Frezenio Tenax intoned the sacred words as he planted his Conquistarium banner in the ground

““I claim this world in the name of the Emperor of Man and his Imperium. I bring justice and truth for the loyal; punishment and death for the guilty.”

Lord Tenax as looked around at the desolate hellhole of a planet that and sighed. Emperor testes this is bleak he thought as the chill wind caught is face.Those poor misguided pilgrims are going to find it hard to make a life here.

Hiya. I was wondering how have people gone about conquering planets so far. In the Rogue Trader rulebook the endeavour section gives an example of the requirements needed:

1) Preliminary surveys to confirm viability for habitation
2) Colony Hab Installations
3) Atmosphere Machines and other protective devices
4) A binding compact with the Machine Cult to support Colony Machinery
5) An Organisation of negotiators and brokers to accept thrones for passage for would be Colonists and negotiate a wide range of one time transport contacts.

I was wondering what people thought the profit factor modifiers for these Prerequisites were…
Also is it worth waiting for the “Into the Storm” supplement as it seems it may address some of the equipment and services needed.

Also what do people believe is the minimum amount of people to set up a colony. I’m pumping for 1300- 1500 which is the size of a battalion , which according to wiki is “A battalion is generally the smallest military unit capable of independent operations (i.e. not attached to a higher command” so Im reasoning that this is the minimum a mount a group of colonists can survive and prosper without constant aid.

Any Ideas?

Depends entirely on 'what' purpose the planet has in terms of what it would provide back to the RT aside from some low rent peons sitting around somewhere cold and picking their arse watching an atmosphere processor. On that note, the planet (and the system) needs to be surveyed for anything of worth or concern because its not much fun if you're setting up shop next to cranky orks, pissy eldar or your local pirate clan with backing for the darker powers.

That done, stick the infrastructure in place to begin the money making cycle, factories, refineries, farms, mines etc

I don't think a 1-1500 people will achieve much, with attrition rates from environmental effects, exotic bacteria and being that the Imperium is labour intensive I'd honestly ramp up that number to at least 20,000 (2-3 trips) just to give them that depth of skills, manpower and redundancy. In the following year run a few more out there just to keep the numbers up and some more material resources.

I'd also go for tens of thousands as a practical minimum.

Ask yourself also what the Rogue Trader expects to get out of it.

If its long term settlement then it really needs mineral wealth of agricultural wealth since it has to pay for itself. Both of course a re labour intensive the way the Imperium does them.

I'd expect PF gain to be quite small for a long time, maybe even ten years. There is going to be a lot of money going into setup costs after all and not much coming out very soon. Mine shafts need to be sunk, forests cleared, atmospheres processed, fields tilled, etc.

After a few years it should be going nicely, assuming the RT has supported it. Keep topping the population up and doing trade runs and then the RT gets +1 PF, the add to this as the years go by. You'll have to make this fit in with your game time and average PF gains but it should be clear that full colonisation is a LONG term plan for PF gain. Whereas harvesting particular native fauna or minerals could be a shorter term more profitable but ultimately less profitable over the long term option.

Gribble_the_Munchkin said:

I think I have colony and outpost mixed up in my mind then. The game we are running needs a warehouse where we can store men and equipment. We have pre generated a map of 70 odd systems and we have done quite well in generating and exploring them. However its becoming clear that going back to the imperium for supplies every six months is taxing. Playing the game fairly close to reality by actually noting down warp travel times and making accurate assessments of how long it takes to get anywhere makes you feel quite sorry for the administraum and their impossible task. By the time we get back to the system a year will have passed. The guys want to create a kind of warehouse and a self sustained community around it which we can use as a stash hole as well as developing mineral extracting capability for profit. We have found a frosty dirtball that approximates the needs of the game, and doesnt need much in the way of atmosphere or development and one that hasnt got xenos as next door neighbours.

One of the factors to keep in mind is the whole issue of gene pools (I mean sure, if you're just after an outpost you can restaff periodically, that's not a problem).

A quick-and-dirty guide to go by when calculating breeding population (and hence how many dependents you're going to have to ship along with your workers) is the 50-500 rule: to maintain a viable gene pool over the short term, you need at least 25 couples, for long term survival, you need at least 250.

Admittedly, this can be fudged if multiple-spouse relationships are accepted (either polygyny or polyandry, depending on whether males or females are in smaller numbers), but you will need a larger overall starting population over the longer term (or a very complex breeding roster, essentially).

Of course, this being 40k, attrition rates to various causes will be high, so budget for transporting a starting population of maybe 5-8 times your intended long term number (but make sure they've got the materiel to deal with an unexpectedly high percentage of survivors, just to cut down on the risk of a peasant revolt)

Brief calculation is that its going to need at least 5000+ then...

Not quite: according to an interesting article in Wikipedia about Minimum Viable Population (MVP):-

An MVP of 500 to 1000 has often been given as an average for terrestrial vertebrates when inbreeding or genetic variability is ignored. When inbreeding effects are included, estimates of MVP for many species are in the 1000s. Based on a meta-analysis of reported values in the literature for many species, Traill et al. reported a median MVP of 4169 individuals.

So a little under 5,000 is probably viable.

This is actually a scientifically interesting issue - I recall reading somewhere that the human genome shows much evidence of "bottle necking" in the past, ie evidence that at certain points (70,000 years ago) in pre-human history, there was a near-extinction event that produced a far smaller human gene pool. The same is true of Cheetahs and elephant seals, who actually have a very narrow gene pool. According to wikipedia, you can transplant skin from any cheetah to any other cheetah without tissue rejection because they're so closely related.

From a science fiction point of view, I find it interesting from the perspective of "lost colonies." In the 40k universe most spacecraft have a crew of 5000+. This means if a ship crashes on a planet, (assuming it has a roughly 50/50 male/female crew and they survive the crash) then you have a ready made colony.

What's also interesting is that as this is a relatively small gene pool, within 10-15 generations, you'll probably have a distinct "race." The initial gene pool would be small enough to magnify and exaggerate certain traits, meaning that a unique and interesting population would emerge, with physiological (and no doubt cultural) traits to distinguish its members from other humans.

This means that every colony of humans encountered by Rogue Traders will look different, think different and act in a different way to "normal" Imperials. Some might be blonde midgets, others might be red-haired giants, others might be dark skinned with green eyes. The "colony effect" would also create very rapid evolutionary advances on death worlds where a high rate of mortality kicks in: perhaps the only survivors are those strong enough to beat the local predators to death with clubs, meaning Ogryns evolve, or where the only survivors are the ones able to survive on virtually no water, or those able to run for hours, or hide in tiny tunnels. Any one of a number of abhuman races could arise, and its interesting to think what they might look like given the prevailing conditions on their world...

Just a few random musings!

Interesting stuff Lightbringer. From the chilly atmosphere of the this planet it looks that after acouple of thousand years they might evolved into scandinavians types

Going back to one of the original questions what do people believe woyuld be the appropriate modifiers for the aquisition of the pre-requsitites for colonisation/outpost?

Theres some nice stuff in the Inquisitors handbook for three man exploration tents but theres little idea on Hab-Blocks. I know from the various flluff that the are prefabbed to a STC standard and are pretty common, even ubiquitous around the imperium with similar planets sharing the same architecture

But in terms of aquisition modifiers how rare are they?

There's going to be a minimum number to avoid inbreeding (and thus, mutation).