Today marks the 20^th anniversary of the human presence on Mars. 200 years ago, a small group of intrepid explorers from multiple of Earth’s nations set foot on our world. And starting from that first brave step, we have built all that you see around us today. A living, breathing, vibrant community, a rich diverse world of peoples from all the nations of Earth and many of us who have always called Mars home.

Today is a day when we must reflect one where we have come from. The debt we owe our forebears and the struggles and sacrifices they made to carve out a life in the barren rock of Mars. The botanists who learned to grow plants that feed us, the engineers who built the tunnels we live in, the scientists who built our water reclamation system, the miners who dug up the materials we need, and the machinists who built the places we now call home.

Today we must reflect on where we came from. But we must also look forward to the next 200 years of this greatest of human endeavors. We will terraform Mars. We will build a new world, a new home for humanity. It will be our greatest accomplishment. And for all that our forebears have done to bring us to this point, we must do more.

For our future, for our children’s future, and for the future of humanity. Let us all work together in this noblest of goals.

Teresa Yeo, Prime Minister of the Martian Assembly, Bi-centennial day address  

Martian Provisional Government Overview

The Martian Provisional Government (MG) has an unenviable position. They need to cater to the needs and wants of the local Martian populace, while maintaining the concerns of large, vested interests back on Earth. And it is this balancing act that defines the role of the MG.

Local autonomy and self-rule are a necessity on Mars. The tyranny of distance means there needs to be people on the planet able to respond in an emergency. But many important strategic decisions, especially around funding and allocation of resources from Earth, are decided 135.39 million km away, in board rooms in Geneva, New York, Mumbai, and Beijing.

The MG is structured into a unicameral, mixed member proportional representation system. Mars does not have a president, it has a Prime Minister, who is normally the leader of the largest party in parliament. However, parliament is opened by, and all acts of parliament signed into law by the Earth appointed Governor of Mars.

So the MG is a government that represents local people, but is beholden to outside interests. A representative body that speaks for its people, but all its acts must be signed off by Earth. An organization who has a lot more responsibility than it does power.

Only by building a broad base of popular support on Mars while keeping Earth happy can the Martian Provisional Government take the final steps towards becoming a true Martian Government.

Mechanic Focus– Housing and Damage

There are a wide variety of population pressures on Mars and they are a central part of the Red Dust Rebellion. First, immigration from Earth is an ongoing issue, as housing needs to be found for new settlers. As the planet gears up for the massive terraforming efforts, more and more people will be needed to work on it. The conflict itself will also cause population pressures, as fighting in the closed and tight underground cities of Mars can cause damage to life giving infrastructure.

This is all represented by the housing mechanics in the game. There is an overcrowding marker on the general records track which shows the amount of people being squeezed into existing housing. Both the MG and the Red Dust (RD) player have actions that can allow them to house more people.

As both MG and RD desire the support of the population, it makes logical sense for you to house these displaced and overcrowded peoples into regions that already support you and regions you can defend. Housing people also impresses the Earth Government and improves their support of the MG.

Now, when a fight takes place in a populated area there is a chance damage will be caused. A lot of explosives and gunfire can cause issues with water pipes, power grids and other life-giving infrastructure. The close proximity of living conditions on Mars makes this a serious problem during an insurgency.   

A damaged region adds its population to the overcrowding pool, but any additional population that was stored there with temporary housing. Cramming people into a region might be good short term, but I can come back to hurt you.

Combined, the damage and housing rules create a very dynamic map that constantly evolves throughout the game. As players house new immigrants and rehouse those displaced by the conflict.

Mechanic Focus – The Aldrin Cycler

Earth is a long way from Mars, and resources, people and forces will take a long time to arrive. In Red Dust Rebellion, this is represented by the Aldrin Cycler mechanic. The Aldrin cycler is a concept created by Buzz Aldrin, of a spaceship, or series of spaceships, that constantly use the gravitation effects of Earth and Mars to slingshot themselves back and forth between the planets, using minimal fuel. You can read more about them here.

In the world of Red Dust Rebellion, Mars is serviced by a number of these craft. Mechanically, they work as follows.

Around 40% of event cards have a special symbol on them that indicates a flashpoint round. During a flashpoint a small number of maintenance tasks in the game are immediately performed, including activating the cycler. We will talk more about the other actions in a flashpoint round in later articles.

There are 3 main things that are placed on the cycler to ship to Mars: Supplies, Troops, and population. When a flashpoint occurs, all items currently on the cycler move to Phobos and are made available for use. Aid gets added to MG resources, population to the overcrowding tracker and Troops stay on Phobos ready for deployment.

Aid, troops and population are then added to the cycler to transit to Mars on a later round. There is limited space available on the cycler, so the COIN player currently enjoying EarthGov’s trust gets to decide what gets added.

How this manifests in the game is that sometimes the cycler activates quickly, and the COIN gets its supplies quickly. And other times, the COIN players must wait for their forces to arrive. This isn’t representing the cycler going faster or slower though, just periods of high and low activity in the conflict.

Conflict with Other Factions

The CORP is your ally, but an ally that would gladly hide behind you and the EarthGov forces and let you carry the cost of the Rebellion. They have powerful tools that can help you out, but they will never work for free. The CORP will also exploit populations for profit that can undercut your attempts to build popular support.  

Red Dust are diametrically opposed to the MG and have many tools that mimic your abilities. They can also house populations and seek to build opposition to your Government. Red Dust’s ultimate goal is to supplant the MG and become the legitimate government. They can do this by undermining your support and building opposition in areas they control.

The Church of the Reclaimer views the MG as nothing more that a puppet colonial administration for Earth. They will focus more on attacking CORP infrastructure than on the MG itself, but you can easily be pulled into fighting them if they decide to target weakly defended outposts and labyrinths.

Factions Operations and Special Activities

Like all COIN games, each faction has a series of Operations and Special Activities.

MG Operations: Train, Recon, Secure, Assault.

MG Special Activities: Entrench, Petition, Transport

Operations list

Train lets the MG recruit new troops and spend resources to improve support. Troops trained directly by MG are placed on Mars.

Secure allows the MG player to move to and locate hidden rebels in the labyrinth cities of mars. It also allows MG to repair damage and house settlers in the cities.

Recon allows the MG player to move to and locate hidden rebels in the deserts of Mars, It also allows the MG to repair damage and house settlers in the deserts.

Assault allows the MG to directly attack Rebels, but note that in Red Dust Rebellion, fighting inside of the labyrinth cities can cause the attacker to also take damage.

Special Activities list

Entrench allows the to build bases and to entrench troops. Entrenched troops protect the local population, but lose this bonus when they move.

Petition lets MG demonstrate to Earth its effectiveness, gaining support and aid for direct actions taken against the rebels this round.

Transport lets the MG reposition troops rapidly around Mars.

Summary

The MG is, in many ways, a traditional Government faction within COIN. With a bunch of additional concerns and issues to deal with. The housing and population game means the MG has a lot of tools to reshape the board in its favor, and judicious use of rehousing will not only boost their support locally, but also the support of EarthGov.

This flexibility is countered by their dependance on the Aldrin Cycler for resources and material. And you will grow to love and hate the cycler in equal measure, and it gives you the ability to control what assets come your way, but it can sometimes take far longer than you want to deliver.

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Previous Articles: 

Factions in Red Dust Rebellion: The Red Dust Movement

Factions in Red Dust Rebellion: The Corporations