Supply Cache Idea... [Archive]

natehale1971

10-25-2010, 12:37 PM

I've been looking at the thread about using cargo containers as the basis of supply caches, and it gave me an idea for the supply caches for teams. I've always seen supply caches as a way for teams to set up refugee camps or provide health can comfort of survivors, not just to reequip the team after they've run out of ammo... Now what i'm proposing does not have to be EVERY supply cache, but at least one or two of the six that the team has assigned to them... this would allow the average recon team to set up a small refugee camp (or bolster the food and medical supplies of a small settlement) that can help up to 300 families.

My idea is that the supply cache is a set up that looks like an eight-pointed star, established around a central shaft that can be used to get supplies out of the cache (namely via a set of block and tackle that would be part of the materials and supplies in the central shaft, along with the stuff for ramps that can be used to get the vehicles being stored at the cache out). Each spoke would be dedicated to a different aspect of supplies being stored... thus allowing a team the ability to know where something is (i always had the first thing that the team found when they accessed a supply cache was an inventory so they would know if what they are needing was in the cache or not). And it would allow the cache to be used as a storage area after it's been cleaned out (something that would be ideal if you are setting up the refugee camp right there at the cache if capable).

Heavy vehicles would all be at depots, boltholes, emergency shelters or the like.

Spoke 1 (Food, Personal Demand & Sundry Items): This spoke contains enough food to feed 3000 people for three to six months (depending on rationing), along with enough HCP 1 & 2 to provide for all health and comfort needs of 3000 people for six months.
Spoke 2 (Humanitarian & Housing Supplies): This spoke contains enough supplies to allow the team set up a long term refugee tent city for up to 300 families. Also includes a portable water treatment unit trailer, thermal conversion waste treatment unit, a small power grid & power plant, and the materials to assemble a water storage tank. Also includes the tools and equipment for at least a 100 workers to build the necessary infrastructure for the refugee camp. In addition there are support tents & materials to build secure structures (such as a clinic or infirmary). The spoke also contains all of the materials & equipment that is to be used to setup a school, which will be capable of providing for the educational needs of children from ages 3 to 14.
Spoke 3 (Weapons & Ammunition): This spoke contains enough weapons, ammunition, and reloading equipment that can be used to outfit a small armed security force of 48 to assist in protection of Morrow Project assets or habitations as needed with small caliber weapons. But the majority of the contents of the cache spoke contain the weapons and ammunition to completely resupply the team.
Spoke 4 (Vehicles, Electronics & Maintenance bay): This spoke contains one or two replacement team vehicles, and a couple alternative vehicles. There is a variety of repair and replacement spare parts and equipment that are available for vehicles, team equipment and gear.
Spoke 5 (Emergency Equipment & Vehicles): This spoke contains all of the equipment needed by fire-fighters, law enforcement and emergency medical personnel to deal with mass fatalities and search & rescue operations.
Spoke 6 (Medical Equipment): This spoke contains a wide variety of medical equipment, supplies, drugs and other necessary goods for treating the medical needs of a refugee camp.
Spoke 7 (Construction Materials & Equipment): This spoke contains all of the construction equipment and materials needed to build a long-term refugee camp. The spoke also contains solar power panels, batteries and equipment necessary to set up a power plant to provide renewable energy for the refugee camp.
Spoke 8 (Horticulture and Agricultural Supplies): This spoke contains several support vehicles (John Deer tractors and electric all-terrain carts), seeds for a wide-variety of staple crops, and all of the farming equipment that can be used to establish a farm that will allow the refugee camp to become self-sufficient within a period of three to six months. The spoke also contains all of the materials needed to build a series of greenhouses to allow for crops to be grown year around.

mikeo80

10-26-2010, 06:35 AM

I agree with your thinking.

IMHO, this is what the region supply bases were supposed to be, one stop shopping as it were to help the locals rebuild. As I read Starnaman, the supply base can be easily modified to provide the items you postulate in your message.

Your idea makes more sense, though. Having a supply system that is departmentalized and distrubuted allows for greater survivability during the Big Bang. Also, your team can activated what is needed now as opposed to opening the whole can of worms as presented in Starnaman scenario.

Just my two cents worth.

Mike

LBraden

10-26-2010, 07:38 AM

Hmm, I think that it maybe less than that idea Nate, more like a one in 10 teams have this as one of their scribed 6 boltholes (no idea exactly how many teams though)

However, mixing my idea of a "Regional Command Centre" and this, I came up with two options, obviously one needs to be bigger than other, but here goes

http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y150/leebraden/Works%20in%20Progress/Image7.png
Obviously these are NOT scaled to anything, but give you an idea what popped into my head thinking about it.

natehale1971

10-26-2010, 12:45 PM

the second one, that's what i was thinking.... the central shaft would be a stop-sign shape, with the ability to be used to store materials as well...

Each cache would easily be a 'refugee camp in a box'... and regional supply bases like starnam would be there for keeping all of these camps supplied. :)

LBraden

10-26-2010, 02:18 PM

natehale1971

10-26-2010, 02:35 PM

I was using something close to the "stop sign" one for my "Regional Command Base" for places they could not make a copy of the NORAD style base, essentially it is a massive supply and command centre, reducing the whole "hub and spoke" system that Base Prime did.

But yeah, I will attempt to do up some drawings of it, no idea how big to make it though.

Each spoke would be a reinforced cargo container box type (10ft x 20ft x 40ft. i think) set inside a concrete block to protect it from the elements like described for to other cargo container cache threads. the shaft would have the equipment for setting up the means of getting the supplies, equipment, gear and small vehicles (john deere tractors and m-gators and other light vehicles) out of the cache.

what program are you using? i've been trying to figure out how to do something like that so i can do the new Damocles base maps...

LBraden

10-26-2010, 04:54 PM

Believe it or not mate, Microsoft Paint.

Okay, that should be enough time for your jaw to have been reset.
Yeah, if you send any hand drawn and that I can work on it, kinda hit creative block with over the top stuff and vehicles, but I maybe able to knock out a few buildings and that.

natehale1971

10-26-2010, 05:03 PM

dragoon500ly

10-27-2010, 01:37 PM

natehale1971

10-27-2010, 03:38 PM

hmmm, standard shipping container holds about 40,000kg maximum gross load, but can be easily "sized" out depending on what is stored.

Just a thought but major bulk items, gravel for fill, concrete blocks, etc, might be stored in pits, next to your containers, the stuff that is too bulky and will not rot.

That sounds like a good idea... having them stored in lined pits would be a really good idea, especially since once the pits are emptied, they could be used as water storage, or even septic tanks.

dragoon500ly

10-27-2010, 04:18 PM

natehale1971

10-27-2010, 04:23 PM

[QUOTE]Spoke 1 (Food, Personal Demand & Sundry Items): This spoke contains enough food to feed 3000 people for three to six months (depending on rationing), along with enough HCP 1 & 2 to provide for all health and comfort needs of 3000 people for six months. [QUOTE]

Started to crunch a few numbers and came across a couple of items...Spoke 1 is supposed to provide enough food to support 3,000 people for 3-6 months. Assuming that you provide MREs/HDR style food, that's 1.5kg per person, per day...soooo (evil grin), the daily requirements would by 4,500kg, for 90 days of supply, that's 405,000kg, just in MRE/HDRs, 180 days supply moves up to 810,000kg or 20 standard cargo containers! Assuming that you provide bulk foodstuffs, the requirements get worse, that's 2kg per person per day (6,000kg) with a 180 day supply running or 1,080,000kg; that's 27 standard cargo containers....

Staying with just 8 standard cargo containers, as broken down in your first post, one container (MRE/HDR)would hold 26,667 person-days or a food supply for 148 people for 180 days. Moving to bulk food leaves up with 20,000 person-days or a supply for 111 people for 180 days. You will notice that this is based on max capacity of the container with just food.

Now this is not meant as a flame!!!! I think that you have an intresting solution that is simply not covered in the canon material. Just how can you help the local population when a standard supply cache is a 4'x4' concrete cube, that also has to hold team resupply? It ain't going to happen!

:D

True... i was thinking of the food being t-rations and the like instead of MREs/HDRs. but if we can't hold that much in a single spoke, might have to have a series of 'stars' for the supply cache. it's alot to think about, and thanks for the math. I'll be thinking about this and figure something out (or hopefully someone can help as well).

From Paul's site describing them...

T-Rations: In bivouac, the normal ration is A/C/A, or hot breakfast, MRE lunch, and hot dinner. This requires the mess section to cook twice daily, and keeping food fresh and restocked presents logistical problems. The T-Ration is a pre-prepared meal kit consisting of sealed metal trays of entrees and side dishes such as meat, scrambled eggs, lasagna, etc., and items like canned fruit and vegetables, designed to feed multiple (18) soldiers per tray. They are heated by boiling the trays in water for a specific time. This system lessens mess personnel staffing requirements and eases preparation. There are 7 breakfast and 14 lunch/dinner menus. A module also contains various instant beverages, nondairy creamers, hot sauce, jelly, Styrofoam cups, cardboard plates, and utensils. The T-Rations are normally supplemented with irradiated, individually wrapped bread slices, UHT Milk (both provided with the modules), and locally procured salad (which became harder to get as the war wore on). Required intake is 2kg per day. The T-Rations are designed to last a minimum of 3 years under poor conditions, and if kept carefully, can last much longer. A can opener is required to open the tins. Weight: (single module) 42 kg, (pallet of 24 modules) 1010 kg; Price: (single module) $215, (pallet) $4125 (S/R)

natehale1971

10-27-2010, 06:00 PM

This has given me alot of though... the cargo containers could be two deep instead of one deep, allowing them to hold more materials. With the secured pits holding gravel & concrete blocks that can be used later for water storage or septic tanks after they've been emptied of there contents... would sand also be able to be kept like this over long term? in a completely sealed pit container? or could the groundwater end up turning that sand into rock?

dragoon500ly

10-27-2010, 09:55 PM

We maybe making this harder than it needs to be. Your original idea is excellent, it's the scale of the thing.

For a Team, one or even two of these 8 spoke sites is an excellent starting point for assisting survivors. These would be placed near prime locations with good water, usable lumber, decent farmland, etc. If the team is going to be operating in areas where a large refugee population would reasonably be expected to pass through, then stacking 3-6 spokes/levels would be a viable solution.

I can even see these sites being positioned in easy to find locations, minus any obvious Morrow Project equipment and perhaps listed as Civil Defense stockpiles. The team would have as part of their mission, the job of checking the nearest "stockpile" and see if any community has been set up.

In my own games, I have the teams equipped with a variety of footlocker-sized chests that hold antennes, radio repeator gear, ni-cad batteries and a solar collector to recharge the batteries. Great way of helping a team expand its radio capabilities...there is also another reason, if one of these sites goes off line, it's a good indicator that locals may be capable of understanding and using this technology....

dragoon500ly

10-27-2010, 09:59 PM

From Paul's site describing them...

That's were I pulled the base numbers for daily capacity. Know and love Paul's web site, it's one of the best support sites out there!!!

Kudo's Paul!!!

Matt W

10-28-2010, 11:24 AM

natehale1971

10-28-2010, 12:43 PM

An excellent idea, but I think you missed a few items. They may seem banal, but they might be very useful

Books: A small library (and not just instruction manuals).
Paper/Printers: If you're running a camp you need paper: records, journals, notes, maybe even a newspaper
School supplies: The UNICEF "school-in-a-box" is pretty good
Entertainment: something to help morale

Thank you!

I thought i had put the school-in-a-box listed in the supplies...

On the entertainment front... at least one of those big screen projection TVs with a large DVD collection to create a movie theater (or even the materials to set up a network of TVs so that they can have several different shows for better morale).

Also have one of those small range 'home broadcast' radio stations that has a range of under a mile that could provide music and 'news reports' for the camp.

also there would be a set of computers (such as Panasonic toughbooks) that would be used for the administration and medical clinic using programs that were developed for the VA to keep track of medical records... the supplies for the clinic facility would also have x-ray machines, and the like. The long-term storage for drugs would definitely be on the priority list, along with means for creating the more easily to make drugs that can be done with a 'low-tech' environment.

The printing press and paper is a good idea, as well as the materials for recycling that paper for later use, and since this is the morrow project with a few of the really kewl gadgets they have for turning poo into fertilizer so easily, they can have a gadget that takes used paper and turns it into new paper for use. Especially if it can make toilet paper, one of the greatest sanitation inventions. it's either that or washrags that get used and washed after each use...

Thus the thought of putting the cache two or three containers deep, thus holding all the supplies needed for the camp. Having the cargo containers as the largest they produce is going to be necessary.

I was just thinking... Once the Cache has been emptied, it would be perfect for cold storage. Be it for food storage, emergency shelter during combat (or during forest fires)

There use to be a website that showed using Cargo Containers as the framework for an underground bunker.. it had blueprints for them as well... even had one called "fortress" or "Castle" or some such... had four containers set on their ends at the corners, with containers set normally inside that... the four containers on their ends were the stairwells... i just wish i could find that website. it'd make this so much easier!

natehale1971

10-28-2010, 12:48 PM

45′ high-cube container stats (found on Wikipedia)
Length: 45′ 0″
Width: 8′ 0″
Height: 9′ 6″
Volume: 3040′
Max. Gross Mass: 66,139lbs.
Empty Weight: 10,580lbs.
Net Load: 55,559lbs.

The United States Department of Defense produced specifications for standard containers for military use of 8-foot (2.44 m) by 8-foot (2.44 m) square cross section in units of 10-foot (3.05 m) long in the 1950s.[citation needed] The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) issued standards based upon the US Department of Defense standards between 1968 and 1970, ensuring interchangeability between different modes of transportation worldwide.[citation needed] and they subsequently also became known as ISO containers for this reason.

The modern intermodal container was pioneered by Malcolm McLean. A global system of intermodal freight transport has developed around these standard containers and new container sizes have been developed to suit different purposes. Since November 2007 48 ft (14.63 m) and 53 ft (16.15 m) containers are used also for international ocean shipments. As of April 2008[update] the only marine company who offer such containers is APL. However, APL containers have slightly different sizes and weights than standard 48 ft (14.63 m) and 53 ft (16.15 m) containers (that are used in the US by rail and truck services).

These 53ft containers might also be possible...

mikeo80

10-28-2010, 02:04 PM

[QUOTE]Spoke 1 (Food, Personal Demand & Sundry Items): This spoke contains enough food to feed 3000 people for three to six months (depending on rationing), along with enough HCP 1 & 2 to provide for all health and comfort needs of 3000 people for six months. [QUOTE]

Started to crunch a few numbers and came across a couple of items...Spoke 1 is supposed to provide enough food to support 3,000 people for 3-6 months. Assuming that you provide MREs/HDR style food, that's 1.5kg per person, per day...soooo (evil grin), the daily requirements would by 4,500kg, for 90 days of supply, that's 405,000kg, just in MRE/HDRs, 180 days supply moves up to 810,000kg or 20 standard cargo containers! Assuming that you provide bulk foodstuffs, the requirements get worse, that's 2kg per person per day (6,000kg) with a 180 day supply running or 1,080,000kg; that's 27 standard cargo containers....

Staying with just 8 standard cargo containers, as broken down in your first post, one container (MRE/HDR)would hold 26,667 person-days or a food supply for 148 people for 180 days. Moving to bulk food leaves up with 20,000 person-days or a supply for 111 people for 180 days. You will notice that this is based on max capacity of the container with just food.

Now this is not meant as a flame!!!! I think that you have an intresting solution that is simply not covered in the canon material. Just how can you help the local population when a standard supply cache is a 4'x4' concrete cube, that also has to hold team resupply? It ain't going to happen!

:D

I was in a game a couple of years ago. Based out of rural Kansas as part of a Recon Team. We (two of us) were looking over a very small town (22Survivors). We were about 7 days light travel from our base camp. We stumbled upon a few of the survivors and started to help with food, water, med kits, etc.

Then it dawned on us...we and these people were screwed. My buddy and I each had 7 days of rations in our back pack. We had one ration pack, good for four people for 15 days...

So here comes the math.

In personal rations/mre's/whatever, we started with 84 meals. ((3x14)x2)

We used 42 in our travels to here. ((3x7)x2) (Yes, the GM made us track consumables. PITA but worth the detail once we got ourselves into this mess.)

In the ration pack, we had 180 meals. ((3x15)x4)

Total of 222 meals

So, to feed these people until we could get back to base, and then return.

We needed 924 meals. Just for them. ((22x3)x14)

Even if we rationed to one meal a day. (Better than eating the rats and other little things they HAD been eating.) we needed 308 meals (22x14)

Oh, BTW, you might notice WE are not eating !!!

The TL had a strong sense of duty and honor. He opened a nearby cache, dumped everthing into his V-150, and drove like hell.

He got there in 5 1/2 days.

So we used ((24x1)x6) or 144 meals.

We made it. But no one was happy. But we did save those 22 people.

But the math sucks.

natehale1971

10-28-2010, 02:46 PM

I was in a game a couple of years ago. Based out of rural Kansas as part of a Recon Team. We (two of us) were looking over a very small town (22Survivors). We were about 7 days light travel from our base camp. We stumbled upon a few of the survivors and started to help with food, water, med kits, etc.

Then it dawned on us...we and these people were screwed. My buddy and I each had 7 days of rations in our back pack. We had one ration pack, good for four people for 15 days...

So here comes the math.

In personal rations/mre's/whatever, we started with 84 meals. ((3x14)x2)

We used 42 in our travels to here. ((3x7)x2) (Yes, the GM made us track consumables. PITA but worth the detail once we got ourselves into this mess.)

In the ration pack, we had 180 meals. ((3x15)x4)

Total of 222 meals

So, to feed these people until we could get back to base, and then return.

We needed 924 meals. Just for them. ((22x3)x14)

Even if we rationed to one meal a day. (Better than eating the rats and other little things they HAD been eating.) we needed 308 meals (22x14)

Oh, BTW, you might notice WE are not eating !!!

The TL had a strong sense of duty and honor. He opened a nearby cache, dumped everthing into his V-150, and drove like hell.

He got there in 5 1/2 days.

So we used ((24x1)x6) or 144 meals.

We made it. But no one was happy. But we did save those 22 people.

But the math sucks.

No kidding... that's why I've been trying to figure out how best to set up these Caches that are a lot more realistic and capable of setting up a way to save as many lives as possible.

I like the idea of having the Caches set up in an area that has already been 'pre-seeded' for building a camp... Especially with the addition of the protective pits holding gravel, sand and concrete blocks that can be used for water storage and septic tanks when they have been emptied.

And making the "Star of Life" shaped supply cache with two to four containers deep... thus able to hold all of the materials needed for such an undertaking.

Morrow Project Facilities are going to be massive to hold all the supplies needed for post-TEOTWAWKI reconstruction planning. They'd need all that just to do the task... Yes the personnel are suppose to be there to act as advisors and using the 'skilled' and 'unskilled' labor pool drawn from survivors.

But it still comes down to the fact, you need the materials to rebuild with. Or the means of making those materials.

dragoon500ly

10-28-2010, 04:41 PM

Let's look at the food situation this way. This is out of the T2K v2.2 rule book, but its a good starting point.

A person needs to eat a total of 3kg of food every day to remain healthy. This is raw foodstuff.

If you are going to use canned or packaged foods, then the requirement drops to 2kg a day.

If you use specially fortified, prepackaged foods, such as MREs, than the requirements drop to 1.5kg.

So for planning purposes, we are faced with a couple of major variables:

1) What time of year that we are setting up this camp; i.e. how long a period can reasonable be expected before crops can be planted? Allowing for emergencies, we would basically be looking at 12 months.

2) How large a population can the area support? This is going to be A MAJOR FUDGE FACTOR!!! For a Recon Team, I would plan for about 300 people. So, planning on using commercial foodstuff, that's 300 people X2kg X365 days= 219,000kg of food. Based on a standard commercial cargo container, that's 6 containers (240,000kg, a little fudge for packing material) required.

Moving on to support, for planning purposes, a typical GI would have about 10kg of supplies, this would cover everything from toilet paper to handcuffs to condoms, reloading equipment, band-aids, mouthwash, etc.etc...so our 300 people for one year would require 1,095,000kg or 28 cargo containers.

So for plaining purposes, our little supply dump would consist of 34 shipping containers with a maximum capacity of 1,360,000kg.

Plugging in some other numbers, lets assume that the Project is going to cover the US and Canada. Over the years the, a total of 40,000 people have been recruited and frozen. Average team size is 10 people, so we have 4,000 teams, scattered across North America. According to canon, a team is supposed to have 6 caches, and since a cache is a 4'x4' cube, we'll say that two containers will fill all of the caches. We'll also assume that each team has an average of 1.5 of the larger dumps.

That works out at 8,000 cargo containers to fille the caches; and 204,000 cargo containers for the supply dumps. This is the largest weak point, because 212,000 containers is a lot of stuff to move around and ship, from a security stand point alone, this would blow any equipment upgrade. And the chance of somebody digging a new swimming pool...and incovering a stash.

But this is the weakest part of the whole idea behind the Project; you have to recruit people, but sooner or later, you are going to have to explain the large number of fatal accidents that your employees seem to be suffering from. Which argues for a smaller Project. Since the stated ideal of the Project is to help rebuild, you have to have the personnel, or a force multiplier provided by superior equipment/logistics, which brings us right back to just how much can be hidden before somebody starts asking questions?

You know, PDing this game can lead to grey hairs and accelerate your drinking problems!

natehale1971

10-28-2010, 07:26 PM

The thing of this is... you have decades to recruit for your project. starting in 1963 and going all the way up to 2012... this allows you to do your recuiting, and to find a lot of ways to 'disappear' the volunteers without anyone finding out about it.

my ideas for the six supply caches and depots that each team would have... this might need some hand-waving being done to cover everything... but that's easy as long as you make things look like they fit.

kato13

10-29-2010, 01:03 PM

My latest thought for supply caches would build off my plan to have the Project own a corporation like UPS. You standardize a shipping module which fits inside a Box truck and they deliver one module to a remote farmhouse daily for a year. The modules are auto loaded into an underground facility and then the cache is sealed.

I am still working on the logistics of digging the hole (perhaps using the trucks to remove the dirt as well), The spoke solution works here as i can see the following schedule.

a) Dig spoke one.

b) Fill recently dug spoke - Dig next spoke - Use truck to remove dirt
Repeat ("b"x7)

c) Fill Spoke 8 - Use Truck to remove digging equipment.

d) seal the cache

I like the volumes of material you can place without raising too much suspicion. I mean who thinks twice about a UPS truck making a delivery (even daily).

I am also probably starting work again on my equipment weight/volume database so I might be reaching out for ideas as to what you might want place in containers or kits.

natehale1971

10-29-2010, 02:17 PM

When Chris get's me to do the Project sourcebook like he said he wanted to do... I want to get as many people's ideas as possible to work together to make a Project that would be as believable as possible...

I mean... i'm sorry. If i had been the commander of Prime Base, i would have set things up to do a general wake-up call for all of the project ten years after TEOTWAWKI, instead of the crazy idea of waking up just a team here and there hoping to wake up a regional command team to get the project started...

also having the project doing it's recruitment starting in 1963 (and tossing in some ideas for time travel by Morrow) allows for the project to get the high-tech, and resources needed for such a major undertaking squirreled away.

dragoon500ly

10-29-2010, 04:12 PM

If I remember Prime Base correctly, the initial plan was to wake up the rest of the Project about 10 years after the attack on Prime. Since the programmers of the wake-up program were a bet rushed (an epidemic tends to have that effect on people) they didn't have time to test all of the code, that's why we have the teams waking up at random intervals.

Always had an issue with Prime Base, THE command base for the Project, being tasked with the mission of testing responses with the survivors...sort of like the Pentagon setting up operations in Afghanistan to test counter- AL Queida operations (have to admit, seeing some of the Potomac Commandos having to risk thier well-polished rears in combat would bring a smile to my face!).

dragoon500ly

10-29-2010, 04:28 PM

In my MP games, I have the Project start up in 1952, with the first times frozen around 1963. My thoughts are that the 10-year difference was used to develop the scentific theory and get prototypes built and tested. Not mention come up with ideas for the cache/supply base systems.

It also places the initial start up date, right in the middle of the Cold War build-a-bomb-shelter-everywhere craze. Another great trick to camouflage the digging/building!

As far as the recruiting, I've always felt that the Project would recruit roughly 250 people a year, then as the team members were being frozen, a rash of accidents of various types claiming their lives to cover thier disapperance. Morrow Industries would almost have to have connections with insurance companies, not to mention having fingers into various Fed, State, County, and City law enforcement...and they just might have some of their people serving as medical examiners...after all, if the ME rules that the cause of death is natural, or consist with injuries sustained in an industrial accident, kind of shorts the ability of the cops to investigate, right?

The problem, especially if the PD allows the game to have a later start date for TEOTWAWKI...our information-based life-style. All it would take is some hacker, some where to start pulling deaths of employees belonging to Morrow Industries subsidaries, and then turning the information to some journalist hack with a personal agenda....

Talk about a major shuffle of companies, closing companies due to law suits, creating new companies, shuffling MEs so the same name/face doesn't show on too many death certificates...

Yup, I think you can safely say that Bruce Morrow and the Council of Tomorrow had to have some truely devious minds....

natehale1971

10-29-2010, 07:45 PM

mikeo80

10-31-2010, 03:02 PM

I have been involved with some other groups that are trying to design a coherent timeline.

One thought we had was that there were actually TWO projects running concurrently.

One was the Council for Tomorrow. Their task was planning for the worst and to take the info that BEM came back with and try and influence the present to PREVENT TEOTWAWKI.

The other being Morrow Project. This was supposed to be the "ace in the hole" IF C.F.T. failed.

Then, of course, the minions of Krell had to interfere. In one blab session, We came up with the idea that Krell and/or his operative was the one to feed the false attack tape into NORAD. With the background of the TV show Jericho, this started to make some sense. Try to destroy the USSR while, hopefully, only damaging the USA....well that worked well...:p

Then we followed that logic a little farther. IF Krell truly wanted to take over, then he HAD to take out TMP. Hense the attack on Prime as soon has he had a bead on just where Prime was located. Krell knew there had to be a C3I for TMP. He did? or did not? know that C3I was SO centrally located at Prime.

This then leads to the problem with the faulty program at Prime. Yes I understand that these people were dying as they tried to write "The Omega Program."

We have postulated several fixes to this problem.

1) Prime Alternate. Fully cryo-sleep staff, set to wake 5 years after seismic impacts of WWIII. Or a signal sent by Prime that the war was over. Remember Prime DID survive the war!
2) Regional Command Centers. Mentioned in TM 1-1. Iv'e never seen any scenario with these involved. Again, I can see a timed wake up based on some time factor from Prime, or seismic readings, or both.
3) More Information for commanders in the field. This goes along the line of what do we do IF Prime fails,blows up, whatever AND the regional command centers do not go online. Then SOMEONE has to have the keys to the kingdom.
4) A tie in with the Snake Eaters? This was sort of far fetched, but we postulated that IF the US DOD knew about Morrow, then Morrow knew about Snake Eaters. Any time I have been in a game with GB's, the GB's are there to help. In fact the GB's are better able to help on a local, day to day basis than TMP.

Another two cents from yours truly.

Mike

LBraden

10-31-2010, 03:38 PM

mikeo80

10-31-2010, 04:23 PM

Your #4 there got me thinking a little -- what IF the Snake Eaters were actually run as part of Morrow so that if elements of the US Army did decide to go "Military Dictatorship" over people and MARS could not remove them, a bunch of GB's could gladly have a "polite word" with them.

And to be honest, I did not know that an Official book mentioned Regional Command Centres for TMP, it was something I just came up.

It is in TM 1-1.

Also, there is a reference in Damocles, that there is a base on Royal Isle. That base is never truly defined. BUT it makes sense that it is SOME kind of Command Center. This could be the source of the Science team that is brought to Damocles. (Mentioned in another book. Not sure exactly which one right this moment. But it is the scenario with the nuke that came down and did NOT go off.)

Also, the supply center mentioned in Starnaman could have information on a regional command center. Starnaman is a regional supply base, so, by inference, there should be a regional command center.

There is another mention in book 7, the power plant in Nevada. The commander of the power plant knows where Prime is. So I would think that could be another possible command center. This commander knows the recall codes for the other teams in the region of the power plant. He does not use the codes due to lack of water at the moment.

Hope this helps.

Mike

dragoon500ly

10-31-2010, 07:01 PM

While it is true that the canon material does not mention regional command bases. From a logical, organizational stand point there has to be some kind of intermediate level in between the field teams and Prime Base. After all, not every problem requires the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs or the CEO to make the decision (LOL)!

This is my own view of how the Project is organized, your views may differ!!!

There is both a Prime Base and an alternate Prime Base that is frozen. Going with the amount of surveillance that the USSR/USA pulled on each other, any major dig had the chance of being observed and maybe pulling a ICBM or two. So Prime Base was dug in the Nevada high desert and Prime Alternate was located in a closed down "salt" mine. This was done to test both proposed methods. I have always felt that CoT would have some sort of pipeline into the intelligence agencies, so there would be some way to check on if the Russians had any knowledge of "something going on".

My Project covers Canada, the US and the northern states of Mexico. There are ten Regional Command Bases sited to support operations. Each RCB has 75-125 personnel. These are NOT field teams, these are the C3I, technicans, and research personnel. Any equipment they have is for their own use. They have access to the wake-up codes and locations of all teams, caches and supply bases in their area of responsbility only.

In addition to the RCBs, each region may have several Combined Teams, these are groupings of 2-12 different teams, charged with a specific mission: safeguarding and reactivating a nuclear power plant; securing a data storage site etc.etc.etc..

StainlessSteelCynic

10-31-2010, 11:03 PM

Just a few thoughts to throw into the mix here (keep in mind I haven't read any of the MP books for a few years so my numbers might be out)...

There is one factor often overlooked in RPGs when it comes to rescuing people, the total number the rescuers can actually look after. So for example, a particular MP team may have the resources to rescue 300 people but it's often likely that 600 or 1000 are going to turn up looking for help.
Then again, they may have the resources for 300 and find that in their area only 80 people survive.

Considering that the Project was meant to awaken its teams 2-5 years or so after the wars end but they ended up sleeping for around 150-200 years I tend to think that they would have planned for maximum numbers of survivors and not minimum numbers. I do seem to recall that part of their mission was to get further supplies from the local region so they weren't going to carry "everything" in their supply caches.
I mention this more so for the RP side of things, it makes life more "interesting" for the Players but it is a part of game design that appears to have been given little thought.

My other thought is about technology. Given enough money and personnel, an R&D facility can cut quite a bit of time from research & development. To give an example, the Soviet Union poured a massive amount of money into theoretical physics after WW2 to the point were they exceeded the Western World in this field and they did it in the space of about 30 years if I remember correctly. Given the drive or resources, technology/equipment can be advanced beyond the standards expected in a society.

What this means is that if MP could purchase/set up various R&D facilities (and businesses to provide funding and so on), they could actually get superior technology than the current level in society. Keep in mind that the concepts for automatic weapons were developed in the late 1800s and a working assault rifle was made in 1911 (Fedorov Avtomat), a little less than 30 years later and the Germans (stimulated by wartime necessity) applied mass manufacturing concepts to the assault rifle idea and replaced the wooden stock with sheet metal stampings.

I've never been too thrilled with the time travel aspect of TMP so I'd happily substitute fuel cell tech (fuel cell concepts were understood as early as 1839 with the first practical fuel cell being made in 1889) for the fusion packs and so on. While fuel cell tech should allow 3-4 times the mileage of a tank of fuel that internal combustion motors provide, it still means stopping to get fuel... so the rules for T2k's distilling can be used if you desire!
Alternately, cold fusion could be allowed for the game, in theory it's supposed to work and I'd rather suspend my disbelief for that (i.e. pretending that superior R&D got it to work) than have the contradiction of Bruce Morrow going into the future and bringing back the fusion technology (and thereby 'inventing' it). The concepts for fusion were understood early enough, hence the atomic bomb.

In terms of funding/driving the tech, I can easily see the US government contracting to a Morrow Industries company to develop a particular concept, it's happened often enough in the real world. This means that the US Govt and Morrow would be working together with perhaps BEM himself having the better idea of why it was really being developed

helbent4

11-03-2010, 12:09 AM

Considering that the Project was meant to awaken its teams 2-5 years or so after the wars end but they ended up sleeping for around 150-200 years I tend to think that they would have planned for maximum numbers of survivors and not minimum numbers. I do seem to recall that part of their mission was to get further supplies from the local region so they weren't going to carry "everything" in their supply caches.

I mention this more so for the RP side of things, it makes life more "interesting" for the Players but it is a part of game design that appears to have been given little thought.

Cynic,

I tend to think along the same lines about "rescue" supplies and the purpose of caches; while elaborate and huge caches are cool, I think they would be the exception to the rule (except for Specialist teams) and not devoted to relief supplies but reconstruction materials.

Regarding the idea of a "refugee camp in a box":

1) The Project's mission was reconstruction. Therefore, planning extensively for relief and rescue efforts is a case of "mission creep". That is, they can make provisions for additional capabilities beyond the core mission but at the almost direct expense of that mission.

2) Given the wakeup window of 3-5 years, it's doubtful anyone will need immediate assistance. If the government is recovered enough it's their responsibility to provide large-scale assistance through FEMA (and similar organisations in Canada, Australia, etc.). There will be NGOs like the American Red Cross already devoted to relief efforts. If there are, they will be far more capable than the Project at administering relief efforts and delivering supplies. On the other hand, if things are really bad then there's little the Project could do in the short term to mitigate these effects.

3) My personal view is the caches are to provide local sustainability for teams that cannot be supplied by the Group and regional logistical systems for whatever reason, not provide bulk supplies (which are stored in the permanent depots, according to TM 1-1). Further, at least for Recon/Recce units, teams are supposed to remain mobile to do their jobs because proportionally there are so few of them. Having teams engage in immediate disaster relief efforts ties them down and they can't engage in reconnaissance. Likewise other teams need to concentrate on their core missions and not get caught up in administering local relief efforts for thousands of people.

This also isn't meant to be a flame, but more asking if adding capability for refugee relief is putting the cart before the horse.

Tony

StainlessSteelCynic

11-03-2010, 12:43 AM

Tony, basically I think the same way as you, I can't see the Project focusing so much effort on rescuing people and setting up huge caches to build refugee camps because I am of the understanding that the Project's mission was to provide a core group of people who remembered skills and knowledge from the pre-apocalypse. That is to say, their job was to check out what had happened and then decide who best to help - and their help consisted of teaching the survivors how to rebuild some semblance of their old society based on all the skills/knowledge they Team has along with whatever supplies they can get from the local area.

It seems redundant for MP to stash massive amounts of supplies to set up refugee camps when there are other organizations as well as the government itself who would already be doing that sort of thing. I see it as a case of MP's aim was to "fill in the gaps", not simply replace the government efforts. Recce teams should be doing exactly that, reconnaissance, science teams should be do the science stuff and so on and so on.

The game really takes off for me when these teams get involved in the rescue side of things knowing full well they do not have the resources to rescue everyone. That's when you start to get some really involved RP sessions because the players have to start coming up with ideas on how to get enough supplies, how to protect them and transport them and then how to stop somebody else taking them away from the people they're trying to help.

To me, TMP is about teams who find themselves out of their depth - they woke up too late, they have too little help, they have too few resources and they have too much to do. For me that's the challenge of the game, if the teams have too many supplies, it becomes too easy for the players.
As Tony said, this isn't a flame so much as a critique.

helbent4

11-03-2010, 01:36 AM

To me, TMP is about teams who find themselves out of their depth - they woke up too late, they have too little help, they have too few resources and they have too much to do. For me that's the challenge of the game, if the teams have too many supplies, it becomes too easy for the players.
As Tony said, this isn't a flame so much as a critique.

Cynic,

As well, I'd like to be clear that I'm not advocating the Project should just be cold-blooded or stand around if people need help! Just that in 3-5 years after the war, it's probably not going to be an issue. Either A) the surviving government/NGOs will be doing what they can or B) the populations that can't feed themselves one way or another will no longer exist.

Likewise, I find the "developmental" challenges of TMP interesting, especially if there is a moral and ethical dimension added by scarce resources, a wildly different situation than expected, and so on. Forging an alliance of communities to defend against an onslaught of Krell/KFS/mutant hordes is classic TMP... but it's been done a few times. ;)

My own Final Watch-based campaign hinged on convincing the Rebels and Reds to get along after 150 years of warfare, introduce democratic governance and abolish slavery in the Puget Sound. As the PCs were part of a Specialty: PSYOPs team their options tended to be based on mobilising public opinion and support in both camps instead of something more violent. (It was clear there was a real chance that violence would spark open war and/or civil war that would kill a good portion of the surviving population.)

Tony

natehale1971

11-06-2010, 09:48 AM

I don't think you're getting the reason for 'refugee camp-in-a-box' that the supply cache concept was about...

The Recon team is suppose to go out and look around and send back reports to higher ups, telling them what they've found. But they will also need to be able to show that they can do SOMETHING for the people they've encountered during their missions.

Having a few luxury goods for trade is nice, but in the long run the people will see the project as nothing but 'good time boys and girls' who are focusing on lofty ideals and passing around the booze.

The idea of these supply caches would be to allow for the Recon Teams to set up a camp that would be used as not only a refugee camp, but also as a fledgling community that would attract the people with the skills needed to rebuild the Republic in the long run.

These camps would also be something of a way to boost morale, as anyone who has ever dealt with the government can tell you. Government recovery efforts SUCK. And notice the capitalized letters in the world "SUCK"... How long did it take to respond to Katerina? Yes that was due to the Local and State level of the chain dragging their feet and screwing around. The neighboring States (and hell cities) around Louisiana and New Orleans bounced back a hell of a lot quicker than New Orleans... Who basically had to rely upon FEMA to put things back together for... And even today we are seeing the waste and screw ups on how those resources were being used.

The Project would know this fact, and be planing for a way to use it to their advantage.

3 to 5 years post-TEOTWAWKI Event, FEMA would still be so totally overwhelmed that they would be so mortarboard that they wouldn't really know were to start to focus their recovery efforts.

By giving Recon Teams the ability to throw up refugee camps that woulds become the Core Communities of the Recovery effort would allow the FEMA resources to be deployed to where they are needed.

IE, the Project would be the Kick-in-the-Pants to get the recovery effort underway.

FEMA has the power to dragoon people as 'Human Resources' and put them anywhere they want. Even if that means breaking up families and putting people with the skills they need into places where they need them.

This alone would cause rebellions popping up all across the FEMA run camps. But a Project camp would do everything they can to keep families together, and thus have better morale and NOT needing heavily armed security to keep the peace (and keep the people in the camps from rebelling due to the fact that Mommy has been shipped to California and Daddy has been shipped to New York City because Mommy is a baby doctor and daddy is an engineer).

if you don't think FEMA has this power, please check it out. It's one of their questionable powers, that people who are Veterans or who work (or have worked) in the DoD are exempt from.

And is the source of the 'Displaced Person' program that has evolved into a form of slavery that created the problem that has risen with the New Confederacy...

The Project is a non-Totalitarian solution to FEMA and it's heavy handed way of dealing with mass emergency conditions.

And by giving Recon Teams the ability to be a hands-on recon of the area, and having the ability to put up a refugee camp WHERE NEEDED RIGHT NOW, is better than them just saying... We can help you sometime in the next three to six months. Even if the camp they can build would comfortably take care of 300 families for a set time, they can support larger numbers in the short-term necessitating them getting resupplied by FEMA or Regional support bases.

natehale1971

11-06-2010, 01:59 PM

(Had my Roommates kidnap me for a little bit....)

Also the Refugee Camp wasn't meant to be operated by the Recon Team.

While the Recon Team sets it up since they are ON SITE and see what is needed, the camp would be operated and administered by specialists deployed form the Combined Operations Group and/or Area Operations Group...

These camps would be able to serve as not only distribution points for relief supplies... but they would also be perfect for organizing the survivors in a way that would let the Project KNOW what kind of skill pool they would have access too.

Another thing that i had forgot for putting in the cache, would be ballot boxes, and other things that would promote voting and electing local representatives.

Yes the Camp would have a Project Administrator, Project Security and Project Medical Staff who would operate as the core that would be dispatched... but they would be assisted by an elected 'Mayor', and elected Chief Constable and of course a local (if available) Chief Medical Examiner.

On the judicial arena.. elections for a Chief Judge, Chief Prosecutor and Chief Advocate would be necessary.

There is a lot of things we might be forgetting that would be needed for reestablishing a fully functioning representative republic with a strong democratic tradition.... To many today think we're a democracy, but the founders were adamant that we're A REPUBLIC, for as long as we can keep it.

And the Project was founded at a time that this was still taught in schools, and the education materials that would be made available for the schools that would be set up, would have the kinds of things that a turn of the last century 8th Grader would have to know to graduate (things that many college graduates today have difficulty knowing).

I'm going to set up a community thread that everyone can post their thoughts on just what is needed to create a self-sufficient society that would be the cornerstone for the government to rebuild the republic upon.

dragoon500ly

11-06-2010, 04:02 PM

There is a lot to be said for both arguements. It's the 5 year mission profile that limits what can be done. So the question to be asked is, just what would be available 5 years after a nuclear exchange? If you want to use the Katrina example, the very things needed to sustain a survivor community ran out the quickest. Things like batteries, flashlights, bottled water, and all the way through to diapers and hand wipes. Now this was within a week of the storm hitting the coast, what would it have been like 5 years later, and in a TEOTWAWKI event?

Would FEMA have been able to haul supplies from one side of the country to the other? And remember, in a nuclear exchange one of the key targets would be communications nodes. So there is nothing beyond short haul railway, the interstate highway system is jammed with wreckage and blast damage at key locations. The various relief agencies would have been completely overwhelmed. Just how much aid could be moved around?

IMO, there is need for every team to have at least one "camp in a box". If only to help set-up or resupply an existing survivor community. I can even see "nests" of the CIAB located in areas that were planned to shelter large numbers of survivors, I can even see the arguement, that some of these CIAB would not be as well concealed as a regular supply cache. The goal is to help the survivors that the team encounters, to at least some degree. And going with the small numbers of personnel, the only other force multiplier would be supplies.

mikeo80

11-06-2010, 07:12 PM

IMO, there is something we have not covered in the discussion. One of the building blocks that TMP was counting on was that there would be survivors with skills. There would be doctors, engineers, steel workers, etc. These people would still have the knowledge base to assist TMP in the rebuilding.

IMO, this is probably what did happen in the first 5 - 10 year after The Bang. These people with knowledge were probably the most important resource a survivor community had. A person who could design and help build a earthen log dam to help contain drinkable water would be a wonderfull asset.

But as time went on, the most important skills were two.

1) We have to grow food to feed our selves.

2) We have to protect that food from those who would steal it.

The technology of farming in the late 20th early 21st century is very crop specific and energy intensive. In the 5+ years after The Bang, someone who can grow beans and corn and maybe some herbs for spices and home grown remedies becomes critical. The blacksmith, the black powder maker become the backbone of whatever self defense force our hypothetical village can muster. Also the person who can help keep whatever farm animals available alive is another important person.

I would think that black powder weapons would start to be produced, at least in some small qualtities very quickly. Yes there are those who would have a stock pile of whatever rifle ammo they prefer. But 5+ years from The Bang, unless you are a SERIOUS survivor, your 30-30 or whatever is now a basically useless club. Even if you have a large re-loading capability, you are going to be running dry on ammo. What you have left is saved "for an emergency." Hense the black powder weapons industries.

I think the another building block for TMP was that WWIII was going to (d)evolve into counter city strikes very quickly. Look at the strike pattern of the Soviet response. I would guess that 150 -200 million DEAD is a fair guess on the day of The Bang. Another 50-60 million probably dead in those first horrible weeks. More die by disease during the five years until Morrow comes out.

I propose that TMP was probably looking at 10 - 20 million survivors spread in very small pockets of survival. If we follow some of the numbers that Nate and others have proposed, we have some where between 20 - 40 thousand TMP. If we take the top end of both numbers, we are looking at one TMP person for every 500 survivors.

If you mesh that with the idea that Morrow is spread VERY thin across the USA, then the ideas of Nate's and others dealing with supplies becomes doable. IMO, TMP was designed to start small, stay small for a LONG time. Keep just enough alive to start the rebuild...some time tomorrow. Today is just to survive. But we keep the engineer, and the chemist and the farmer alive until we are READY to rebuild. These survivors (with Morrow help) will teach their children these skills.

Just another of my two cents. :D

Mike

natehale1971

11-07-2010, 08:40 AM

IMO, there is something we have not covered in the discussion. One of the building blocks that TMP was counting on was that there would be survivors with skills. There would be doctors, engineers, steel workers, etc. These people would still have the knowledge base to assist TMP in the rebuilding.

Actually Mike...

This is one of the biggest reasons why i stated that TMP set up the 'Camp in a Box' as it's being called. These camps would allow TMP to find out WHO the survivors are and find out what skill-sets they possess and how best to use them during the rebuilding.

While FEMA camps would be doing the same thing, FEMA camps would be using (or abusing) their ability to redistribute Human Resources as the government administrators felt best (especially with the fact that FEMA has their own plans for breaking up families as they see fit).

Thus making the Project Camps a lot more preferable when compared to the Government run recovery operation. While TMP was meant to help the government rebuild after a TEOTWAWKI Event... it was going to need to be able to offer something that would allow it to continue operations with the kind of draconian laws that would be in effect with FEMA running the show.

Even the President will end up answering to the 'shadow government' in Mouth Weather... thus my feeling that TMP and Snake-Eaters were protected by pre-TEOTWAWKI Executive Orders, the same thing that gives FEMA all that power. Reagan had rolled the most draconian Executive Orders back, but Clinton had brought them back with a vengeance.

Thus the way the Displaced Person (DP) population in the 'New Confederacy' became Slaves in the same way that Indentured Servants became Slaves in the North American Colonies during the Colonial Period. And what caused the formation of Maxwell's Militia when the National Guard rebelled against the draconian measures that FEMA and Mount Weather were undertaking. And much to the Militia's heartbreak, gave the 'new confederacy' protection to set up a system that was totally against the ideals that the American Republic was founded upon.

Thus the two largest of the United States successor states are the Confederated American States (aka New Confederacy) and the Allied American States (aka Maxwell's Militia)... With the New Presidencies who lay a direct claim to the legacy of the United States by retaining the name of the country and constitution.

Including, ironically enough, the FEMA enclave Shadow Government centered around Mount Weather. Which includes parts of the pre-war states of West Virginia, Virgina and Maryland that is connected to the Potomac River to provide access to the sea.

The FEMA Enclave has many of the characteristics of New Confederacy, Maxwell's Militia and the New Presidencies... and giving messages and 'orders' to the various New Presidencies scattered all across the remains of the country (and most of the New Presidencies just give FEMA and Mount Weather lip service and 'tributes' every year to keep FEMA Overseers from showing up to screw things up).

Kentucky Free State isn't the only major threat to TMP that could also be a good asset in rebuilding the United States. FEMA and Mount Weather would be an excellent asset in Rebuilding the East Coast if paired up with Prime Base... the KFS could easily become the 'Arsenal for Democracy' in providing the industrial base for reconstruction (and the fight against the Warriors of Krell).

natehale1971

11-21-2010, 12:17 AM

Something I've been thinking about... When a volunteer joins the Morrow Project, they would look forward to their retirement after the Project has done it's monumental task. Many of the volunteers would have something in their lives that they would not want to just loose (family heirlooms and the like).

Thus I had always allowed for the PCs to come up with the kinds of personal belongings that would be for their HOMES when the project is over. And all this stuff would be stored in a cache along with building materials so they could build their new homes when everything was done and over with.

The way I've been thinking of setting up the supply caches using the ideas started by Kato has given me a lot of ideas for doing something like this.

My question is this.. would it be better for each team member to be given a cargo container of their own, or have all of the personal belongings put into cargo containers as needed?

One of the reasons i ask this, is for those volunteers who had beloved pets (or family) that they did not wish to be parted from. I had always felt that those who are married with children would have their families placed in Cryo with the agricultural or medical teams where they would work as 'general support' personnel since the Project tried to keep everything in the family.

Another idea would be a secondary bolthole holding loved ones and pets... or even have that secondary bolthole being the location of the cache holding all of their personal belongings and the materials for building homes.

helbent4

11-25-2010, 05:33 AM

Adding the supply and administration of camps, even a "camp in a box", is a significant burden for the Project, which seems to have enough on its plate already. There are other organisations and people better suited to taking care of refugees, why not let them? (Unless I'm somehow missing the point.)

On the other hand, I do see that once specialists and key personnel are identified, they will need to be housed. For the most part, they will already have housing or accommodation of a sort, but if the Project needs to set up a colony of sorts (say, to staff a Project manufacturing facility that's geographically isolated) then staff will need shelter. But most of the time, as it says in TM 1-1 people will still use pre-war structures.

Moving along, I've allowed for a personal cache per team (not per person but one per team). As for dependents and close families, while the teams were dispersed, there is nothing saying there are also bulk storage facilities with hundreds, if not thousands of cryotubes (or scaled-up equipment). Allowing for family would give personnel an extra personal stake in the Project's success, not to mention a natural gratitude for helping their loved ones survive.

Tony

natehale1971

11-25-2010, 06:10 PM

The 'camp in the box' would be administered by 3 project personnel (administrator, doctor, security specialist) who are assisted by locals they are training to do the bulk of the labor. And those three personnel wouldn't be permanent if they can help it. One of the ideas for the camp in a box would be a 'intake' location for the project.. the project personnel wouldn't be from the field teams, but support/specialty teams. I had an idea for a loose type of team who'd rotate between the camps providing administrative and health & medical care. but felt that the three project personnel would allow for the best administrative care. the doctor would operate as a primary care physician, and would either send those who are 'out of his scope' to the health & medical facility for advanced care.

This actually would fit into how the project could easily work.

Matt W

11-25-2010, 08:34 PM

I have (auxiliary) vehicles for your "camp in a box"

BIKE AMBULANCES

http://www.eranger.com/products/health/ambulance.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcF7DozrZGM&feature=related

FIRE BIKES

http://www.bikeinsurance.net/news/fire-bikes-uk-trial

Matt W

11-25-2010, 08:42 PM

helbent4

11-26-2010, 07:16 AM

natehale1971

11-29-2010, 04:40 PM

Nate,

I could see this as accommodation for the people who are doing work on Project contracts and so on. Not a refugee or a transit camp in the traditional sense. (Such would either be unneeded or already established.)

Still, I think it might be better to look towards more permanent housing than a temporary camp, but better than nothing.

Tony

the camps aren't meant for permanent housing (either for those working with the project or those that Recon Teams encounter and in desperate need for a place to stay and get help)... but are temporary. prompting the people to work harder at building their own homes and pull themselves out of the basic living standards that you'd find in a camp.

robj3

12-21-2010, 06:18 PM

I agree fully with the concept of the population assistance cache as outlined in the initial post.

The team may wake up in the middle of a disaster. If not, then the supplies could be allocated to the reconstruction effort.

Regardless, teams are able to offer prompt substantial assistance to locals which must be useful in establishing goodwill for the Project.

The base unit for supply caches should be the intermodal container,
as Richard mentioned upthread.

This enables pre-loading at Project warehouses, and supplies require minimal
concealment - they blend in with regular road and rail freight. For maximal access to all the nooks and crannies caches and boltholes will be placed, sticking with 20' containers as the base unit might be good (the only problem I can see with the 40', 45' and 53' containers).

With regard to the amount and location of supplies, this depends on how much independence of action field teams are going to need (weeks? months? a year without resupply?). There are game balance and plotting implications here - but I think that game refs/PDs should be able to cope with an apparent excess of gear.

Despite Bruce, I don't think the Project is blessed with perfect precognition; the Project must then plan for a broad range of contingencies (e.g. nuclear war the most likely way civilisation could end, but not the only one; how bad the 3-5 years after environment will be will also vary). So I would tend to be generous with supplies. Logistic support from area/regional bases can't be assumed.

The most extreme scenario is that Project team members are going to repopulate the world - that there are no other human survivors.

[I don't think the Project should be capable of coping with a total biospheric collapse option (caused by nearby supernova, gamma-ray burst, major impactor or gravitational wrenching by rogue whatever, etc). Game over; everyone dies].

At the low end of the range is the nebulous (and controversial?) threshold for Project activation.

A reasonable level would seem to be 'limited' nuclear war scenarios with near total destruction of key industrial infrastructure (>95% of oil refining, chemical plants, etc.) and an initial (to one year) mortality of ~30-40% of the pre-attack population. This would also fit with a 'Black Death' style pandemic.

Sorry about topic drift.

Rob

natehale1971

12-21-2010, 08:11 PM

Thanks Rob... you hit the nail on the head on WHY there is so much there. The Project planned for alot of things, but they KNEW that human nature being what it is, that it's better to have something than not have it at all when you need it!

helbent4

12-23-2010, 02:31 AM

The team may wake up in the middle of a disaster. If not, then the supplies could be allocated to the reconstruction effort.

Regardless, teams are able to offer prompt substantial assistance to locals which must be useful in establishing goodwill for the Project.

A reasonable level would seem to be 'limited' nuclear war scenario with near total destruction of key industrial infrastructure (>95% of oil refining, chemical plants, etc.) and an initial (to one year) mortality of ~30-40% of the pre-attack population. This would also fit with a 'Black Death' style pandemic.

Rob,

The Project is going to be activated 3-5 years after a major disaster, not weeks or months. At that point, is there still going to be an immediate crisis?

Refugee aid seems to be a kind of "primary" function, not the kind of top-level cadre/reconstruction the Project is geared towards. No one says the Project wants to deliberately see anyone starve, but if it's still a problem three to five freakin' years after the war, then it's likely to be completely outside the scope of the Project's resources to alleviate except in a limited way unless 100% of the supplies go towards that end (and even then, I don't think you could dig enough holes to make a difference).

To be clear, while I don't think refugee relief is tenable as a Project capability, I do agree the proposed caches are a solid idea! It's not an issue of earning goodwill by offering prompt assistance, it's a matter of defining the Project's "core" mission and then keeping focus. Refugee aid seems like its really widening the core mission.

I also agree the Project seems to be aimed towards a limited nuclear exchange instead of the typical "total destruction" scenario. It seems to me isolated teams (no matter how well armed) aren't optimally organised to cope with a complete loss of civil order, and there doesn't seem to be enough resources to rebuild a completely destroyed industrial infrastructure.

Tony

robj3

12-27-2010, 04:15 PM

Tony Stroppa wrote:

The Project is going to be activated 3-5 years after a major disaster, not
weeks or months. At that point, is there still going to be an immediate crisis?

Contingency planning. A team could wake up in the middle of a famine, flood, wildfires, etc. etc.

Just because civilization has ended doesn't mean that something else can't go wrong. The project has a 'global' mission but has to respond to local problems.

I also agree the Project seems to be aimed towards a limited nuclear
exchange instead of the typical "total destruction" scenario. It seems to
me isolated teams (no matter how well armed) aren't optimally organised to
cope with a complete loss of civil order, and there doesn't seem to be
enough resources to rebuild a completely destroyed industrial infrastructure.

That's not my point, but I wasn't explicit.
A limited exchange represents the minimum disaster level ('the low end of the range') the Project should be able to respond to.

The extant game material is weighted towards field teams for play purposes, I think.
A supply/support depot based scenario (Morrow Project + MASH/China Beach/Sgt. Bilko??) might be someone's cup of tea.

Rob

LBraden

12-27-2010, 06:11 PM

hmm 4077th in TMP, now that sounds interestingly fun, just need to get done the Jeep and the Deuce and a half done up before I start drawing it.

But yeah, I have been working on "light" versions of that supply base from Sarnman project.

Matt W

12-28-2010, 07:26 PM

While it is true that the canon material does not mention regional command bases. From a logical, organizational stand point there has to be some kind of intermediate level in between the field teams and Prime Base. After all, not every problem requires the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs or the CEO to make the decision (LOL)!

.

Page 34 of TM1-1 seems a pretty clear indication that regional command installations are an option (it also makes me suspect that the creators of the game didn't always read each others contributions,. But that's another matter). Prime Base is mentioned on this page - along with a suggestion that there is a second base of similar function - and then the description of installations continues to the following

"The second type of installation is that of a permanent depot/base. These installations are scattered throughout the country and may be either manned or automated. The purpose of such bases is to resupply and support the Morrow teams as needed. They carry complete stocks of materials and equip,ent. The stocks included the materials to help start man back on the road to civilization and include construction equipment and materials as well as full libraries on microfilm. The MARS-ONE vehicles are stored in such bases and include very large arsenals of weapons and ammunition. Installations of this type should be limited to a maximum of 10."

"Another type of installation is of a more specialized nature. These are the bases for the specialist teams and include complete farms, hospitals, supply bases and power stations"

(my italics)

The extant game material is weighted towards field teams for play purposes, I think.
A supply/support depot based scenario (Morrow Project + MASH/China Beach/Sgt. Bilko??) might be someone's cup of tea.

I suspect that a campaign based around a "supply base" could be interesting.

helbent4

12-29-2010, 01:27 AM

Tony Stroppa wrote:

Contingency planning. A team could wake up in the middle of a famine, flood, wildfires, etc. etc.

Just because civilization has ended doesn't mean that something else can't go wrong. The project has a 'global' mission but has to respond to local problems.

Rob

Rob,

That's a worthwhile sentiment, no one is arguing that the Project isn't going to try and help whoever they can, however they can.

Please keep in mind there is a serious danger of mission creep, of losing focus if too many contingencies are taken into account. As well, we need to keep in mind a few things to remain within the realm of plausibility:

While the Project has a lot of resources available, they are not actually unlimited. That is, they must be paid for in some sense.
All these resources not only need to be paid for, they need to be pre-emplaced in some fashion; re-supply/replenishment is going to be problematical, at least at first, so we're talking about caches and stockpiles.
Contingency planning in this case is a zero-sum game; every ton of material devoted to refugee aid is one less available for reconstruction, the Project's core mission.

I read some of the numbers posted earlier on this list. According to Lee, a 90-day (3 month) food supply for only 3,000 people is 405,000kg. That's 27 shipping containers worth, for a few thousand people. Imagine the space that takes up! To help 3,000 people for 3 months.

Wouldn't it be more worth it to devote that 405,000kg/27 container loads to reconstruction? I agree it would be expedient to be able to hand out food or other aid immediately, but it wouldn't be more than a token unless a serious amount of Project capacity and resources were re-purposed from reconstruction to aid, which seems to defeat the purpose of the Project in the first place.

As for the destruction level, it's hard to see how the Project could function in the book scenario of a full thermonuclear/biological/chemical war, if you treat it like a thought exercise. Isolated teams, little in the way of industrial infrastructure, well-armed as individuals but not much more. Not the optimal strategy for an all-out war. Which to me would be organising many Project field teams into brigade group-sized units clustered around highly-automated industrial facilities in areas that are agriculturally self-supporting. Note, I don't normally advocate such a highly militarised Project other than as a thought-exercise for what would work best after an all-out war.

As Matt mentions, the Depots actually could be part or mostly industrial facilities. This would make sense, and provide a backup capability for the "worst-case" scenario. Still not optimal, but much better than nothing!

Tony

natehale1971

12-29-2010, 01:38 AM

helbent4

12-29-2010, 02:36 AM

Also a reason for these kinds of supplies goes back to the fact that a team might just wake up during or right after TEOTWAWKI event, and need to do SOMETHING to help people.

But even if they don't need the 'Camp in a Box' for refugees... the equipment would still be definitely be put to good use that would go a long way into improving not only survivors lives where they get used, but improve project public relations ("hey, these guys are here to help.. and they've built a clinic/school in our town").

Nate,

I'm not trying to be a big meanie or anything, but on one hand the whole point was that teams would not be activated right after the war. Primarily because of concerns over radiation or disease, but as a side effect the immediate crisis would also be over.

On the other, it's an issue of what I keep trying to bring up: mission creep. The food requirement alone is astounding. 405 metric tons (27 container loads) of food alone just to keep 3,000 people alive for 3 months. It's a "zero-sum" game, where almost every kilo of refugee aid is taken at the direct expense of reconstruction.

Let others who are better equipped handle the refugees. If there is no one, then it's not likely something the Project can handle anyways except in a limited way. It's not a matter of what will be appreciated, it's that including sizable stocks of refugee aid literally hamstrings the Project.

As for the design of the supply base, hey, I'm going to use that for my game, for sure. a "camp in a box" will be useful as well for housing Project personnel and contractors.

Tony

natehale1971

12-29-2010, 10:59 AM

The food issue is something i've been working on. Just because we can't hold enough food for 3000 people for 3 months does not change the fact something like this is necessary.

Just because the plan is NOT to make up during or during the immediate aftermath of TEOTWAWKI Event. Accidents happen. And planning for those accidents are a hell of alot easier than not. That's why we have lifeboats on our ships. Even though an aircraft carrier is built so that when the flight deck reaches water level it will float for several hours. But we still had enough lifeboats for more than double the crew. And that's not counting the liberty boats, and other embarked boats we have aboard. You have an access of them so that if anything is lost, you have plenty of replacements.

It goes back to the fact of "Better to have it and not need it, than to need it and not have it" principle.

And the one thing about the project is, they have the time to put all this together... And they would have the time to take the long range preps to set up each of these 'camp in a box' concepts. Their only fear is these places getting uncovered.

That would keep them from setting them into places that would be easy to stumble onto. Such as buying property were they are located to keep them from getting bought by some developer... Such as front companies that are developers who are going to build something, but then go out of business... that's always a good cover.

helbent4

12-29-2010, 05:51 PM

It goes back to the fact of "Better to have it and not need it, than to need it and not have it" principle.

And the one thing about the project is, they have the time to put all this together... And they would have the time to take the long range preps to set up each of these 'camp in a box' concepts. Their only fear is these places getting uncovered.

Nate,

No matter how well planned or how much time it has to prep, the Project doesn't (or at least realistically shouldn't) have unlimited space or probably even funding (although I agree that this planning can be done relatively cheaply). Therefore a better principle is ""you can't do it all".

Refugee relief, while a useful PR effort, is not part of the Project's core mission. Otherwise the Project would be activated right after the war. This is not a situation that for want of a nail the shoe was lost, because not having it won't negatively affect Project operations in a direct way. (There are a host of indirect factors that might affect the Project, but we can't cover all bases!)

That said, I see the "camp in the box" as feasible and desirable, not just for refugees but for Project personnel. Shelter is not going to be as bulky and the materials can always be re-purposed. In my own game, one group of players is setting up a Project base of operations and rebuilding a destroyed community for political reasons, having this material would make things a lot simpler. The campaign is based on Final Watch, so this is a cooperative effort between the Reds and Rebels, basically a joint effort between former enemies run by the Project and used as their base.

The sheer amount of food and supplies? I can see a token issue of a 3-month supply for 3,000 on the Regional level, but not something for teams or Groups to worry about.

Tony

natehale1971

01-02-2011, 11:51 AM

I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. the 'camp in a box' isn't 'doing it all'... it's something that would allow a team in a pinch to be able to DO SOMETHING. Not everything. Just because you can set up a camp and keep the people fed for three months isn't going to solve all problems.

Hell, doing that actually ties the team down. I came up with the idea for 'Camp in a Box' as it's become known as a way for the Recon Team to be able to do SOMETHING to help locals when they wake up, and allow locals to feel like they are doing something to better their condition. I never intended for the team to manage or run the camp.

Having the food there is not 'trying to do everything'... and seeing that the Project is operating on a long-term basis they could easily take the time to build things up and set up caches all around the country. because in all honesty, it's the only way that the project could do anything they are attempting to do.

Thus giving the teams the flexibility to do their jobs. That's what 'camp in the box' is all about. Giving flexibility to a team. They can use the 'camp in a box' for refugees or setting up a project community.

But I'm a big believer in the idea that if the project is doing something for it's own people, they are doing it for the people they are helping. You don't have the Project personnel and contractors living good, while the people you are helping are living in squallier. That just makes the people you are trying to help feel resentment that you are keeping the best stuff for yourself.

Thus i came up with the 'Camp in the Box' so that the Team could give locals some of the 'perks' that the Project would be using for their own people as well. A bridge between the two worlds, showing that soon as we get all this done, everyone can have access to the same stuff if you work for it.

robj3

01-03-2011, 06:58 PM

Tony,

You seem to assume that supplies can be used for one thing only.

Stockpiled food and temporary shelter are multi-purpose items.

In terms of 'unlimited resources', the Project has fusion power and cryotubes.
Depending on whether or not you follow canon slavishly, they also have
weapons of mass destruction. The Project must be extremely well resourced to have such these!

How much gear is too much for a given team?
As I stated earlier, some decision about team endurance needs to be made with regard to consumables (food, other consumables e.g. ammo, spare parts). Three months seems a reasonable minimum. The camp in a box cache
may end up being used by the team in the worst case.

Thinking more broadly, what is the Project set up to do? What does
'recovery' mean?
From Quarantelli 1999:

http://www.udel.edu/DRC/preliminary/pp286.pdf

Reconstruction (rebuild infrastructure)
Restoration (of physical and social environment)
Rehabilitation (of the survivors)
Restitution (governance rather than settling claims of loss in the Morrow setting!)

The Project's activity has to cover all these options to some extent.
I do not agree with the 'disaster relief is mission creep' concept.

Rob

dragoon500ly

01-04-2011, 05:30 AM

My own throught behind the 90-day food supply was to assume worst case (no food) and the minimum amount of time for crops to grow. The limiting factor is just how many people could be supported by the Camp In A Box and above all else, just how many survivors/refugees a single team could support. And this is perhaps the greatest stumbling block to a CIAB. I think we all agree that the is simply no way for the Project to aid everyone, the sheer scale of supporting a refugee populations swamps FEMAs (but then just about anything swamps FEMA!!!) ability to aid the survivors.

So what is the cutoff? Does the Project plan on CIAB supporting 500; 3,000; 15,000? Should there even be a CIAB? The careful use of a CIAB should allow a PD to let the team answer this question...

natehale1971

01-04-2011, 06:43 PM

helbent4

01-06-2011, 02:03 AM

You seem to assume that supplies can be used for one thing only.

Stockpiled food and temporary shelter are multi-purpose items.

In terms of 'unlimited resources', the Project has fusion power and cryotubes.
Depending on whether or not you follow canon slavishly, they also have
weapons of mass destruction. The Project must be extremely well resourced to have such these!

How much gear is too much for a given team?

Reconstruction (rebuild infrastructure)
Restoration (of physical and social environment)
Rehabilitation (of the survivors)
Restitution (governance rather than settling claims of loss in the Morrow setting!)

The Project's activity has to cover all these options to some extent.

The Project's activity has to cover all these options to some extent.

Rob,

I seem to think supplies can be used for one thing only if they are in fact used for one thing only. In this case, the stumbling block is food. Food and pre-fab shelter are short-term solutions to long-terms problems. How much is too much? 27 containerloads to feed 3,000 people for 3 months is too much, in my opinion.

I do agree that pre-fab shelter can be re-purposed to house workers, although it's not truly multi-purpose. Certainly, I'll concede that point.

Fusion, cryotubes, even WMDs are either small or crucial to Project operations, worth the expenditure. Storing food and shelter takes an enormous amount of space that can go to other materials that are specifically meant for reconstruction. It's a question of "bang for your buck" in terms of space and manufacturing capabilities.

I like the list you quote, although the link is no longer active. The Project can cover all the elements listed without taking "immediate" disaster relief into account.

Tony

helbent4

01-06-2011, 02:26 AM

We might be able to combine the Camp in a Box with a Farm in a Box idea... once the containers have been emptied, they can be converted into a hydroponic garden. All you'd have to do is have equipment stored in the cache complex, with a 'snap-together' type set up that would allow even unskilled labor to put everything together.

Nate,

I don't think we'll have to agree to disagree, I do think the "camp" part is useful. I'm going to use that in my own game. I'm just not sold on the food. Like Lee asks, how many people is the Project supposed to feed using stored food supplies? 3,000? 300,000? 20,000,000?

Agriculture is also something that takes an enormous amount of materials, from seeds to fertiliser and feed. I think that the Project is best served by concentrating on industrial infrastructure. Agriculture teams should be focused on returning mechanisation to agriculture (by applying high-tech solutions like fusion power) to enhance all food production. Not just, say, build a farm to feed X people in a given town.

Tony

robj3

01-10-2011, 03:15 AM

dragoon500ly wrote:
My own throught behind the 90-day food supply was to assume worst case (no food) and the minimum amount of time for crops to grow.

I think that's very reasonable - assuming you can grow food (shades of 'The Road'?).

The limiting factor is just how many people could be supported by the Camp In A Box and above all else, just how many survivors/refugees a single team could support.

It should be a relatively small number - from the 'Farm in a Box' thread, 34,500 person-days food per 20' ISO container is an upper limit.

Area and Regional Agriculture teams are the ones who can really assist in longer term food production.

Tony Stroppa wrote:
27 containerloads to feed 3,000 people for 3 months is too much, in my opinion.

What are you feeding people with? 9 containers of rice or corn will provide the required amount of calories - bland, but it's an emergency diet. If you don't need to eat it directly, plant it or feed livestock with it.

I like the list you quote, although the link is no longer active.

Quarantelli E.L. The Disaster Recovery Process: What we know and do not know from research. University of Delaware Disaster Research Center Preliminary Paper 286.

Google Scholar gives this alternate link. Replace the %20 with a space:
http://dspace.udel.edu:8080/dspace/bitstream/19716/309/3/PP%20286.pdf.txt

I think that the Project is best served by concentrating on industrial infrastructure. Agriculture teams should be focused on returning mechanisation to agriculture (by applying high-tech solutions like fusion power) to enhance all food production.

Industrial infrastructure?
Are cattle feedlots and high intensity piggeries/battery farms 'industrial infrastructure'? I think a fertiliser plant counts.

Do Agricultural teams make plows, combines and tractors?

Agricultural teams help people grow food. Mechanisation is a small (but highly visible) component of modern high-yield agriculture.

At a minimum, Ag teams need skills in agronomy, pedology, climatology, applied climatology, entomology, environmental toxicology, microbiology, mycology and veterinary medicine.

Father Fletch

01-11-2011, 09:20 PM

helbent4

01-12-2011, 12:02 AM

dragoon500ly wrote:

Tony Stroppa wrote:

What are you feeding people with? 9 containers of rice or corn will provide the required amount of calories - bland, but it's an emergency diet. If you don't need to eat it directly, plant it or feed livestock with it.

Industrial infrastructure?

Are cattle feedlots and high intensity piggeries/battery farms 'industrial infrastructure'? I think a fertiliser plant counts.

Do Agricultural teams make plows, combines and tractors?

Agricultural teams help people grow food. Mechanisation is a small (but highly visible) component of modern high-yield agriculture.

At a minimum, Ag teams need skills in agronomy, pedology, climatology, applied climatology, entomology, environmental toxicology, microbiology, mycology and veterinary medicine.

Rob,

If you page back, the information I was using came from Post #11 by Lee Yates' on possible food requirements.

"Assuming that you provide bulk foodstuffs, the requirements get worse, that's 2kg per person per day (6,000kg) with a 180 day supply [for 3,000 people] running or 1,080,000kg; that's 27 standard cargo containers..."

Nine as opposed to twenty-seven 20' ISO containers is a lot more reasonable, but still, how many people is the Project supposed to feed, and for how long? Let's take a token amount of the American population, 300,000, for the suggested duration of 6 months. That's 1,800 containers needed to feed a token population scattered across the USA, containers that can't hold anything like components for a fertiliser plant, materials to build or repair plows, agricultural machinery of any kind. It's not even a farm-in-the-box, just the seed stock (which is still important, of course).

Certainly, dual-purpose food-seed stock makes sense, but it would be most useful really in a narrow range of circumstances. That is, there is starvation but not so that it overwhelms Project food stocks, and not where there's already enough of a yield for sustainable agriculture that the food/seed would be redundant and therefore wasted space/resources. Not that there's no use, but it seems that the space and resources could be better used for something else.

Speaking of something else, saying "Mechanisation is a small (but highly visible) component of modern high-yield agriculture" is kind of like saying mechanism is a small (but highly visible) component of modern high-speed transportation. More seriously, your suggestions about agricultural components, technology and skills are well-taken. While the obvious thought about Ag teams is they would be slaving out in the fields (and there would still be lots of that) but they are most useful as a cadre and knowledge base.

As a side note, I figure that 1 20' ISO container (1 Twenty-foot Equivalent Unit) will store 28,119kg of maize/seed corn (at 721kg/cu.m, 39 cubic metres per TEU). This amount of seed will plant 1313 hectares (21.4/kg seed/hectares) with a yield of 6.6 tons per hectare or 8672 tons total.

Tony

dragoon500ly

01-12-2011, 05:44 AM

The key question in this whole debate has been just how much the Project can help local refugee populations. This breaks down into two parts; how large is your Project and how much gear/technology is available to support your Project.

Say, for arguement's sake that your version of the Project has 20,000 recon personnel, split into 10-person teams...thats 2,000 recon teams and let's further say that each recon team has a CIAB that can support 3,000 survivors...that's roughly 6,000,000 survivors being supported by the Project.

At the 2kg per per person per day supply; that's 12,000,000kg or 6,000 tons of foodstuffs per day.

Supplying a 90 day supply...that's 540,000 tons of just basic foodstuffs, no clothing, no tools, no reference materials. This is the weak point of the CIAB.

Don't get me wrong, I think the CIAB is a wonderful idea! It's the logistics side of it that are the major stumbling block.

A better way of calculating things may be to look at the population of the area that the team will be working in...if the pre-war population was 38,000,000 and following TM-1s 98% death rate...that would leave a post-oops population of 760,000, once again at the 2kg rate that's 1,520,000kg or 760 tons per day or 68,400 tons for a 90 day supply.

There is no way that the Project would be able to support the entire surviving population of a post-oops world for much more than a minimal amount of time. The logistics of securing and emplacing CIAB of the size needed are almost impossible...not to mention the security problems of burying 540,000 tons around the country, sooner or later somebody is going to uncover a cache or a CIAB. That's why I feel that the CIAB would be of the minimal size, perhaps to support 1-3,000 people in very carefully selected portions of the country.

natehale1971

01-12-2011, 01:14 PM

I wonder why you wanted to come up with a hexagonal or octagonal design, other than they look cool?
Digging a frakking big square or rectangular hole is commonplace and known and "easy" for countless construction firms. Placing ISO/ConEx containers therein and covering them with the fill dirt again, a basic construction job.
If you wanted to be all fancy you could lay in a conventional concrete slab after leveling the hole, and place your containers on top of that. Cover with dirt, etc.
Lather, Rinse, Repeat
While an octagon or hexagon isn't incredibly difficult, square and rectangles are likely cheaper and perhaps faster to build with less questions asked by the locals.
As for construction materials like gravel and sand they could be used as some of the fill material on the sides or banked areas around the container cache. There is a map of their location relative to the entry to the cache and their removal wouldn't disrupt the integrity of the cache. Even in 2-5 years those would be expected to be completely overgrown.

I put it in this design for one reason.. That all of the containers can be accessed at one time, and that you wouldn't need equipment to pull them out if they were stacked on each other.

More data came in with ideas of bulk supplies being placed in pits, thus the pits would be placed in between the spokes of the supply cache complex of the spokes. Thus you dig one big hole, place the cargo containers around the pre-fab central shaft. Once the containers have been placed you would the place the specially designed 'pits' full of bulk construction equipment (bricks, sand and the like) in between the container spokes and then fill it all back in. The job can take a few days.

While someone finding something like this going on, is greater... we haven't been talking about the fact that boltholes getting put into place can be just as easily stumbled across.

It's why i was using the Georgia Guidepost monument as an example of a place that the Project can set up as a rally point, or cover for a facility, ect.

robj3

01-16-2011, 07:43 PM

Tony Stroppa wrote:
Nine as opposed to twenty-seven 20' ISO containers is a lot more reasonable, but still, how many people is the Project supposed to feed, and for how long?

dragoon500ly wrote:
There is no way that the Project would be able to support the entire surviving population of a post-oops world for much more than a minimal amount of time.

Richard's initial post suggested to me that this was an emergency relief capacity - enough to relieve a local disaster that was available to a given field team.

The 90 day food supply for 3,000 people being kicked around seems like a reasonable start, until area and regional Project assets are brought to bear on the situation.

That's 1,800 containers needed to feed a token population scattered across the USA, containers that can't hold anything like components for a fertiliser plant, materials to build or repair plows, agricultural machinery of any kind.

Fertiliser plants and tractor factories are area or regional level assets. Plow kits would be part of one of Richard's proposed containers.

Speaking of something else, saying "Mechanisation is a small (but highly visible) component of modern high-yield agriculture" is kind of like saying mechanism is a small (but highly visible) component of modern high-speed transportation.

The remark wasn't as silly as you apparently think.
Without oil extraction, refining and distribution, where's modern high-speed transport? What about roads, ports, airports? The factories that build cars, trains, planes and their supply chains? What about the common engineering and safety standards that underlie all of this?

Back to agriculture: there's a lot more to growing crops than combines and tractors.

Thinking more widely: this is another reason why recovery has stagnated at D+150 - a lack of infrastructure and physical capital (Tony's right about needing to rebuild industry).

Another obvious area for Project expertise is food storage (pest proof containers). Distribution comes 'naturally' with area and regional level logistic support networks.

While the obvious thought about Ag teams is they would be slaving out in the fields (and there would still be lots of that) but they are most useful as a cadre and knowledge base.

Agreed - all Project members are most useful as a knowledge base.

As a side note, I figure that 1 20' ISO container (1 Twenty-foot Equivalent Unit) will store 28,119kg of maize/seed corn (at 721kg/cu.m, 39 cubic metres per TEU). This amount of seed will plant 1313 hectares (21.4/kg seed/hectares) with a yield of 6.6 tons per hectare or 8672 tons total.

Looks reasonable.
From:
http://www.extension.iastate.edu/publications/pm1885.pdf

figure 30,000 seeds per acre - this is ~75,000 per hectare.

A pessimistic fudge factor for seeds/bushel (25.4kg of corn) is 85,000 seeds per bushel:

http://www.agry.purdue.edu/ext/corn/news/timeless/yldestmethod.html

That's ~22.4kg corn per hectare.
1,250 ha planted per 28,000 kg corn.

Historical average yields from the Iowa State file linked above and
http://www.davidrumsey.com/luna/servlet/detail/RUMSEY~8~1~32750~1152128:Corn--Yield,-per-acre-of-area-plant

range from 10 bushels/acre (635kg/ha) to 150 bu/acre (9525kg/ha).
6.6 tons/ha (~104 bu/acre) is a typical 1970s level yield.

This makes a good case for a container of seed corn as an emergency supply in areas where it can be grown. Wheat and rice look like good alternatives in certain regions. The question is whether or not this should be a field level asset or not. I can't see why not.

Rob

helbent4

01-18-2011, 03:21 AM

Tony Stroppa wrote:

Richard's initial post suggested to me that this was an emergency relief capacity - enough to relieve a local disaster that was available to a given field team.

The 90 day food supply for 3,000 people being kicked around seems like a reasonable start, until area and regional Project assets are brought to bear on the situation.

The remark wasn't as silly as you apparently think.

Without oil extraction, refining and distribution, where's modern high-speed transport? What about roads, ports, airports? The factories that build cars, trains, planes and their supply chains? What about the common engineering and safety standards that underlie all of this?

Back to agriculture: there's a lot more to growing crops than combines and tractors.

Pob,

If we're looking at a capacity to aid 3,000 people for 3 months per (say) a hypothetical 10 regions across the entire Project, then that's not out of the question at all.

Even with all those things you mention, high-speed transportation is not possible without mechanisation. Transportation, yes, but not the high speed kind. Likewise, without mechanisation farming is possible, just not modern farming.

Anyways, I just found your comment amusing, and thanks for the smile.

Tony

robj3

01-24-2011, 01:54 AM

Tony Stroppa wrote:
If we're looking at a capacity to aid 3,000 people for 3 months per (say) a hypothetical 10 regions across the entire Project, then that's not out of the question at all.

Do you mean each team can do this, only 10 teams nationally, or something else?

Likewise, without mechanisation farming is possible, just not modern farming.

What do you mean by 'modern farming'?

Yields (gross and/or net of storage and harvesting losses)?
Productivity per farm worker?
The use of synthetic pesticides and fertilisers?

The only one of the items above where mechanisation is essential is productivity per farm worker. Green Revolution farming techniques in the 3d world invalidate the others as points of argument.

I'm pretty sure you're avoiding a circular argument (modern farming = mechanisation).

Rob

helbent4

01-24-2011, 05:58 AM

Tony Stroppa wrote:

Do you mean each team can do this, only 10 teams nationally, or something else?

Rob,

If we arbitrarily set the number of regions in the USA at ten, then one per region or equivalent area in the USA. Ten such caches (9x containers) nationally is better than nothing, but not a significant drain on Project resources.

What do you mean by 'modern farming'?

Yields (gross and/or net of storage and harvesting losses)?
Productivity per farm worker?
The use of synthetic pesticides and fertilisers?

The only one of the items above where mechanisation is essential is productivity per farm worker. Green Revolution farming techniques in the 3d world invalidate the others as points of argument.

I'm pretty sure you're avoiding a circular argument (modern farming = mechanisation).

Agreed, I could be doing a better job of defining my terms.

By "modern" I mean industrialised agriculture that provides increased individual productivity along the scale of the 1st world, per your point above.

The methods of the Green Revolution (pesticides and fertilisers) are important in raising post-war agriculture to the level of the pre-war third world. (It's funny, when used in the context of the Cold War, 1st and 3rd world are quite appropriate.) I would hope the Project is aiming for something higher.

Tony

natehale1971

01-24-2011, 05:53 PM

Tony... only helping that small of a group (one group of 3000 per region) would be a slap in the face of the project itself.

The entire project has been designed to HELP as many people as possible. Considering helping people a 'Drain on Resources' is... well, that goes totally against what the project was founded for. And is honestly heartless.

The project has 30+ years to prepare for TEOTWAWKI. And any Prepper will tell you, that stocking food is the easiest part of prepping for disasters. It's also the CHEAPEST part of their prepping. And considering the resources of the Project, stockpiling food is not a 'drain on resources'... because the project is the one whose very founding is to HELP as many people as possible. The original game had a bunch of supplies stuffed in a tiny little concret box that really could not hold all the stuff they talked about being in them.

My idea here, was to explain how a cache complex would be set up.

Giving each field team (recon, mars & science) a 'Camp in a Box' wouldn't be a drain considering just how VAST the conspiracy that would be necessary for the Project to have existed (and another reason to say that the Federal Government knew about it, and was turning a blind eye to it... and would give a damn good reason for Carter to have killed Civil Defense Preparations).

Look at the Soviet Union, they never gave up on Civil Defense and pretty much didn't give a rat's ass about their people as individuals. But even they had kept civil Defense going, and had made provisions for people to survive a nuclear exchange.

if 3000 people is just to big a group in your oppinion to help, cut it down to 1000. Or even 500. But to call it a 'drain on resources' is heartless and a slap in the face to the very IDEALS that the Project had been created for.

helbent4

01-26-2011, 10:30 PM

Tony... only helping that small of a group (one group of 3000 per region) would be a slap in the face of the project itself.

Nate,

Ah, no one, much less the poor Project or it's IDEALS, are getting slapped in the face! (Repeatedly, and so violent, too!) Roshambo'd in the balls, maybe. :D

I think the Project isn't heartless, nor should it be seen to be. Immediate aid for 30,000-100,000 people seems about right. Significantly less isn't worthwhile, significantly more requires diversion of additional Project resources and courts the danger of "mission creep". Project resources may be vast but they shouldn't be practically unlimited (if we want to keep this within the bounds of reality). Hand-waving this concern away is simply dodging the question. As has been mentioned several times, the Project can't feed all survivors, everywhere, even if all possible resources are devoted that end.

Please note, I am separating immediate food aid from the idea of a CIAB, which I otherwise like. So don't take this as a flame for your idea in general. To recapitulate, as it stands, CIAB to my understanding comprises 16x standard ISO containsers: 9 for food/seed stock alone, 7 for the other supplies and facilities. I can't see one of these per team, but one or more per region would be do-able. If I am mistaken, please clarify!

We must keep in mind the main mission is still to aid in long-term reconstruction of the USA. That is the guiding principle to keep in mind. Therefore, short term aid is acceptable as long as it's not a drain on the resources that are available for reconstruction. That said, I agree that the COT and Morrow would see the USSR's continued efforts towards civil defence and postwar reconstruction is deserving of a private-sector response (with some government backing or at least tacit acceptance).

Tony

Cpl. Kalkwarf

01-27-2011, 07:29 AM

I wonder why you wanted to come up with a hexagonal or octagonal design, other than they look cool?
Digging a frakking big square or rectangular hole is commonplace and known and "easy" for countless construction firms. Placing ISO/ConEx containers therein and covering them with the fill dirt again, a basic construction job.
If you wanted to be all fancy you could lay in a conventional concrete slab after leveling the hole, and place your containers on top of that. Cover with dirt, etc.
Lather, Rinse, Repeat
While an octagon or hexagon isn't incredibly difficult, square and rectangles are likely cheaper and perhaps faster to build with less questions asked by the locals.
As for construction materials like gravel and sand they could be used as some of the fill material on the sides or banked areas around the container cache. There is a map of their location relative to the entry to the cache and their removal wouldn't disrupt the integrity of the cache. Even in 2-5 years those would be expected to be completely overgrown.

Actually you would want to protect the containers before covering them with dirt. I work in the construction Observation, management and testing field. Metal will corrode in allot of soil situations and not last long. Encasing it in a concrete cocoon will help considerably. The tricky part would be to protect the lock/access area from the soils and still allow some one to gain access to them with a minimum of tools. One such idea would be a specially designed lightweight concrete that with a large hammer or other object could be used to break it away for the critical area. Perhaps with a MP or other symbol cast into it.

All in all Caches will be a tricky part of the project. Though if you were only expecting them to last a short time then it would not be a problem. Though in the case of the normal MP scenario waking up 150ish years later some of the caches may have been compromised as in rusted through or rusted/corroded shut. This may even be an issue with Bold holes to some extent. Location is the most important part of the planning. Know your area. How it reacts chemically and geologically. Ground water level/depth is very important. Trying to keep something buried in or below the water level and keeping it sealed or dry is very hard without an active system. Big sealed stainless steel containers would be the best bet, especially with an additional plastic or rubber coating. The one tricky part is the access to the cache. How it is protected and still accessible.

natehale1971

01-27-2011, 07:32 AM

Nate,

Ah, no one, much less the poor Project or it's IDEALS, are getting slapped in the face! (Repeatedly, and so violent, too!) Roshambo'd in the balls, maybe. :D

I think the Project isn't heartless, nor should it be seen to be. Immediate aid for 30,000-100,000 people seems about right. Significantly less isn't worthwhile, significantly more requires diversion of additional Project resources and courts the danger of "mission creep". Project resources may be vast but they shouldn't be practically unlimited (if we want to keep this within the bounds of reality). Hand-waving this concern away is simply dodging the question. As has been mentioned several times, the Project can't feed all survivors, everywhere, even if all possible resources are devoted that end.

Please note, I am separating immediate food aid from the idea of a CIAB, which I otherwise like. So don't take this as a flame for your idea in general. To recapitulate, as it stands, CIAB to my understanding comprises 16x standard ISO containsers: 9 for food/seed stock alone, 7 for the other supplies and facilities. I can't see one of these per team, but one or more per region would be do-able. If I am mistaken, please clarify!

We must keep in mind the main mission is still to aid in long-term reconstruction of the USA. That is the guiding principle to keep in mind. Therefore, short term aid is acceptable as long as it's not a drain on the resources that are available for reconstruction. That said, I agree that the COT and Morrow would see the USSR's continued efforts towards civil defence and postwar reconstruction is deserving of a private-sector response (with some government backing or at least tacit acceptance).

Tony

The plan i had for the "Camp in a Box" is for each Field Team (MARS, Science & Recon Team) to have at least one of these types of supply caches. And this is not a drain on resources. No by a long shot. You are forgetting the fact that this kind of prepping is the easiest and cheapest. You are providing for immediate aide to a community, and news of this will get around. Thus improving the public perception of the project.

Once the "CIAB" has been set up and gets running (something that the team isn't expected to run, just get it started), it will act as a good distribution point for a localized recovery area.

This does something for the PC Team... it's part of the standing orders of the project, and allow them to feel like that even without being able to raise the Project on the radio that they are doing something substantial.

You stated We must keep in mind the main mission is still to aid in long-term reconstruction of the USA. That is the guiding principle to keep in mind. and the CIAB is an important part of that goal.

Look at the big picture Tony. Only providing help for a handful of people would come across as elitist. That the 'Morrow People' are only helping 'those people' and keeping all the good stuff for themselves and those that kiss their asses.

That creates a division in the people you are trying to help.

By providing a field team, who is out in the field and can see where the help is needed RIGHT NOW, the ability and means to do something positive about it... goes a million miles further than just pretty words of 'we've got aide coming'.

Actually having the ability to do something RIGHT NOW, even if you feel it's a 'drain on resources' to feed someone starving, or provide medical aide to someone who is dying and can't 'just hold on a little longer'.. because those words would be seen as hollow, and when that aide doesn't show up as said... well, that turns you into a liar.

The "CIAB" provides a field team composed of PCs something that allows them to get things set up, so they have long-term goals that fall into what the Project is all about.

To break the fourth wall for a moment, having a team of PCs just running from one shoot-first-grab-loot encounter to another is boring in my opinion. and the "CIAB" falls into the entire ideal of the Project with one big box with a nice bow on top. The project's long-term goal is to rebuild the country, and to do that you have to do it one building block at a time. That's what a CIAB is. a building block. It's a starting point.

Back into the game universe now...

Even if the project got started out 5 years after the nukes were exchanged, they would have some people out there who knows how to do high-tech skills. But they need to get find them. To get them into a place that their knowledge can be used.

Thus the CIAB.

It allows the Field Team to see what is needed on the spot, and set up something that will act as a rally point for civilians to come too. And allow the project (who sends someone from the supply & logistics branch to run the CIAB at first to set up the computer hook-ups that will allow them to know who they are helping, their skill set, ect) to start finding out just what human resources they have access too.

Once the CIAB has been set up, this central location will be perfect for the Agricultural teams to go to first, then go to the local communities that really need their help the most.

That's what this has been used for in my campaigns. And it worked. If you don't want to use it, so be it.

But to call something like this a 'Drain on Resources' goes totally against what the Project's goals are.

helbent4

01-28-2011, 02:29 AM

But to call something like this a 'Drain on Resources' goes totally against what the Project's goals are.

Nate,

I don't agree being rational goes totally against the Project's goals. In fact, it's crucial.

I also believe we both see the big picture. To suggest otherwise simply doesn't make sense.

We just disagree on how resources should be allocated, or even what (if any) the reasonable limits to those resources are.

I think the CIAB is a good idea, maybe one per Group or several per region. Minus the enormous food storage, of course! I've even adapted the CIAB for my game, so that's certainly a personal compliment regarding the idea.

We'll leave it at that, and no hard feelings.

Tony

Darkwing

01-28-2011, 11:55 AM

Tony... only helping that small of a group (one group of 3000 per region) would be a slap in the face of the project itself.

The entire project has been designed to HELP as many people as possible. Considering helping people a 'Drain on Resources' is... well, that goes totally against what the project was founded for. And is honestly heartless.
No, just realistic. Depending on number of people, transportation, and other resources, you can only do so much, Recognizing that is not a slap in the face or heartlessness. Now, saying "We're all about rebuilding America, and we'll let the survivors starve because there's plenty of other survivors elsewhere that we can use without having to give handouts" would be heartless and disregarding of the projects ideals. OTOH, as a servicemember, I know how many sailors couldn't give a rat's ass about the flag, the constitution, or the ideals of America.

"The project has 30+ years to prepare for TEOTWAWKI. And any Prepper will tell you, that stocking food is the easiest part of prepping for disasters. It's also the CHEAPEST part of their prepping. And considering the resources of the Project, stockpiling food is not a 'drain on resources'... because the project is the one whose very founding is to HELP as many people as possible. The original game had a bunch of supplies stuffed in a tiny little concret box that really could not hold all the stuff they talked about being in them. "
Any use is a drain - just how justifiable is it?

natehale1971

01-28-2011, 03:28 PM

No, just realistic. Depending on number of people, transportation, and other resources, you can only do so much, Recognizing that is not a slap in the face or heartlessness. Now, saying "We're all about rebuilding America, and we'll let the survivors starve because there's plenty of other survivors elsewhere that we can use without having to give handouts" would be heartless and disregarding of the projects ideals. OTOH, as a servicemember, I know how many sailors couldn't give a rat's ass about the flag, the constitution, or the ideals of America.

i am a DAV, so i know there are many in uniform who don't care about the flag or the constitution or ideals of america. but one thing you are forgetting. the project SCREENED everyone to make sure that only those who believed in those three things got into the operation.

And what you and Tony are not getting is the fact that I have worked with Preppers, and know that what I am talking about is NOT difficult. Every prepper I have worked with has stated that stockpiling FOOD is the easiest (and cheapest) part of their preps.

Yes that will take up space, but when you empty the container... you are opening up space that can be used later. Thus the "FARM IN A BOX" idea can be combined with the CAIB... you can turn the empty storage area into green houses.

Any use is a drain - just how justifiable is it?

As I stated. Saving lives is never a drain, and is always justifiable.

Remember that the project is country wide, and that they have to place resources in a way that will allow the intital teams the greatest flexibliy to do their jobs without immediate support from the main resources of the Project itself.

CIAB gives that ability. it allows for teams on the ground/frontlines to do their job, and do it right up until they can get access to the rest of the Project's resources in all those hidden warehouses in Alaska and Canada.

That's why i came up with CIAB in my campaigns.

I came up with CIAB using the Planning on how to do things with the 5 to 10 year window after TEOTWAWKI in mind. Considering the way the game has it being 150 years afterwards... the CIAB allows teams to have the ability to set up a settlement, and give them the breathing room to set up everything that can give them a sense of self-sufficiency.

Darkwing

01-28-2011, 11:35 PM

i am a DAV, so i know there are many in uniform who don't care about the flag or the constitution or ideals of america. but one thing you are forgetting. the project SCREENED everyone to make sure that only those who believed in those three things got into the operation. screening isn't perfect, and after a major event, some people change, even if they thought they were prepared. I've seen it. No matter how intellectually prepared you are for it, pulling a Rip Van Winkle until after your world ends and finding yourself in a whole new world WILL unhinge some of your sleepers and temporarily unbalance more of them. PCs of course have enough emotional insulation that it won't happen to them, but it can and should be expected to happen to a portion of the NPC sleepers.

And what you and Tony are not getting is the fact that I have worked with Preppers, and know that what I am talking about is NOT difficult. Every prepper I have worked with has stated that stockpiling FOOD is the easiest (and cheapest) part of their preps.
Not my point. There's a finite amount of space that can be hidden without giving the secret away by the work required to hide it. Then there's distribution. After Katrina, my family did disaster relief on the Gulf Coast, so I have some idea.

As I stated. Saving lives is never a drain, and is always justifiable.
Any use is a drain. Groceries are necessary, but they still drain money from my account. Your position is emotional. I've been a stretcher bearer, and one of the lessons is that it is sometimes necessary - not pleasant or desirable, but necessary - to sacrifice some who could be saved in order to save others or to save the ship as a whole. During the evac from Katrina, a hospital in New Orleans was evacuated with outside aid. The workers evacuating the hospital focused on readily transportable patients first, leaving the worst cases and least likely to survive for last, and ultimately, left some behind. The doctors and nurses complained about it on the news afterwords - they were trying to get everyone out, starting with the ones worst off. Not only were they wrong, their skewed priorities and cross-purposes with the workers very likely contributed to the number of patients who had to be left to die. They were idiots, putting emotion before reason in a survival situation.

Remember that the project is country wide, and that they have to place resources in a way that will allow the intital teams the greatest flexibliy to do their jobs without immediate support from the main resources of the Project itself.
I get that. I simply asked where do you draw the line? How much can you stash without blowing cover, and how much can you control after you wake up? "Hey, we don't know the lay of the land, don't know the players, but we got a bunch of food"
"Ok", says the local warlord "after I kill you, my troops will have enough food to support us for our next campaign". Rear-echelons staying in the 20th/21st centuries can ask these questions, model them, and make cold-blooded decisions the personnel waking up may be too involved to arrive at.

CIAB gives that ability. it allows for teams on the ground/frontlines to do their job, and do it right up until they can get access to the rest of the Project's resources in all those hidden warehouses in Alaska and Canada.

That's why i came up with CIAB in my campaigns.

It's a good idea, I think we're haggling the details. Each cache and CIAB/FIAB/etc is less money and resources to apply towards teams to sleep into the future and do the rebuilding work, and that much more chance to blow the secret. You have to strike a balance.

I came up with CIAB using the Planning on how to do things with the 5 to 10 year window after TEOTWAWKI in mind. Considering the way the game has it being 150 years afterwards... the CIAB allows teams to have the ability to set up a settlement, and give them the breathing room to set up everything that can give them a sense of self-sufficiency. If it survived the wait and wasn't found and looted in the interim, yes.

Now, some other things to think about: How many species will die out? In addition to food, you probably would want mini-Svalbard-style seed vaults for important plants, maybe a Titan AE-style gene bank (in the 60's, it'd just be frozen animal ova and semen, towards the end it might get more sophisticated) with useful species. If gengineering gets good enough neo-mules like Buck (Time Enough For Love, Heinlein) might be developed. Neo-mules were intelligent, spoke somewhat intellibly, and bred true. Even if they aren't developed, I would put some pack and riding animals in cryo chambers (what survives freezing better? Zebras, ponies, camels?). They can replace their numbers without factories or spare parts. Maybe some dogs, too. Include the hardware to assemble a couple of Connestogas in any cache and in the CIAB for transporting the goods if necessary. Lower tech is more sustainable in a post-apocalyptic setting.

Then there's the possibility of project members who don't want to be frozen. It'd be helpful to have families living in the area who could check on the boltholes and caches, and if they successfully pass on their charge to their children, the PCs might wake up to a small community with working farmland to brief them on how the world has changed and to provide an initial base of operations - or maybe a worshipper base, if the wording of their duty got garbled. Or maybe even the villagers think they're supposed to guard AGAINST the demons ever waking up? For such a village, if feasible, I'd have built them their own cache, knowing they'd have used it before the PCs woke up. But it would have given them a head start and ensured they had the tools to survive the Big Uh-OH!

In my first thread I asked about others disliking Bruce as a time traveler - it seems to me that the only thing given up by making him a precognitive with a silver tongue is the advanced tech - no resist weve, no fusion, no lasers - and I'm cool with that.

OTOH, if I were a time traveler in his shoes, I'd go farther back. I'd set up a brokerage in the 20s, play the market, and pull out just in time. Then I'd use that money to bribe senators and bureaucrats into making secure "food storage" vaults all over as WPA and CCC projects, invoking the dust bowl and food riots as justification. Have them built the same way the Nazi's made bunkers, concrete reinforced to 4 times the civil construction standard. Then quietly suggest around '39 - '40 that the economy can continue recovery without these projects as we prepare to help England. In the 40's, while everyone's thinking about other things, I'd quietly buy those plots through agents, holding them through proxies and dummy corporations. That gets a lot of your digging done early and before satellite photography, and none of it is in your name.

Then, when the project officially starts in the 60's, it inherits a lot of pre-prepared sites. Maybe even enough to fulfill the design.

"Blessed Saint Liebowitz, keep 'em dreaming down there" Astronaut Randy Claggett, Space, James Michener

natehale1971

01-29-2011, 11:51 AM

screening isn't perfect, and after a major event, some people change, even if they thought they were prepared. I've seen it. No matter how intellectually prepared you are for it, pulling a Rip Van Winkle until after your world ends and finding yourself in a whole new world WILL unhinge some of your sleepers and temporarily unbalance more of them. PCs of course have enough emotional insulation that it won't happen to them, but it can and should be expected to happen to a portion of the NPC sleepers.

for those NPCs... we have the Phoenix Team to deal with unbalanced and warlord mentalities.

Not my point. There's a finite amount of space that can be hidden without giving the secret away by the work required to hide it. Then there's distribution. After Katrina, my family did disaster relief on the Gulf Coast, so I have some idea.

Good for you. Preppers who actually took the time to put supplies away didn't need that help. The Project planned in advance, so taking a page from the Preppers is important. Not just taking after-the-fact relief effort playbooks.

Any use is a drain. Groceries are necessary, but they still drain money from my account. Your position is emotional. I've been a stretcher bearer, and one of the lessons is that it is sometimes necessary - not pleasant or desirable, but necessary - to sacrifice some who could be saved in order to save others or to save the ship as a whole. During the evac from Katrina, a hospital in New Orleans was evacuated with outside aid. The workers evacuating the hospital focused on readily transportable patients first, leaving the worst cases and least likely to survive for last, and ultimately, left some behind. The doctors and nurses complained about it on the news afterwords - they were trying to get everyone out, starting with the ones worst off. Not only were they wrong, their skewed priorities and cross-purposes with the workers very likely contributed to the number of patients who had to be left to die. They were idiots, putting emotion before reason in a survival situation.

Emotional? Damn right. it's me being HUMANE.

And mister stretcher bearer... I was a CORPSMAN. I know what it takes to save a life and save a ship or community. So don't try to preach to me about it. I've been there, Done that and got the crappy tee-shirt and little coin to prove it.

And you know what. I wouldn't want you in the project, and with how you're talking, you'd never have made the screening process.

I get that. I simply asked where do you draw the line? How much can you stash without blowing cover, and how much can you control after you wake up? "Hey, we don't know the lay of the land, don't know the players, but we got a bunch of food"
"Ok", says the local warlord "after I kill you, my troops will have enough food to support us for our next campaign". Rear-echelons staying in the 20th/21st centuries can ask these questions, model them, and make cold-blooded decisions the personnel waking up may be too involved to arrive at.

And you aren't getting how the field team would work... and not giving the field team any props for being able to do their damn job. once again, you're not showing ANY knowledge of how a field team would work, or how the Project operates.

The screening was massive to keep idiots and power-mad types out. And it took place over several years. At each level of the Project, starting from working at their cover agencies (Morrow Industries & its subsidiaries), into doing the labor of building Project assets, to actually learning what the project was when they started to get brought into Project itself after passing each of the lower levels of security and trust.

It's a good idea, I think we're haggling the details. Each cache and CIAB/FIAB/etc is less money and resources to apply towards teams to sleep into the future and do the rebuilding work, and that much more chance to blow the secret. You have to strike a balance.

And as I stated. that is the only down side to the entire project, and why i feel that the government was giving a blind eye to the entire thing. The supply caches are all about providing the field teams with everything they would need over a short-term when they cannot get access to the project's resources through resupply and the like.

Now, some other things to think about: How many species will die out? In addition to food, you probably would want mini-Svalbard-style seed vaults for important plants, maybe a Titan AE-style gene bank (in the 60's, it'd just be frozen animal ova and semen, towards the end it might get more sophisticated) with useful species. If gengineering gets good enough neo-mules like Buck (Time Enough For Love, Heinlein) might be developed. Neo-mules were intelligent, spoke somewhat intellibly, and bred true. Even if they aren't developed, I would put some pack and riding animals in cryo chambers (what survives freezing better? Zebras, ponies, camels?). They can replace their numbers without factories or spare parts. Maybe some dogs, too. Include the hardware to assemble a couple of Connestogas in any cache and in the CIAB for transporting the goods if necessary. Lower tech is more sustainable in a post-apocalyptic setting.

All that goes beyond the Field Team Supply Cache. The Project has these things called specialty teams (such as, i don't know.... the agricultural teams who are placed in a nice large base with all the species of animals and plants needed in hibernation).

Yes i was a little condescending there, on purpose. It doesn't feel good does it? You've piped into something you don't know about, and then act as if you know it all.

I was a combat corpsman and chemical-biological-Radiological warfare specialist when I was in the US Navy, so i know a little bit about what it means to triage wounded and prioritize things to get a job done.

it's why i came up with the CIAB idea.

It's the start of the project's long-term goals, and gives breathing room for a field team do get started doing that job of rebuilding when they do not have immediate access to the Project's resources.

The rest of your post has NOTHING to do with what we're talking about here. We're talking about a Supply Cache Idea. Not about Project members who refused to be frozen... or how you don't like Bruce being a time-traveler or what you'd do if you were a time traveler. That's something for a different thread. Not hijacking this one.

Now back on Target.

Tony does not think giving each field team a CIAB because it's a drain on resources, and I'm using real world experience to say it's not.

The Project is the biggest Prepper endeavor ever taken. It's not about disaster relief.. it's about reconstruction five years AFTER the fact. And to do this you have to take lessons learned from both disaster relief and from the Prepper community.

Preppers have to think of EVERYTHING they will need, and start putting them away for a later date.

I've talked with the Chris (owner) & Chris (head writer) at Timeline about having the Project being behind the people who wrote the essays and books that started the Prepper (not going to use the survivalist title, since to many people associate it with armed racist separatist groups) Movement, and they liked it since it made alot of sense. Especially since 9-11 with FEMA telling people all the time that they need to start prepping for possible emergencies (even though most people don't).

The work I've done with the Prepper Community has shown me, that the easiest and cheapest part of their Prepping... but at the same time, is the one that they have to take the greatest care in keeping from drawing attention. Each one has a different way to buy so much food to be placed into storage without it being noticed.

One would hit a different grocery store each month to get their bulk supplies, while doing normal shopping at a regular interval at the stores nearest to them. Another Prepper i worked with had memberships to each of the bulk stores in the surrounding communities and would shop at a different one every payday to get their bulk goods while continuing their regular shopping trips at their local grocery store to keep from anyone getting suspicious of them not doing any shopping.

Now the Project has a series of companies all across the country that allows them to create the stockpiles they need. Be it weapons, equipment, meds, clothing, ect.. They have the ability to get their hands on it.

They have 30+ years of time to prep for what is coming, the only thing they have to worry about is getting discovered. This is one of the reasons the psyche screening is so important. They aren't just looking for mental stability, they are also making sure that their personal integrity is above board...

The best way to describe it, would be the kind of anal probes you have to get to receive the Yankee White security clearance. And you're getting these probes ALL THE TIME with the Project, and you never even know you're getting them.

Morrow Industries has been described by some as a major Government Contractor, building facilities all over the country. And thus providing some cover for what they are doing on such a grand scale.

Kato came up with Morrow Industries owning a shipping company to provide cover for all the transportation of supplies around the country... and having MI owning several public storage companies to act as a cover for project facilities.

But what would the cover be in case someone accidentally stumbled across the emplacement of a bolthole or a supply cache? Well, it depends on what part of the subsidiaries of MI that is being used at that point in time.

If it's one of the Government Contractors... "We're setting up a remote site to monitor geothermal output" or "we're placing an automated monitoring site to measure earthquake activities" or what ever sounds official enough.

If it's one of the public storage or shipping companies... "We're setting up the subbasement for an environmentally controlled long-term data storage site."

That's what we should be focusing on... what story would be if someone stumbled on a construction crew putting a cache or bolthole or facility into place. Be it a story an a HUGE payment of 'hush money'... or the extreme of taking the trouble makers and putting them into hibernation.

Darkwing

01-29-2011, 12:54 PM

for those NPCs... we have the Phoenix Team to deal with unbalanced and warlord mentalities.
So when your buddy freaks out because he thought he could handle his new reality on waking up, you just have him shot? He may not be an asset in the field for a while, if ever, but that seems an extreme solution.

Good for you. Preppers who actually took the time to put supplies away didn't need that help. The Project planned in advance, so taking a page from the Preppers is important. Not just taking after-the-fact relief effort playbooks. That depended on how well your cache came through the storm.

Emotional? Damn right. it's me being HUMANE. I believe that being humane does not require clouding judgment with excess passion. Especially when thinking things out in advance, one can clearly examine the logic and find the best balance.

And mister stretcher bearer... I was a CORPSMAN. I know what it takes to save a life and save a ship or community. So don't try to preach to me about it. I've been there, Done that and got the crappy tee-shirt and little coin to prove it. I wasn't trying to preach, just saying some of the things I think should be considered, and what my personal experiences were that led me to think so. I've got a few t-shirts and coins of my own.

And you know what. I wouldn't want you in the project, and with how you're talking, you'd never have made the screening process.
Now you're getting personal. If you have military experience, you know some folks lose it when things happen, and others remain level-headed. Your screening process would try to find such people, not bleeding hearts.

And you aren't getting how the field team would work... and not giving the field team any props for being able to do their damn job. once again, you're not showing ANY knowledge of how a field team would work, or how the Project operates. What am I not getting? When you wake up, you see what's out there, what's going on, you figure out how to link up with other units, you find locals and make alliances, and do all this with a handful of people. Each task is not performed in a vacuum. You have so many man-hours, and so much work.

The screening was massive to keep idiots and power-mad types out. And it took place over several years. At each level of the Project, starting from working at their cover agencies (Morrow Industries & its subsidiaries), into doing the labor of building Project assets, to actually learning what the project was when they started to get brought into Project itself after passing each of the lower levels of security and trust.
Nothing's perfect.

And as I stated. that is the only down side to the entire project, and why i feel that the government was giving a blind eye to the entire thing. The supply caches are all about providing the field teams with everything they would need over a short-term when they cannot get access to the project's resources through resupply and the like.
Fine. I never argued against the caches; I said that you have to balance resources on hand with what resources can be stashed without revealing the fact that you are hiding something. Even if the US gov't is pretending ignorance, they can't control a reporter getting a whiff of it or Soviet spy-sats.

All that goes beyond the Field Team Supply Cache. The Project has these things called specialty teams (such as, i don't know.... the agricultural teams who are placed in a nice large base with all the species of animals and plants needed in hibernation). At least some live working animals should be in each bolthole. Your vehicle gets shot up soon after waking, what do you ride? Semis may not be available at your CIAB, especially if you haven't met up with the larger bases yet, so those connestogas are handy.

Yes i was a little condescending there, on purpose. It doesn't feel good does it? You've piped into something you don't know about, and then act as if you know it all. No. You mistook my tone, and jumped on your high horse over it. Growing up during the Cold War, I read a good amount of post-apocalyptic fiction, thought about it a fair amount back then. Sure, I'm new to this game, but having read a bit about it, I was sharing some of my thinking about how things be done. Everything I've read seems to show MP personnel having a lot of high tech gear in relation to their new world. That's failure to prepare well. I don't need to know it all to see that much.

I was a combat corpsman and chemical-biological-Radiological warfare specialist when I was in the US Navy, so i know a little bit about what it means to triage wounded and prioritize things to get a job done.

it's why i came up with the CIAB idea. [QUOTE] So take a step back, breathe, then think like a military medic planning for combat, not like a civilian planning for the weekend rash of accidents.

QUOTE]The rest of your post has NOTHING to do with what we're talking about here. re-read it and see how it relates.

We're talking about a Supply Cache Idea. Not about Project members who refused to be frozen...
Who would be useful in helping maintain that cache against discovery or disaster.

or how you don't like Bruce being a time-traveler or what you'd do if you were a time traveler. I mentioned that I prefer the lighter touch of Bruce being a precog as prelude to mentioning all the things he should have done if he were a time traveler that would ease the infrastructure burden of placing caches and bases and boltholes, which means more resources in hand and less work concealing the facts of what you're doing when the project officially starts.

That's something for a different thread. Not hijacking this one. I wasn't hijacking this thread.

Tony does not think giving each field team a CIAB because it's a drain on resources, and I'm using real world experience to say it's not. I agree that it's a good idea, I just am less optimistic about how much can realistically be stored, and how many caches can be emplaced without giving away that you are doing such a thing.

I've talked with the Chris (owner) & Chris (head writer) at Timeline about having the Project being behind the people who wrote the essays and books that started the Prepper (not going to use the survivalist title, since to many people associate it with armed racist separatist groups) Movement, and they liked it since it made alot of sense. Especially since 9-11 with FEMA telling people all the time that they need to start prepping for possible emergencies (even though most people don't).
I like that idea. Best book I've seen on that was the Bad Times Primer.

The work I've done with the Prepper Community has shown me, that the easiest and cheapest part of their Prepping... but at the same time, is the one that they have to take the greatest care in keeping from drawing attention. Each one has a different way to buy so much food to be placed into storage without it being noticed.
And that's part of my point. Each CIAB is a good idea, but the size and number can't be allowed to draw outside attention.

Now the Project has a series of companies all across the country that allows them to create the stockpiles they need. Be it weapons, equipment, meds, clothing, ect.. They have the ability to get their hands on it. And I don't argue that. What I argue is that building the site, filling it, and burying it is the vulnerable point for being noticed.

They have 30+ years of time to prep for what is coming, the only thing they have to worry about is getting discovered. This is one of the reasons the psyche screening is so important. They aren't just looking for mental stability, they are also making sure that their personal integrity is above board... As mentioned above, if Bruce really is a time traveler, then they have 30+ years for getting and stashing the goods, but they also could easily 60+ years for the whole thing because most of the construction would have been done 20-30 years before, and would also thus make it easier to avoid spysats as a discovery vector.

The best way to describe it, would be the kind of anal probes you have to get to receive the Yankee White security clearance. And you're getting these probes ALL THE TIME with the Project, and you never even know you're getting them. If you're looking for personal integrity, you can't screen for it without talking to them. Security clearances can be screened without a member's knowledge, but that limits it to secondhand information.

Morrow Industries has been described by some as a major Government Contractor, building facilities all over the country. And thus providing some cover for what they are doing on such a grand scale.

Kato came up with Morrow Industries owning a shipping company to provide cover for all the transportation of supplies around the country... and having MI owning several public storage companies to act as a cover for project facilities. All good ideas.

But what would the cover be in case someone accidentally stumbled across the emplacement of a bolthole or a supply cache? Well, it depends on what part of the subsidiaries of MI that is being used at that point in time.

If it's one of the Government Contractors... "We're setting up a remote site to monitor geothermal output" or "we're placing an automated monitoring site to measure earthquake activities" or what ever sounds official enough.

If it's one of the public storage or shipping companies... "We're setting up the subbasement for an environmentally controlled long-term data storage site."

That's what we should be focusing on... what story would be if someone stumbled on a construction crew putting a cache or bolthole or facility into place. Be it a story an a HUGE payment of 'hush money'... or the extreme of taking the trouble makers and putting them into hibernation. All of that makes sense, and I like the storytelling aspect of a bunch of temporal kidnapees being a PITA for the PCs, who didn't know about them until they woke up to find out one of their fellow teams is actually a bunch of old rednecks who were hushed up by freezing, not fellow project members.

But what about a reporter who sees and photographs a site being put in and gets away to file the story without being noticed till the newspaper comes out? What about GRU agents analyzing satellite surveillance?

natehale1971

01-29-2011, 06:01 PM

So when your buddy freaks out because he thought he could handle his new reality on waking up, you just have him shot? He may not be an asset in the field for a while, if ever, but that seems an extreme solution.

People who freak out would have been weeded out with the training. You are frozen and awoken as part of your training. They would have found those who would have hibernation sickness syndrome before they ever where sent into the field. Everything the project did was tried and tested before it was put into place.

That depended on how well your cache came through the storm.

shows how little you know about preppers. they always have more than one cache. the minimum that i've noticed among the real preppers has been three caches, and two Bug-Out Locations.

I believe that being humane does not require clouding judgment with excess passion. Especially when thinking things out in advance, one can clearly examine the logic and find the best balance.

do you really think i am clouding my judgment? Because i'm not. i'm thinking through this rationally and using my knowledge of Preparing and Emergency Relief to come up with the CIAB. It's not only logical, it gives the field team the flexibility to do what they are suppose to do.

I wasn't trying to preach, just saying some of the things I think should be considered, and what my personal experiences were that led me to think so. I've got a few t-shirts and coins of my own.

then realize that you're not the only one with experience. everyone has different experiences and training. mine was in several areas outside the norm, and it allowed me to think outside the box and focus on how to solve problems using any and all methods possible.

Now you're getting personal. If you have military experience, you know some folks lose it when things happen, and others remain level-headed. Your screening process would try to find such people, not bleeding hearts.

Bleeding Hearts? are you flipping daft?

Anyone who'd volunteer to be frozen and woken up after TEOTWAWKI with the goal of rebuilding the USA and helping people are going to give a damn about the individual. Anyone who does not, who'd say that one life lost while winning the end goal is okay, would not be allowed into the project.

because the individual is just as important as the whole.

I've never been called a bleeding heart. so this is a first.

What am I not getting? When you wake up, you see what's out there, what's going on, you figure out how to link up with other units, you find locals and make alliances, and do all this with a handful of people. Each task is not performed in a vacuum. You have so many man-hours, and so much work.

Let's see, how you worded it.. that a fieldteam goes up to some local warlord and gives up everything and gets killed... Get it?

Field teams would wake up, check out the area. spend time LOOKING at the area, studying it and finding out who needs the help, and how much help they need. That's what they do. They don't just walk up to a warlord and get themselves killed.

Fine. I never argued against the caches; I said that you have to balance resources on hand with what resources can be stashed without revealing the fact that you are hiding something. Even if the US gov't is pretending ignorance, they can't control a reporter getting a whiff of it or Soviet spy-sats.

as i said.. cover stories would been needed for all the work that the project is doing over the 30+ years they are putting things into play.

At least some live working animals should be in each bolthole. Your vehicle gets shot up soon after waking, what do you ride? Semis may not be available at your CIAB, especially if you haven't met up with the larger bases yet, so those connestogas are handy.

that would be pushing it. that goes beyond what a field team is going to be able to do. animals and spare vehicles are in other project facilities that are better capable of using and allotting their use.

No. You mistook my tone, and jumped on your high horse over it. Growing up during the Cold War, I read a good amount of post-apocalyptic fiction, thought about it a fair amount back then. Sure, I'm new to this game, but having read a bit about it, I was sharing some of my thinking about how things be done. Everything I've read seems to show MP personnel having a lot of high tech gear in relation to their new world. That's failure to prepare well. I don't need to know it all to see that much. [/qoute]

I grew up during the coldwar, and was trained to fight the cold war. My father was a grounds keeper at a resort in the mountains and watched as he set up all the infrastructure that made it completely self-sufficient.

[QUOTE] Who would be useful in helping maintain that cache against discovery or disaster.

are there people not frozen? yes. But they are frozen right before TEOTWAWKI and placed in support facilities. Only Prime Base was awake for TEOTWAWKI, and that became the reason why the project isn't waking up until 150 years post TEOTWAWKI.

As mentioned above, if Bruce really is a time traveler, then they have 30+ years for getting and stashing the goods, but they also could easily 60+ years for the whole thing because most of the construction would have been done 20-30 years before, and would also thus make it easier to avoid spysats as a discovery vector.

if you did grow up during the Cold War, you would know that it wasn't until the late 1950s and 1960s that people started to really believe that TEOTWAWKI could actually happen. that something horrible could be done to destroy a country.

We didnt have the weapons like the A-Bomb until post-1945. And even then the scope of what the atomic/nuclear (and biological) weapons could actually do.

For God's sake they had men and women standing out in the open watching nuclear tests.. Throwing Parties to watch them!

it wasn't until the late-1950s and early-1960s that all the players that would be needed for such a grand scale conspiracy comes into play. the new edition of The Morrow Project will be dealing with the groundwork that the time traveling Bruce E. Morrow set up for the project down the road.

That one of the key operators behind the Council For Tomorrow was Howard Hughes, through him Morrow was able to make the connections with the other industrialists and get the resources needed to set everything up.

Nothing happens in a vacuum, as you stated. The difference is, i am using knowledge of various fields to try and create a coherent whole.

The Supply Cache model that i came up with was something that would hold all the kind of gear that the books say a cache would have in them. And introduced the CIAB as one of the six supply caches that each field team would be assigned to give the team the flexibility they'd need.

Not EVERY team would have a CIAB, but the field teams (SCIENCE, RECON and MARS) would have them. The Specialty teams would have resources to build something more intense because they would have direct access to the full resources of the Project, and would have direct resupply routes...

But Field teams would be operating on their own, without direct support for extended periods of time. Thus the three month food supply. That would either provide the breathing room for resupply from the Project Supply chain or for the first crops that would come from the 'greenhouses' and fields that would be set up in and around the CAIB site.

If you're looking for personal integrity, you can't screen for it without talking to them. Security clearances can be screened without a member's knowledge, but that limits it to secondhand information.

Wrong. The government does this to it's personnel in sensitive areas ALL THE TIME. Half of the guys i hung out with while i was in the service with had some massive security clearances. One of them told me that i had been given a Top Secret clearance since i passed the background checks that were ran on me because of the people i had made friends with (once of which was a Flag Officer who shared my love of Opera).

But what about a reporter who sees and photographs a site being put in and gets away to file the story without being noticed till the newspaper comes out? What about GRU agents analyzing satellite surveillance?

that's why i said a cover story would be needed for the project's assets being set up. Back in the time period the project was getting set up, satellite coverage was not what it is today.

robj3

01-30-2011, 07:38 PM

Tony Stroppa wrote:
If I am mistaken, please clarify!

I'll give it a go.

If we arbitrarily set the number of regions in the USA at ten, then one per region or equivalent area in the USA. Ten such caches (9x containers) nationally is better than nothing, but not a significant drain on Project resources.

That's a bit on the small side unless your Project is very small indeed.
Think bigger, Tony.

U.S. corn production is on the order of 10,000 million bushels (254 million tonnes) per year. It's been like that for almost forty years.

http://www.ers.usda.gov/data/feedgrains/Table.asp?t=01

Diverting a hundred thousand tonnes a year (~0.04%) from this production flow would cost US$20 million a year in current prices. That provides enough grain for over 3,500 containers at 28,000kg per container. At nine containers per team, that's almost 400 (~388) teams supplied per year.

By "modern" I mean industrialised agriculture that provides increased individual productivity along the scale of the 1st world, per your point above.

OK, it's hard to escape the need for tractors and combines then.
I think we should avoid feedlots, battery farms and high-density pig farms though. There are better ways to produce meat.

In your response to Richard:
Project resources may be vast but they shouldn't be practically unlimited (if we want to keep this within the bounds of reality).

See above. The cost is modest. I think we had a discussion on one of the Yahoogroups about how big the Project could be - and given the size of the U.S. economy during the second half of the last century (4-10+ trillion of dollars per year using current prices), it can be very large indeed.

A multi-billion dollar (in current dollar terms) annual budget would be noise in the system ; corporate profits exceed a trillion dollars a year, let alone the activity of the rest of the economy.

Therefore, short term aid is acceptable as long as it's not a drain on the resources that are available for reconstruction.

I've just demonstrated that for low percentages of the resources likely to be available to the Council of Tomorrow we can provide a large quantity of grain.

I agree with Richard.

Cpl. Kalkwarf wrote:
Actually you would want to protect the containers before covering them with dirt.

I agree with sheathing metal with concrete. It provides corrosion resistance as well as protection from ground shock.

One such idea would be a specially designed lightweight concrete that with a large hammer or other object could be used to break it away for the critical area.

This is a good idea.

All in all Caches will be a tricky part of the project.

Yep. In terms of general construction, I'm thinking along the lines of the launch control centres used for ICBMs, as well as extensive standardisation (e.g. Minuteman silos).

Avoid the water table, use impermeant rock formations where possible.

Darkwing wrote:
There's a finite amount of space that can be hidden without giving the secret away by the work required to hide it.

This is the big problem - or is it?
It depends on how big you think the Project needs to be. Over the years people have used small (a few thousand field personnel) to very large (over 100,000) in their games.

With regard to construction, the United States is a large country and there's lots of building going on. Covering up from prying eyes (Soviet or other foreign intelligence services, nosy investigative journalists) is going to be hard work - but it is doable (e.g. the B2 bomber and stealth aircraft, much of the nuclear weapons production effort). We know this from the development of the 'security state' following WW2.

Now, some other things to think about: How many species will die out?

That depends on how the world ends. I don't think the Project would plan for a Permian level mass extinction scenario (96% marine species, 70% of terrestrial vertebrates, for an overall loss of ~60% of all families).

Seed and animal banks that you go on to describe are area or regional level assets, as Richard has pointed out.

I don't have an objection to small animals being frozen with the teams, but horses and the like are probably more trouble than they are worth (Project members have enough to learn without developing equestrian and large animal vet skills).

Darkwing

01-30-2011, 08:24 PM

People who freak out would have been weeded out with the training. You are frozen and awoken as part of your training. They would have found those who would have hibernation sickness syndrome before they ever where sent into the field. Everything the project did was tried and tested before it was put into place.

No screening is perfect. You're making overly optimistic assumptions.

shows how little you know about preppers. they always have more than one cache. the minimum that i've noticed among the real preppers has been three caches, and two Bug-Out Locations.

Shows that I assume that something will always go wrong.

do you really think i am clouding my judgment? Because i'm not. i'm thinking through this rationally and using my knowledge of Preparing and Emergency Relief to come up with the CIAB. It's not only logical, it gives the field team the flexibility to do what they are suppose to do.

The concept is sound. Where I think you're clouding your judgment is taking questions of details as hostile criticism of the base concept.

then realize that you're not the only one with experience. everyone has different experiences and training. mine was in several areas outside the norm, and it allowed me to think outside the box and focus on how to solve problems using any and all methods possible.

Never claimed to to be the only knowledgeable person, and I have also led an uncommon life that has taught me to live outside the box as well.

Bleeding Hearts? are you flipping daft?

Anyone who'd volunteer to be frozen and woken up after TEOTWAWKI with the goal of rebuilding the USA and helping people are going to give a damn about the individual. Anyone who does not, who'd say that one life lost while winning the end goal is okay, would not be allowed into the project.
They certainly would. The individual is important, but the mission comes first, and if you aren't willing to make sacrifices, you cannot succeed. Life is not black and white. The end can on some occasions justify the means, but since most people don't have a moral compass capable of ethically wending their way through that, most folks deny that.

because the individual is just as important as the whole.
Yes and no. In a pragmatic sense, there are times when the individual must take back seat to the whole, especially in survival situations.

I've never been called a bleeding heart. so this is a first.
I didn't call you a bleeding heart, I said that the project cannot want them in their teams.

Let's see, how you worded it.. that a fieldteam goes up to some local warlord and gives up everything and gets killed... Get it?

Field teams would wake up, check out the area. spend time LOOKING at the area, studying it and finding out who needs the help, and how much help they need. That's what they do. They don't just walk up to a warlord and get themselves killed.

And of course, the local warlord announces his intentions and makes public demonstrations so any recon team has advance warning that he's a bad guy.
Real life is muddier than that.

as i said.. cover stories would been needed for all the work that the project is doing over the 30+ years they are putting things into play. Any cover story gets thin after a while - Roswell?

that would be pushing it. that goes beyond what a field team is going to be able to do. animals and spare vehicles are in other project facilities that are better capable of using and allotting their use.
So how are you getting that food from your CIAB out? What's your transportation when your vehicle gets trashed?

if you did grow up during the Cold War, you would know that it wasn't until the late 1950s and 1960s that people started to really believe that TEOTWAWKI could actually happen. that something horrible could be done to destroy a country. non sequitur. WPA and CCC wouldn't know anything about the real purpose of their projects.

it wasn't until the late-1950s and early-1960s that all the players that would be needed for such a grand scale conspiracy comes into play.
the new edition of The Morrow Project will be dealing with the groundwork that the time traveling Bruce E. Morrow set up for the project down the road.

That's when I figured the official project begins, too, but since I have not yet seen any mention of such groundwork, I thought it should be brought up.

That one of the key operators behind the Council For Tomorrow was Howard Hughes, through him Morrow was able to make the connections with the other industrialists and get the resources needed to set everything up. I like that idea.

Nothing happens in a vacuum, as you stated. The difference is, i am using knowledge of various fields to try and create a coherent whole. I don't see a difference there.

Wrong. The government does this to it's personnel in sensitive areas ALL THE TIME. Half of the guys i hung out with while i was in the service with had some massive security clearances. One of them told me that i had been given a Top Secret clearance since i passed the background checks that were ran on me because of the people i had made friends with (once of which was a Flag Officer who shared my love of Opera).
I always knew the status of my clearance - but for checking on stability and integrity, the second- and third-hand methods don't work well enough.

that's why i said a cover story would be needed for the project's assets being set up. Back in the time period the project was getting set up, satellite coverage was not what it is today.

Cover stories are fine, as long as they're not overused. But the more you can do to avoid even having to use them, the better.

Darkwing

01-30-2011, 08:42 PM

OK, it's hard to escape the need for tractors and combines then.
I think we should avoid feedlots, battery farms and high-density pig farms though. There are better ways to produce meat.
You may not have much choice in methodology, depending on what the locals have been doing, and what their building capabilities are.

A multi-billion dollar (in current dollar terms) annual budget would be noise in the system ; corporate profits exceed a trillion dollars a year, let alone the activity of the rest of the economy.
Still more than enough for bean-counters to sniff out money being diverted

This is the big problem - or is it?
It depends on how big you think the Project needs to be. Over the years people have used small (a few thousand field personnel) to very large (over 100,000) in their games. I'd say 10,000 is a bare minimum to be prepared to rebuild if you're trying to cover the whole country.

With regard to construction, the United States is a large country and there's lots of building going on. Covering up from prying eyes (Soviet or other foreign intelligence services, nosy investigative journalists) is going to be hard work - but it is doable (e.g. the B2 bomber and stealth aircraft, much of the nuclear weapons production effort). We know this from the development of the 'security state' following WW2.

It is a problem, though, which can delay and raise costs of projects. Delay is bad throughout the project, the more so the closer to TEOTWAWKI. Money is less of a problem in the last few years or months - who cares of the project goes bankrupt 24 hours before the event?

That depends on how the world ends. I don't think the Project would plan for a Permian level mass extinction scenario (96% marine species, 70% of terrestrial vertebrates, for an overall loss of ~60% of all families).
I'm NOT thinking mass extinction either - but specific food and drug plants might get blighted or something else in the chain does and the domino effect takes out a staple. If you wake up and find that the local area has lost something like that, having a small supply of such seeds would help restart agriculture until the regional base can be contacted for larger issuances.

Seed and animal banks that you go on to describe are area or regional level assets, as Richard has pointed out.
So they are in the plan, then?

I don't have an objection to small animals being frozen with the teams, but horses and the like are probably more trouble than they are worth (Project members have enough to learn without developing equestrian and large animal vet skills).
They would definitely need to have those skills in a post-apocalyptic world. Cars won't exist, except for what you brought with you, and there haven't been road crews repairing the highways since the event.

dragoon500ly

01-31-2011, 05:52 AM

Welcome to the Morrow Project Darkwing, I'll try to answer your questions, at least from my point of view.

Still more than enough for bean-counters to sniff out money being diverted
In order for the Council of Tommorrow to pull off the Project, there would have to be a some sort of process to divert funds...Howard Hughes pulling billions out to fund his various personnel projects would be one example. Funds diverted into research projects, DoD-classified projects, etc. There would be a way to get around the bean-counters.

I'd say 10,000 is a bare minimum to be prepared to rebuild if you're trying to cover the whole country.
I generally go for a Project numbering 30-40,000. I also start with a 1949 start date for the Project and a war date sometime in 2001. My point is that the CoT would have started research into power and cryo systems and that this would have taken about 10 years to perfect, it allows you roughly 40 years of recruitment, training and building.

I'm NOT thinking mass extinction either - but specific food and drug plants might get blighted or something else in the chain does and the domino effect takes out a staple. If you wake up and find that the local area has lost something like that, having a small supply of such seeds would help restart agriculture until the regional base can be contacted for larger issuances.
Even from the earliest days of Timeline, every cache has always included bags of seeds. The need is not debated, the only questions is quantity and how large an impact a few bags can have. This would be the mission of the Specialty teams who would have larger caches of ag machinery, seeds, fertilizers, frozen animals. Something like a Recon Team, this really would be beyond what their mission requires.

They would definitely need to have those skills in a post-apocalyptic world. Cars won't exist, except for what you brought with you, and there haven't been road crews repairing the highways since the event.
No arguement here! Until people have really tried to bring a vehicle into an area where vehicles have never been, they are simply clueless as to how difficult it is to move through terrain. Military-grade vehicles are better suited overall since they are designed to work in this type of environment. You will see arguements about being non-threatening and using SUVs....I have to laugh because I have seen the results of people trying to use these top-heavy pos in wilderness areas...it isn't pretty.

Darkwing

02-01-2011, 05:45 PM

In order for the Council of Tommorrow to pull off the Project, there would have to be a some sort of process to di vert funds...Howard Hughes pulling billions out to fund his various personnel projects would be one example. Funds diverted into research projects, DoD-classified projects, etc. There would be a way to get around the bean-counters. I just think it's a factor to consider when deciding how and why things are done, and just how much can be done.

I generally go for a Project numbering 30-40,000. I also start with a 1949 start date for the Project and a war date sometime in 2001. My point is that the CoT would have started research into power and cryo systems and that this would have taken about 10 years to perfect, it allows you roughly 40 years of recruitment, training and building. 10 years is wildly optimistic. How long have we worked on SDI-scale lasers, fusion, cold-fusion, et al?

No arguement here! Until people have really tried to bring a vehicle into an area where vehicles have never been, they are simply clueless as to how difficult it is to move through terrain. Military-grade vehicles are better suited overall since they are designed to work in this type of environment. You will see arguements about being non-threatening and using SUVs....I have to laugh because I have seen the results of people trying to use these top-heavy pos in wilderness areas...it isn't pretty.
I grew up in Colorado, and whenever it snows, the 4WDs and SUVs were the first to spin out. And I took an old 2WD pickup with granny gear many places jeeps wouldn't go.

Thanks for the welcome!

dragoon500ly

02-02-2011, 05:33 AM

10 years is wildly optimistic. How long have we worked on SDI-scale lasers, fusion, cold-fusion, et al?

All to true, but since this is a SciFi game.... ;) One of the things I've noticed about some of the great scientists, is the sheer amount of work that they never publish, now a lot of this is theories that never panned out, good ideas, bad ideas, and flat out things that man must never know. Just what was Einstein working on the last ten years of his life? Why was the US Government so careful in gathering up all of Telsa's unpublished material? You get the idea.

I grew up in Colorado, and whenever it snows, the 4WDs and SUVs were the first to spin out. And I took an old 2WD pickup with granny gear many places jeeps wouldn't go.

Tell me about it...my favorite is the "ahem" "expert" who took his SUV into a local swamp for some 'mud-dogging' and wound up sunk up to the bottoms of his windows. He just couldn't understand why his SUV couldn't drive out..."Its got four wheel drive!"

robj3

02-06-2011, 08:18 PM

Darkwing wrote:
In response to:
I think we should avoid feedlots, battery farms and high-density pig farms though. There are better ways to produce meat.

You may not have much choice in methodology, depending on what the locals have been doing, and what their building capabilities are.

If the local's food system is that well developed that they can run feedlots, battery farms and modern high density pig farms they don't need Project assistance. These forms of intensive farming require lots of externally sourced inputs (e.g. feed, growth promoters, antibiotics, waste management) which imply a well developed economy.

On budgetary issues:
Still more than enough for bean-counters to sniff out money being diverted

Counter-examples:
Enron. WorldCorp. The recent GFC.
The Pentagon/DOD complex is infamous for shoddy accounting.

In any case we're talking about extremely small diversions of flow - cents in the tens of dollars in my example. Noise in the system.

Yes, the project isn't possible with omniscient auditors, spies and investigative journalists. Evidence suggests they are in short supply.

So how big is the Project?
I'd say 10,000 is a bare minimum to be prepared to rebuild if you're trying to cover the whole country.

I agree; I was merely reporting the range I have seen over the years.

On concealing project efforts:
It is a problem, though, which can delay and raise costs of projects.

I've never said that it wasn't a problem. You seemed to be arguing that it was an insurmountable problem.

If you wake up and find that the local area has lost something like that, having a small supply of such seeds would help restart agriculture until the regional base can be contacted for larger issuances.

While I've been on the thread I've argued for an emergency food supply. A seed supply seemed so obvious I didn't explicitly mention it. Mea culpa.

On seed/animal banks:
So they are in the plan, then?

They have to be, however the only canonical description of an Agricultural team is in the module 'Fall Back'. It is a regional level asset.

Note that in reality, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has a facility at Fort Collins, Colorado that is the national seed bank:

http://www.ars.usda.gov/main/site_main.htm?modecode=54-02-05-00

On the need for equestrian and veterinary expertise:
They would definitely need to have those skills in a post-apocalyptic world. Cars won't exist, except for what you brought with you, and there haven't been road crews repairing the highways since the event.

Some personnel, not all. There's a limit to training time, but no limit to the size of the potential curriculum.

Project issue vehicles are largely military AFVs which have proven off-road capability.

I largely agree with dragoon500ly's remarks.

On the Project's extraordinary hardware:
10 years is wildly optimistic. How long have we worked on SDI-scale lasers, fusion, cold-fusion, et al?

In the published material, Bruce Morrow provides a helping hand. Whether this comes from the future, a parallel timeline or Alien Space Bats isn't clear.

Agreed, cryogenic suspension with successful revival and vehicle sized fusion plants are going to require many profound advances in knowledge.

For the sake of the story, the divergence point is that these enabling technologies are successfully developed - otherwise there is no Morrow Project.

WallShadow

02-25-2011, 08:36 PM

On the topic of seeds, I could see where high-yield hybrids might seem desirable, but on the long-view side, heritage species would be more likely to be more renewable after the first couple of growing seasons/generations.

Again, depending on the state of civilization/population base in the team's area of operation, focusing on intensive rotated integrated-crop farmsteading, including a family pig and/or goat/sheep/cow if available, might provide the simplest, most defensible food production arrangement. Especially if you have nearby neighbors who are willing to come to help you if raiders are attacking, as long as it's understood you'll return the favor. There might be a common central field for grain production, with the farmsteads on the perimeter. This would help build a sense of community and civic duty, if the current civilization is one radish away from collapsing into anarchy and starvation.

whassupman03

03-09-2011, 09:50 PM

Hello...

Hey, it's me. I haven't posted for a while, but I thought of something interesting that came from my bookmarks. All of you were talking about how much food to store in the supply cache, and I believe you mentioned using ISO containers, so I pulled up this archived website:

http://web.archive.org/web/20080126093631/http://personals.galaxyinternet.net/tunga/i3.htm

This website detailed a simple plan that could save around 800 people from a comet impact a la the movie Deep Impact, with materials and supplies you can easily find on the present-day, real-life open market. It could be prepared in less than three months (I think), and would be able to not only save them, but sustain them long enough to rebuild. Please note that the website in this archive is not complete, but most of the vital material is there.

According to the website, to feed 800 people for three years you would need one ton of grain for each person, such as from corn and soybeans (Which can be replaced with rice). This can fit in 18 40' ISO containers, holding 800 tons of grain altogether. Of course to supplement this you would add canned vegetables and meats (Which were home canned in the plan), as well as 12 gallons a head of cooking oil (9,600 gallons for 800 people). Also added would be roots and edible tubers, such as potatoes, carrots, etc, as well as powdered milk, salt, and canned fruits. While I haven't done the math for exactly how much of these supplemental foods would be needed per person for three years, I do know that all you would need to do is add some more containers, which were included by the creators of this plan (See the map of the shelter site - it's at http://web.archive.org/web/20060112174153/personals.galaxyinternet.net/tunga/F2.jpg.

One more thing - when they made this plan, they proposed using a 20' ISO container to store 8 tons of wheat seeds and 8 tons of soybeans (Which would be non-hybrids, and would yield 240 tons of wheat and 270 tons of soybeans). I would think that when they said that smaller quantities of other seeds would be added, such as for fruits and vegetables, they could be stored in at least one more 20' container. While I think that they should have included more (In my opinion), they planned for two pairs of chickens and two pairs of rabbits to provide a little more nutrition as well as pelts and feathers when it is time to begin growing food.

So pretty easily, you could extrapolate this to meet your 3,000-person refugee camp. That's just my two cents.

whassupman03

Gelrir

04-23-2011, 02:59 AM

I also haven't posted much. I ran a MP campaign in the 80s (as a review for a game magazine, originally), and the whole "why didn't they try to stop the war, why wait 5 years, what did Bruce Morrow really know" package bugged the players ... and the characters.

A lot of discussions like the ones on this thread were no doubt had by planners within the MP; given 20-30 years of work, they may have had changes in policy, differences of opinion, etc. Maybe even conspiracies! Heh, if you can hide a massive industrial scheme from the government, you can hide a piece of it from itself.

"I don't agree with the Council; I'm gonna make sure that in my district, there are some large amounts of food supplies stashed away for the survivors!"

The 'camp in a box' idea sounds very appropriate for *some* form of the Project, at some period. My campaign didn't feature the MP as being quite such a gigantic scheme as to divert 2% of grain production, though. But I think the main issue with several of these concepts is the "what were the planners planning for?"

For any number of reasons in canon, it's "wake up 3 to 5 years after the war (or whatever event". But the actual snooze period turns out to be 150 years. I'm pretty sure that buried ISO containers full of food, etc. are probably not gonna be in usable condition in 150 years. How rust-resistant are they?

On a related topic: I've heard of miles-long sets of railway container flats stored on unused sidings in some Western states lately; and this news story:

http://readingeagle.com/article.aspx?id=234087

The durability of MP caches and bolt-holes is sort of a requirement for the game to proceed at all; but there's no reason at all to presume that every other cache, supply, stash, base, etc. was laid down ready for a 150 year delay.

"You manage to pry open the rusty steel cover, and peer down the concrete steps. The air smells ... off, and you decide to let it ventilate for a couple of hours. Proceeding inside, you enter the underground space; the concrete is very thick but crudely finished. There are rusty water stains up to shoulder height on the walls, and a few dangling remains of light fixtures on the ceilings. Some cracks in the concrete walls and ceiling have wept long strings of cement and dirt from outside. As you proceed around the hexagonal passage, the corroded end doors of formerly-sealed containers are on your left hand. All of them are completely rusted out at the bottom; a layer of mold, bits of cardboard, deteriorated plastic, rust flakes, and broken glass covers the floor for 20 cm or so. Prying open one of the doors, you see what was once an ISO box container packed with MREs - now reduced to a dry, mildew-smelling compost about waist-deep. Do you want to look in more containers?"

The bigger the stash, the more likely that it will have been found, or degraded environmentally. Still, nice to lure your bunkering Recon team out to a remote site and the usual fun with the locals.

So: camp-in-a-box may well have existed, but doesn't mean you have to make up a 200 page spreadsheet listing all the contents.