[ALT] What do you see yourselves doing in the long run?

[Dave Howery]

OK, we've gathered our gear, we're preparing for a hard couple of years of clearing fields, sowing crops, and putting up buildings. Let's look ahead a couple of years.... what do you see yourselves ending up as when our colony is up and running? What do you want to be in the long run? I imagine the majority of us will have to be food producers of some kind, but we need some other specialists too. Some are obvious (Glenn as our chief MD)... what about the rest? I suppose if the actual players want to be various specialists, we could commandeer the NPCs to be the farmers. Just off the top of my head, we need:
grain farmers cattle ranchers sheep ranchers goat ranchers lumbermen builders, general contractors leather workers/tanners freight haulers fishermen river freighters blacksmiths medical personnel coopers glass blowers hunters (?) military
But I imagine the majority of us will have to be like the average colonial farmer... have some vegetable plots, potatoes, a milk cow or two, a few pigs, etc. Personally, I like this one, and that's my long term goal, and the gear I'm taking reflects it. We have an advantage over the real US colonials, in that we're in a much better climate, get more crops, and have modern plants right off the bat.
So, what about the rest of you?

[Forum Lurker]

My goal is to become a physician; I've got the training to make the pharmaceuticals, and the dexterity and deliberation to be a surgeon. I'll probably keep a farm, as well, but just enough to keep in food; coplanting soybeans and potatoes, five acres should be enough, plus a bit of grazing for the livestock.

[Psychomeltdown]

Rancher.

Horses, sheep, cattle.

I'll have a house with a garden large enough to supply my family with it's immediate needs. Hopefully I'll also have plenty of ranch hands, possibly recruiting from the local tribes we meet, it would be a good starting off point in helping them integrate into our society.

[Dave Howery]

I plan on having a fair sized 'truck garden' farm... lots of vegetables, potatoes, fruit trees and bushes, milk cows and pigs (only a few of each)... I'm basically gonna be a food producer, geared for excess, not just enough for me. I probably won't bother with horses... I figure someone else can freight the stuff... I'll also have a little side business with flowers... I'm throwing a few seeds and bulbs in my gear...
probably have to surround the place with bunny-proof fences for a while... one good thing, rasberries and blackberries grow fast and make their own hedges after a while...

[Psychomeltdown]

I'll try to go for tanneries and wool producing also, if I can get my hands on enough equipment and people.

Horses will probably be mainly farming horses, big and brawny, with a side line of quick quarter horses. Tanning will come from the cattle and wool making from our sheep.

I'm thinking probably a large group of people, probably even venturing into a form of a co-op.

[Scarecrow]

i may aim towards the co-op farmer, working with others on a farm, just being a land owner, nothing special...maybe part of the local milita reserves. i plan on trying to set up a distillery though...

[Ward]

i may aim towards the co-op farmer, working with others on a farm, just being a land owner, nothing special...maybe part of the local milita reserves. i plan on trying to set up a distillery though...




So did you bring a still with you

[Norbert]

To start, I will work at the lumber trade, with a side of building. Cutting and splitting firewood, and farming when the pressure is off. Hunting and fishing, and working at learning the native language of the area.

[Scarecrow]

So did you bring a still with you
i may be thining of adding it to my list. but the problem is yeast...

[Ward]

i may be thining of adding it to my list. but the problem is yeast...


rember it can come as dry yeast and store it in a palstic contaner that is air tight,

[Scarecrow]

rember it can come as dry yeast and store it in a palstic contaner that is air tight,
yeah, but how can i get more after i use that first lot?
im probably just going to become a logger with a veggie patch anyway :D

[Norbert]

yeah, but how can i get more after i use that first lot?
im probably just going to become a logger with a veggie patch anyway :D

Find out what medium you need for reproducing it. Then figur if you can get it from the enviroment qround you.

[DominusNovus]

I'd like to help with organizing things. Office work, and all that jazz. Or carpentry, that sounds like fun. As little to do with animals as possible.:cool:

[Forum Lurker]

The medium that your yeast grows on is a neverending supply of sugar and/or starch. Mashed-up potatoes, fruit pulp, corn syrup; yeast will eat it all. The trick is simply to leave at least, say 10% of the liquid every time you skim off a batch to distill, so that you've got stock left.

[Bulgaroktonos]

Ideally, I'd like to set up some kind of shipyard in the bay. We'll have enough people, and resources, in a decade or so to make shipbuilding reasonable. Perhaps not on a massive scale, but a decent scale.

[Flocculencio]

I'm going to help with the guarding and exploratiin as we slowly but surely expand. Ideally I'd like to help develop the guard force into something resembling the Texas Rangers- irregular mounted personnel functioning halfway between military and police roles.

The militia can handle it if anything big happens but for the normal times if there are caravans or specialists to escort, community laws to enforce or raiders to be hunted down the Rangers will be there.

[Steffen]

As I have a bit of experience in that field, I´ll start a vineyard. (and yes, i brought grapevine with me, would be too much of a hike collecting some in the Caucasus where I beleive would be the area to find some that time ago)

[schrammy]

well what i would like to do is become our local chemist/appothecar (not sure if its spelled correctly) providing us with things like black powder,medicine.oil(s),fuels etz.

and altough that might be usefull to some extend i doudt that i will do this fulltime,because it is most likely that we will still have to put alote of man hours into basic and secondary life maintaining work.

there for i doudt that more than 10% of use will eventualy be able to do a none food/build/manufacture job for full time, so most likely it wil be only part time while i do either farming of fishing for the most,not because its what i want to do but i deem this the most likely to happen.

[Glen]

well what i would like to do is become our local chemist/appothecar (not sure if its spelled correctly) providing us with things like black powder,medicine.oil(s),fuels etz.

and altough that might be usefull to some extend i doudt that i will do this fulltime,because it is most likely that we will still have to put alote of man hours into basic and secondary life maintaining work.

there for i doudt that more than 10% of use will eventualy be able to do a none food/build/manufacture job for full time, so most likely it wil be only part time while i do either farming of fishing for the most,not because its what i want to do but i deem this the most likely to happen.

If you have any experience to back up that wish to be a chemist/apothocary, we'll be keeping you busy, right enough.

I've brought what I could to help jumpstart the process, and hopefully you've done the same. We've got a lot of hard work ahead, and I'm not talking about plowing.

[General_Paul]

I'm shooting to be the school master in later years, as well as founding the Goodfellow Shipyards in Alameda.

[Straha]

I'd probably end up being a sheep herder(I think herding sheep especially on camelback wouldn't be THAT complicated) as well as one of the people who helps keep morale up(I know how to roll joints). Maybe I'm also a bit of a community historian recording things for posterity.

[Flocculencio]

I'm shooting to be the school master in later years, as well as founding the Goodfellow Shipyards in Alameda.

I would like to teach classes on Lit from time to time at said school

What? It can't all be useful subjects! :D

[Matt]

I'm going to help with the guarding and exploratiin as we slowly but surely expand. Ideally I'd like to help develop the guard force into something resembling the Texas Rangers- irregular mounted personnel functioning halfway between military and police roles.

The militia can handle it if anything big happens but for the normal times if there are caravans or specialists to escort, community laws to enforce or raiders to be hunted down the Rangers will be there.


Yup that's the deal with me. A small professional military/police hybrid. A life in the field. I decided to bring my sister along instead of a wife, so I can be relatively seperated from her with out adversly affecting her. Perhaps at one point I'll marry a native.

[Ward]

I'd probably end up being a sheep herder(I think herding sheep especially on camelback wouldn't be THAT complicated) as well as one of the people who helps keep morale up(I know how to roll joints). Maybe I'm also a bit of a community historian recording things for posterity.


Straha I hope you don't get stoned when you are working but your pot seeds will be importian for other things beside smoke . Like rope out of the stems and paper out of the leafs as well as cloth . Please bring at less 30 lbs of seeds for pot I would even help you plant it in your guarden and I would like to see ten acers put in in the community fields for its other uses .

[Straha]

Straha I hope you don't get stoned when you are working but your pot seeds will be importian for other things beside smoke . Like rope out of the stems and paper out of the leafs as well as cloth . Please bring at less 30 lbs of seeds for pot I would even help you plant it in your guarden and I would like to see ten acers put in in the community fields for its other uses .
Fine I'll bring 30 pounds of it and I'll save the getting stond for AFTER work.

[Flocculencio]

Yup that's the deal with me. A small professional military/police hybrid. A life in the field. I decided to bring my sister along instead of a wife, so I can be relatively seperated from her with out adversly affecting her. Perhaps at one point I'll marry a native.

Well I am bringing along a wife even though that might be a bit inconsiderate on her. :o The whole life in the field thing sounds like a worthwhile way to live.

[Matt]

Well I am bringing along a wife even though that might be a bit inconsiderate on her. :o The whole life in the field thing sounds like a worthwhile way to live.


It's rugged and noble. We'll evolve into Davey Crockett like figures :)

[Flocculencio]

It's rugged and noble. We'll evolve into Davey Crockett like figures :)

Or something much grander...check out the ALT Chat Thread, O God of Lightning :D

[schrammy]

If you have any experience to back up that wish to be a chemist/apothocary, we'll be keeping you busy, right enough.

I've brought what I could to help jumpstart the process, and hopefully you've done the same. We've got a lot of hard work ahead, and I'm not talking about plowing.

i had chemistry in shool for 3 years and during that time and a little beyond it has been my hobby until i bought my first computer :D

i even considered it for a long time 1 of the 3 professions that i might take up
even the most likely one (until i got my first pc that is)

so i would say i defentetly have some knowlage and yes i have brought some stuff,so unless some one more quilifyed steps up i am your man.

[pisces74]

I'll probably be the front runner in things that need to be done, early on I'm going to do my best in producing a food overage, then swith to jacking lumber, and stone quarrying, basicly be whatever the state needs at the time.

[Straha]

I'd likely be involved in various odd jobs like stacking wood/picking crops/sometimes fishing. I can do some cooking so I'd probably also do that.

[Grimm Reaper]

Based on my skills and interests I wind up founding the first industrial chemical plant in the future.

After all, gunpowder, candles, soap, pharmaceuticals, etc. will inevitably lead me to napalm.

[Straha]

Based on my skills and interests I wind up founding the first industrial chemical plant in the future.

After all, gunpowder, candles, soap, pharmaceuticals, etc. will inevitably lead me to napalm.
I don't know if you got the memo or not but we are NOT doing a draka style conquest of the natives.

[schrammy]

Based on my skills and interests I wind up founding the first industrial chemical plant in the future.

After all, gunpowder, candles, soap, pharmaceuticals, etc. will inevitably lead me to napalm.

am am not sure you have considered the actual needs for makeing napalm
granted makeing the napalm it self is quite easy but getting the needed quanteties of raw oil will require drilling, and unless you brought along a oil rig it would be hard to comeby.

other than that if you also are interested in chemistry i will spesify a list of items i will bring so we don't bring to much dubble stuff

[Othniel]

In the long term I acualtly want to set up a spilinter colony in Sierra Nevada's by a lake and some forest. I had read that in the 1800s men cut out iceblocks from lakes during the winter, packed it in Sawdust so it wouldn't melt, and sold it during the summer. An immportant job that would become in preseving foods for longer periods of time.

[Forum Lurker]

Actually, the oil is the easy part of napalm; pressed soybean oil will burn quite well, if not quite as explosively as petroleum still hot enough to cripple. The real problem is the binding agent; the first recipes used rubber, which is hard enough to find, but modern mixes use benzene and polystyrene, and we're not going to be making those in industrial quantities.

[Glen]

Based on my skills and interests I wind up founding the first industrial chemical plant in the future.

After all, gunpowder, candles, soap, pharmaceuticals, etc. will inevitably lead me to napalm.

All chemists etc please report to Doc Finney...we need to put our heads together to figure out what we can produce when and what we'll need to do it.

[Grimm Reaper]

We can probably whip up sulfa and such with some speed, antibiotics will take MUCH longer.

Unless someone brought a starter's kit?:eek:

I was joking about the napalm, but surely the other items will make me useful to the group?

[Nicksplace27]

I would likke to become a hunter and fisher. I also brought along lots of boooks so i could become a scribe.

[Forum Lurker]

We can probably whip up sulfa and such with some speed, antibiotics will take MUCH longer.

Unless someone brought a starter's kit?:eek:
Yes, Glen was bright enough to bring a starter kit, presumably a -cillin and a -mycin to avoid resistance. That's much, much easier than making sulfa drugs, which require a real chemical base.

[Hendryk]

I think my significant other and myself are going to try our luck in the paper-making trade. In a low-tech but literate community, it's an important item to have around.
So among the stuff we're bringing is a manual and a starter kit.

[Othniel]

I think my significant other and myself are going to try our luck in the paper-making trade. In a low-tech but literate community, it's an important item to have around.
So among the stuff we're bringing is a manual and a starter kit.
At this point paper is a rare resource, as soon as you are able to replace it thats going to jumpstart the community, however we might have to stick with hard labour and a town Crier right now.