Having read through the Colony rules - especially those for if the characteristics are greater than the size - I have some queries for you erudite forum hoppers.

Let's take the example of the Ecclesiastical Starting Colony (Size 1, Complacency 1, Productivity 1, Order 2, Piety 2). As Piety is larger than Size, Order and Complacency each increase by 1, giving a statline of S1, C2, Pr1, O3, Pi2. Order is also greater than Size, giving Productivity +2. After this, Productivity and Complacency are greater than Size and give +3PF, leaving the ACTUAL starting stats of the Colony to be S1, C2, Pr3, O3, Pi2 and providing 4PF to the founding Trader. On top of this, there is a potential +1 bonus to two of these stats, one from the starting Cultural Improvement (SoI says 'Cultural District' but as such an improvement doesn't exist, I assume they mean Improvement) and one from the colony's location. Am I understanding the rules correctly, or are the various bonuses already incorporated into the calculations for the starting characteristics?

Moreover, once the colony increases in size, and Piety and Complacency become equal to the Size, wouldn't the stats then decrease to C1, Pr 1, O 2, and Pi2 due to the 'no longer greater than the Size' being the case? Doesn't this seem a little weird?

*bump*

'cause I've just encountered this same issue.

Yeah. First off, the colony rules in SoI are too easily gamed. Secondly, the population growth of colonies would make a Mormon blush. There are really only a couple factors in establishing a colony. First off, how inimical is the environment? That will determine the amount of space taken up by environmental infrastructure as a ratio to the actual number of colonists. Secondly, ditch the notion of an Ecclesiastical colony. Does your RT and the party really want to build a shrine in the middle of the God-Emperor's own nowhere to his glory? If so, you're the first kind of that particular snowflake I've heard on these forums. RT Dynasties want to make profit. That means mining and industry, or agriculture, or "archaeology." Let the lesser Dynasties run errands for the Ministorum. "We want you to deliver our pilgrims to this newly opened Shrine World." Hey, I remember my first beer. I'm kidding. I don't remember it at all. That was like 40 years ago.

The "archaeology" colonies are the easiest. They are usually very limited in scope. They aren't built to be self-sufficient. They are entirely dependent on supply ships that give them what they need to live in exchange for "goods." They can produce PF, especially from doo-dads in the Cold Trade, but your players will mostly be interested in the toys they fit on their ship(s), or the shiny bits with dakka.

Agriculture colonies are rather easy, too. They harvest something that's usually already on the planet in question. If the planet supports agriculture then it already has a flourishing ecosystem. Keep in mind that the Imperium isn't exactl eco-friendly and these planets tend to crash in short time...the herds were over-hunted, the land was over-grazed, erosion washed all the soil into the ocean, the fish were depleted, you get the idea. These colonies quickly become self-sufficient, grow to legendary PF status, then crash like eggs in an overturned semi. Then you get to go rescue the colonists or take a PF hit for abandoning them to their fates.

Which leaves us with mining and industry colonies, which are the bread and butter of an RT Dynasty's influence and power, or at least the ones that last. All mining colonies become industrial colonies. It just isn't economical to export ore. It's not very economical to export refined metals. Eventually, to become profitable, that mining colony has to manufacture "stuff" of its own in order to become self-sufficient. The best of these colonies specialize in making the things the colonists need in order to transform their new colony into an Imperial world. This means slow and methodical growth. Most RT Dynasties, however, go off the deep end and want to immediately open their own Fury production line. Check above on agricultural planets for similar results. Otherwise, your Dynasty will want to contract with Free Captains. Use background Endeavors to make regular deliveries to your colony and realize that slow, but reliable and long term growth into an Imperial World.

In the final analysis, all your players really want are some ongoing storylines and a PF bonus for all the work. The storylines are easily manufactured from all that gobbleti-**** in SoI, the upgrades and infrastructure. "Colony Gamma Beta Delta needs more water. That type of equipment is cheap and plentiful on Malfi. Time to make a trip back to Calixis." Make it a Trade Endeavor, with all the AP bonuses that cargo components usually give you. Since it's a survival thing, and not a money-maker, it's a base PF 0 (unless it's a colony belonging to another RT Dynasty, in which they can bargain for more PF). 2 main cargo holds (+250 AP to Trade) and a luxury passenger quarters (+100 AP to Trade) would turn that into a +3 PF voyage. Easy and done. The game moves on and the play is all about your voyages, your encounters, and your rivals' intrigue.

But hey, that's just my group. Some players like spreadsheets. I'm thankful my current don't. SoI, btw, runs smoother with spreadsheets. I ran one of those campaigns. Never again...

Ooookay, in no particular order...

I'm already using your house-rules for SoI so some of the wonkiness is ameliorated, and anything major I'll tweak as I go, but I've disregarded the AP>PF conversion (I still track 'em to measure completion of an Endeavour, but no PF bonuses).

You and I are on the same page regarding narrative drives and spinning Endeavours out of colony needs or misfortunes, that's not the issue here; I'm trying to pin down their starting characteristics only.

And the group's RT is a religious zealot with Temple, um, tendencies and as such is very, very likely to want to found ecclesiastical colonies - not least to form a devotional core to his nascent shadow-Imperium.

You use my colony rules? I'm flattered. Those are still incomplete and I've rewritten them several times. I'm fairly happy with the newest version, though. I kept it super-simple and easy to adjudicate with background endeavors.

I've pretty well stopped using AP myself, though I still keep them in mind. I have to reward the players somehow for using them.

Did you look at the Errata? They changed the starting characteristics of most of the colonies. That fixed most of the stupid. Still, growth will quickly make your colonies crash using SoI if you aren't making constant trips back and forth to bring in new infrastructure and upgrades. Even the group I ran that loved spreadsheets hated that. And if your party does make those constant trips back and forth you'll quickly have a hive, and that's a whole new level of broken game.

Heh. Well, if your RT is a religious zealot with a temple component or two, I stick with my statement that they still won't really be making an ecclesiarchal colony. They'll probably be making a self-sufficient colony at the very least. Otherwise they'd just be making trips back and forth with subsistence for the colony and getting nothing in return except warm feelings. That's negative PF and I'd be sure to reward them appropriately.

On a side note, there is another type of agricultural colony that isn't covered much but I think deserves mention, since it's probably necessary to keep those 32k or so hive planets out there alive, and that's the hydrocarbon mining planet. They probably export food bricks that look and taste like a charcoal briquette. Yummy.

Big fan of all your work.

Huh, no, I didn't check the Errata. I'd convinced myself SoI wasn't covered in there. Thanks.

I had envisaged "setting up trade routes" to be part of founding a colony; I mean, how does a colony boost your profit factor unless what it's producing is reaching the desired markets? As such, food and supply runs would just happen in the background. In addition, if you have an agri colony over here and an Ecc colony over there then surely one would feed the other? I saw my players founding different colonies on different worlds but building up a kind of inter-dependent structure. Given your greater experience with the system, is there any reason this wouldn't or doesn't work in practice?

And yeah, some more variety in production infrastructure would have been nice.

Let me reframe your question. "What is the level of intersystem mercantile exchange in the Expanse?"

There has been some discussion on the forum before of shipping population. There's only a few quotes to refer to, and they are subject to interpretation. I'll lay out how I've decided to run with those vague references.

1. There are approx. 1 million inhabited systems in the Imperium of Man
2. There are approx. 200 inhabited systems in the average sector
3. Thus, there are about 5000 sectors
4. The average sector fleet of the Imperial Navy has 50-75 ships
5. The Imperial Navy is only about 10% of the total shipping population
6. Therefore, the average sector has about 600 merchant ships flying around between 200 planets
7. A significant number of those merchant ships are "slow boats," taking several years to make a circuit
8. In the case of "fast boats" time dilation in the warp results in an inordinate amount of relative time spent per merchant-cargo voyage

How many stars are there in the Expanse? Given local stellar population (which is incorrect since population density seems to decrease with distance from the galactic core), there would be about 32k active stars in the Expanse, with about twice that number of non-luminous or stellar remnants out there (and stellar remnants are rife with the possibility of ancient xenos-tech, right? I mean, what better setting for your players than a planet under a burned-out sun?). How many have colonies? How many of those see traffic?

I don't assume intersystem mercantile exchange in my campaigns. The paucity of shipping suggests otherwise. I require the players to come up with that shipping. They might detail a ship to the route. They might contract out for it. But they should not assume it, or they'll probably return to a failed colony living like the Donner Party. But yes, it generally does happen in the background. I usually run negotiations with the contractee asking for certain monopolies in order for them to guarantee themselves a profitable run.

Oh, yes, I planned to foreground the setting up of these routes - devising a 'triangle trade' (or whatever), hiring or detailing ships, tasking escorts - but once the plans are laid the actual deliveries will happen outside of PC awareness. I thought by " they'd just be making trips back and forth with subsistence" you meant that you expected the Explorers and the dynasty flagship to be making the runs themselves

You were right about the Errata, it takes care of the issue I was having.

And I'm also using your "Powers of the Expanse" so shipping numbers will be the same in my game. (Thanks again for that document, I was planning to draw up something almost identical - dynasties, houses, factions, foes, stars, ships and shipping - for my campaign when you posted it. Saved me several hours of my life!)

Hello, I just read what you said.

First, thanks for the imput, I ll try to follow your advices and go easy on SoI to ovoid constant trips back. They are no fun.

Now my two cents: you can make money with Ecclesiastical colony. They can produce valuable goods (books, statue, holy stuff), and they can become a major destination for pilgrims. Pilgrims pay to visit the holy soil of Whatever-the-holy-colony and it goes to your pockets. By example see "Sabat Matter" the Dan Abnett book, lots of pilgrim give all they have to come ona special planet with holy watter and rumors of a saint.

As for the agricole colony, I dont believe to the non-environmental friendly trends of Imperium argument. Agri-world exists (I mean, in the game) they are not all about to collapse. And on some you can have special valuable ressource like the best beer on this sector or algae with healing properties that will export intersystem.

I see your points, Negaddar, but I view them differently. You see the shrine world as a source of income because of the pilgrims that want to visit it. I see the pilgrims as a source of income. They could as easily be jettisoned after they purchase their tickets if it weren't for the desirability of even more pilgrims that likely hear about the route via word-of-mouth.

To me, it's the trade route that's worth something, not the actual world, and quite frankly it's not likely to be a wealthy trade route. It's a matter of traffic and I don't see traffic into the Expanse as very heavy. In my campaign, this would probably be resolved by the Dynasty contracting with a minor Captain to carry the pilgrims for them for a cut of the profit, with the whole probably being worth a measly 1 PF to the Dynasty's bottom line, maybe 2 PF if the Ministorum were favorably influenced by the deal. This could be further modified with Luxury Passenger Quarters that carry a better-paying clientele to the shrine world. Of course, if the players wanted to make a stop at that world every trip into the Expanse they could cut out the middle-man and make even more, but I've never had a group that wanted to do that.

ah, what a pleasant discussion