Rockhaven Vietnam World Event: Operation Everclear

The special forces base at Con Thien lies near the DMZ, only about 3km from the North Vietnamese border. For six weeks they have been subject to heavy mortar and artillery fire from PAVN forces, likely in preparation for an assault.

Charlie Company, 11th Engineering Battalion is assigned to clear the jungle between Con Thien and Gio Linh to facilitate supply operations, and are guarded by a Marine battalion (2nd battalion, 7th Marine). TAC assigns a strike package from the 69th Tactical Fighter Squadron based at Ubon to provide close air support. There is no FAC on station so this support must be directed by ground-based troops (this will become important later).

The plan is for the Phantoms to lurk about 30km south of the AO during the work period, refueling as needed from a tanker orbiting offshore near Da Nang to the southeast. Most of the work was expected to be suppressing sporadic mortar fire or clearing out a few recon patrols.

After half a day's uneventful work, at 1400 Charlie Company ran smack into a full scale PAVN assault crossing the Bến Hải River en route to Con Thien. 2nd Battalion moved to positions on the riverbank and were able to temporarily halt the advance. Heavy mortar and artillery fire from the north riverbank began to fall on the positions, and 2nd battalion made the call for the F-4s to roll in.

What ensued was 2 hours of utter chaos as ground-based controllers attempted to verbally issue commands to aircraft that they couldn't see that were travelling at transonic speeds at low altitude. The WSO on the phantom would be calling out their position relative to various landmarks and the ground controller would be trying to track the aircraft on a paper map and direct them to the target area. The Phantoms zipped back and forth along the northern riverbank and the airwaves filled with frustrated chatter:

"4 clicks west of that river bend..."

"I can hear you but I can't see you!"

"3 clicks..."

"Still nothing. You're getting quieter"

"2 clicks..."

"You're going the wrong way. Turn left"

"My left or your left?"

"I mean South"

"I can't see a fucking thing"

"Oh wait I see you! Right there. You just flew over the spot. Drop the bombs there."

"WHERE?"

"No it's too late now. Come back around and try again"

By late afternoon with the F-4s nearly out of fuel, they just decided to lay waste to a random spot on the north bank of the Bến Hải River. The PAVN had long since gotten bored and moved to attack somewhere else (the attack was supposed to be a feint anyway). Charlie Company was able to finish clearing the jungle and the F-4s landed safely back at Ubon.

The operation helped illustrate some of the shortcomings of ground-based bombing direction. Why had we decided not to use a FAC? Our bird dog pilot had to pick up his daughter from soccer practice. We probably should have used a slower CAS aircraft like a Skyraider or a helicopter but we had just finished building the F-4C version and wanted to showcase it. All these factors conspired to make the operation a somewhat underwhelming experience, although both sides considered their respective missions a success.

Everyone had fun, no one got hurt. 😎

Thanks for checking it out!

Flora of the Southern Midlands

By Norman Bickhoff PhD (Botany), Clang State University

Earthlike planet has what many botanists would consider a depressingly low level of biodiversity, appearing to support only a few dozen species of plants, even in what would be considered the lush, temperate regions in the middle latitudes/elevations where you would expect to find a more complicated, diverse genetic component.

While it may seem somewhat unintuitive, the biodiversity on Earthlike is actually higher than it has ever been at any point in its history, thanks (or no thanks) to human intervention. Contrast this with the situation on Earth which is currently undergoing an extinction event, Earthlike is actually closer to an explosion of life compared to what its natural history would imply.

The flora that does exist on Earthlike is a combination of native plants, non-native introduced species, and hybrids of the two. We have provided here a useful guide to the curious traveller about the sorts of plants you might expect to see if you find yourself in the southern midland area of Earthlike.

The Trees

Scientific Name: Picea lithophilia

Common Name: Rock Spruce or Hardy Spruce

Status: Introduced, naturalized

Occurrence: Common

Life History: Closely related to the Earth-origin Norway Spruce and Sitka Spruce, this conifer was introduced by humans, established itself and quickly adapted to Earthlike's very consistent weather patterns. It's scientific name comes from its ability to seemingly grow out of bare rock, which makes it one of the few trees that can cling to the windswept mountainsides and rocky cliffs common on Earthlike. It is found all over the planet, even at equatorial latitudes (in shrub form on cliffs) but under ideal conditions can grow to about 40 meters in height

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Scientific Name: Pinus magnifica

Common Name: Errol pine, Sigmund's pine, Jill pine (northern variety)

Status: Introduced, naturalized

Occurrence: Uncommon

Life History: Closely related to the Ponderosa Pine of Earth, this species was introduced and already had an advantage due to its affiliation for sandy well-drained soils. Its wind-dispersed seed enabled it to establish itself everywhere on the planet; although it is most common in upland slopes, it does sprinkle itself into most other biomes. It is the tallest tree on Earthlike, with some examples exceeding 50 meters in height

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Scientific Name: Pinus pentafolia (P. strobus pentafolia)

Common Name: shrubby white pine, failed pine

Status: introduced, semi-naturalized

Occurrence: Common

Life History: Literally, gene-for-gene, it's an Eastern white pine (P. strobus) but for unknown reasons when imported to Earthlike it refused to grow into a tree, preferring to remain in shrub form. This is interesting because P. magnifica, which is related, had little difficulty adapting as a tree despite a similar life history. Many suspect some sort of mycorrhizal dysfunction is to blame for this.

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Scientific Name: Quercus cerafolia

Common Name: Waxleaf Oak, midland oak, waxy oak

Status: Introduced, invasive

Occurrence: Common

Life History: Extremely common in the temperate midlands, this tree is related to various species of Live Oaks common in southern North America. It was genetically engineered in a well-intentioned attempt to control the spread of the daisy/Dactylis complex, but became invasive itself, thriving in the stable climatic conditions of Earthlike and spreading along with the invasive complex, and is now the primary component of the woodland areas in the temperate latitudes. They can get quite large, exceeding 40 meters in open field conditions.

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Scientific Name: Amelanchier pseudoprunus

Common Name: Falseberry, midland shadbush

Status: Introduced, fully naturalized

Occurrence: Common

Life History: This is an example of a tree that prospered greatly and almost immediately despite being alien to the landscape, however it isn't considered invasive. It created its own ecological niche rather than displacing native species. Descended from serviceberry plants on Earth, it does not produce an edible fruit, although its red leaves are often mistaken for berries at a distance. Earthlike does not have seasons like Earth, so this plant has lost its ability to defoliate in the autumn. Instead, it selectively defoliates individual leaves throughout the year, giving its distinctive speckled red-and-green appearance. It could be considered to be in a state of "perpetual autumn"

Herbs & Shrubs

Scientific Name: Bellis perennis

Common Name: Common Daisy

Status: Introduced, invasive

Occurrence: extremely common

Life History: A daisy just like you'd find in your grandma's garden. Massively invasive to Earthlike. Occurs in complex with Dactylis grasses

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Scientific Name: Dactylis spp.

Common Name: Orchard Grass

Status: Introduced, invasive

Occurrence: Extremely common

Life History: Orchard Grass from Earth. Occurs in complex with B. perennis. This complex dominates the southern midland region and is displacing the native slowgrasses at an alarming rate

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Scientific Name: Cersium via

Common Name: hill thistle, road thistle, plungeweed

Status: unknown, likely hybrid

Occurrence: Common

Life History: This poorly-studied annual herb is believed to be either a mutation of C. vulgare from Earth, or an endemic variety of similar thistle, or (most likely) a hybrid of the two. Common on dry hillsides with excessive drainage, often a good indicator of uneven/rocky underlying terrain. So "road thistle" is a bit of a misnomer, since you'd probably want to avoid driving over this stuff

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Scientific Name: Triticum aestivum

Common Name: Common Wheat

Status: Introduced, cultivar

Occurrence: Uncommon

Life History: It's wheat...regular old cereal grain. Unlike on Earth, it doesn't grow very well on Earthlike without excessive human intervention, so is cultivated as a food crop but has a lot of difficulty establishing itself in the wild, making wild sightings relatively rare. Not considered an invasive risk for that reason.

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Scientific Name: Prunus terrasimilis

Common Name: Clangberry, Clangcherry

Status: Probably endemic

Occurrence: Uncommon

Life History: This is known to be related distantly to some species of Earth cherries but isn't believed to have been introduced by humans, so is assumed to be endemic. Its delicious fruit is a major food source for engineers. While it is uncommon in most biomes, it is relatively abundant in the southern midlands.

The True Natives

Scientific Name: Pseudobrassica monofolia

Common Name: Edible rubbertree, midland cabbage, Clangcabbage

Status: Endemic, threatened

Occurrence: Uncommon

Life History: This is one of the few "true natives" to Earthlike, a leafy plant with edible leaves and a modest nutritional content. Not related to any known species on Earth. Cultivated for food but also found growing wild if you know where to look. It is threatened by the Daisy/Dactylis invasive complex

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Scientific Name: Xenocladium spyrosis

Common Name: Hill sawgrass, slowgrass, golden sedge

Status: Endemic, threatened

Occurrence: Common

Life History: Perhaps the worst victim of the daisy/Dactylis invasive complex, this grass used to be completely pervasive on the planet's surface. Any area dominated by the invasive species probably used to have this grass instead. The golden color is a drought-tolerant adaptation, but it doesn't photosynthesize as efficiently as the green grasses, leading to its being pushed out of its native range by the more competitive invasives.

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Scientific Name: Xenogleditsia retorta

Common Name: Spiral locust, false Acacia, Twistwood, tanglevine (young form)

Status: Endemic, critically endangered

Occurrence: Extremely rare

Life History: Definitely the most fascinating tree on the planet, while it superficially resembles an Acacia tree like we have on Earth, it is a completely unrelated species. The climatic stability of Earthlike for the past 6 million years has led these trees to be extremely long-lived, by some estimates up to 3000 years for the oldest examples. The "tree" itself is more accurately described as an "above-ground root" as it is capable of wicking moisture directly out of the atmosphere, or directly absorbing rainfall. The root systems can extend for miles in every direction and are locally allelopathic to other X. retorta specimens but not to other plant life, meaning they only exist as a sparse collection of individual trees than as a "forest" in the traditional sense. They appear to have relied on an insect to pollinate their flowers, but the insect likely went extinct around the same time humans arrived. All propagation of this tree is now reliant entirely on humans. The tree has a strong cultural value among the tribes of Earthlike, while it is considered sacred by the forest and mountain tribal peoples, it is considered cursed by the desert peoples. In either case however, destroying one of these trees is a strong cultural taboo, considered no different from killing another human, and is a capital offense in all the tribal nations.

Distributed by Icelake Geological Survey

I made this in an attempt to explain what we at the IGS are actually trying to do, but watching it back now I think it raises more questions than it answers...oh well. It was fun to make

Whirlybirds and history nerds

The success of the equatorial expedition left the IGS with enough money to buy some new equipment. Now, being the mid-1950s, helicopters are still a pretty nascent technology, but the US Navy was finally getting rid of some of its WWII-era first generation helicopter designs. We had the fortune of already having a team member in Xavier "Ray" Arroyo, who flew this helicopter for the Navy during the war, which was good because it is insanely difficult to fly.

Unlike some newer helicopters, it does not have an auto-hover feature, and essentially has only a single direction of thrust, requiring the pilot to manually maintain the correct pitch and attitude. In addition, we pushed it somewhat beyond its original capabilities as it was not designed to handle sling loads. It had a tendency to "crab" with a load and the lowered center of gravity meant the pilot was constantly fighting a moment of torque perpendicular to the direction of travel.

Also its range was awful compared to fixed wing aircraft. Mt. Gad was only about 36km from our base and it just barely completed a round trip, literally running out of fuel as it settled onto the landing pad. That, and a number of other close calls, led to this aircraft being probably the scariest addition to our fleet...plus the resources we have wrapped up in it basically mean if we crash it we're screwed. It's more expensive than all our other vehicles combined and is uninsured.

Pushing South

Mt. Gad is probably the least accessible peak in the Sierra Galeria range, but it's also the tallest, positioned centrally in the region and giving a line of sight all the way to the polar highlands, so it will likely be the second-to-last antenna we need before we can begin our polar expedition. Although we spitballed various ideas for other ways of ascending the peak, including a giant bridge from the slopes of Mt. Kirçu (whose peak is probably accessible via rover), we knew the only realistic way of doing this safely was to make use of our new helicopter, risky as that may be...we weren't even certain the helicopter would be able to generate enough lift at that altitude to hover, let alone carry 4 tons of supplies in a sling.

Rather than test this we just decided to send it; either the antenna would get built, or the expedition (and the hopes of the Icelake Geological Survey's future) would be dashed against the mountainside in a fitting and poetic end to our little adventure. The weather cooperated, the little helicopter proved quite plucky, and Arroyo's expert piloting brought the expedition another great success, with the antenna coming online just after noon on day 2.

However the survey shot was not good. We missed it by over 100m! It's simply too far away from our base to accurately use the reference theodolite. We had sort of expected this; we knew we would need to follow up with a UMT-equipped ground survey team to the mountain's base, so this isn't the worst thing in the world. But for now it's a big red stain on our data sheet. The problem with that is there's a pirate base smack in the middle of the valley, so driving the UMT out there might come with....extra challenges...

Thanks for checking it out!

Getting to know your planet

After basking in the success of her breakthrough paper on the Mellam's Teeth formation, Dr. Seales agreed to join the team permanently, deciding that joining a ragtag geological survey is more exciting than life in the ivory tower at Clang State University. This week's expedition was to find the equator! We actually believed this would be a trivial task...We devised a method that wouldn't require clunky google spreadsheets! All we needed was a compass, some simple constructions, some clear weather, and a keen eye....

Pulling some strings with friends at a nearby trade station, they traded us a beat-up old WWII halftrack for our respawn rover, which was nice because the respawn rover seemed anachronistic in our 1950s world anyway. We ripped out the rear seats of the halftrack and hacked in a fuel generator and survival kit, modified it to tow a 10 ton supply trailer, and stuffed it with food, ice, building materials, and of course a bigass compass which was our only real survey equipment on this trip. No fancy self-leveling theodolites this time. We're doing this old school 😤

Although upon reflection, we probably should have hauled the theodolite out there and just pointed it at the sun. Our crude method meant we spent 4 days wandering in the desert, fighting off wolves and staring into the sun, literally chasing shadows...but we did succeed!

Our "observed" equator was only about 50cm off from the true equator, but our grid alignment was perfect, so it's accurate to say the equator lies along the indicated grid, even if it isn't right in the center of the block. We built a solar observatory there and established that location as the Prime Meridian of earthlike (0 degrees latitude, 0 degrees longitude) since Prime meridians are completely arbitrary anyway. We would have liked to have found a spot along the equator at exactly sea level to use as the Prime Meridian, but the reference theodolite isn't accurate enough at that range (about 25km) to verify its elevation to within what we consider "survey quality" precision. However being within 50cm of the true equator on a 60km radius planet is very much within our definition of survey quality (we were hoping to get within 100m)

We used the funds from completing the survey to finally purchase a helicopter, which will be instrumental in our next expeditions into the mountains to find the south pole! And now we can begin plotting our discoveries on a lat/long grid instead of as a vector from our reference theodolite, which in retrospect was never going to work as a universal datum if we plan on actually surveying the entire globe instead of just an area within 20km of our base. Very cool. Thanks for checking it out!

The survey continues

After the mostly successful Mt. Puncie expedition, the team needed a new geologist to replace now-deceased Conrad Massey. We were able to acquire the services of Dr. Victoria Seales, who was head of the Clang State University geology department, Massey's former colleague and friend. As an academic, she was a bit rusty with fieldwork, so we took the opportunity to organize a low-stakes field trip to Mellam's Teeth.

The purpose of this trip was twofold: to further explore the origins of the Mellam's Teeth formation using new data from the Mt. Puncie expedition, and to test our newest piece of precision survey equipment: the Universal Mobile Theodolite. This fascinating instrument enables precise angular measurements at long distances. The plan is to use it as a reference datum when surveying large distant areas so we don't need to rely on the reference theodolite at our main base (which loses accuracy at high angles and large distances). The two instruments will supplement each other's results.

In the spirit of our 1950s postwar tech-world, we reached into the bag of war surplus vehicles and bought an old German flatbed truck to use as the carrier vehicle for the instrument. We had considered using a tracked (or preferably halftracked) chassis, but went with the truck for its wider wheelbase and higher overland speed. This sacrificed off-road capabilities for stability; the delicate device is very heavy and shifts the center of gravity upwards considerably.

The two-day expedition was considered a great success, the UMT device performed acceptably (once it was properly calibrated) and Dr. Seales was able to piece together a theory that could explain the Mellam's Teeth formation

The Seales Hypothesis (abstract)

The felsic formation near the base of Mt. Puncie known as "Mellam's Teeth" has puzzled geologists for some time, but recent evidence, supported by data and samples from the Icelake Geological Survey's Mt. Puncie expedition has revealed the extrusive rhyolite composition at the mountain's peak is identical to the main component of the Mellam's Teeth formation.

Mt. Puncie is characterized by a large dome-like structure on its northern slopes, which is the remains of a collapsed lava dome that formed during a period of geological activity (8-10 million years ago). At some point during that period, the dome cooled while geological activity continued beneath. During a second period of geological activity about 6 million years ago, magma pooled beneath the dome and somehow became pressurized, likely by a partial collapse of the dome during an earthquake, and the resulting eruption blasted approximately 0.7 cubic kilometers of material off the top of Mt. Puncie, collapsing the northern rim of the volcano crater. The displaced material fell to earth as a jagged spike about 8km from the peak, and over the ensuing 6 million years, weathered into the formation we now call Mellam's Teeth.

The specific composition of rock was named "Masseyite" in honor of Conrad Massey, whose work collecting rock samples from the mountain during the fatal expedition was crucial in forming this hypothesis. The period of geological activity that formed Mellam's Teeth is the most recent known such period in Earthlike planet's history, as it is now believed to be geologically dead.

TLDR: Mellam's Teeth is the "fallen" top of Mount Puncie

Pretty neat, huh? Now that we have the tools and the expertise, we are on the lookout for new points of interest to survey on Earthlike. If you have any locations in mind that you want us to theorycraft a bunch of pseudoscientific lore about, we are taking suggestions!

Thanks for checking it out!

-Icelake Geological Survey

After the WWII server shut down, we started a new world to fool around with some war surplus assets and began a geological survey of Earthlike planet. Now normally surveying is a fairly simple task using in-game X,Y,Z GPS coordinates. However our server rules put us in the 1950s, meaning traditional SE hover ships and jetpacks are forbidden. We mostly have only fixed-wing aircraft and ground vehicles. So actually getting somewhere is difficult. Also, GPS is OP.

The nearest peak was Mt. Puncie, a soaring dormant volcano in the northern hemisphere, about 25km from our base at Icelake, which was used as our universal geodetic reference (the only GPS point we were allowed to use for surveying purposes). Using this reference, we designed transit theodolite and a method of radiotelemetry which would enable us to accurately measure angular distances, which we then use trigonometry (with corrections for the curvature of the planet) to determine the elevation. However this method requires a transmitter at the survey point, necessitating an expedition to construct an antenna tower at the mountain peak.

The expedition:

• 4 engineers (2 mountaineers, 2 support pilots)
• 1 motor sledge
• 1 towing vehicle (we just used a lightly modified respawn rover because we were broke)
• 1 light aircraft for scouting
• 1 Trimotor transport for suppplies and extraction
• 1 S-10 pistol (10 magazines)
• 1 Flare Gun (10 magazines)
• 10x powerkit
• 10x medkit
• 100kg food
• 4x oxygen bottles
• 9 tons of construction supplies

The motor sledge was specially designed for the expedition; it would carry the supplies as far as possible, but was expected to be abandoned/scrapped near the peak with the final push being made on foot, with trips back to the sledge for supplies to finish construction. Descending the mountain was expected to be a relatively straightforward direct trip, sort of by bunny hopping and platforming on foot, although there was also a distinct possibility this would be a one-way trip.

The expedition was largely a success (One fatality). Using the antenna, theodolite and a spherical line-of-sight formula we were able to determine the height of the mountain peak to be about 5137 meters (assuming "sea level" of 60,000 meters from planet center). We checked this against the GPS value (which isn't cheating because I just wanted to make sure this wasn't a giant waste of time) and using the radial distance formula got a result of 5020m. This is considered "in the ballpark" since if you account for the height of the antenna mast it brings our error to within 100m which was our initial goal. We know this isn't the tallest mountain on Earthlike, and we are constructing more precise tools to improve the measurements and are saving money for a helicopter which is desperately needed so we don't die on the top of mountains anymore. But with this antenna, the entire northern mountain range is now accessible, and we will need to construct a string of these in our quest to create a radiotelemetry network and, eventually, survey the north pole. Thanks for checking it out!

I know they don't really do anything but I love station NPCs. They mill about, they wave at you, they point at butterflies, I think they're adorable. All that's missing is rambling conversations that don't make any sense. Although maybe replace "Oblivion gates" with "Space Pirates" or something