Why do people live on Ceres Tarn (HR 1185 A 4)?

Louis Calvert

Louis Calvert
The station there looks normal but the planet is a 4g world. Being as there's an Imperial carrier in orbit maybe there's something we don't know about that planet?

There's no artificial gravity in Elite, so those people on that base are living and working in a 4g environment all the time. I'm assuming there's all sorts of special equipment like mobility suits and meds to allow them to function.

But given that there are other planets in that system, it leads me to conclude that there must be a good reason the Imperials felt it was important to not only park a carrier in orbit but also make a planetary base.
 

damon8r351

damon8r351
My thoughts: Ceres Tarn has an Extraction based economy and HR 1185 A 4 is a high metal content world, so exploitable resources is probable a pretty powerful motivation. I haven't looked at the temperature stats of the system, but if I were to wager a guess, that planet might have the least inhospitable climate of the high metal worlds in the system, so that could be another reason. And gravity conditions might not be that huge a problem to deal with on a person level in the Elite universe. As for The Indra, it was explained in a Galnet article that it is the centerpiece of the Imperial fleet's presence in the Pleiades. The Indra might be in place in orbit to help stabilize Ceres Tarn, and if you haven't noticed the Empire doesn't seem to have as firm a toehold in the Pleiades as the Federation does, so HR 1185 might be as close as the Empire feels safe to commit without disrupting the Federal fleet in Merope. So they might have their forces consolidated until they feel they can make further inroads into the Pleiades.
 

Louis Calvert

Louis Calvert
damon8r351 said:
My thoughts: Ceres Tarn has an Extraction based economy and HR 1185 A 4 is a high metal content world, so exploitable resources is probable a pretty powerful motivation. I haven't looked at the temperature stats of the system, but if I were to wager a guess, that planet might have the least inhospitable climate of the high metal worlds in the system, so that could be another reason. And gravity conditions might not be that huge a problem to deal with on a person level in the Elite universe. As for The Indra, it was explained in a Galnet article that it is the centerpiece of the Imperial fleet's presence in the Pleiades. The Indra might be in place in orbit to help stabilize Ceres Tarn, and if you haven't noticed the Empire doesn't seem to have as firm a toehold in the Pleiades as the Federation does, so HR 1185 might be as close as the Empire feels safe to commit without disrupting the Federal fleet in Merope. So they might have their forces consolidated until they feel they can make further inroads into the Pleiades.
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Interesting! You'd think the horrible drawback of liking an working in 4gs would offset all but the most desperate operation though.

OnTheMinute said:
Maybe that's where their Olympic athletes train? Like a Saiyan
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That's a ways to go for training, but it's as good an explanation as any!
 

damon8r351

damon8r351
Moribus said:
Interesting! You'd think the horrible drawback of liking an working in 4gs would offset all but the most desperate operation though.
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Well, as I said, maybe counteracting g's on a high-grav world isn't that big a quality of life issue in the Elite universe. For instance, I was reading a sci fi novel where soldiers wear powered armor in battle. The main character, a woman, wears a suit that only increases her height to 6 feet tall and adds maybe 150 pounds to her weight. She makes some comments about how she's used it to rip a cargo door off a dropship, and you do see her use it to throw a 200 pound man wearing his own armor around a cargo bay. But then she makes a comment that most of the time she has the powered assistance turned off while she's walking around in it, because having actual muscles is helpful when you need to toss the armor in its case into an overhead locker.

So my thought is that the gravity is an oversight by the developers, but to make it work in my head, I explain it to myself that personnel on Ceres Tarn are wearing some sort of powered suits like in the novel I read, that assist in counteracting the effects of the gravity on the body. They could also limit the population to people who are already "heavy-worlders", so they have previous experience living in high-grav situations like 1.60g's, it's just that the suit gives them that extra push to be able to work.
 

Louis Calvert

Louis Calvert
damon8r351 said:
Well, as I said, maybe counteracting g's on a high-grav world isn't that big a quality of life issue in the Elite universe. For instance, I was reading a sci fi novel where soldiers wear powered armor in battle. The main character, a woman, wears a suit that only increases her height to 6 feet tall and adds maybe 150 pounds to her weight. She makes some comments about how she's used it to rip a cargo door off a dropship, and you do see her use it to throw a 200 pound man wearing his own armor around a cargo bay. But then she makes a comment that most of the time she has the powered assistance turned off while she's walking around in it, because having actual muscles is helpful when you need to toss the armor in its case into an overhead locker.

So my thought is that the gravity is an oversight by the developers, but to make it work in my head, I explain it to myself that personnel on Ceres Tarn are wearing some sort of powered suits like in the novel I read, that assist in counteracting the effects of the gravity on the body. They could also limit the population to people who are already "heavy-worlders", so they have previous experience living in high-grav situations like 1.60g's, it's just that the suit gives them that extra push to be able to work.
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That makes sense for movement definitely, but at 4g for prolonged periods your internal organs struggle, your heart struggles to pump blood to your head if you stand up, fluids pool in places, your digestive system struggles, your lungs struggle to inflate properly, your whole body is under stress and it leads to embolisms, strokes and similar things. While a suit of some sort (like the pilots RemLok we all wear) is to some degree an advanced g-suit it doesn't address any long-term organ issues (and by that I mean after just hours at 4g it would be bad for you, let alone living there for a prolonged period).

Genetic modification is a possibility, but I've read nothing about that type of extensive engineering in the Elite universe.

Siobhan said:
It's only iSlaves that work in 4g.Imps don't care about them.
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Lol true, maybe there's a horribly short lifespan there.
 
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