General Progress Update (Patreon)

Because it's been quite a while since the last post in the main series, I figure a general update on how everything's going might be nice:

1, The next major post in the main "apple pie from scratch" series is going to be on making topographical maps, and has been taking a while largely because I thought it would be a great idea to once again find an obscure bit of research software with limited documentation and try to get that working. The good news is that it does actually work, but getting it to work well is going to take some more testing, and each test generally takes a few hours if not most of an evening (the software doesn't take all that long to run, but setting up the input maps and tweaking the parameters can take a while). I'm hoping that won't take more than another couple months at the absolute most but I can't be sure what stumbling blocks I might encounter.

2, While that's working, I might try to put out one or two shorter standalone posts on a couple topics somewhat outside the purview of the main series; One I've been thinking of is an overview of the main types of climate models used in research and what types processes are actually modelled. I often have a bit of free time during work where I can read papers or write but couldn't use any of my software at home, so working on this wouldn't take any time away from working on the next main post.

3, I also want to keep doing some updates on the earlier main series posts, and I have a pretty substantial one planned for Part IVb (including a number of interesting ideas I've seen in the literature like planets with obsidian glass surfaces, silicate/carbide hybrid planets, and strange matter planets), but I know this isn't always as exciting as a completely new post; maybe I'll finish this up after doing the above short standalone one.

4, There probably won't be another climate explorations post until after winter. Energy prices are getting pretty substantial in the UK and keeping a second laptop constantly churning through processor-intensive work just isn't economical right now. I'm hoping to at least get the 3-hour days model done before turning it off, but it's been taking its time balancing. If it's taking too long I'll at least show you the latest year and grab a couple wind maps for Stephen.

5, Once I have finished the next main post, actually drawing out a complete map of Teacup is probably gonna take some time; there's only so quickly I can draw maps without annihilating my wrist. I'll probably make a little side series going over each continent and the particular ways I incorporate the geological history and climate into the terrain, but depending on my approach that may have to wait until after I've already mapped out the whole planet.

6, The above has an impact on the posts planned after it: I'm considering doing a post going over some interesting landforms we might see on planets with geology or chemistry unlike Earth's, but I'll have to see how much good information I can find for that; The next 4 posts planned after that, though--1 overviewing map projections and maybe talking about making a "true color" map if I can find a good approach for that, and 3 regarding natural resources--all sort of depend on having a final teacup map to use as an example. If the map is taking a while, I might work on some short posts and updates to old posts again, but if it's taking a really long time, I might consider skipping ahead to subjects I have planned later in the series (starting to get into biochemistry, mass extinctions, and evolution) which don't really depend on the map (I do eventually want to do spec evo on teacup, but the idea would be to lay out all the considerations and options first and then start getting into that as an example of how to execute them). It might make the site map confusing for a while, but then future fans could debate on whether the series is best experienced in production order or chronological.

7, The worldbuilding spreadsheet could also really use an update in a couple places, but I may wait on that until after I've done full updates on Parts IVb and c.

Basically, working on these topography maps is proving to be a big bottleneck, but there are a few things I can work on in parallel to that, and after they're done I think I should be able to return to a somewhat faster pace again.