1 Jul 2225
Much has happened in the past months since my last entry. There were of course many victories during that time: our second colony, Nexus, was established, we met two other space-faring gibberish-speaking races, and we developed an Ion drive based on data found in an artifact recovered from a meteorite. However, the single most important discovery arrived just a week ago from our flagship: they have discovered Paradise. The fourth planet around the star Primus has been so named, and our flagship was the first there, our scouts the first to set foot upon the verdant world lying directly at the center of our star cluster. I am told the planet is even more beautiful, more usable than our homeworld, and upon hearing the news our starport immediately rushed the production of a long range colony ship, at great expense to our treasury.
Let me speak for a moment on the geography of our star cluster. All the stars in the cluster lie roughly in a plane, along the edge of our galaxy. When we refer to this plane, we can then label one axis arbitrarily to be galactic north, and the other galactic east. The intersection of these two is then arbitrary, and we thus let that location be the center of our star cluster. Thus one can imagine the coordinate system upon which I will then describe our geography. Our homeworld, New Iconia, lies almost two parsecs galactic south of the center. Our first colony, Labyrinth, is then a parsec west of the homeworld, and our second colony Nexus is a parsec south of the homeworld. Paradise was discovered within a half parsec distance of the center, and thus is quite far from our homeworld. Along the way there, our flagship also discovered an important source of rare metals (which they named Draconium) and that would be about a parsec north of the homeworld.
A sample of those rare metals were recovered and brought back for study by our scientists. Alas, they proved to not be useful for our technology, but the scientists did come up with another purpose: those metals did make a very exquisite jewelry, possessing an inner glow of different colors, and thus would make excellent luxury goods for our citizens. Thus, immediately prior to our third colony ship (the one which we recently rushed into final production) we sent out a starbase construction ship to establish a mining outpost for these rare metals.
Our research also shifted after the discovery of ion-based drive propulsion, examining some artifacts which previously had been assumed to be junk, but now revealed their basic design to be some sort of translator. With this research we contacted those races we had met before, and established good relations with them. Well, not in the sense of having sent over an embassy, but in the sense that they indicated their good nature and we did the same. The ones we met first were the Torian Confederation, whose homeworld appears to lie one and a half parsecs east of the core. There were also the Akilians, who have not developed star travel, but do have a very large population on a planet a half parsec southeast of the core. Finally, just today I received news that representatives of the Altarians, and the Dominion of Korx were encountered by our flagship. I do not know yet where these lie, but I fear that they will soon discover our Paradise, and attempt to gain it for themselves.
1 comment:
Hail Emperor Zifnab!
Still enjoying the reading of these.
I have the latest report from the think-tank of analysts you recently ordered assembled. Their conclusion:
"As goes the core, so goes the galaxy." Paradise will be the hub about which we share the enlightenment of our culture with the rest of the galaxy.
Personally, you should do everything in your power to claim that world, even if it's under-populated at first.
I have never before, in my entire bureaucracy-addled career, witnessed an entire council of economists, political scientists and military strategists come to such an overwhelming consensus.
Military-wise, it'll be tough to hold, but an invaluable staging ground for any engagements you have. Economically, any high-PQ worlds are, well, great. Also, dues to it's position, it *would* be at risk influence-wise, but again, it's high-PQ will, likely, result in a large and robust population, making it secure on several fronts.
Based on a collection of findings from your scout and colonization fleets, our leading scientists, and reports from what little we know thus far of our neighbors, we've been running simulation after simulation on likely inter-empire interactions in this newly discovered galactic arena.
In my experience playing...
In nearly every simulation that involved such a ripe world in a strategically-similar spot, control of such a world would eventually be equated with some form of dominance over the galaxy. Of course, causality is still as much in the realm of philosophy as ever, and another reasonable assumption is that any empire strong enough to retain a hold on such an exposed and tempting target was strong enough to eventually dominate the galaxy. We leave the interpretation of these results to your excellency.
I'm not sure about causality/correlation here, but whenever there's a distinct core, it almost always follows the balance of power. Less so on the larger games I've played more recently.
Even with the scant amount of information we have on our recently-discovered company in this arm of the galaxy, we are confident that if we can secure a colony on Paradise soon enough (so long as we can rightfully claim it before our neighbors begin emulating our embrace of the galaxy), it won't suffer from any outside influence, military or otherwise, in the near-future.
Unless you've got tech speed up, almost any colony will be able to more than pay for itself (and make up for the early strain of reaching it) before it's at serious risk of a military takeover. Influence is more likely, but only with PQ <= 6 or so, in my experience.
We are certain that by time any of our competition (if you can call them that) muster the political will, or, even the capability to threaten Paradise, it will be a teeming metropolis. Not just an asset to our now-interstellar economy, but fully capable of defending itself. Your decision to release the information regarding the discovery of Paradise to the population at large was a brilliant move -- citizens are already lining up to volunteer as colonists of this new world, as soon as we have the means.
Even in the unlikely event that we lose grip of Paradise, it will have enriched our empire immeasurably beforehand.
There was some initial worry, in our discussions, that taking such a position would result in sharing borders with, potentially, every other sentient race in this cluster of stars. The thought of such political tension was initially worrisome, but faith in our ways as a people and culture prevailed -- it is unfathomable that sentient races capable of such feats as the development of a hyperdrive would be so petty or aggressive, and would obviously recognize the grace and brilliance of our people.
One thing you're definitely sacrificing -- my best allies are usually the ones I don't share a border with. Less of a conflict of interest, and they're an invaluable asset, say, when engaging a third empire sandwiched between us. Sharing borders with every empire will make your political relationships a bit more stressed.
One last thing, before you go. We've been approached independently by several large, commercial organizations, all asking for first-rights to construct shopping malls in space -- what a thought! -- around Paradise, should it become ours. For once, they are ahead of us. Certainly the resources and production of various goods in each of the growing empires are not the same, and interstellar trade brings with it the potential for great wealth. The location of Paradise brings with it the potential to tax and claim our share of a large percentage of the trade in the galaxy, whether or not it's directly with our own imports or exports.
When playing a peaceful path (and even when warlike, though it becomes very on-and-off), I pull down tons of money through trade routes. Since both empires gain money from trade routes, it's key to get an upper hand somehow. Economy starbases help rake it in, as does simply ensuring that people are trading with you rather than each other. The politically-stabilizing effect of trade routes is also quite valuable. I wouldn't run the routes directly from Paradise, unless they auto-path too far from where you would build starbases, but rather use Paradise as the hub around which to spam Economy starbases. If you can't get a freighter to path through your taxed-space, then go ahead and route it from Paradise, otherwise it'll make more money by making the longest route you can manage.
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