Aduro (World project)

[minimal]

I started my first thread a few days ago with a proof of concept. The concept is to take a full world and be able to break it up bit by bit for regions and then down to city and travel levels.

The concept works. It's time consuming but it works.

Now I can start on what the concept was for. I've been having trouble writing lately. One of the things I realized is that I've always had established, solid, worked out settings for the stories I've written. World, setup, then placing a character in the world. The exercise of giving myself a world should help and, if not, it's a fun exercise.

Enter Aduro:

Aduro is a colony world 50-150 years into colonization. It was setup by seeder colonization ships. Starting from a planet with compatible conditions but no higher order life forms, the planet was seeded with basic plant and animal life. The colonists were kept in cold sleep for this time while the planet stabilized a basic ecology. The crew of the ship awakened in 5 year shifts to continue maintenance and perform minor adjustments. When time came, they remained behind on the ship while the colonists were sent down in 3 groups to form different base colonies (I've always had an issue with 'eggs in one basket' colony stories). Each is given basic tools and they have been trained in the knowledge needed to survive at an earlier technology level. They do not, however, have access to the ship or any communications equipment. Like wise, the ship itself is not built for atmospheric entry.

Decades pass. Not having the time to form oil deposits, the settlements have to rely on a technology base using native resources such as coal. This leads to a somewhat steam punk flavor to the tech levels. Each colony, being self-contained, develops along different lines and controls its own are of influence in a city-state style fashion. The joining point for writing will be as these groups establish trade routes and loose affiliations again.

The next step is to make overlays for different data views:

• Cities, splinter groups and trade routes
• Resources and initial landing sites
• Areas of Influence (political boundaries)

Then the map will be broken down for greater detail in major regions.

and then important cities and locations will get local maps.

I'll keep going back and tweaking things on older maps as needed until I feel like the decisions all work and are 'finalized'.

Currently: Deciding if I like the darker land style in the world map. Deciding if I need a different more 'tech' looking version of the same map. Making a 'blank' version of the same map so that I can do more bare bones looks for some things.

Unrelated Note After doing some proof of concept work, I have a PnP based idea along similar lines using a DB and random gen for overland encounters. I just wanted a note about the concept since when I get to a good point to start a side project I'll need a reminder.