Maybe 5500 is TOO far in the future.

[Devon_v]

If you can make armor out of stuff a lead bullet can't get through, you can use new stuff to make a bullet that does go through it, and fire it out of a 9mm. Or just use advanced machining to make a monomolecular tipped bullet. Kevlar that.

Also nobody is wearing anything that stops lead bullets most of the time in Rimworld.

Also, mechs, charge rifles, glitterworld medicine, bionics, it may not be pervasive,  but the game has future tech in it, and one item is explicitly from the glitterworlds where tech DID advance for another 2-3000 years unimpeded.

Never mind the ability of any random trio of survivors to build turrets with advanced AI capable of not only engaging arbitrary targets automatically,  but also of doing foolproof IFF completely visually.

[Adamiks]

"If you can make armor out of stuff a lead bullet can't get through, you can use new stuff to make a bullet that does go through it, and fire it out of a 9mm. Or just use advanced machining to make a monomolecular tipped bullet. Kevlar that. "

Guns and bullets don't works just like that.

"Also nobody is wearing anything that stops lead bullets most of the time in Rimworld."
That's the case.

"Also, mechs, charge rifles, glitterworld medicine, bionics, it may not be pervasive,  but the game has future tech in it, and one item is explicitly from the glitterworlds where tech DID advance for another 2-3000 years unimpeded."
1 charge rifle that (for me) is weaker than M16 due to small range. Glitterworld medicine? It's jsut a better antibiotics... Bionics? Like max 50 years and we will have ultra super bionic body parts. Now we have kinda bionic parts - parts from steel but that can be controled by mind.

"Never mind the ability of any random trio of survivors to build turrets with advanced AI capable of not only engaging arbitrary targets automatically,  but also of doing foolproof IFF completely visually."
That's the case also. Player can do it, but he use Enfield from World War II.

[Tynan]

I don't think you could really make the game "about" realistic deep future tech in any scenario.

Most visions of "futuristic" warfare are just visions of present warfare with guns that glow or look different. In reality, it'll be as different as the battle of Thermoplye was to the battle of Stalingrad.

There likely wouldn't be much of a role for people, either. Once you assume general AI and really high-tech manufacturing, there's little reason to build "guns" and human soldiers would be largely useless. You'd see things like swarms of honeybee-sized drones with poison injectors or drills to burrow into people. Or rapid autonomous ground robots that run at 100km/h, leap 30m in the air and fire single perfectly-aimed shots at targets while twisting through the air at tremendous speed. It's interesting to consider but it's not necessarily the game I prefer to make.

[Adamiks]

Well... I'm not talking about making killer-robots, i'm talking about making more futuristic weapons/things that one charge rifle. I don't expect much from the Rimworld about future tech, but seriously shooting with enfield in future is like fighting with a bow today. But i can imagine to where people are going too. I think that in future soldiers will fight in nanosuits or at least exosuits (prototypes of these exist even now). Even "modern" guns in Rimworld are starting to be kinda old, M16 for example, great gun, but soldiers was using it in Vietnam, so there are better assault rifles than that even now. Power Armor is just a "better" version of vest, don't give any speed boost etc. Rimworld looks more like history of mankind without World Wars than an actuall Sci-fi game based in 5000 year - a lot of futuristic things from Rimworld are researched now and i think that after like 50-100 years we will can have almost all of the things that are in Rimworld (maybe not mechanoids, though) in 5000 year.

[Mihsan]

Others thoughts?

IMO you think that human species could only move forward (not to stagnate or degrade). And at this point I disagree with you.

Also about year 5500: do you take into account that RimWorld fundamentally do not have FTL travel? For me year 5500 is TOO SOON.

[Boston]

Think about this, guys:

even today,we have rifles that can shoot around corners, with bullets that are smart enough to be able to detonate on their own over the cover, instead of when it hits things, and have bombs that can fly through specific windowpanes when guided via a laser.

But, with all of that, what gun do you think would serve you best in the frozen North, or an African Savannah? Probably that 100 year old bolt-action rifle.

[Adamiks]

Think about this, guys:

even today,we have rifles that can shoot around corners, with bullets that are smart enough to be able to detonate on their own over the cover, instead of when it hits things, and have bombs that can fly through specific windowpanes when guided via a laser.

But, with all of that, what gun do you think would serve you best in the frozen North, or an African Savannah? Probably that 100 year old bolt-action rifle.

Probably a best and light assault rifle that this world made. But i really must say that even if modern guns are better i would choose bolt-action rifles. I don't know why, it's just a kind of fetish i really like sniper rifle and bolt-action rifles, i think because i like one shoot-one kill, don't waste ammo, max accuracy things from games ;d But in real life i would choose the best gun on the market.

[Devon_v]

"If you can make armor out of stuff a lead bullet can't get through, you can use new stuff to make a bullet that does go through it, and fire it out of a 9mm. Or just use advanced machining to make a monomolecular tipped bullet. Kevlar that. "

Guns and bullets don't works just like that.

I'm confused here. A 9mm gun can fire any appropriately sized bullet. The gun does not care what the bullet is made out of.

Weapons in the future will still just throw metal at things. People love to have their lasers and their plasma, but there's no point to it. High speed metal makes things dead far more efficiently than any sort of flashy exotic weapon.

Glitterworld medicine grants an AUTOMATIC rank 6 in medicine. A pawn who knows nothing about medicine can perform surgery via glitterworld medicine. That is not antibiotics.

[Mikhail Reign]

I swear I remember Ty saying once that the traders as they are weren't goin to say on the game FOR the reasons you as listing - they were just a stand in for a future trading system. Even if it was just the trading system from Mics (I think - got a few on) mod it'd be sweet. Random pawns from any faction you are friendly with come every now and again and set up a tent near by and you can send someone to go trade with them.

[Tynan]

I would prefer to have ground-based traders but it's a significant technical/design challenge. Space traders work quite well and could do so indefinitely; perfecting this hasn't been the top priority.

[Elixiar]

I would prefer to have ground-based traders but it's a significant technical/design challenge. Space traders work quite well and could do so indefinitely; perfecting this hasn't been the top priority.

The trading system is fine really. The tribals might just be too stubborn to want change as is often the case but maintain a radio for stuff they accept they can't go without like metals and to trade animal skins. Being that far in the future I can imagine that some sort of better radio technology is available like a dirt cheap torch is today.

As for future tech, no one is really saying they NEED futuristic things because it's a rimworld. A place cobbled together from what falls from the sky and is already available.
It would just be nice to FEEL like we are more in the future.
For example,
A normal M-24 sniper instead being,
An L-34 Gauss Rifle.
Colt pistol - MKII Bolt Revolver.

A small change that feels like a big difference.

The survival rifle is good though I can see that basic type of projectile weapon always being essential. And it sounds nice!

[Veneke]

I swear I remember Ty saying once that the traders as they are weren't goin to say on the game FOR the reasons you as listing - they were just a stand in for a future trading system. Even if it was just the trading system from Mics (I think - got a few on) mod it'd be sweet. Random pawns from any faction you are friendly with come every now and again and set up a tent near by and you can send someone to go trade with them.

Tynan's basically said the same thing again just above, but the post you're thinking about is this one: https://ludeon.com/forums/index.php?topic=8114.msg81545#msg81545

As for the year... honestly without FTL I'm inclined to think that it's too soon. I actually think I preferred it when we didn't have the year as a reference point though. Years vary from planet to planet at any rate, and what matters on a Rimworld are the seasons. While you need some kind of calendar to mark the passage of time, planning etc knowing the actual year isn't all that important to gameplay, or the lore frankly.

[Kegereneku]

"- Near the center of the galaxy inhabited star system can be around 2~10 light-years aways."
Rimworld ISN'T in the center of galaxy, this is why it's called Rimworld.

First, From the lore data file I'm pretty sure it is. You'd take 13000years at Light-Speed to cross the galaxy, Colonizing near the center is much more interesting (not right at the center, because black hole and stuff).

Next, to quote Asimov's Foundation sometime the outer rim is simply the furthest human can be from a highly populated zone, since without FTL and reason to colonize again a star system is pretty much isolated, it mean a Rimworld can be in between a Primitive world, a High-tech world and a Glitterworld and still be isolated.

Last, even baring that you can take the outer rim of a galactic arms toward the center of the galaxy.

There is so much of them than you can have a ship every 5 days?

Easily. Just look at immigration numbers and the number of boat/plane which travel around the world. Our planet population is 8 billions, now imagine 3~6 worlds with extremely more advanced manufacturing ability (we can build a damn ship in the game).

Time is less important under 5 years of travel, what really matter is that people/market keep going for 50 years, which is easy when you sell to underdeveloped country.
In the old sailing era you had expeditions going for years for trade/exploration. Now imagine the prospect of living in a dreamy Glitterworld or Subjugating tribals with your fancy technology.
The cheapest medicine from High-Tech world would be the stuff of legend in a lesser world. (we could make Plasma-riffle and Glitter-stuff overpowered and rare, but it will be hard to balance)

Also applying how today we sell old plane rather than scrap them once we don't use them ourself, I can imagine Spacecraft being used once for migration, then sold at destination (old and unreliable).

Why? Ships in games have reactors that (i think) make fuel from nothing. And 10/20 years? If this would work like this player wouldn't crash on Rimworld.

Well, 10-20 is only because someone can receive information about another planets and decide that in that time frame it will not change by the time he/they reach it, then operational-time isn't enough, a lot can happen in space regardless of wear-failure. Just imagining the Mechanoid as remnant from a Terraforming fleet there is a lot of reasons for a spaceship to fail around a planets (which can be an extremely busy place with wreck in orbit, near Kessler Syndrome and all)
Plus second-hand spacecraft.

Explain nothing. That they WANT something don't make it possible (sorry, your dreams will stay just dreams)

It's like creating "story" in FNAF that don't have any story. It's just working like that and it's not logicial, don't look for much sense when there isn't any.

Woah, I'm feeling hostility here. Did I "triggered" something or what ?
This is obviously a fan-Retcon of Tynan's world, I'm confident I can personally blow your mind with SF more realistic than what you believe to be realistic. The thing is, it will NOT be shaped appropriately for the Firefly wibe (which had FTL).

Tynan could have used a magical Starwars-setting, but that's no fun to work with.

[b0rsuk]

Aye, the tech level in the universe is actually all over the place, and the story explains why.

The planets with the tech people are thinking about are the Glitterworlds and beyond that, the Transcendent worlds.

But why is the average civilization of 5500 so low ? Apparently space travel is so common that ships carry passengers. People routinely crash into planets - that's how you get many extra colonists. You'd think there would be more tech than just "better cloth" and "better steel". Spaceships need lots of supporting technologies at high level of development, a civilization where only spaceships are very advanced makes no sense.

E.g. the Inuit couldn't ever really advance in their northern climate with a nomadic hunting lifestyle; the land just couldn't sustain a non-nomadic settlement, which is necessary to do anything complex and civilizational.

This seems to be the conventional wisdom, but it doesn't have to be true. Have you heard of Gobekli Tepe in Turkey ? They've unearthed a very impressive ruins of a temple. 10000-11500 years old. Another estimate says 6500 years before the Stonehenge and 6000 before pyramids in Giza. That's even before the Wheel, pottery, and Neolithic Revolution(You probably know this - wide-scale transition from hunters/gatherers to farmers/agriculture)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEZuLUqn18s

I don't think you could really make the game "about" realistic deep future tech in any scenario.

Hard SF ? Maia is doing that. The far future colony simulation game. Simon Roth seems pretty serious about it.

There likely wouldn't be much of a role for people, either. Once you assume general AI and really high-tech manufacturing, there's little reason to build "guns" and human soldiers would be largely useless. You'd see things like swarms of honeybee-sized drones with poison injectors or drills to burrow into people. Or rapid autonomous ground robots that run at 100km/h, leap 30m in the air and fire single perfectly-aimed shots at targets while twisting through the air at tremendous speed. It's interesting to consider but it's not necessarily the game I prefer to make.

Or maybe genetic engineering ? Animals still have a few things going for them. They don't need to be manufactured. They self repair and grow using common materials. Spidersilk may not be the holy grail people once thought it was, but spiders produce it in very low temperature under very low pressure.

[Adamiks]

"If you can make armor out of stuff a lead bullet can't get through, you can use new stuff to make a bullet that does go through it, and fire it out of a 9mm. Or just use advanced machining to make a monomolecular tipped bullet. Kevlar that. "

Guns and bullets don't works just like that.

I'm confused here. A 9mm gun can fire any appropriately sized bullet. The gun does not care what the bullet is made out of.

Weapons in the future will still just throw metal at things. People love to have their lasers and their plasma, but there's no point to it. High speed metal makes things dead far more efficiently than any sort of flashy exotic weapon.

Glitterworld medicine grants an AUTOMATIC rank 6 in medicine. A pawn who knows nothing about medicine can perform surgery via glitterworld medicine. That is not antibiotics.

1. And what? You will make bullet from anothe metal and then what? Your 9mm pistol will be killing machine? This isn't working like that. Just google how weapons works.
2. Maybe but one futuristic thing don't make game good sci-fi.

@Kegereneku

You made a long post, i don't know from what i should begin. Anyway i still don't agree with you.
1. You said Rimworld is isolated.
2. Galactics are big, distances beetwen them are also big, this is why there wouldn't be ships every 5 days. Why every ship would stop?

"I'm confident I can personally blow your mind with SF more realistic than what you believe to be realistic"

...... My kids and your kids will have a nice fun reading this and looking at the actuall world. If you think that you can say something about future and this will be 100% realistic then, yeah, i'm hostility here.