I say we blow em out of the sky before they even touch down.

Get this out of the way before I see what else there is to think about. I think we've all been saying that this is necessary since day two - there's a long way from inception to completion but let's get this up and running now.

Vote build colony defence

So I can't help but think that Crimson is the victim of the phantom interrogator while Raven was hit by the murderer/stowaway.

Looking at the victims of the interrogation certainly suggests that the interrogator is interested in the stowaway as I can see people making cases for Chief and Crimson being suspects. I suspect that the murderer is only able to wound people, not get an assured kill. Of course if the person is already wounded then that's enough to kill them. That would explain why they chose to hit Schmidty and Danny despite the fact that they were probably not optimal targets in terms of their contribution. They couldn't risk attacking Chief though as he there was the possibility that he was being protected thanks to Thomkal's warning.

Raven didn't have a specific activity assigned to him yesterday, so it might be that the murderer will avoid targeting people in groups, presumably because of the increased risk of discovery. I don't necessarily that means that people with a specific activity couldn't be guilty of the attack as I'm guessing everyone has the ability to sneak away. Why would Raven be targeted though? Is he the least under suspicion of all the people without specific tasks?

Personally I never even considered that the murderer and stowaway weren't two seperate people but I guess it bears thinking about. My experience of werewolf says that they are the same person though.

So fontisian and Thomkal were both involved in the group working on action. Why wasn't one of them targeted rather than Raven? Is it time to get paranoid about one of them being converted? Or is it just an opportunity attack and the perpertrator doesn't get much in the way of deciding whom he hits?

And what exactly do we do if we even suspect that someone is the stowaway or murderer? It doesn't really seem like we have much in the way of options to deal with it anyway - I guess certain roles and positions get the option to do stuff.

On the science front I can't help but think that we should be looking to secure a source of water next. I presume we're currently recycling our own water - if we're hoping to become self-sufficient then we probably need to have water. So I'm leaning towards water as the scientific project for today. Stronger materials just sounds too non-specific to be much use while it seems pointless concentrating lots on agriculture if we don't have the water to run said agriculture.

So to sum up

a) We have been given some sort of chemical by whoever is running this thing, chemicals that they believe made the first team go mad. Not great news for us we can surmise. For those wondering, given my profession on Earth, I know nothing about what chemicals have been pumped into us.

b) There's someone among the 21 original colonists who we should be worried about. This adds credence to the murderer and the stowaway being different people. Under those circumstances finding the murderer is of greater importance than finding the stowaway. Of course, it's still possible that the stowaway is the murderer and then there's someone else on top of that who we should be worried about.

c) Earth has developed FTL communication.

With communications coming in it has become imperative that we protect ourselves from both outside and within our colony. We must create the colony defense system today.

I would like to hear Jackal and saldana's thoughts on which direction they believe our engineering team should take today.

We need to keep someone on Raven at all times. I know he's injured, is it at all possible to treat him and keep him in our jail until he's back to decent health? Yes, it keeps him trapped, but the stowaway or murderer likely won't be able to get at him in there. Just a thought.

Font should ask what has happened to the previous crew and who among us should not have been allowed on board. If they care about our safety, they will tell us who it's most dangerous on our colony.

I think we'll need weapons before we start exploring the surface.

Vote create colony defense

Agree with Narc on researching water, though an improved communicator I think is potentially useful too, for more information. We clearly have a mystery we need to solve, which could be linked to the stowaway / murderer in some way.

Medical team probably split up to try and treat the wounded. Engineers probably offensive design so we can more safely explore the other colony site to get clues into what's going on.

I am agree with that, I don't know how we manage to survive 5 days without water...

By the way, why we are not 100% healed after ate every day :(

I would also like to sincerely thank our leader, fontisian, after acquiescing assets in saldana and Golden Eagle to help out in the engineering department. We will not let the colony down with our designs and implementations.

Jackal should read as Golden Eagle there, my mistake.

Wow, what a bunch of a-holes at NASA... I think we need to miscommunicate our situation here a bit in order for them to get their act together. What a bunch..

Also, a favor to ask. Could someone track the votes today? Will be offline getting FIOS installed and it is already running late as the install guy just got here and will be several hours.

Thanks for beating me up shoveler. So on top of starving to death I'm beaten up. Don't let autumn anywhere near me.
He kills people for a living. YOu know how Dexter kills people that kill other people? Autumn seems to be killing people that are already sick and dying. He left a hospital littered with dead bodies.

Keep him away!

I mean REALLY people??? REALLY?????

i won't be around much today. I'm taking it easy after near fainting episode last night.
Can chat in little bips through the day maybe.

Get better CF!

Sure thing boss... I am around most of the day and night and should be able to help out. If someone else has the time that'd be swell to. Either way. Just wanted to get a message out there that I should be able to. Hope the switch goes well... damn IT people (I'm looking at you GoldenEagle! jk)!

This has no direct correlation to this session but heard this on the way in to work and laughed... methinks this game will warp your mind!

Day Five Objectives

Grover may decide
- what his team works on (offensive design, improved communicator, improved tools, improved biodome)


My thoughts... Offensive design seems the route to go. This will allow us the ability to start to search the planet for supplies as well as clues as to who else is out there. While we are starting our search we can obtain improved tools to help us. The communicator is operational and we'll know more about its usefulness once we ask our 3 questions today. We are back at 100% health wise except for the interrogation and murder attempts so we can probably hold off on the improved biodome for now.

Grover, I would recommend Offensive Design but it is your call.

Day Five Objectives

Scientific Team may decide:
- What to research (local agriculture, stronger materials, source of water)


This decision seems to be a little more complex... not sure we need to know more about local agriculture at this point as we seem to be very healthy for the most part. We could have a need for stronger materials once our base gets larger and/or we start exploring off base. Water is not an issue right now as we are doing ok for biodome. I have to wonder if local agriculture and water will be needed to travel the surface. Longer trips may require both maybe? It seems like water could be a huge help if that is indeed the case and it also may be necessary for redundancy if the biodome is sabotaged. I need to hear everyone's thoughts on this item before I proceed with an option.

Day Five Objectives

Colony may decide:
- Action (Create colony defense, collect supplies from drop, investigate the heat source to the northeast, investigate the landing area to the southeast)


This one seems easy unless I am missing something. My only thought is are we shooting ourselves sin the foot if we don't collect supplies? Font alluded to this last night... they are just sitting there. I assume we would know if the other craft we saw was looting them. Even if that is the case it seems like defense would be a very strong need. If they loot supplies why not our camp next?

Vote Create Colony Defense

septadola

I agree with the idea that the stowaway and murderer are separate. In fact I wonder if the interrogator is teh stowaway and is looking for the murderer.

I suppose CF will be happy that I would suggest that Chief and I work on Raven, and have NTN work on CrimsonFox. I assume that Raven is in more danger. NTN should at least be able to stabilize CF's condition.

I think it's probably time to get those supplies. I would say we put together our defenses, get the supplies, and ask some pointed questions.

Ahhh yes. Questions. A few possibles;

- What expectations does earth have regarding the drug side affects for the medication we were given for the mission?
- What other signs of life has earth seen on Mars?
- What supplies were given to use as part of our landing supply cache?
- What is the background and identity of the individual that was not supposed to be sent along with the other 20 colonists?

If I had to guess I'd bet the stowaway was sent by the outfit that put that wonderful chemical into us before our departure. Probably an observer type.

In response to timmae and a general statement on where I think we should go:

I am leaning toward offensive design or improved tools. Obviously you are right, having the offensive designed may give us the ability to more properly explore the area and collect our supplies that are just hanging out on the surface.

Now that we know more about the previous survivors and their potential zombie-like status, we need to work on the offensive design and I would urge my fellow engineers to agree with this assessment. I know that final discretion on where we go with this is in my hands, but I want input from all sides.

By getting the project to improve colony defense today, which I have voted for, it gives us the chance to protect ourselves from any outside threat, as well as potentially giving us more options to track down the stowaway and/or murdered (for the record, I also believe they are two separate people). I digress, but I believe that defenses should be the priority over collecting supplies today. We only have a hazy, vague idea of what lies in wait for us outside of our colony. We need to shore up defenses and then immediately enhance our offensive capabilities. I think the drop supplies can wait another couple of days before we venture out of the colony.

Safety first, folks.

So is CF being CF or is he role-playing being a nutjob? A question I often asked myself when I played werewolf with him.

I guess if we have guards they need to guard CF and Raven. If there's only a chance to guard one person I would guess a coin-flip to keep the attacker on their toes/worried.

Given that they weren't supposed to be talking about it I would imagine that questions about the extra won't be answered as we're likely to be talking to the guys who run the show who, apparently, don't want us to know about him. I like the question about the drug side effects although, again, we shouldn't get our hopes up about a decent answer.

Asking if they say the third spaceship and if they have any ideas where it came from seems like a good way to go - as that is, presumably, something that won't be classified.

Hrm, interesting accusations. Seems to fit yesterdays theme of pointing the finger at the shoveler.

I will happily submit myself to incarceration. The jail may be the safest place in the colony right now. I'm guessing that was the motivation for framing me last night, an easy way to get a colonist out of the mix after Thomkal's blanket statement.

I'm not a scientist but is it possible that these drugs are creating hallucinations and possibly masking the true identity of our resident thug? I suppose that goes along with asking about side effects of this chemical they dumped into us.

...sigh...

I am not sure if I am more upset at CF or Shoveler right now.

I'll start off with CF: did it not occur to you that Shoveler has a kinda seer role with his interrogations? Thanks for outing him.

And Shoveler, I wish you hadn't challeneged his assertion. No one else had even said anything about CF (except for Narcizo, who thought CF was being a nut job).

I have known it was Shoveler since I healed abit at the end of Day Three. I intentionally kept that quiet for obvious reasons.

Incidentally, after beating me up, apparently Shoveler watched over me the rest of the night.

I assume shoveler had convictions regarding CF... CF was pretty high on my watch list although I had absolutely no input into this decision. The good news is that we have a shorter list of possibilities for the murderer and/or stowaway.

just a guess on you based on how you are acting. The autumn stuff is fact. Before coming to Mars, he killed people. He killed lots of people. And I don't want him killing me.

Alrighty then...

This has certainly been an interesting past hour or so.

Autumn stuff? What did I miss?

i didn't out him. YOu just did. I was lying :P

Technically, since the stowaway might indeed not be the murderer, it is conceivable now that the interrogator and the stowaway are one and the same.

I would also argue it is fairly conclusive that the murderer and the stowaway are not the same person. The stowaway is not known to NASA, but they clearly knew about the murderer being one of the original 21.

What was the purpose in that?

Why lie or accuse anyone, I mean, if you didn't know?

I frankly don't believe you. You knew it was Shoveler, and that's why you said it. That was a bad move, CF.

To see his reaction really. I don't really like a guy going around hurting us every night. This makes it clear that the interrogator and the murderer are not the same person. Altho they could be working together.

how did you know it was shoveler, CR? I didn't.

But you just said you didn't know Shoveler was the interrogator. Better get your lies straight, bud. ;)

Bulldoody.

I recovered more memory of the night after being healed some at the end of Day Three.

I saw the manifest incidently. That's how I know Autumn's past. Saw some other's too. SOmeone stole it from me though.