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[Nirur Torir]

Nigel: Please let us know if (and what) you tell the crew about your suspicions about the Pteroleons.

I think they're smart enough to want to use us towards their own ends. Sounds like regular diplomacy.
They appear to be interested in our human expertise at blowing things up.

Sulfur has a distinctive smell, which he might recognize if there's more nearby. Assuming we have some as part of our rares, I'll show Daedalus a small sample of sulfur and use pictures and gestures to try to show that we can use it as part of the explosion making process, but don't have much. Maybe there's a natural deposit nearby, or even some sulfuric springs.
I don't know how much you'll let me do as a free action, but I'd also like to use photos of explosions and the Lorelei to see if Daedalus wants us to explode the Lorelei. (I'm pretty sure he wants us to explode the Lorelei.) He might however not want us to anger it it unless we have a sure kill OR if we merely hurt it and then take the full blame ourselves, but that's not a distinction I expect to know enough of his body language be able to figure out.

As the xenologist, I have no +social suggestions on resource exploitation at this time, but feel that linguistics would be a very good use for the next research turn.

[Quarque]

Next time, I'll show him photos from around our camp, and of myself. I want to try to see if there's some recognition of what a photo is. In a future turn, after bringing it up with my colleagues, I might try to teach him what the drone is, and that we see what it sees.

Ahh, I am sorry! I completely forgot about this. I´ll explain it by saying that Daedalus hasn´t shown up much last phase, it happens.

I don't know how much you'll let me do as a free action, but I'd also like to use photos of explosions and the Lorelei to see if Daedalus wants us to explode the Lorelei. (I'm pretty sure he wants us to explode the Lorelei.) He might however not want us to anger it it unless we have a sure kill OR if we merely hurt it and then take the full blame ourselves, but that's not a distinction I expect to know enough of his body language be able to figure out.

As a general rule, if you want to do something absolutely trivial like showing Daedalus pictures of your own camp, yeah you can do that as a `free action´, meaning that it doesn´t change the difficulty of the roll. What you mention here is on the edge of that category, I have to think about it. In any case, it is best if you could add personal actions to the votebox. It helps to remind me and it ensures that you have the consent of the rest of the group.

At some points I´ve taken some liberty in writing up what your characters do during the turn. If you ever feel your character wouldn't do or say something I made them, please do let me know.

[mightymushroom]

Wow, so much exciting stuff there.

Turo: you get to name your tunnel.

"Oh, ah, in my head it's just been 'the Forest Tunnel' so far. Not sure what else we'd want to call it since there isn't a named destination on either end yet. We've not even formally named our landing site, or colony."

The best Turo's come up with for a local site name is 'Plymouth Rock' from an old Earth story and the rocky place where we landed. Might be apocryphal, or one of those where all the settlers disappeared? Maybe not the best omen.

-----

I take it the 'tunnel' is roughly proportional on the map? If so, that's quite the cavern; we could fit a decent size settlement in there without worrying so much about building roofs. Something to think about for the future.

Sandstone is very good, much better than shale for building blocks. We still probably need to get timber going first to build transport, cranes, scaffolding... but a quarry there could supply our foreseeable stonework needs. Quartz and rubies I don't have an immediate use for but give me time in the databanks to refresh my memory about their properties and I'm sure there will be something. At the least, rubies are quite high on the hardness scale; perhaps I can experiment with ruby-coated tools in lieu of industrial diamonds.

I can't help but notice the striders appear to have curious and possibly friendly minds, too. Not my department so I don't know what it takes, but taming some local wildlife would go a long way toward easing the labor shortage.

-----

I'm still committed to expanding the farmland this phase by Exploiting some of the soil from the forest and wetlands. I should let Grace chime in on that.

I will point out that if we locate the fields near the stream – even if it means hewing basins for them like we did for the base site aqueduct – then we can use a simple water dipper for irrigation.

[Xvareon]

I propose to name our colony site Petrichor, after the pleasant smell generated when fresh rainfall strikes ground that's been dry for some time. It's rather fitting, considering we're in the badlands.

[Quarque]

The best Turo's come up with for a local site name is 'Plymouth Rock' from an old Earth story and the rocky place where we landed. Might be apocryphal, or one of those where all the settlers disappeared? Maybe not the best omen.

Do you mean for this to apply to the local badlands or a wider area?

I take it the 'tunnel' is roughly proportional on the map? If so, that's quite the cavern; we could fit a decent size settlement in there without worrying so much about building roofs. Something to think about for the future.

It is not as wide as I've drawn it there, but note that I've only shown the part you've seen so far. The cavern leads deeper to the SW. Tomorrow I'm adding another more detailed map.

[Xvareon]

I feel like Phryne might have her hands full. She's just going to continue keeping an eye on operations, assisting with anyone who wants to visit the forest tunnel—by the way, I'm going to tentatively name that loosely according to the Galactic Star Charts standard for classifying celestial bodies. Greengate-1122. The format normally goes... Size:Temperature:Atmosphere:Water. Here it's Greengate for notable feature, i.e. gateway to the forest, then... Size 1(human-passable):Length 1 (crossable in less than a day):Hazard 2 (at least marginal human presence but neither actively secured nor fully explored):Water 2 (no obvious sources, groundwater only).

While I'm generally being helpful and protective, Phryne is also going to use her free time to make something... impractical, for a change. She will assemble... a rock collection.

Well, okay, not 100% that. But, like, I'm imagining a circular bowl-shaped depression carved out of the shale around base, filled with a thin layer of sand, and then a nice zen garden of various stones. I want to collect some quartz and ruby if I can, not much, just pocket it to add to this collection. I'll use any nicely-shaped shale, sandstone, or even erosion-carved creekstones I can find. I'll have little cairns of rocks with pointy shards of quartz sticking out of the points where they meet.

[Quarque]

I take it the 'tunnel' is roughly proportional on the map? If so, that's quite the cavern; we could fit a decent size settlement in there without worrying so much about building roofs. Something to think about for the future.

Sorry for taking long, but here is a more precise map of the forest cavern. The branch leading SW goes deeper, but you don't know yet how deep.

Spoiler: Cavern detail map (click to show/hide)

The rock collection is trivial enough to be a "free action" that doesn't add to the overall risk of the phase, but please do add it to the votebox to remind me (and get explicit consent of the group).

[Xvareon]

Collect rocks/minerals/gemstones for a zen garden (1) - Xvareon

[mightymushroom]

Right, unanswered question ... I should get back to that.

The best Turo's come up with for a local site name is 'Plymouth Rock' from an old Earth story and the rocky place where we landed. Might be apocryphal, or one of those where all the settlers disappeared? Maybe not the best omen.

Do you mean for this to apply to the local badlands or a wider area?

I originally intended it for the name of the settlement itself, the name of the town so to speak. I also tried to take a self-deprecating tone because I thought it wasn't very good as a town name, but I did want to start a discussion. Thanks to the discussion, I now think 'Plymouth Rock' would be better recast as a geological name applied to the badlands: the Plymouth Rock Formation. While I still think the human town/colony needs a proper vote to name it, I wouldn't feel bad about a one-player suggestion for the rocks, seeing as my character specialty appears to be the nearest thing to a geologist.

-----

*sees the votebox put up* -- Well, somebody should add a major action as well as a minor one. I'd rather Grace takes the lead on this project, if possible, but I suppose I can write it down.

Major action:
Collect lowland soil and bring it to the badlands for agricultural fields (1) - mightymushroom

"Free" action(s):
Collect rocks/minerals/gemstones for a zen garden (1) - Xvareon

I didn't add a vote to name the settlement yet, because we are left with only one suggestion currently and a significant fraction of the players have yet to chime in.

(My not voting on the zen garden is a true abstention, not a silent "nay.")

[Quarque]

I think

I propose to name our colony site Petrichor, after the pleasant smell generated when fresh rainfall strikes ground that's been dry for some time. It's rather fitting, considering we're in the badlands.

So, then the Colony would be called Petrichor and the local terrain the Plymouth Rock Formation?

I feel like Phryne might have her hands full. She's just going to continue keeping an eye on operations, assisting with anyone who wants to visit the forest tunnel—by the way, I'm going to tentatively name that loosely according to the Galactic Star Charts standard for classifying celestial bodies. Greengate-1122. The format normally goes... Size:Temperature:Atmosphere:Water. Here it's Greengate for notable feature, i.e. gateway to the forest, then... Size 1(human-passable):Length 1 (crossable in less than a day):Hazard 2 (at least marginal human presence but neither actively secured nor fully explored):Water 2 (no obvious sources, groundwater only).

Would Greengate-1122 be a name for a gate?

[Xvareon]

Yes, and yes. Petrichor for the colony, and Greengate-1122 for the tunnel we found to the wooded space beneath us. I plan to use similar designations for other interesting terrain features.

[Quarque]

ok, please note that mightymushroom already named the excavated tunnel "Forest Tunnel",  how do we resolve this?

[Xvareon]

We just call it "Forest Tunnel" and call it a day. I shrug and just move on to name the next interesting terrain feature we find. No need to 'resolve' anything.

[Naturegirl1999]

((if I'm allowed to join))

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Name: Lea Webster
Area of Expertise: Biology
Background: Lea was born on Earth and spent time learning about as many different lifeforms she could, She focused on botany and mycology later since they were seemingly less studied, at least by people she was around, she also learned about various microbes as well, at some point she was able to go to Europa and help find new creatures and help discover chemicals that could be used in medicine, she helped with lab work more often than not, she would of course go out and sample the water, small creatures being caught as well, even if her target was mostly microbes, she was still able to help her colleagues research the larger specimens, she helped find new species, as well as make sure the machines were working right. She tried to sync her sleeping and wake up times to match with when the machines powered off for power saving when not in use, sleeping when they were in such a state, when they woke up, she'd wake up to the gentle humming of the equipment, cleaning them up often before her human colleagues woke up, sometimes she would stay up longer than the rest of them, collecting more data, cleaning the machines, making sure to thank them for the data even though she knew they'd provide it anyway. One of the new microbes she found was a bioluminescent eukaryote with 3 nuclei, they seemed to use chemosynthesis using the various chemicals in the Europan waters to survive, they glow a bright yellow, and through further research found that they made large molecules that could be used to synthesize medicine, she kept a small colony of these microbes to study on her own, most were given to the research but she kept some alive to ensure steady supply, some time later, when the data from Europa was being sent to nearby planets for storage and further analysis, she got a reply different from the usual replies, instead of just getting the "data sent" message, she noticed a new one mentioning the various medicines and the new species she helped find, "Europa Colony/Expedition, your lab has sent 6x more new medicines and 4x more species catalogued than the previous century set, the increase in microbiology submissions will allow for more detailed simulations of potential diseases and helpful microbes. we are looking for people willing and useful to assist in colonizing a distant planet, [Delta Pavonia C], the company will send a thought drone to assess which colony members will have useful knowledge for the mission" she smiled, she saved the email and made sure it was sent to all lab members, not everyone checked the main terminal every day. She did her final checks for the night, sterilizing the lab, then slept, dreaming she would be picked, that people considered her useful, that she'd help with a colony and discovering new life on another planet

((too much? too little? Correct amount? I know it's optional but I want to know wheter I built a good background, even if it is only fluff))

[Quarque]

((if I'm allowed to join))

Yes of course, welcome. I added your bio to the list of characters in the first post.