Whence - Revision history

Angel at 09:52, 22 March 2009

2009-03-22T09:52:29Z

Angel at 21:10, 5 May 2008

2008-05-05T21:10:21Z

Angel at 20:58, 5 May 2008

2008-05-05T20:58:53Z

Angel: typo

2007-04-05T00:53:10Z

typo

Angel: /* External Trade */

2007-03-30T18:45:30Z

‎External Trade

Angel: /* Whence Island */

2007-03-13T04:44:07Z

‎Whence Island

Angel at 16:34, 12 March 2007

2007-03-12T16:34:26Z

Angel at 13:54, 12 March 2007

2007-03-12T13:54:55Z

Angel at 23:07, 11 March 2007

2007-03-11T23:07:39Z

Angel at 21:37, 11 March 2007

2007-03-11T21:37:11Z

← Older revision		Revision as of 09:52, 22 March 2009
Line 45:		Line 45:
	A regional map, on the other hand, is even more abstract. The ground ridges are always horizontal, and are never shown. This means that the map is distorted in regions where the ground beneath isn't level. Distance on the map represents the difficulty of travelling a route, rather than any indication of ground distance. In order to make the roads connect at sensible places, roads which are shorter on the map than they should be (such as a direct route across high ground, where going via another village would be faster) are highlighted in red. Between any two villages, there is always at least one non-red route. Between villages, roads are drawn as straight lines.		A regional map, on the other hand, is even more abstract. The ground ridges are always horizontal, and are never shown. This means that the map is distorted in regions where the ground beneath isn't level. Distance on the map represents the difficulty of travelling a route, rather than any indication of ground distance. In order to make the roads connect at sensible places, roads which are shorter on the map than they should be (such as a direct route across high ground, where going via another village would be faster) are highlighted in red. Between any two villages, there is always at least one non-red route. Between villages, roads are drawn as straight lines.

−	{{planet\|class=2\|settled=2441}}	+	{{planet\|class=2\|settled=2441\|code=WWW}}

@@ Line 28: / Line 28: @@
 ==Geography==
-The majority of Whence's surface is covered with freshwater oceans. The sea is only broken by 3 major island groups.
+The majority of Whence's surface is covered with freshwater oceans. Apart from Whence Island, there is also a research post on the <address>[/Spine], and an independent civilisation on the [/Southern Continent]</address>.
 The island is what most people mean when they refer to Whence. However, like many other geographic terms on this planet, 'Island' means something quite different from what you might normally expect. The island is approximately 840 miles across at its widest point, although dramatic tidal patterns make it difficult to determine where the sea ends and the island begins.
-====Physical Geography====
+==Physical Geography==
 The island's surface is a series of parallel ridges and ditches, much like the patterns left on a sand beach by the retreating tide. In some areas the channels carry water, and the ground is swamplike. Where the ground is higher, the ground dries out in all but the highest tides, and provides a solid surface which is easier to build on. The size of the lines also varies between regions, being anything from a few inches on the real beaches up to a yard in some places. There are also a few un-lined areas which are either known as deserts (flat expanses of rock, including some areas where the thick earth was transformed to ceramic by the [[vapour pile]] engines of early settlement ships), or forests (where organic processes have changed the shap of the ground).
-====Settlements====
+==Settlements==
 The main political unit on Whence is the village. A village is loosely defined as any collection of buildings, connected to other villages by a road. It is always the presence of a road which defines boundaries - a pair of houses on its own constitutes a village, and so does a sprawling multi-level metropolis like [[Whence/Kreig|Kreig]], with a population of more than 3 million.
 For the most part, homes are built on top of poles some distance from the ground. At the time of the early settlements, it was believed that flattening the ridges and ditches over any great area could divert the rivers and tidal flows in unpredictable ways, and was therefore best avoided. By now, this method of construction has become a tradition even in areas where the ground is high enough not to be flooded in the highest tides. A house or shop is usually surrounded by a walkway on every level to allow exterior maintenance, with ladders which can be dropped to the ground. On the lowest level of a building (and the highest for buildings of more than 3 storeys, as well as certain others designated by the village leaders), these walkways are known as 'right paths' along which anyone has the right to walk. Right paths are usually close enough to step between even where they aren't joined, negating the need to descend to ground level within a village. As every path is maintained by the owner of the building, there is no need for publically-owned roads except connecting one village to another.
-====Maps====
+==Maps==
 Maps on Whence Island are just plain weird. A map of a village will usually represent each building as a square (regardless of its actual shape), and use arcs between them to indicate junctions between rights paths. Roads are marked with a name, and a series of faint parallel lines across them to indicate their direction relative to the ridges of the ground as they leave the city.

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
 The Free People's Commonwealth of Whence is one of the more unusual among the 333 planets.
 ==Economy==
@@ Line 27: / Line 30: @@
 The majority of Whence's surface is covered with freshwater oceans. The sea is only broken by 3 major island groups.
 ===The Southern Continent===

@@ Line 12: / Line 12: @@
 Trade with the outside world is usually negotiated by station chiefs. These people live on the [[line station]]s and trade with offworld visitors in a more conventional manner. As the chiefs receive crops from the villages free (as any other villager can), and provide imported appliances on the same terms, those living on the surface don't even need to understand the concept of money.
-Whence's Line station undergoes a significant level of trade even when [[temple ship]] visits are quite rare, as an [[accellerative discontinuity]] provides travel to the more populous trade centre of [[Magellan]].
+Whence's Line station undergoes a significant level of trade even when [[temple ship]] visits are quite rare, as an [[accelerative discontinuity]] provides travel to the more populous trade centre of [[Magellan]].
 ===Main Imports===

@@ Line 10: / Line 10: @@
 ==External Trade==
-Trade with the outside world is usually negotiated by station chiefs. These people live on the [[Line Station]]s and trade with offworld visitors in a more conventional manner. As the chiefs receive crops from the villages free (as any other villager can), and provide imported appliances on the same terms, those living on the surface don't even need to understand the concept of money.
+Trade with the outside world is usually negotiated by station chiefs. These people live on the [[line station]]s and trade with offworld visitors in a more conventional manner. As the chiefs receive crops from the villages free (as any other villager can), and provide imported appliances on the same terms, those living on the surface don't even need to understand the concept of money.
 ===Main Imports===

← Older revision		Revision as of 04:44, 13 March 2007
Line 40:		Line 40:

	===Whence Island===		===Whence Island===
		+	The island is what most people mean when they refer to Whence. However, like many other geographic terms on this planet, 'Island' means something quite different from what you might normally expect. The island is approximately 840 miles across at its widest point, although dramatic tidal patterns make it difficult to determine where the sea ends and the island begins.

−	{{planet\|class=2}}	+	====Physical Geography====
		+	The island's surface is a series of parallel ridges and ditches, much like the patterns left on a sand beach by the retreating tide. In some areas the channels carry water, and the ground is swamplike. Where the ground is higher, the ground dries out in all but the highest tides, and provides a solid surface which is easier to build on. The size of the lines also varies between regions, being anything from a few inches on the real beaches up to a yard in some places. There are also a few un-lined areas which are either known as deserts (flat expanses of rock, including some areas where the thick earth was transformed to ceramic by the [[vapour pile]] engines of early settlement ships), or forests (where organic processes have changed the shap of the ground).
		+
		+	====Settlements====
		+	The main political unit on Whence is the village. A village is loosely defined as any collection of buildings, connected to other villages by a road. It is always the presence of a road which defines boundaries - a pair of houses on its own constitutes a village, and so does a sprawling multi-level metropolis like [[Whence/Kreig\|Kreig]], with a population of more than 3 million.
		+
		+	For the most part, homes are built on top of poles some distance from the ground. At the time of the early settlements, it was believed that flattening the ridges and ditches over any great area could divert the rivers and tidal flows in unpredictable ways, and was therefore best avoided. By now, this method of construction has become a tradition even in areas where the ground is high enough not to be flooded in the highest tides. A house or shop is usually surrounded by a walkway on every level to allow exterior maintenance, with ladders which can be dropped to the ground. On the lowest level of a building (and the highest for buildings of more than 3 storeys, as well as certain others designated by the village leaders), these walkways are known as 'right paths' along which anyone has the right to walk. Right paths are usually close enough to step between even where they aren't joined, negating the need to descend to ground level within a village. As every path is maintained by the owner of the building, there is no need for publically-owned roads except connecting one village to another.
		+
		+	====Maps====
		+	Maps on Whence Island are just plain weird. A map of a village will usually represent each building as a square (regardless of its actual shape), and use arcs between them to indicate junctions between rights paths. Roads are marked with a name, and a series of faint parallel lines across them to indicate their direction relative to the ridges of the ground as they leave the city.
		+
		+	A regional map, on the other hand, is even more abstract. The ground ridges are always horizontal, and are never shown. This means that the map is distorted in regions where the ground beneath isn't level. Distance on the map represents the difficulty of travelling a route, rather than any indication of ground distance. In order to make the roads connect at sensible places, roads which are shorter on the map than they should be (such as a direct route across high ground, where going via another village would be faster) are highlighted in red. Between any two villages, there is always at least one non-red route. Between villages, roads are drawn as straight lines.
		+
		+	{{planet\|class=2\|settled=2441}}

@@ Line 30: / Line 30: @@
 The Spine is mostly uninhabited, however there are usually about a dozen geologists from offworld universities studying the area's unusual formation. There is also a permanent research station maintained by [[Gracini University]] on one of the larger islands, although this is currently unoccupied.
-==The Southern Continent==
+===The Southern Continent===
 It may seem (at least from an outsider's point of view) that whoever produced the first world maps of Whence must have been less than serious with the naming. The feature marked as "Southern Continent" is not a continent but an island chain, and Whence's geography does not define a direction as 'south'.
 The Southern Continent is a series of large flat columns of sedimentary rocks which rise from the sea bed, an early experiment with [[Geologic Engineering]] to produce habitable land. Each island has a flat surface, between sea level and 50 feet higher. During the original settlement in 2949, it was apparently believed that these would provide a safe space to build habitations for which fishing and algae farming would be the main primary industry.
 {{planet|class=2}}

← Older revision		Revision as of 13:54, 12 March 2007
Line 29:		Line 29:

	The Spine is mostly uninhabited, however there are usually about a dozen geologists from offworld universities studying the area's unusual formation. There is also a permanent research station maintained by [[Gracini University]] on one of the larger islands, although this is currently unoccupied.		The Spine is mostly uninhabited, however there are usually about a dozen geologists from offworld universities studying the area's unusual formation. There is also a permanent research station maintained by [[Gracini University]] on one of the larger islands, although this is currently unoccupied.
		+
		+	==The Southern Continent==
		+	It may seem (at least from an outsider's point of view) that whoever produced the first world maps of Whence must have been less than serious with the naming. The feature marked as "Southern Continent" is not a continent but an island chain, and Whence's geography does not define a direction as 'south'.
		+
		+	The Southern Continent is a series of large flat columns of sedimentary rocks which rise from the sea bed, an early experiment with [[Geologic Engineering]] to produce habitable land. Each island has a flat surface, between sea level and 50 feet higher. During the original settlement in 2949, it was apparently believed that these would provide a safe space to build habitations for which fishing and algae farming would be the main primary industry.

	{{planet\|class=2}}		{{planet\|class=2}}

← Older revision		Revision as of 23:07, 11 March 2007
Line 21:		Line 21:
	*Rare spices		*Rare spices
	*Fish and fish oil		*Fish and fish oil
		+
		+	==Geography==
		+	The majority of Whence's surface is covered with freshwater oceans. The sea is only broken by 3 major island groups.
		+
		+	===The Spine===
		+	This range of undersea mountains follows half a great circle around the planet. It is currently believed that this may have been the planet's equator at the time the mountains were formed. For about 35 degrees around the planet (1900 miles), these mountains each above sea level. They are mostly isolated peaks rather than a true mountain range, with hundreds of yards or even a few miles of sea between neighbouring islands.
		+
		+	The Spine is mostly uninhabited, however there are usually about a dozen geologists from offworld universities studying the area's unusual formation. There is also a permanent research station maintained by [[Gracini University]] on one of the larger islands, although this is currently unoccupied.
		+
		+	{{planet\|class=2}}

← Older revision		Revision as of 21:37, 11 March 2007
Line 1:		Line 1:
	The Free People's Commonwealth of Whence is one of the more unusual among the 333 planets.		The Free People's Commonwealth of Whence is one of the more unusual among the 333 planets.

−	The local government has passed a series of bylaws which mean currency is virtually unused on the planet's surface. ~~Instead~~, ~~any commerce~~ between villages is ~~managed as~~ a ~~barter~~ system.	+	==Economy==
		+
		+	The local government has passed a series of bylaws which mean currency is virtually unused on the planet's surface.
		+
		+	Within a village, the farmers usually provide their crops to anyone who wants them. Once a villager is seen to have understood this principle, they can expect to get everything they need without paying.
		+
		+	A barter sytem is used between villages who have a surplus of different produce. However, neighbouring villages often adopt an informal system of supplying whatever the other is short of. Once the members of a village generally believe the other village's leaders to be good and honest it is common to not track what goods they have been given, an expansion of the local gift-trade system.
		+
		+	==External Trade==
		+	Trade with the outside world is usually negotiated by station chiefs. These people live on the [[Line Station]]s and trade with offworld visitors in a more conventional manner. As the chiefs receive crops from the villages free (as any other villager can), and provide imported appliances on the same terms, those living on the surface don't even need to understand the concept of money.
		+
		+	===Main Imports===
		+	*Manufactured goods
		+	*Metals
		+	*Meat and Game
		+
		+	===Main Exports===
		+	*Herbal extracts
		+	*Rare spices
		+	*Fish and fish oil