Vehicle choice

[The Sociologist]

ok so instead of having things saying it can hold xxxgr would people be happy with "it can hold a vast amount" or "it only has a limited amount of space" ??

Yes, and I think we'd like confirmation of the general features. Like I'm supposing a bike cart is a single-seater bike with an added "storage bin", a Riksjah a single-seater bike with an added "people space" and so on. Guesses based on the names.

That info, plus a general indication of how much of the overall investment goes towards speed, would be helpful. For example, it seems a tandem concentrates more on speed--you can't even fit two people on it if they're carrying too much.

So, such overall descriptions would be very welcome.

By the way, is it just me or are vehicles hopelessly too expensive for the "Hematite Age"? Anyone built a station car recently without using iron left over from "the old days"?

[west]

I've seen a lot of dirt motorcycles built in a certain location within the past 6 years or so, after the switch. I'm sure they could have built a stationcar or two instead.

[julie2]

It would be good to know what the difference between wood and stone would be. I don't really see why you would know it's exact capacity...that's not something obvious from thinking about a way to put something together, or even from looking at it. (doubt me? Tell me the volume of your bedroom. In cubic meters. Without measuring tools)

Also...I don't think anyone knows exactly how many passengers a car will hold untill they've tried packing friends into it...cantr cars don't even have seats (as far as I can tell), so there's no particular indication of how many bodies are meant to be crammed in.

And for knowing speed and such...modern engineers can't tell you the exact capabilities of a device without building and studying it first. Cantrians shouldn't be better off.

I can tell the difference between a boxroom and a spacious lounge just by looking. No I couldn't tell the exact capacities, but I could make an educated guess and arrive at a good approximation. And if I happenened to be the architect, I would know the answer exactly, wouldn't I ? (admittedly my guess as to how many guests I could invite to a party would be a little bit vague, and rather depend on how big and how friendly the gueasts were). I'm just asking to know the kind of things Canrians would know automatically if they happene to possess eyes and brains.

Anyway, unless they're going to fix this problem whereby you can't get back into a building to empty it if you shove too much inside (or does that only apply to corpses?) people will be too worried to discover these things by experimentation.

As others have said, realistically you're going to have some idea of what you're setting out to build before you build it. You're not going to set out to build a bigger vehicle , then realise - Oops !- you built a faster one instead, by accident. Not unless you live in Cantr.

[boomhaeur]

"Anyway, unless they're going to fix this problem whereby you can't get back into a building to empty it if you shove too much inside (or does that only apply to corpses?) people will be too worried to discover these things by experimentation."

Well, that's simple - have someone stand in the building and then load it up. You'll know the capacity limit of the building that will still allow a person to enter.

[Nixit]

Maybe, but that would stink for the person just standing in the building. I think maybe it should just say "partially full" "half full" "almost full", or something like that.