 100 meters at a time weighs 100 tons.

Crushers and Rockbreakers - Crushers for heavy mining use either a jaw or a gyratory wheel. The biggest industrial plants handle about 15,000 tons/h. Modern automated facilities can work with minimum stoppages. Packed up, a large semi-mobile plant should also weigh about 15,000 tons. The plants are usually semi-mobile because they are located in the mine and the ores are crushed before they are transported by truck.

Transport Crawlers: A huge tracked machine used to move machines. Your BWE stripminer and the semi-mobile crushing facilities are usually broken up and moved in 1000 ton chunks by a 1000 ton machine

Mining Trucks - Giant Ore carrying trucks weighing about 250 tons that carry up to 400 tons with a 4000hp engine

Static Facilities:

Bulk Ore Sorter: Processes raw ores into common ores and rare materials
Size: 50,000 tons, Capacity, 5000 tons/h

Greenhouse, 1 Hectare:
Yield: Potatoes 13,180,000, kilo calories per hectare per year. 17,268 kg per hectare per earth year, 332kg per earth week. 770 Kcal per kg, 255,640 Kcal per week
Yield: Polystyrene grade Sugarcane: 7,151 kg per hectare per year, 137 kg per earth week
Yield: Soybeans: 2,384 kg per hectare per year, 45.8 kg per week, 1173 Kcal per kg, 53,723 KCal per Week
Cost: ~ 200 tons/steel

Ammonia Plant:
Size 50,000 tons
Capacity: 500 tons/day

Advanced Electronics
Capacity: 2000 silicon wafers/day

Industrial Processes:

Extractive Metallurgy:
We will abstract ores into "rare" and "common".

Pyrometallurgy: We will abstract smelting to just modern induction furnaces that melt down the ores and sends the refined products straight to the casting machines. The bulk of our steel for heavy machines will come from Pyrometallurgy. This is a weight losing process with an efficiency as high as 60-70%.
Capacity: 100 tons/hour , 10,000 ton facility weight, 50MW power consumption.

Hydrometallurgy/Electrometallurgy: Leaching is done to extract rarer metals and minerals. Ores are placed in a leaching solution and electrolytic processes are used to extract them. Aircraft aluminum and metals used in aircraft alloys are extracted this way. Raw uranium is also separated from its impurities this way before it is enriched.
Efficiency is about 30%.
Capacity: 3 tons/day (to make 1 ton of metal), 10,000 ton facility weight, 50 MW power consumption

Non-metals:
Polymers don't neccessary come from oil. Cellulose can be used in their place. Sugarcane is used to produce polyethyene, which is used to make ballistic fabrics. We will abstract plastic production and consider all thermoplastics to be more or less equal. (Polycarbonates are still largely produced from oil and gas because they rely on acetone production, but fuck it, any hydrocarbon will do.)

Explosives:
Smokeless powder is basically organic materials dissolved in nitric acid. We can abstract the hydrocarbons, but will probably simulate nitric acid production from ammonia.
The main primary explosive today is lead azide, which is lead dissolved in sodium azide. Sodium azide comes from sodium dissolved in ammonia.
Ammonia is key. Ammonia gives us nitric acid which produces all secondary explosives. Ammonia gives us sodium azide to make lead azide to make primers and detonators.
Lead is common enough to come from "common" ore.

I will run the numbers for industrial plastic and explosive production later.  I might also add uranium enrichment processes if it doesn't over-complicate things.

Light Equipment:

The humble forklift: Used for carrying pallets of miscellaneous goods and foodstuff.

Industrial Powersuits: About as strong as a forklift, but has better dexterity from grasping hands, and generally better bipedal mobility. Used by technicians in the same manner as a forklift.

Light Buggies/ATVs and Rovers: Light framed cars for moving people about.

Manufacturing:

Machine-tooling - We take it for granted that your average technician with a workbench can take a lump of steel (or other requisite materials) and turn it into a rifle, just like that.

Heavy Fabrication - The player faction has to build a facility with an assembly line to automate a fabrication processing that involves all the cutting and bending and welding of the huge chunks of metal. For adhoc work, a bunch of technicians in powersuits wielding the machines could also do the job.

Game phases after setup:

Game map: The game will use a coordinate system with 0,0 being the players' landing site. Coordinates can go in all quadrants, including negative numbers. Each grid square represents 1 kilometer by 1 kilometer. Vector maths will be used to calculate distances.

Movement: Resource Exploration - The players scout a grid point and can choose to use a prospector person and a drill to make an exploratory excavation for resources.

Movement: Military and Logistical - The players can make the decision to start excavating a point, assign forces the guard or patrol a point or route, and set up supply routes between mines and facilities. The set up of more industrial facilities and production decisions also takes place here.

Pre-Design: Requirement Analysis - Based on experiences in the field, the players (perhaps acting as cushy executives or a team of scientists) decide on what problems need to be prioritized, and what new pieces of tech must be designed.

Design: Conceptualization - Like in other arms race games, design characteristics are listed.

Detailed design is simulated, probably by dice roll, after the conceptualization phase. At the end of which, you will have a working prototype that either performs better or worse than expected and is ready for fabrication. You will however need to build specialized fabrication facilities for each type of vehicle or machine in the logistical phase.

Rest phase: Civilian life simulation: Civil affairs of the colony are described here. Laws and social issues are brought up (but generally have no direct impact on the raw industrial and military numbers), you might describe the consumption and preferences for luxuries here and how luxuries and entertainment are distributed among the workers. We will not be number crunching in this phase.

Then it cycles back to resource scouting and then to action. The "revision phase" in the arms race games will be part of the pre-design and design phases. You might have multiple projects and multiple improvements on projects running at once. I might want to plan on how to impose limits on that.

[Kashyyk]

I like overly complex games, but there'll probably only be a few others besides me who'd play something like that.

[Aigre Excalibur]

proposal to my own brain:

Abstract all materials into just 3 types:

Common Metals
Rare Metals
Organic Produce

Then forget the components, just make the damn tonk out of the materials.

[Aigre Excalibur]

Draft 2:

Deathworld: A PVE player faction vs planet 4x game

A campaign of resource exploitation with combat and R&D in an escalating conflict against a virgin planet.

You are colonists from the evil Weyland Yutani corporation. You are sent on a very long voyage across the stars to set up shop and exploit a virgin world.

Tech Level: The flavour is near-future space exploration. All the tech we have today is scaled up within foreseeable limits. Rockets are cheaper and bigger and can take our mining equipment up. Cyrogenics are working better to facilitate long distance space flight. Inter-stellar ion engines have also been scaled up and produced more cheaply. Power-suits are more practical and more common.

21st Century earth doesn't even have a practical working theory for FTL much less prototypes, so we don't get that. But everything else exists within the boundaries of existing tech and is scaled up a bit.

Resources:

Steel/Common Metals: Steel is used for the bulk of our heavy machinery. Other common metals include copper, lead and tin.

Rare Metals & Minerals: Almost every other metal and mineral can be extracted in some quantity from stripmining.

Organic Produce: Our greenhouses grow staple crops in a controlled environment that is safe from the planet outside.

Mining Logistics Summary:
Strip mining BWEs -> 400,000 tons of Raw Rocks
- > 1.11 1 Crushers -> 400,000 Crushed Rocks
-> 3.33 1 Ore Sorters -> 400 tons common metal ores or 0.4 tons rare material ore
-> pyrometallurgy -> 240-280 tons of common metal
-> Hydro/Electric Metallurgy -> 0.12 tons of rare material

Crew Requirements::
Crew needs are per shift. Your average technician works for 8 hours every 24 without performance drops. To staff a vehicle or facility for continuous operation, triple the crew needs are required.

Non Combatants:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Technicians - blue collar workers that do the bulk of the infrastructure building. The can also be easily repurposed to crew vehicles and operating almost any machine. They do everything.
Needs: 3000 Calorie Diet, shelter, air, etc...

Horticulturalists - workers who specialize in crop production. they run greenhouses and hydroponics setups on new worlds.
Needs: 3000 Calorie Diet, shelter, air, etc...

Heavy Machinery - Mining

Mining yields: Mines will have a richness that is multiplied again a base number of 0.1% for common metal ores and 1 ppm for rare materials. A mine with 200% richness can yield 0.2% common metal ores, etc.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The Bucket Wheel Excavator - Used for open pit strip mining. They consist of a series of rotating scoops attached to a superstructure. The largest weigh about 15,000 tons and can move 250,000 cubic meters a day. The amount of common ores yielded from such a method is about 0.1-0.2%, while rarer minerals are extracted at a yield of about 1 to 5 ppm.
1 cubic meter of soil weighs about 1.6 tons
Crew: 1 Technician
Capacity: 250,000m3 / 400,000 tons of raw rocks per day
Weight: 15,000 tons
Cost: 15,000 tons Common Metals, 100kg Rare Materials

Rotary Drills - Drills have 2 major applications - taking samples before an open pit mine is built, and possibly for underground mining. A large drill that goes down about 100 meters at a time weighs 100 tons.
Crew: 1 Technician
Weight: 1000 tons
Cost: 1,000 tons Common Metals, 100 kg Rare Materials

Crushers and Rockbreakers - Crushers for heavy mining use either a jaw or a gyratory wheel. The biggest industrial plants handle about 15,000 tons/h. Modern automated facilities can work with minimum stoppages. Packed up, a large semi-mobile plant should also weigh about 15,000 tons. The plants are usually semi-mobile because they are located in the mine and the ores are crushed before they are transported by truck.
Crew: 1 Technician
Capacity: 15,000 16,667 tons of raw rocks per hour 400,000 tons per day
Cost: 18,000 tons Common metals, 100 kg Rare Materials

Transport Crawlers: A huge tracked machine used to move machines. Your BWE stripminer and the semi-mobile crushing facilities are usually broken up and moved in 1000 ton chunks by a 1000 ton machine
Crew: 1 Technician
Capacity: 1000 tons of transportation
Road Speed: 20kph/ 5.56 ms^-1
Cost: 1000 tons Common Metals 100kg Rare materials

Mining Trucks - Giant Ore carrying trucks weighing about 250 tons that carry up to 400 tons with a 4000hp engine
Crew: 1 Technician
Capacity: 400 tons of transportation, usually optimized for ores.
Road Speed: 67kph (maximum loaded speed) 18.61 ms^-1
Cost: 250 tons Common metals 100 kg Rare materials

Static Facilities:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Bulk Ore Sorter: Processes raw ores into common ores and rare materials
Crew: 1 Technician
Weight: 200,000 tons
Capacity, 20,000 tons/h 400,000 tons/day
Cost: 200,000 tons Common Metals, 1 ton Rare Materials

Greenhouse, 1 Hectare:
Yield: Potatoes: 17,268 kg per hectare per earth year, 332kg per earth week. 770 Kcal per kg, 255,640 Kcal per week
Provides a basic 2000 Kilocalorie diet for exactly 18 people. Rations can be increased to 1.5 times for morale or reduced in times of need.
Crew: 1 Horticulturalist per hectare
Cost: ~ 200 tons/steel, 100 kg Rare Materials

Habitat
Capacity: 50x 20 square meter apartments for 50 Humans
Weight: 10,000 tons
Cost: 10,000 tons of Steel, 100 kg Rare Materials

Light Equipment:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The humble forklift: Used for carrying pallets of miscellaneous goods and foodstuff.
Crew: 1 Technician
Capacity: 40 tons
Weight: 40 tons
Road Speed: 60km/h 16.67 ms^-1
Cost: 40 tons Common Metals, 100 Kg Rare Materials


Industrial Powersuits: Power assisted suits featuring dextrous arms and articulated hands. Allows superhuman loads to be carried.
Crew: 1 Technician
Lift: 200 Kg
Weight: 200 Kg
Road Speed: 60km/h 16.67 ms^-1
Cost: 0.2 ton of Common Metals, 10 Kg Rare Materials

Light Cars and vehicles: Light framed cars for moving people about.
Range Rovers:
Weight: 2.5 tons
Towed Payload: 3.5 tons
Max Laden Payload: 0.5 tons
Passengers: 6
Cost: 3 tons of Common Metals 100 Kg of Rare Materials

Combatants

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Security men - Armed with old surplus AR-15s, Glock sidearms and a kevlar vest. They are barely 1 step up from unarmed mall cops. Their equipment is mostly effective against other humans, and they are mostly trained to watch buildings or cover public spaces and events. While there are some veterans who get these kinds of security jobs, their training will not have much effect on the larger pool of rent-a-armed-cops.

Training Doctrine: 18 hour course in Security legalities, emergency response and fire-arm handling all thrown in.
Theoretical Accuracy is 55% under range conditions.
Fitness is Mediocre

AR-15 Rifle: Lightweight gas-fed semi-automatic rifle designed to be manufactured with aluminum alloys and synthetic materials.
Weight: 3Kg
Calibre 5.56x45mm
Cost: 3 Kg Rare Materials

Effective Range: 600m
Effective Sustained RoF: 15 RPM
Muzzle Velocity: 995ms^-1 (H335)
bullet weight 3.564g
Projectile Energy: 1763 Joules

Glock Pistols: Polymer-framed, short recoil-operated, locked-breech semi-automatic pistols
Weight: 0.915Kg
Calibre: 9x19
Cost: 1Kg Rare Materials

Effective Range: 50m
Theoretical RoF: 60 RPM at close range
Effective Sustained RoF: 15 RPM
Energy Density: 3999J/cm^2
Muzzle Velocity: 227ms^-1 (H4227)
bullet weight: 8.1g (Sierra JHP 8125)
Projectile Energy: 193 Joules

Level 3A Body Armor carriers
New armor protects against:
    8.1 g (125 gr) .357 SIG FMJ Flat Nose (FN) bullets at a velocity of 448 m/s ± 9.1 m/s (1470 ft/s ± 30 ft/s)
    15.6 g (240 gr) .44 Magnum Semi Jacketed Hollow Point (SJHP) bullets at a velocity of 436 m/s (1430 ft/s ± 30 ft/s).
And all threats listed by level 2 and 1

Game phases after setup:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Game map: The game will use a coordinate system with 0,0 being the players' landing site. Coordinates can go in all quadrants, including negative numbers. Each grid square represents 1 kilometer by 1 kilometer. Vector maths will be used to calculate distances.

Movement: Resource Exploration - The players scout a grid point and can choose to use a prospector person and a drill to make an exploratory excavation for resources.

Movement: Military and Logistical - The players can make the decision to start excavating a point, assign forces the guard or patrol a point or route, and set up supply routes between mines and facilities. The set up of more industrial facilities and production decisions also takes place here.

Pre-Design: Requirement Analysis - Based on experiences in the field, the players (perhaps acting as cushy executives or a team of scientists) decide on what problems need to be prioritized, and what new pieces of tech must be designed.

Design: Conceptualization - Like in other arms race games, design characteristics are listed.

Detailed design is simulated, probably by dice roll, after the conceptualization phase. At the end of which, you will have a working prototype that either performs better or worse than expected and is ready for fabrication. You will however need to build specialized fabrication facilities for each type of vehicle or machine in the logistical phase.

Rest phase: Civilian life simulation: Civil affairs of the colony are described here. Laws and social issues are brought up (but generally have no direct impact on the raw industrial and military numbers), you might describe the consumption and preferences for luxuries here and how luxuries and entertainment are distributed among the workers. We will not be number crunching in this phase.

Then it cycles back to resource scouting and then to action. The "revision phase" in the arms race games will be part of the pre-design and design phases. You might have multiple projects and multiple improvements on projects running at once. I might want to plan on how to impose limits on that.

Player Roles

Anyone jumps in:
Designers
Logistical Planners

Specialized roles:
Chef: In charge of detailed design of food rations

Heroes: Takes charge of a single military character to perform feats of heroism.

[Aigre Excalibur]

So the discord people said, make the numbers less anal, don't have 1.11 rockbreakers per stripminer... and stop counting calories per square meter... fine.