Radioactives

[MasterGwydion]

How does a group of Travellers set up a Radioactives mining base on a Low Pop world? None of the mining equipment seems to mine Radioactives, yet, by the Trade Code, Low Pop worlds sell Radioactives.

 

[Terry Mixon]

How does a group of Travellers set up a Radioactives mining base on a Low Pop world? None of the mining equipment seems to mine Radioactives, yet, by the Trade Code, Low Pop worlds sell Radioactives.

Strip mining? With low pop, it wouldn't get them in trouble.

 

[MasterGwydion]

Strip mining? With low pop, it wouldn't get them in trouble.

Maybe, yeah, but there are no rules for it that I have found in MgT2. So where do they magically come from? Everything else is mined with mining equipment, but somehow, not radioactives.

 

[Terry Mixon]

The interwebz say:

Uranium mining is the process of extracting uranium ore from the ground. The method used depends on the depth of the uranium:

• Open pit mining
  When uranium is near the surface, miners dig out the rock in open pits, removing the topsoil and rock above the ore.
• Underground mining
  When uranium is deep underground, miners dig underground mines and remove the rock through tunnels.

My thoughts are that that hasn't changed. Maybe done with machines rather than people though. It must use mining equipment.

 

[agentwigggles]

This is entirely an invention by the GM.
There are some splots from other editions that may help. Like any of the previous edition merchant prince lines.

But roughly in no real order;
A shit load of cash. Like, buy your own jumpship level of cash. Doabble for a lot of PCs.
Depending on the TL of the planet, or how sociopathic the players are, you will want to at least import TL6. If the players dont care about the workers, then pick axes and mine carts can get out radioactives just well, you'll just need a Panama Cannal size workforce to kill.
Depending where this planet is, the importing may take months to years.
Depending how sociopathic your players are, the subjugation of the population. The population size, doesnt negate this being possible, it just makes it more expensive, to 'able to buy a dozen jumpship' of money. If its a small, like double digits, a merc team with good planning and support can take it over.
If they arent sociopaths, then they have two options.
Option 1. Depending on the size of the planet and size of the population, you can just ignore them entirely, go someplace entirely isolated and set up shop. The local govt. may tell you to pay taxes, or tell you to go away, but small population, low tl, on a large planet, will have a difficult time enforcing their will.
Option 2. You get permission. You talk to the local population and convience them. Conviencing them, with cogent arguments, or bribe enough of anyone that matters. Or a mixture of both.

Bonus Secret Option 3. If this planet is in the Imperium. Become a landed noble, get your feif on the planet, get your fief over a mining sight. You can now legally ignore the local govterment.

Pay for astrogeographic survey to see if the planet has any sites with good grades of ore you're going after. Dependng how isolated the planet is. I can easily see this being at the cost 'buying a jumpship' worth of money.
Paying for fully staffed L type lab ship to come over, and do surveys for a couple months.

How do you determine this? High Gurad '16 for mongoose 2e has some very terrible dumb stupid rules you can apply for this.

Great.
You have a site, you have equipment or slaves to get cancer you have permission or total authority to mine.
Now you wait.
Thank goodness this is a table top rpg as we can just skip the waiting.
From what I can find, uranium mine and other radioactive mines, take 15 years to become operational.
We can use the POD base building rules to speed this up, depending on what equipment you imported. These 15 years is with TL8 tech. So using TL6, probabbly make it slower.

Great, so we've spent, at least 3 or 4 'buy a jumpship' amount of money. Its been 15 years. You're importing slaves to get cancer, or you have crew who is about ready to retire.

How much ore does your mine produce?
This will have to be decided by the GM entirely. Whole cloth fiction with no support to go with that I am aware of.
From what I can gether IRL small mining concerns do aobut 50 tons (in mass).
Traveller deals in volume!
Lets have fun with numbers
1 cubic meter of uranum ore from what I can find is 19k kg.
So that means the mine is producing bit over 5 cubic meters every 2 days.
1dton is 14 cubic meters.
So this means makes one 1dton of ore every 3 days.

So the mine makes about 1m credits per day.

Whats the net and gross on that.
More pure ficton from the GM.
And I'm bored now.

 

[MasterGwydion]

This is entirely an invention by the GM.
There are some splots from other editions that may help. Like any of the previous edition merchant prince lines.

But roughly in no real order;
A shit load of cash. Like, buy your own jumpship level of cash. Doabble for a lot of PCs.
Depending on the TL of the planet, or how sociopathic the players are, you will want to at least import TL6. If the players dont care about the workers, then pick axes and mine carts can get out radioactives just well, you'll just need a Panama Cannal size workforce to kill.
Depending where this planet is, the importing may take months to years.
Depending how sociopathic your players are, the subjugation of the population. The population size, doesnt negate this being possible, it just makes it more expensive, to 'able to buy a dozen jumpship' of money. If its a small, like double digits, a merc team with good planning and support can take it over.
If they arent sociopaths, then they have two options.
Option 1. Depending on the size of the planet and size of the population, you can just ignore them entirely, go someplace entirely isolated and set up shop. The local govt. may tell you to pay taxes, or tell you to go away, but small population, low tl, on a large planet, will have a difficult time enforcing their will.
Option 2. You get permission. You talk to the local population and convience them. Conviencing them, with cogent arguments, or bribe enough of anyone that matters. Or a mixture of both.

Bonus Secret Option 3. If this planet is in the Imperium. Become a landed noble, get your feif on the planet, get your fief over a mining sight. You can now legally ignore the local govterment.

Pay for astrogeographic survey to see if the planet has any sites with good grades of ore you're going after. Dependng how isolated the planet is. I can easily see this being at the cost 'buying a jumpship' worth of money.
Paying for fully staffed L type lab ship to come over, and do surveys for a couple months.

How do you determine this? High Gurad '16 for mongoose 2e has some very terrible dumb stupid rules you can apply for this.

Great.
You have a site, you have equipment or slaves to get cancer you have permission or total authority to mine.
Now you wait.
Thank goodness this is a table top rpg as we can just skip the waiting.
From what I can find, uranium mine and other radioactive mines, take 15 years to become operational.
We can use the POD base building rules to speed this up, depending on what equipment you imported. These 15 years is with TL8 tech. So using TL6, probabbly make it slower.

Great, so we've spent, at least 3 or 4 'buy a jumpship' amount of money. Its been 15 years. You're importing slaves to get cancer, or you have crew who is about ready to retire.

How much ore does your mine produce?
This will have to be decided by the GM entirely. Whole cloth fiction with no support to go with that I am aware of.
From what I can gether IRL small mining concerns do aobut 50 tons (in mass).
Traveller deals in volume!
Lets have fun with numbers
1 cubic meter of uranum ore from what I can find is 19k kg.
So that means the mine is producing bit over 5 cubic meters every 2 days.
1dton is 14 cubic meters.
So this means makes one 1dton of ore every 3 days.

So the mine makes about 1m credits per day.

Whats the net and gross on that.
More pure ficton from the GM.
And I'm bored now.

I am wondering if it would be easier just to have the Mineral Refinery put out 50% Common Ore, 30% Uncommon Ore, 15% Crystals and Gems, 4% Precious Metals, and 1% Radioactives. House rule it and call it done.

 

[agentwigggles]

I am wondering if it would be easier just to have the Mineral Refinery put out 50% Common Ore, 30% Uncommon Ore, 15% Crystals and Gems, 4% Precious Metals, and 1% Radioactives. House rule it and call it done.

Great way to retire a game for PCs. They're mining barons. Raking in a very comfortable of money. There is no more need for adventuring. They are now patrons that hire others to adventure.

 

[Geir]

Great way to retire a game for PCs. They're mining barons. Raking in a very comfortable of money. There is no more need for adventuring. They are now patrons that hire others to adventure.

1. Looks like easy money. The local pirates would like to take it over. But that's too much work. Tell you what, you pay 50% of the gross to us and we won't bomb your mining facilities.
2. Too many dead workers? Well, if the Imperium doesn't care, Local 105 of the Do Gooder's Union and their camera team shows up to film the exploitation. Sure, you can put them in the mass grave with the rest, but eventually somebody might come looking for that do-gooder daughter of the subsector Duke.
3. Too much profit? You flood the market and the selling price goes down.
4. Fifth Frontier War and the Zhodani show up.
5. Emperor assassinated and the Aslan show up.
6. Mad computer virus infects all transponders and your own ships decide to bomb the mines the pirates missed.
7. Empress Wave. Workforce goes crazy.
8. Mines run dry. Plus, nobody around to sell to.

See, plenty of adventure.

 

[agentwigggles]

1. Looks like easy money. The local pirates would like to take it over. But that's too much work. Tell you what, you pay 50% of the gross to us and we won't bomb your mining facilities.
2. Too many dead workers? Well, if the Imperium doesn't care, Local 105 of the Do Gooder's Union and their camera team shows up to film the exploitation. Sure, you can put them in the mass grave with the rest, but eventually somebody might come looking for that do-gooder daughter of the subsector Duke.
3. Too much profit? You flood the market and the selling price goes down.
4. Fifth Frontier War and the Zhodani show up.
5. Emperor assassinated and the Aslan show up.
6. Mad computer virus infects all transponders and your own ships decide to bomb the mines the pirates missed.
7. Empress Wave. Workforce goes crazy.
8. Mines run dry. Plus, nobody around to sell to.

See, plenty of adventure.

ehhh
I would say there are 3 maybe 4 adventures before you repeat yourself.
A rival sabtages the mine.
The workers refuse to work.
The civil authorities tries to shut down the mine.
The forth one, is, there a monster in the mine.
And come on befair Geir, like 3 of your adventures are the same adventure. 'the end of the world happens'.

 

[MasterGwydion]

Great way to retire a game for PCs. They're mining barons. Raking in a very comfortable of money. There is no more need for adventuring. They are now patrons that hire others to adventure.

Anyone who spec trades is too. With a decent Broker it is almost impossible to not rake in the money.

Also, remember, they are on a Low Pop world. They have a negative modifier to sell Radioactives on a Low Pop planet.

 

[MasterGwydion]

1. Looks like easy money. The local pirates would like to take it over. But that's too much work. Tell you what, you pay 50% of the gross to us and we won't bomb your mining facilities.
2. Too many dead workers? Well, if the Imperium doesn't care, Local 105 of the Do Gooder's Union and their camera team shows up to film the exploitation. Sure, you can put them in the mass grave with the rest, but eventually somebody might come looking for that do-gooder daughter of the subsector Duke.
3. Too much profit? You flood the market and the selling price goes down.
4. Fifth Frontier War and the Zhodani show up.
5. Emperor assassinated and the Aslan show up.
6. Mad computer virus infects all transponders and your own ships decide to bomb the mines the pirates missed.
7. Empress Wave. Workforce goes crazy.
8. Mines run dry. Plus, nobody around to sell to.

See, plenty of adventure.

All of those are good things.
1) Sell to the Pirates. Theev is good.
2) Use robots. Keep the body count down. Be outside Imperial Space. (I don't even remember the last time I ran a game inside Imperial Space. I tend to avoid running games inside the super-polities, supply runs, yes, but not much in the way of adventuring)
3) Hard to flood a market with a few measly tons of Radioactives when you are just off the Florian Route and it is a planet that supplies Radioactives already.
4) Did this even effect the Dustbelt?
5)That is still coming, but a few years off.
6)Totally possible, but kind of a dick move wiping out the PCs with their own ships.
7)Coming, but still in the future.
8)Pick up and move. The whole mining operation is only 90-tons. Florian Trade Route. Someone will always buy, even if it is just a broker who knows he can sell it later to one of the ships running to the Florian League or the Imperium or the Aslan.
9) The Glorious Empire slavers show up and steal the workforce. Given the location, this should be included. Or Oghman Raiders.

 

[Condottiere]

 

[Sigtrygg]

Great way to retire a game for PCs. They're mining barons. Raking in a very comfortable of money. There is no more need for adventuring. They are now patrons that hire others to adventure.

Ah but think of the game you could make getting them to that pay off.

During character generation one or more of the characters (it's always a good idea to have the characters have met each other at some point) learn the tale of a rogue planetoid discovered by a scout. The scout told tales of the tremendous riches waiting to be exploited because of the size and composition. It was discovered while trying to determine a calibration point.

During the game one of the characters learns of the death of the scout, his funeral is soon. At the funeral there are the usual mix of scum an villainy, but one thing stands out. The scout had a paramour and that sophont has a young child.

During the inevitable bar fight one of the characters notices the child being abducted.

 

[MasterGwydion]

This is entirely an invention by the GM.
There are some splots from other editions that may help. Like any of the previous edition merchant prince lines.

But roughly in no real order;
A shit load of cash. Like, buy your own jumpship level of cash. Doabble for a lot of PCs.
Depending on the TL of the planet, or how sociopathic the players are, you will want to at least import TL6. If the players dont care about the workers, then pick axes and mine carts can get out radioactives just well, you'll just need a Panama Cannal size workforce to kill.
Depending where this planet is, the importing may take months to years.
Depending how sociopathic your players are, the subjugation of the population. The population size, doesnt negate this being possible, it just makes it more expensive, to 'able to buy a dozen jumpship' of money. If its a small, like double digits, a merc team with good planning and support can take it over.
If they arent sociopaths, then they have two options.
Option 1. Depending on the size of the planet and size of the population, you can just ignore them entirely, go someplace entirely isolated and set up shop. The local govt. may tell you to pay taxes, or tell you to go away, but small population, low tl, on a large planet, will have a difficult time enforcing their will.
Option 2. You get permission. You talk to the local population and convience them. Conviencing them, with cogent arguments, or bribe enough of anyone that matters. Or a mixture of both.

Bonus Secret Option 3. If this planet is in the Imperium. Become a landed noble, get your feif on the planet, get your fief over a mining sight. You can now legally ignore the local govterment.

Pay for astrogeographic survey to see if the planet has any sites with good grades of ore you're going after. Dependng how isolated the planet is. I can easily see this being at the cost 'buying a jumpship' worth of money.
Paying for fully staffed L type lab ship to come over, and do surveys for a couple months.

How do you determine this? High Gurad '16 for mongoose 2e has some very terrible dumb stupid rules you can apply for this.

Great.
You have a site, you have equipment or slaves to get cancer you have permission or total authority to mine.
Now you wait.
Thank goodness this is a table top rpg as we can just skip the waiting.
From what I can find, uranium mine and other radioactive mines, take 15 years to become operational.

From what I can find, 3 to 10 years of that number is waiting on permitting, which is not a problem outside of controlled territory. It says to restart an old mine only takes 2 -4 years at TL-7 or 8.

We can use the POD base building rules to speed this up, depending on what equipment you imported. These 15 years is with TL8 tech. So using TL6, probabbly make it slower.

Great, so we've spent, at least 3 or 4 'buy a jumpship' amount of money. Its been 15 years. You're importing slaves to get cancer, or you have crew who is about ready to retire.

How much ore does your mine produce?
This will have to be decided by the GM entirely. Whole cloth fiction with no support to go with that I am aware of.
From what I can gether IRL small mining concerns do aobut 50 tons (in mass).
Traveller deals in volume!
Lets have fun with numbers
1 cubic meter of uranum ore from what I can find is 19k kg.
So that means the mine is producing bit over 5 cubic meters every 2 days.
1dton is 14 cubic meters.
So this means makes one 1dton of ore every 3 days.

So the mine makes about 1m credits per day.

Whats the net and gross on that.
More pure ficton from the GM.
And I'm bored now.

 

[Arkathan]

I am wondering if it would be easier just to have the Mineral Refinery put out 50% Common Ore, 30% Uncommon Ore, 15% Crystals and Gems, 4% Precious Metals, and 1% Radioactives. House rule it and call it done.

Uraninite is typically less than 1% of the ore mined from a uranium mine. You will also have iron, copper, silver, rare earths, etc.
In with the UO2, you will typically find lead, helium, iodine, cesium and strontium. So a fraction of the <1% of total ore with those.
All that to say YES, the mineral refinery model is accurate enough for game play, even assuming you are mining materials that contain "high" concentrations of the radioactives you want.
Radioactive ores in high concentrations are not stable, geologically speaking. You will generally find them broadly distributed in the host rocks.
The normal decay process for Uranium is alpha decay. You skin stops Alpha radiation (Helium nuclei). The biggest danger from ingestion of Uranium dust is damage to your kidneys. Uranium shrapnel does not seem to damage the kidneys, and the internal alpha exposure to bullet sized lumps of uranium is small.

 

[MasterGwydion]

Uraninite is typically less than 1% of the ore mined from a uranium mine. You will also have iron, copper, silver, rare earths, etc.
In with the UO2, you will typically find lead, helium, iodine, cesium and strontium. So a fraction of the <1% of total ore with those.
All that to say YES, the mineral refinery model is accurate enough for game play, even assuming you are mining materials that contain "high" concentrations of the radioactives you want.
Radioactive ores in high concentrations are not stable, geologically speaking. You will generally find them broadly distributed in the host rocks.
The normal decay process for Uranium is alpha decay. You skin stops Alpha radiation (Helium nuclei). The biggest danger from ingestion of Uranium dust is damage to your kidneys. Uranium shrapnel does not seem to damage the kidneys, and the internal alpha exposure to bullet sized lumps of uranium is small.

So, maybe it should be 4.9% Precious Metals and 0.1% Radioactives.

 

[MasterGwydion]

I can start a Mining Colony with the current rules for about 31.26MCr. This will mine about 100 tons of ore per day, from the first day on-site as it is built in a 30-ton module so it can be easily transported. Has an initial crew of 1 sophont, 2 robots, and 16 drones. For another 5MCr, you can throw down another 30-ton Habitation Module with 2 High Staterooms, 1 ton of Biosphere, 5 tons of Common Area, a workshop, and 6 tons of cargo space. This is way less than the cost of one starship. Your example seems predicated on the belief that everything costs way more than it actually does in game.

 

[agentwigggles]

Well, this is an MTU/YTU thing. There is an understandable desire to treat the game mechanics as the reality physics and to then make everything as optiminal as possible. The space station, as deisng is probably rules legal. Its assuming that that perfect moedule exists. Its assuming that there werent compromises to its design. Its assuming thats its on site and doesnt need to be transported.
My post, I assume you buy most of what you need off the shelf. It shouldnt wouldnt be at a home depot, and it wouldnt be on the same planet. Have to ship it all in, and the desire planet seems to be isolated shit hole, you'll need to pay for the shipment going in and pay for the ship going back out. This doesnt matter if the cargo ships manage to pick up cargo for its return trip. You cant gaurentee that. So call it like 80-100dton to transporting the 60dton mining encapement. So need at least a 300dton ship. Call it a 1m a month. Thats pay for all the stuff the ship needs, the crew and profit margin. So 250k per week. Or about 35k a day. Probably an M1, so fall it 1 day to get to the planet, 1 day back out, and 1 day to unload. 105k. 2 weeks of jump. 605k. 605k per import trip. Assuming its 1 parsect away from the source location.
I am not familar with any large module industrial machine that doesnt need to be installed and assembled on site. We'll cheat and say, you dont need to like level the site, and provide drainage and give ti a cement foundation so it doesnt just sink into the ground. Call assembly a month. Import the work crew. 605k. Workcrew is paid on their way in and out. Call it like 5? 10 construnction members. 2 cooks? 1 medic. Temp housing. Say thats like 15 grand. Barrack housing. Cafeteria. Probably double this, if the planet isnt short sleeve planet. And double the pay if the planet isnt short shirt sleeve planet. 9k for a month for the woerks. 2k for the supervisor. 2k for the cooks. 4k for the medic. 17k in labor. 13k in life support. We're not worried abbout consumables used in construnctions. Like argon gas or replacement welder tips or safety equipment.
Now the mining module is set up.
I dont know if you ever worked in IT or have friends who do. Setting up equipment, isnt free in manhours.
So need a new workcrew. 605k. The good news is if you're able to time everything well and there no like set backs, like say bad weather or the end of the world, you can use the ship bringing the new workcrew to take home the previous work crew. If you cant get the time right. 605k to send them home.
Call it 5 IT folks, and 5 mechanics/engineers. 2 cooks. 1 medic.
13k in lifesupport. 40k a month for the IT folks and Engineers. 2k for the cooks. 4k for the medic. So 46k a month.
Call it a month to get the whole facility systems working, to get the 18 robots working.
So the spacestation needs 1 person to do all the things. Fine. You cant really expect 1 person to work there 7/24 on this outpost for the rest of their life? So, it cant be one person. So at least 2. They do a 4 on, 4 off type deal. They're isolated doing industrial mining with cancer dust. Probbably need a medic. And they cant be on call 7/24/365. So at least 2. They also do a 4 on, 4 off type deal. I would be willing to bet hard money that Chris Griffin would agree with me robots and drones need repairs and maintaince. So at least 2 mechanics. Though this might be where you need a lot more. It depends how many man hours of maintaince they need per hour of working. Offshore works in IRL, seem to do abbout 1 on, 1 off. So need to cycle out work crews once a month. 605k per crew exchange. 24k in labor per month. 6k in life support. But there a biosphere. So lets cut that in half to 3k. The biosphere doesnt make toliet paper, or shampoo, or band aids or lube or filters.
The other thing you havent addressed is knowing where to mine. Since this is for a game you're currently running, this can already be answered. But the question wasnt framed with that worked out. The existing population knows of some sites, and are exploiting them. They may have prior mining survey. And they are probably tripple digit in age. This step I can see PC ignoring and just rolling the dice in a metaphorical sense and use the old data. The mining concern is module and mobile. So they can just move it, if it turn out to be a dud. A new survey of the planet, probably cost somewhere around 1.2m amonth, maybe more. And lets assume, you dont survey the entire planet. You stop the survey when the survey effort find a site with high confidence to have high grade ore what you're after.
The spacestation rules dont have any consideration for how long it takes to get planet side mining site operation. It also doesnt care abbout transit time for the space rock. It also doesnt care about amount of time it takes to crush the rock to get the ore. It gives you numbers when you're hit the paydirt.
So you dont to just plop the mining site, and then magically it starts getting ore. It has to build the mine. Based on real life time frames, thats 10-15 years. TL12, TL15 can probably reduce that.
How much money does it cost to build the mine? I dont know. I cant find any numbers that would require an investment to understand that I dont want to do. Though, its a lot. I like using 1m for baseline price of expensive for Traveller. In case that wasnt obvious. 1m a month. Without going through POD base construnction rules, lets say that TL15 infrastructure and tools cut the time down to 5 years.
So 60 months. 60 millions. 60 crew rotations. 36.3 millions. 60 months of wages. 1.24 million in wages. 180k in life support. And 60 months of maintaince of the space station. Thats expensive.
This is also assuming there was no issue with the site. Pirates or end of the worlds.
Then there a few other questions that spacestation mining concern doesnt have to worry about. Tailings. The waste products. You're producing 100 dtons of ore per day. This is actual ore. So that means you're mining 1000 dtons 5000 dtons ore per day to get that.
You have several thousand tons of tailing to deal with it. You have several thousand tons of cancer to deal with.

The other thing your spacestation doesnt address is logistics. You have ore. Are you making an E class starport at your mining concern? Or are you shipping it to the spaceport. So you'll want a shuttle.
15 million to purchase. 2 pilots. The shuttle has 64 tons of cargo space. It'll do 2 trips a day. With Thrust 3, thats easily done. Might even be able to hire out the shuttle. But lets assume you cant.

Shuttle will cost 1.2k a month, plus 5k in fuel a month. 2 pilots, is 8k a month. The space station will need an internal hangar so you can do repairs on the shuttle, and stop the elements from beating down on it. Or pay for hangar space at the spaceport on planet. I tend to look at boat docking storage fees and airplane hangar fees. Something like few thousand a month. You probably want a mechanic/engineer for the shuttle too, as the mechanics you have the entire base and the 18 robots to take care of. But silcon valley start up mentality is popular, so make everyone as overworked as possible.
Since there is so much danger in this area, as by the possible plots proposed for this site, then you'd probably want to doubble all the wages. Hazard pay. Unless we're assuming all the folks that live in the subsector dont understand where they're being asked to work is fraught with, you know, death. And you probably get charge nother 50 percent or double to ship things out. If somehow the workers never understand where they're being sent to is deadly, the shipping companies would. They have fancy actuarial tables.
With so much danger, you probably want a SDB. Or mercs. Or both. Which is just even more money.
It would seem to be a bad idea to open up a mine in Somalia.

 

[Arkathan]

So, maybe it should be 4.9% Precious Metals and 0.1% Radioactives.

For general ores, perhaps. Around 1% is the norm for a uranium mine.
Then 98% of that is U238. That is the stuff you make plutonium from. U235 (2%) is the stuff that fizzes more readily.

 

[Condottiere]

What are we using this stuff for, outside of medical applications, and possible niche industrial ones?

Long term power production, but Mongoose just kabushed that.

Reverse the nuclear damper, and recycle used rods.

Unless it's cheaper to mine it.