Colonies On A Needle's Head Among The Clouds - - The Oort Cloud & The Hostile Rpg - Campaign Setting Update

 A while back, I talked about using the Oort Cloud section of our outer solar system as an exploitable resource for the Hostile rpg. A place of ship sized asteriods & comet points just outside of Neptune on the blog here. 

The Orrt Cloud would be the perfect point for a starship building yard and it could potentially be the point to drop off some alien ruins onto it. And it this place would be a dynamic zone for both explorers and miners in the Hostile universe. And while the majority of the 2 million dollar bonus for any concrete information leading to any evidence for alien life forms would be bunk from the corportations.The drive for getting that bonus would be the continued expansion into the the Kuiper belt, for the establishment of facilities for faster processing of materials and starship manufacturing. 
The very nature of the beltways are going to be a source of frustration and expansion of mankind into the belt. The lure of the belt would be a 'moth to flame' for the corporations. Easily accessible resources and the potential for exploitable employment of those resources. The bonus for explorers stands at thirty thousand credits for new claims on resources. Gettting to spend it is another matter entirely. 

Would the combination though turn out to be deadly for those exploring and cataloging the mountain sized spinning points of death? 
To a certain extent the answer is yes. The very nature of the Rpg Hostile makes this a certainity. And this also would drive forward the point of establishing colonies among the worlds of the Oort Cloud. 

The gold rush of the Oort Cloud is the fact that comets and the like are readily exploitable for fuel materials for interstellar craft. And given the proxcimity of the cloud to major hyperspace points the potential is there for serious expansion. 
There are rumors of a possible colony or two that has been lost among the cloud during the beginning of the Second Recession according to the Hostile timeline but these remain rumors. These rumors also tell about huge strikes of nickel and other resources supporting such a colony. They remain the floss of roughnecks and spacers. 
The truth is much more darker and mundane, colonies among the Oort Cloud are established as both exploitable and temperory affairs. Minining colonies that can be packed up and moved where needed. Permenant settlements come with the striking of usuable material. Many of the mining colonies are moved as needed moving miners and families all. The corporations are exploiting the people as much as the resources. 
There have been several combinations of metals and materials that have not been found anywhere else in space given the unique nature of the Oort Cloud and it's tumbling resources. Add to this exotic nature of such materials and the value of the Cloud becomes quite clear. 

Between a Rock & A Cloud - The Oort Cloud, mini Planet Eris & The Hostile Rpg - Campaign Setting Update Part II

 Beyond the Oort Cloud is Eris and it's promise of riches and more. The Trans Plutonian corridor is highly important inthe campaign world of Hostile. And the Dwarf Planet Eris is incredibly important. But where is Eris?!  The Dwarf planet Eris, "Eris (minor-planet designation 136199 Eris) is the most massive and second-largest known dwarf planet in the Solar System.^[22] It is a trans-Neptunian object (TNO) in the scattered disk and has a high-eccentricity orbit." A long range colony was established on Eris back during the Age of Exploration befor the second Recession kicked in. See the Hostile rpg timeline. 

Eris and it's moon are important jump point fuel station & hyperspacial corridor. And given the corporate 'gold rush' that was happening with the Oort Cloud. And it's natural resources. China,the United States and European conerns were rushing to establish colonies on Eris. 
Science stations, and exploration bases were established. And slowly but surely the areas around Eris along with it's moon Dysnomia were being exploited. 
Then everything came to a crashing halt and there were several reasons for this.. Reason one was the Second Recession and then radio silence from the Eris colonies! 
There were rumors of interstellar warfare but no one country or corporate entity took up responsibility for the supposed warfare. 
When a mission was launched two years later into the Recession not a trace of any of the colonies were found! 

There may be far less dramatic reasons for the colony losses and that's the planetary wide methane storms that happen on Eris. Eris also has an abundance of nitrogen in a very chemically volitile state perfectly suited as an ingrediant within interstellar fuel. Eris is little explored and only the habital zones where colonies have been established have been exploited by the corporations of Hostile. Eris supports two interstellar  processing & refinery plants and roughnecks have only recently begun to exploit Eris  moon Dysnomia.

Eris's moon's orbit is also hooks into a rare hyperspacial shunt that allows almost instant access into the TransPlutonian Hyperspacial Corridor. This is a region of hyperspace that allows that allows one to cut 10% off of travel time in hyperspace. Why is not fully known nor understood. 
Eris is also the gateway into the Orrt Cloud with many leaving Neptune station and it's colonies for the Cloud. Even the space around Neptune is not as explored as the corporations would have the Earthsiders to believe. There is a 30,000 credit bonus for those willing to do a three year stint on Eris & it's colonies. The close proxcimity to the fledling comets of the Orrt cloud have allowed the corporations to exploit them for commerical mining ventures. 
The liquid methane storms of Eris have proven to be troublesome however. These roiling planetary wide weather events happen in the 'wet season'. And the planet's weather patterns kick up giant roiling clouds of liquid methane that blow across one hemisphere of the planet. These storms last for months at a clip and can destroy even interstellarly created metals and the like. Nothing survives these storms. Newer colonies on Eris have become like sunken vaults deep into the ground going down almost a mile into the mini planet. Space madness and insanity are common and those who serve on the planets are all a bit touched. Still there are fortunes to be made among the Cloud and the TransNeptunian Corridor. 

Dancing Among The Clouds - The Oort Cloud & The Hostile Rpg - Campaign Setting Update

Our Hostile Rpg campaign has been on hold for a few weeks because of work scheduling issues. So I've been reading & doing campaign notes. And I've been focusing on the Oort cloud just outside of Neptune. The cloud is just  a collection of mountain sized asteroids & space debris that's hardly been mapped even by the time of Hostile. 

Who cares about the Oort Cloud?! Besides it's a local pheneoma and location to the solar system. The cloud hasn't even been explored and written off by the time of the Hostile timeline's Second Recession? However the fact that it has all of the material that makes up Jupiter within it makes the Cloud perfect for space mining & fuel production. The fact that you've got millions of object the size of mountains tumbling through space very challening to mapping. And this makes the Oort Cloud the perfect location to send corporate sponsored explorers. This also makes the cloud the perfect location for alien and space going lifeforms. 

 

The Oort Cloud is perfect ground for the Pioneer Station series of fuel stations are suited for the myriad of mining and fuel processsing station refineries. The Pioneer stations have the numerious configurations needed for the cloud; "The 600-ton Leyland-Okuda Pioneer is a general purpose industrial operations platform, a five-man space station designed to serve as an operations center, drone control, fuel store or supply dump."
The Pioneer stations have be setup in carefully A.I. computer calculated orbits so as not be smashed to little pieces by the mountain sized space debris of the cloud. Those roughnecks who serve to mine the Oort Cloud are some of the roughest and toughest miners to put on a space suit. The cloud is weird, awe inspiring, and very lonely. Because of the hazardous conditions at the Oort Cloud there is a 20,000 bonus for those who sign up. Because of the casul loss of life only a few get to spend it! 

Space madness is among the most common insanities that infects Oort Cloud miners and no one knows why. The most common metals in the cloud are the huge deposits of nickel and the building blocks of comets. These materials are essential to the space industries back on Earth. Two giant refineries and smelters have been built within  the Kuiper belt, for faster processing of materials. 
There are always rumors of alien artifacts, lifeforms, etc. most of which turn out to be bunk. The standing 2 million reward for information is still safe along with claims of the giant bonuses put out by corporations. 

There have been several corporate skirmishes among the Oort Cloud but sustained battles are absolute suicide because of collosions & debris chain accidents. There have also be UIO reports among the cloud. Unidentified Intersystem Objects have become quite common just before industrial accidents. The rumors among the miners are that the aliens are laughing at them. They also think that there might be a hidden colony among the rocks.
The Oort Cloud has provided the corporations a rich bounty of materials for manufacturing and space industries. The  Oort Cloud is only beginning to be exploited by the corporations and there are several unique trademark and copyrights that have come about because of the close procimity to several comets that have been explored, cataloged, and mined by roughnecks. 
Now the corporate gold rush is on for the hidden sections of the Oort cloud.