Arctic Terrain

[MEHughes]

Evening all,

I haven't posted in a while, and that's because I've been suitably busy with various things for a few months, but glad to report I'm back.
The question I pose to you this evening is simple. What kind of terrain would you expect to find on an Arctic planet? I'm sure there are people here more qualified than me to provide suggestions; but I'm thinking something beyond the normal glaciers and frozen lakes.
For example, an Imperial Base. Would it be under or overground? Would aircraft be able to land above ground? I know this would vary from planet to planet but assume that this in many ways is an icy desert, but with little in the way of storms or disturbing weather, just lethal cold.
I'm looking forward to here what people suggest

MEHughes

[Dolnikan]

It depends on how cold it really is but buildings could exist on the surface. Landing pads would also be possible as long as it is not too cold. A world of that kind would also need some natural resource to draw people, so perhaps a mining installation?

[MEHughes]

I agree, perhaps some sort of gas trapped underneath ice sheets that requires big drills?
That could always be fun to convert

I'm thinking cold enough that to stay out on the surface is certain death; a bit like Hoth cold.

[Kaled]

I was just about to say you could do something like the rebel base on Hoth...

[Dolnikan]

Big drills are always a good thing, except when they're pointing at you of course. The extremely low temperatures, which I assume to be around 170K would cause many fossil fuels to freeze, so storing a vehicle which has not been properly prepared in the open would be quite a bad idea. People outside would need constant protection and remaining outside would be unwise. Buildings would need thich, well-isolated walls or they could be undergrground where the temperatures could be a bit higher. Oxigen content in the athmosphere would be low because there is probably very little plant life on the planet. A very hostile and unpleasant environment.

[DapperAnarchist]

I would imagine that the buildings would be underground - above ground, cylindrical or hemispherical entrances (minimum surface area and no corners to reduce heat loss), perhaps even ones that drop into the ground when not in use, sensor devices, snow drifts, crevasses, perhaps some sort of ancient frozen skeleton, ice caves, pits in the ice/tundra filled with soft snow, perhaps some peculiar form of plant life, very slow growing and almost crystalline (less liquids), similar to mortar rot, a snowed in convoy truck perhaps, with frozen crew...

[Draco Ferox]

I would imagine that a frozen runway would be fairly easy to land on, as long as your aircraft had either VTOL, like a valkyrie, or landing skids, for craft such as thunderbolts. A mining facility soounds fun, and I would imagine that most of the base would be under the snow to seal the heat in, as would most of the vehicle storage.

As far as terrain goes, cramped tunnels interspersed with huge caverns for under the snow, and wide open white spaces for above ground. Maybe in game terms have a blizzard to limit visibility so that it doesn't become a duck shoot. A few things sticking up above ground, such as sensor vanes to provide a break to the visual whitewash, and maybe some vehicles in high-visibility colours. Maybe having all characters have to wear high-visibility clothing would be a good idea, as well as a hat with a flag on it, so that if they fall into a snowdrift, they can be easily located. Nothing to do with making them look ridiculous....

[Inquisitor Octavian Lars]

I would SO love to see a hoth base board!

[Dolnikan]

Hats with flags on them are fabulous...

I'm afraid that a multilevel boad could be quite complicted to make, especially if you ever feel like mixing things up. If it is extremely cold bodily fluids would freeze to the ground as well and be rather hard to remove without cutting out a part of the ground. Fluids that drop down would freeze partially before they reach the ground as well. A frozen runway would have molten parts because of the heat of the engines. These heated parts would rapidly freeze again but it would give some nice, very slippery areas. Never forget that characters should fall down a lot when running over areas of flat ice, it gives them something to do.

[Draco Ferox]

Never forget that characters should fall down a lot when running over areas of flat ice, it gives them something to do.

That, or they might not be able to stop. the idea of a series of flags of various bright colours whipping around on a runway seems... interesting, and the idea of "we're very near a cliff, and by the throne, it's slippy!" is amusing, to say the least.

[Dolnikan]

That's a nice idea, some of the moving flags could also try to use ski's of course. But to come back to terrain, you could even have the population mining frozen petrochemicals. Lakes of liquid methanol could also be a possibility where strange kinds of life could develop.

[Draco Ferox]

I was thinking that if it was cold enough, chemicals like methane might exist in liquid form, which would be excellent for extraction purposes, as it would not require compression or refrigeration for transport, and other chemicals such as mercury might be solids, rendering them easier to mine. I also want to include a mercury lake in one of my games, as a giant mirror-like object sould be an intersting focal point.

In flora and fauna terms, larger animals do better in colder climes, so assuming that they could get enough energy, creatures the size of houses would be an interesting twist on a scenario, especially a stampede *evil smirk*

[krenshar]

Even if you go with undergrounds facilities, an air purifier/exchanger could be a large multi-level structure if you wanted one.  As well as an obvious weak point that enemies of the imperium (and the occasional inquisitor) might want to target.
Heat in the expelled gases and their exhaust flues provides an excuse to add a bit of flora to scatter terrain, as they can be explained by pipes running close to the surface.  You could even add some pale colours to base-coats, representing fungal blooms beneath the ice caused by past leaks or rotted lagging.

I've also seen some more standard industrial terrain get a winter treatment with icicles made of pva glue.  Though the method was very time-consuming, as each icicle was built up one tiny blob at a time using the end of a cocktail stick.  I've tried using slivers of offcut from plastic laminate sheets to do similar; a lot less effort but equally less impressive results

[Adlan]

I've also seen some more standard industrial terrain get a winter treatment with icicles made of pva glue.  Though the method was very time-consuming, as each icicle was built up one tiny blob at a time using the end of a cocktail stick.  I've tried using slivers of offcut from plastic laminate sheets to do similar; a lot less effort but equally less impressive results

I've seen Christmas Ornaments done with Clear setting Hot Melt glue, similar effect, but much faster.

[Dolnikan]

Methane has a very low boiling point, around -160C, this kind of temperature is too low to move around in wearing only a special suit. Solid mercury is certainly possible, it freezes at only -39C. Characters moving around in really extreme temperatures without being modelled for the environment could look verry strange.