Science
Science Improvements
Science currently has only a background role in the simulation. Most activities at a settlement are driven by survival and expansion. Given that early Martian settlements will likely be primarily scientific research bases, I think science should be given a driving role in settlement operations.
The following scientific fields are represented in the simulation as skills: areology (geology on Mars), botany, medicine, materials science (chemistry & engineering), and construction (architecture). Others we should consider adding: astronomy, physics, biology (search for life), and meteorology (weather study & prediction).
This feature is focused on introducing the concepts of scientific breakthroughs, achievements, and activities.
Scientific breakthroughs would vary from field to field and would represent important discoveries or inventions in the field. Some breakthroughs might have direct improvements for the field, such as new manufacturing processes, building designs to construct, farming yield improvements, etc. Others may be more general, such as an important new scientific theory or a discovery or evidence for life on Mars. Breakthroughs can occur when a person is performing scientific research in a lab and is a random event based on the total amount of effective research time the person has performed since their last breakthrough in the field, the skill level of the person, the tech level of the lab, and the difficulty of the particular breakthrough. Scientific breakthroughs will be accredited as achievements for both the scientist and his/her settlement. Since the breakthrough will be communicated to all other settlements, they can make use of any direct improvements made possible by the breakthrough.
Scientific achievements are based on the total amount of research in each field by a person and a settlement as well as any breakthroughs. Settlements with a high scientific achievement may get better funding/resupplies from Earth and attract immigrants who specialize in the field. Scientists with a high scientific achievement will be attractive for research partnerships and in relationships with other scientists in the same field.
Scientific activities should be more detailed than just research in labs. We should represent communication and collaboration among scientists, publishing papers and peer review. Experiments and remote scientific instruments (weather stations, etc) could be included as well.
developer mailing list post about science
Science reports at Mars Desert Research Station (MDRS)
Science reports at Flashline Mars Arctic Research Station (FMARS)
The Antarctic Sun (journal) science news
Feel free to add more ideas to this page or add to its discussion.
Update (11/20/09):
Most of the science improvement idea has been implemented in version 2.87. We added scientific studies, new scientist jobs, new science research missions and tasks, and tracking of scientific achievement for both people and settlements.
Things we might still want to do:
Add meetings between collaborating study researchers when they are at the same location. This may require adding support for general meetings to the task architecture in the code since it currently isn't supported. Meetings would improve relationships between the study collaborators.
Add a task for sending one-way messages (email equiv.) from one study researcher to a collaborator. This may need to be a part of an overall communication improvement. Message communication would improve relationships between the study collaborators.
Add medical research that involves using other people as test patients.
Have settlement achievement affect resupplies from Earth.
Tie scientific study completion to potential breakthrough improvements in operations on Mars (improved crops, etc). We might want to make this separate from scientific studies, though.
