Late nights, ports shifting around

Working on clearing out all of the communications lanes in the Rimward sectors.

Moving the larger starports.

Once I get a feel for what is what, I will straighten out the jump connection lanes for a layout that seems to make sense, given the setting.

Lots of minor detail work with numbers today. Tiring after a long week.

More work on the old routes to Rimward

I thought a lot about this last night, as I was going to sleep.

The Varala Drift seems like an area that is an unexplored frontier, yet surrounded by systems to Rimward that have multiple settled colonies and major worlds?

How could this be?

So I came to the idea that in the initial push to the Rim, worlds that were prime colonization sites, clean atmosphere, water, etc, got larger populations, and huge starports. Other worlds had native populations.

I have the idea that those non-human worlds that invented their own interstellar travel technology pushed out from their own homeworlds, settling those stars around their origin worlds.

I am reworking my maps with that alien expansion in mind.

Subsector C - The Lor Worlds

The Lor worlds will be the Main Corridor to the Varala Drift.

Looking at the Subsector map, the random generation has led to major communications routes in the lines Rimward of the frontier.

I take a visual survey of the map, and move and shift a lot of the larger port worlds to Coreward, with an eye to having communication route to most worlds at the edge of the Republic with some backwater areas.... and Rimward of the Republic border, a side route to the old major port of Basa Haula, in the Varala Drift. But major shipping lines into the area stop at Varala. 

I think about having a polity that still retains the flavor in name and culture, Coreward of Basa Haula.  So that takes more shifts and changes.

Moving things around, making sure it all seems like it is fits the setting.

Continuing Development, Step-by-step D'Zuli's World is a Flagstone.

I arranged data for all the worlds of the Aurin Cluster into their Subsector data.   From there, arranging the Jump routes continues.

I had my morning instant coffee, and a banana for breakfast, with a small bag of peanuts. It makes me wonder, what kind of food would an alien writer on another world have for breakfast?

1. It all starts in Subsector D, to Coreward and Trailing of the Aurin Cluster, at the edge of the Orion Republic, (the large off-screen, off-map polity).

We are now looking at the beginning of the active settlement of the Ree Expanse Subsector.  A stellar gap is here, somewhere, difficult to cross without very advanced Drive technology.

This World, D'Zuli's World, becomes the entrance to the Aurin Cluster from the "Dorai Crossing" Sector, on an average Agroworld Starport, administered by House Tubatiir, where Body pistols are permitted, as is travel on the world, but Starship landings are only permitted at the Gole Starport, or Hendu Spaceport. 

High Tech level items are prohibited, but items up to Basic Interstellar are allowed (and desired).

Notable features of the world include:
The Shattered Plains, to the east of the Downport
The Trading market at the abandoned Bani Industrial Complex at the crumbling (but still usable) Hendu Spaceport
The Downport at the Crystalline City of Gole
The Aetherium Mines
The Wreckage of the Starship Adrego
The Airship Port at Darenga Station, for local on-world travel. There are not a lot of people here, most of the world is wilderness / unsettled.

I begin to imagine these named places in my mind.

"D'Zuli's World" is a Trading Hub. Not large, but well connected.

It will seek potential interstellar Trade connections with:
Agricultural, Garden, Hi Tech, High Population, Industrial, Rich, and Water Worlds.

So, in summary, a decent jumping-off point for further exploration, as civilization moves Spinward, and Rimward.

Ree Expanse - 1st Draft Map, finally

I have finally finished recalculating populations, Tech Levels, Trade codes, and Bases for the Ree Expanse.

Port Classes are nearly directly based on Population.

The worlds are now very different. I took a long stroll through the names to make them evocative. No real method, just some sounded "like what they should be, or I imagined them to be in print."

Many hours later, the Trade routes of the Ree Expanse are complete. A fun time, but painstaking. Almost all are connected, and interlinked.

This is the final first draft map:

Ree Expanse - Draft Map, 19 June 2019

Ree Space starts at 3006, "A'Rie".
Coreward of that is Republic Space.
I plan to do more detail in a few days, adding a lot of depth to the Subsector.

Subsectors, and the Initial Setup

I've broken out all the data produced into individual subsectors, and now arranging the pathways and trade routes to establish the initial colonies and alien homeworlds in the Aurin Cluster, from the days of the initial exploration of the Republic.

Homeworlds that do not have advanced technology will be along the routes of expansion, but not directly hubs of transit and trade.

I am trying as hard as I can to make this an organic approach to establishing the setting, so that over time, the colonies that develop in the setting's backstory as the Republic expands, make sense as to place, and time.

Hot Coffee, Banana Muffin, and Tedium

I got all the modifications for Space Opera Variations done for the Atmospheres.

Now working on how this affects the Hydrographics of each world, taking into account that small worlds have less gravity, Thinner atmospheres retain less water, and Temperature, especially hotter temperatures, causes evaporation from the surface.

Lots of calculations, but I am getting through it. I think this is the actual strength of a world builder, endurance, research, and making sure all of this is plausible.

Going through the list of Worlds, I discovered some minor mistakes I had made. Small asteroids that mistakenly had a trace atmosphere.

Moderately sized worlds, for example, like Mars, that mistakenly had a dense atmosphere.

So just looking at hundreds of numbers, step by step. Very difficult to focus like this for some people.

Each string of digits, I imagine the world that represents, and think, "This is wonderful. All these worlds."  
:)