I am still waiting for the new Lost World to begin season 4, A&E’s Lost World was really good. Even if the story was changed some and they added women. Actually, Doyle’s book was pretty good, but for the genre I think the TV series and perhaps A&E have changed it for the better.

Certainly in the TV series, if you forgive some of the sillier episodes, the background story is excellent, if you like that type of story, which is one of my favorites. Even Edgar Rice Burroughs stories with Tarzan and the various lost worlds/civilizations really get my imagination going. I have been slowly working towards that for my gaming, to produce, or copy a lost world, for gaming. I have some Roman and Egyptian soldiers as well as ape-men, stone-age-men and dinosaurs. I think that will expand my potential for a good game with some Darkest Africa explorers.

I see that you are thinking of creating a “Lost World”. I have over the years created lots of Worlds. I have several in which I have created continents, basically the entire planet. I have been working on a world created by my late friend Jim Brown, and I have taken Antarctica and turned that into an unknown continent. At one point I had a briefing book for the various countries – listing form of government, currency, population, language, military organization etc. I haven’t done that in a while.

I received some figures from Chris in exchange for some I had. I’m not quite sure but I believe the figures are Prussian Jaegers from the Franco-Prussian War. Well it does not matter to me they fit perfectly into a new unit I was about to build.

I bought a couple of packs of West Wind’s gothic horror Zendarians (Ruritania) (from the Prisoner of Zenda stories) to use as a controlling power on my new continent. I was wondering what figures to buy to make into units for them as I have plenty of Askaris to use but I needed some continental European ‘elite’ troops to go with the natives. I was thinking of ordering some Serbians or Rumanian troops from Alpha Miniatures and your Jaegars arrive that fit just right. Thanks loads, for saving me some money. I’m thinking Brown boots and equipment, red trousers, with medium gray jacket and hat. They will be the main European battalion.

I have a couple of other figure types that will form other European/Indian units and I have plenty of askaris. I thought of doing a whole world but for now I am just doing the continent.

I bought a Star Gate DVD (the first three shows $10 at Best Buy) and it has a Star Gate design on it so I will be sending British colonial troops and expeditions through it to various worlds, so I can use my Martians and other weird figs, but I don’t want to fight too many bugs. At this point I don’t think I will go into economics and politics. I guess that will come later. I think the size of the various European forces I have now will be sufficient. I can muster Brits, French, Germans, Austrians, Ruritania, and Italians. I will probably need a couple of Boer type states, with no organized army.

As I remember my old continent was large enough to hold all of Europe. I think I might use the Star Gate for a Lost World type place rather than a misplaced plateau in the wilds of the Amazon, we’ll see about that in the future. I am sort of reluctant to use Dinosaurs on earth.

How useful was it to you to set up various economies etc on your world. And what did you do or rather how did you do it? Any gaming books you used? Right now a combined question you wrote that you used actual economic figures for each country, ok, how did you figure out what portion the colony got. Second, since you were in your own creation, how did you determine the natural resources of each colony?

Looks like you have got things organized. I think that you are quite right not to use Dinosaurs. I seem to recall that GDW had a role-playing game (Cadillac’s and Dinosaurs) that might have helped with that regard.

Generally, in setting up the various economic structures I used a variety of books including some Rand McNally Atlas’s dating from the 1960s to US Department of State information sheets on countries. That gave mean idea as to how to do the overall system. I’ve also looked at histories and some other stuff. Generally, the economic set up gives one a guide as to what the capacity--industrial and natural resources are.

As to what a colony might have in the way of natural resources, well I sort of put in some of the same resources into an area on my world that would be similar to earth. Now there are variations and I allowed for chance to determine a greater or lesser amount. The economic structure is a good guide as to what countries can and can not do, determine its’ capacity to produce items and whether or not it can afford to take certain risks.

The economies were made for the fictional countries on my world but to a large extent they would correspond to those of England, France, US, Germany, etc. (My next question was which came first the economy or the number of cities/towns in each colony on the continent? I can see that it could work either way.) I would say that to an extent the economies come first because one critical aspect to the economy is the natural resources of the area. It is possible that these resources may not be developed by the people in the area due to lack of technology or knowledge.

I have recently been occupying my spare time with working on my fictitious continent--background, terrain, and troops. I used several atlases to determine weather, currents, environments, natural resources (the hardest to figure out), and people.

Since I have placed the continent between Madagascar, India, Indonesia, and Australia some of the choices were quite easy. Near by landmass and oceanic weather and currents along with adjacent landmass environment helped to determine the new continent environment that in turn determined the new continental weather.

For the natural resources I used near by landmass resources and continental weather to determine crops and animals. But, mineral resources are more difficult. I am hoping that there are mineral maps of the Indian Ocean so that it will make it easier.

People-wise I am going to draw on near by landmasses as well as past history—-Arab, Indian and Chinese sailors as well as Malayan pirates roamed these waters and deposited colonies. These colonies over the centuries will have done well or collapsed and will accept or reject colonial efforts as it suits them politically (all as determined by die).

I never realized how many countries I could represent on the tabletop by myself using my skirmish companies as battalions/regiments (a la 800 Fighting Englishmen), plus the number of individual characters, not soldiers, I can use.

There are 14 countries with 99 units of various sizes, representing over 2400 figures, hundreds of civilians, and all the natives in unexplored areas. This is going to keep me busy for quite a while.

How do I know this, because I have begun record keeping by creating index cards for each unit and most characters by using Avery inkjet index cards with the basics and then I add the specific info.

Unit card
Country
Unit:
Type: Cavalry/Infantry/Artillery Station:
A Troop : B Troop
1 : 11
2 : 12
3 : 13
4 : 14
5 : 15
6 : 16
7 : 17
8 : 18
9 : 19
10 : 20
Notes:

The Unit Card is based on the Battle Honors sheet that comes with TSATF, and using pencil I can keep track of where the unit is, casualties and replacements.

Character Card
Character
Nationality
Profession
Strength
Endurance
Intellect
Charisma
Social Level
Close Combat
Field craft
Skills
Weapons
Experience
Languages

The character card information is geared to using with TSATF rules, more later on after I figure it all out (but will obviously have to do with movement, firing, morale, melee, and events).