ARCHIVED: Discussion Topic - Technology

[KingArthur]

Here are the links to our tech trees. These trees have been designed with The Steampunk: Lost Worlds scenario in mind.

Era 1

Spoiler :

Era 2

Spoiler :

Era 3

Spoiler :

Era 4

Spoiler :

Key to Trees:

Blue = unit
Blue (underlined) = special character unit
Red = improvement
Brown = wonder
Green = resource
Purple = government

Here are lists of the Improvements and Wonders that tie in with the technologies above

Improvements
Improvements and Wonders continued

 

[KingArthur]

A list of tech icons required to complete the scenario

Landships *
Armoured Bulkheads *
Asylum Districts *
Turbines
Air Tactics
Wireless Telegraphy
Mechatronics
World-wide Commerce
Practical Invention
Portable Beam Weaponry
Forcefields
Teleforce

* work in progress

 

[KingArthur]

A list of Wonder images required to complete the scenario

The Royal Albert Docks
The Royal Exchange
Around the World in 80 Days
Universal Library
Illuminati ** (Blue Monkey)
The Crystal Palace
Scotland Yard
Bedlam
Sandorf's Armoury
Ada Byron Institute
A Christmas Carol
Moon Base
Lloyd's of London
The Violet Ray
Edison's Lab
The Salvation Army
Predictive Engine
The Wardenclyffe Tower
The Roch Fulgerator
Orbital Telescope ** (Blue Monkey)
Buffalo Bill's Wild West
Bensington & Redwoods Elixir
Public Call Stations
Das Kapital
Dr Frankenstein's Laboratory
Dimensional Portal
Invisibility Formula
Krupp's Armaments Factory
The Penny Dreadful
Home Office
The Weldon Institute
Stock Exchange
Baker Street Irregulars
Iron Works
Red Cross ** (Blue Monkey)
The Gold Bug
Time Machine Project
Martian Foreign Office
Lunar Foreign Office
Magickal Cabal
Torchwood

* work in progress
** complete

A list of Improvement Buildings required
Weapons Lab
Wealth ** (Vanilla images used)
Royal Office
Warehouse
Private Club
Private Quarters
Export-Import Co.
Laboratory
Pleasure Garden
Police Station
Waterworks
Theatre
Port
Museum
Salon
Opium Den
Workshop
Analytical Engine
Textile Mill
Port Doors
Factory ** (Vanilla images used)
Gas Lighting
Infirmary
Telegraph Station
Telephone Exchange
Wireless Transmitter
Electric Lighting
Hangar
Railway Station
Electromechanical Computer
Sewerage System
Cloudbuster
Pneumatic Subway System
Customs Office
Shipyard
Steel Works
Mental Asylum
Telautomatic Defence System
Teleporter

 

[Blue Monkey]

Well, since KingArthur let the cat out of the bag, here's my original PM to him:

Would mind sharing with me the steampunk images and/or tech ideas you've compiled?

It would be a great help since I'm still brainstorming the required techs for the scenario. I will need 3 eras worth so the more inspiration the better.

I have more than 150 images at some stage of development. They fall into these broad categories:

Spoiler :

Alternative Power
Architecture & Design
Art
Astronomy
Automata
Communications
Computation
Electrification
Entertainment
Eugenics
Exploration
Flight
Gyro-Stabilisation
Magneto-Electrical Therapy
Mechanisms
Lamarckian Design
Non-Euclidean Mathematics
Orientalism
Perpetual Motion
Photography
Psychedelia
Public Safety
Public Transit
Relativity
Science
Social Darwinism
Sound Reproduction
Space Flight
SubMarine
Things Man Was Not Meant To Know
Vehicles
Warfare

One way to make techs steampunkish is to give ordinary techs strange-sounding pseudo-Victorian names. For example Bio-Mechanistical Transport may only mean an advanced version of horse-drawn carriages. Another alternative is to do a little Wiki-research on Victorian science and pseudoscience. Bertillonage is an actual system of criminal identification that pre-dated fingerprinting. Theory of Aetheric Transport assumes the disproved existence of the ether was true in the Steampunk world - a precursor tech to space travel. Animals evolving in a Lamarckian way, rather than Darwinian, would make Dr. Moreau's job a lot easier (And lets us use the collages of Max Ernst to make a tech icon).

The individual icons closest to being finished are:

Spoiler :

Aerial Dining
Aerodreadnought
Aerodynamism
Anti-Gravitics
Arcology
Astronomical Modelling
Astronomy
Automata
Automatic Servants
Ballistic Flight
Bertillonage
Bio-Mechanistical Transport
Bureaucracy
Chemical Warfare
Chrononautics
Cloudbusting
Cogitative Enhancement
Concentrated Non-Dispersive Energy (Death Ray)
Constabulary
DADA
Difference Engine
Electrical Economy
Electrical Revivification
Electric Light
Electrification
Electro-Education
Electro-Medicine
Electroskates
Exo-Archaeology
Fluorescent Lighting
Gas Light
Gyrostabilization
Heliograph
Hovering Ferry
Industrialism
Interplanetary Voyage
Ironclad
Jacquard Programming
Lamarckian Design
Lost Worlds
Lunar Expedition
Machine Aesthetics
Mechano-Stenography
Monowheel
Multi-Communicator
Observational Astronomy
Opiates
Panopticon
Personal Flight
Phrenology
Plotinusian Adventurer
Pneumatic Messaging
Pneumato-Mechanics
Polar Exploration
Loop Programming
Public Transit
Public Transit (Dystopian)
Scientific Detection
Secret Bureau
SkyScrapers
Slipstream Warfare
Sound Reproduction
Spiritual Machines
Steam Robot
Subjective Time
Subaquatic Transport
Surrealism
Surveillance
Synchronised Clocks
Telephony
Theory of Computation
The Violet Ray
Trans-Chronological Travel
Universal Knowledge
Urban Planning / Utopian Design
Wireless Power Transmission

Here are 16 samples. Even though they look decent, they are definitely not finished.
(Left to Right & Top to Bottom):
Electric Light, Sound Reproduction, Panopticon ("Big Brother" Prison System), Pneumatic Messaging
Pneumato-Mechanics, Difference Engine, Automata, Cloudbusting
Secret Bureau, Chemical Warfare, Polar Exploration, Subaquatic Transport
Tesla Death Ray, Lunar Expedition, Chrononautics, Slipstream Warfare

I ask that you please don’t post these publicly. Some may not make it due to palette problems, etc.; also I wish to release them in themed groups. I also have and continue to collect images that are more suitable as inspiration for units or improvements.

Let me know if there’s something specific you are looking for; I’m a real web-troller, and I already have quite a few relevant links bookmarked.

 

[pinktilapia]

These pics are amazing. If the scenario can come out with a media package of that polish, it will be a work of art. Tech names are really confusing though, but if it adds to the atmosphere, why not. Can't be more puzzling than Latin anyway

 

[Blue Monkey]

These pics are amazing. If the scenario can come out with a media package of that polish, it will be a work of art. Tech names are really confusing though, but if it adds to the atmosphere, why not. Can't be more puzzling than Latin anyway

Thanks. I'm not the maker of the images themselves, just a searcher & CnPer.

As to the names, I'm pretty sure "Chemical Warfare" isn't confusing, but some of the others would need explanation. "Chrononautics" for example is time travel (by analogy to Aeronautics and Astronautics), "Cloudbusting" is weather control (the image was actually a weird attempt at anti-dirigible defense), and "Slipstream Warfare" is warfare carried out across alternative timelines. This mod ought end up with a pretty fascinating 'pedia.

If you have questions about any of the others feel free to ask. I have a feeling that a lot on the long list will make much more sense when there's an icon to look at.

 

[pinktilapia]

You mean that the image #8 is actually a real photo? What where they willing to achieve by throwing a massive trumpet concerto at dirigibles? Pics will help a lot understanding what the techs are about for sure. Can't wait to see this progressing!

 

[KingArthur]

A tentative era 2 tech tree. As I've said previously it's a bit conventional so far but I still have 2 more eras to fill.

Any ideas what to put in Occultism at this stage? I had an idea to put a 'sleeper' improvement in there that would be a prerequisite for wonders and improvements in later eras.

 

[Plotinus]

Occultism could bring the Wonder Ordo Templi Orientis; or the Golden Dawn, perhaps, though maybe these should come later (with the Thelema tech!). Theosophy might go in there somewhere too, and it'd be fun to have some Lovecraftian stuff (the Necronomicon!) although I don't know so much about that.

 

[Blue Monkey]

Occultism could bring the Wonder Ordo Templi Orientis; or the Golden Dawn, perhaps, though maybe these should come later (with the Thelema tech!). Theosophy might go in there somewhere too, and it'd be fun to have some Lovecraftian stuff (the Necronomicon!) although I don't know so much about that.

I can't really comment on the specifics of the tech tree. I have a whole "Things Man Was Not Meant To Know" category of tech icons I'm working on - Thelemic, Spiritualist, Fortean, Mu, Lovecraftian, Hollow Earth, Lost Worlds/Civilizations, etc.

 

[KingArthur]

Progress so far. I have refined era 1 and it's pretty much how I want it now.

Era 2 has been hammered out but has a few empty techs (so if you have any ideas to fill them in let me know).

Era 3 is a bit skeletal. I think this is as far as I will go as a fourth era would be pushing it a bit. I need help with era 3 though to come up with some more techs. Primarily this era is all about the Moon Race so if you can come up with some nice alternatives for the spaceship parts please post them:
SS Thrusters
SS Engine
SS Cockpit
SS Docking Bay
SS Fuel Cells,
SS Life Support System
SS Stasis Chamber,
SS Storage/Supply,
SS Exterior Casing
SS Planetary Party Lounge

 

[Blue Monkey]

To flesh out the tech tree try first laying out the units, improvements & wonders large & small you want, in roughly the order you want them to appear. That may suggest, after a little rumination, the techs that are needed.


Edit: I'll give you two examples from your own tree:

Automata are self-directed mechanical creatures. Historically they began to be developed in Europe at least as early as the Enlightenment. clearly an automata unit needs technologies related to clock work & logic, so Analytical Engine makes sense as a precursor.

A Lunar Voyage requires some means of propulsion adequate to the task, and a way for the voyagers to survive. So there could a tech intermediate to flight & the Lunar Expedition for the propulsion system. And perhaps a line developing from the Submarine tech would make sense since Victorian space suits would probably be based on diving apparatus.

 

[KingArthur]

I like your explanation for subs being a prereq for Lunar Expeditions and I will now move automata to era 2 since it fits in there better. Era 3 is a bit light.

 

[Blue Monkey]

I've posted my SteamPunk Tech Pack #1. Hopefully some will be of use to you. I've got several more sets in the works, although arrival dates are unpredictable.

 

[KingArthur]

Updated tech trees now on posts 2 and 3.

 

[cubsfan6506]

Progress so far. I have refined era 1 and it's pretty much how I want it now.

Era 2 has been hammered out but has a few empty techs (so if you have any ideas to fill them in let me know).

Era 3 is a bit skeletal. I think this is as far as I will go as a fourth era would be pushing it a bit. I need help with era 3 though to come up with some more techs. Primarily this era is all about the Moon Race so if you can come up with some nice alternatives for the spaceship parts please post them:
SS Thrusters
SS Engine
SS Cockpit
SS Docking Bay
SS Fuel Cells,
SS Life Support System
SS Stasis Chamber,
SS Storage/Supply,
SS Exterior Casing
SS Planetary Party Lounge

I suggest instead of a space ship you do a space cannon. I remember reading that they were one of the first imagined ways to get into outer space. Here is a pic
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:FETMlaunch.jpg
Wouldn't go right into the picture.

 

[Blue Monkey]

As a matter of fact one of the tech icons I'm working on is for "Ballistic Flight" featuring a super cannon & Melies' moon.

 

[KingArthur]

A space cannon is an excellent idea.

I was thinking of gravity shields where you shield an object from the force of gravity but I think a cannon is more fun.

 

[Plotinus]

Yes, Jules Verne-style space exploration - I agree it's more fun than the Wells-style "Cavorite".

 

[KingArthur]

I also think I'll change some other spaceship part names to impart some flavour. How about SS Engine Room, SS Galley, SS Cabins, SS Bridge?