s.wbones

AUTHOR'S INTERLUDE: Agriculture

Hi. Teeny tiny author's interlude here.

As I've been writing this fic, I've found myself thinking about a lot of things. Mostly, the logistical practicalities of trying to grow enough to eat in the wasteland, and the culture surrounding those practicalities. If that doesn't sound interesting to you, you don't have to read this little interlude. Just skip ahead to the next section.

Let's start with the napkin maths.

We're going to be working out a couple things. First, the thing I'm sure we've all wondered: can you really feed that many people with what space they give you in the canon settlements?

To do this we need to find: A) the amount of energy people need, yearly, B) the amount of energy the crops give you depending on the space they take up, C) how many nutrients you need, and what kinds of crops give those nutrients, D) how much space those crops take up, and E) the equivalent amount of space in-game available at the settlements.

Also since we're limited to averages, our results can only be considered an estimate.

A) Population

Vanilla game, maxed out Charisma, you have 23 settlements with up to 20 settlers each. So 460 people - call that the realistic average, because Starlight could almost certainly fit more, and Hangman's would be lucky to squeeze in 10.

Here's our process:

1. Find the recommended average adult daily intake*. In Australia, that's 8700kj.
2. Find the yearly intake for the average adult. 8700 x 365 = 3175500kj
3. Multiply that by 460 to find the needed kj for our maximum population. 460 x 3175500 = 1460730000kj

*Some of these people will be robots, who do not need to eat. We're counting them anyway because they still cost resources and energy to maintain, and we can say the allotted food to them is instead being traded for fuel or spare parts.

B) Energy

Then we go over the crops in-game, to find out what we're working with to hit that energy goal. Essentially, what energy do our available crops actually give us?

To do this, we're going to try to find the energy output in kj per square metre of each crop, per year, because that will help us with the next section.

Here's our process:

1. Find out how many of each crop grow in a square metre of soil, per yearly harvest.
2. Find out how many grams per individual unit of crop.
3. Use (1) and (2) to determine how many grams produced per square metre.
4. Find out how many kj per 100g.
5. Use (3) and (4) to determine the total # of kj produced by square metre of crop, per year. (Divide the kj by 100 to get the 'per gram' #, and times that by (3)).
6. The final number SHOULD BE the yearly energy output in kj for that particular crop, in one square metre of soil.

Because this is messy, we're gonna do it as a table. For space reasons, we're shortening 'per square metre of soil' to '*sqm/s'.

*I don't have the resources to find this for bulk crops, so I'm using other ppl's research. It's for a fanfic. It's okay.

C) Nutrients

Now for nutrients. Let's have a look at that.

Carbohydrates

• "45-75% of daily energy"
• Whole grains, vegetables, fruits and pulses - unprocessed maize, millet, oats, wheat, brown rice, lentils, chickpeas, beans, and dried peas, fresh fruit, and vegetables.

Sugars

• Limited to less than 10% of total daily energy intake. Sugars naturally present in honey, syrups, fruit juices.
• Relevant crops: mutfruit, tarberries.

Fats

• "15% of energy consumed per day should be from fat, up to 30%"
• No more than 10% of total energy intake should come from saturated fat (found in fatty meat, butter, palm and coconut oil, cream, cheese, ghee and lard).
• No more than 1% of total energy from trans fat (found in meat and dairy foods from ruminant animals, such as cows, sheep, goats and camels).
• Unsaturated fat (found in fish, avocado and nuts, and in sunflower, soybean, canola and olive oils) is preferable to both.

Protein

• "Protein intake at 10–15% of total daily energy intake is generally sufficient to meet the needs of adults".
• Relevant crops: wheat, chicken eggs (if find chickens).

Salt/sodium and potassium

• "In adults, salt intake should be limited to less than 5 grams per day (2 grams per day sodium). A potassium intake of at least 90 mmol/day (3510 mg/day) for adults may be beneficial. Intake of potassium can be increased by consuming fresh fruit and vegetables."

Vitamins and minerals (micronutrients)

• "Micronutrients are essential vitamins and minerals – there are about 30 in total, including 13 vitamins (such as A, B-complex, C, D, E, and K) and 16 minerals (like iron, iodine, zinc, and calcium) – that the body needs in small amounts."
• "A wide variety of nutrient‑dense foods, including fruits, vegetables, whole grains, legumes, nuts, seeds, beans, and lean animal‑source foods, to ensure adequate intake of key vitamins and minerals. Dark‑green leafy vegetables to improve vitamin A status; or iodized salt to avoid iodine deficiency."

Now, because I'm insane, I can't help but notice we're missing some crop staples. To make up for this, we're going to invent some new, fake seeds for Ozzie to grow to help fill these gaps in nutrition.

Animal-wise, we're also missing honey (bee-hives) (sugar), fish (fat, protein), chickens (fat, protein, nutrients), game (hunting)(protein, nutrients), and some larger source of protein, like deer or cows. And if you thought that plants were complex, animal husbandry is a whole other beast. For animals, we'll say 'Fire bees' (guess what the sting feels like), 'Rad-fin' (fish lol), 'Rad-chickens' (basic is best), and maybe 'Geep' (goat / sheep hybrid).

• Potatoes (carbs)   =   'Radyams' (potato/onion mix, some variants more sweet potato-ish, some more red-oniony - maybe even garlic!).
• Lentils/beans (carbs)   =   'Mungoss Beans' (as in, humongous mung beans - closer to faba in production, though).
• Different fruits/berries (carbs, sugar, potassium, nutrients)    -    'Zuch-fruit' (round zucchini/cucumber - tastes good cos I say so) and 'Applecherries' (basically lilly pilly / cherry guava).
• Nuts/seeds (fat, protein)   =   'Wazelnuts' (hazelnut/walnut combo) and 'Sunflowers' (sunflowers).
• Olives (fat)   =   'Oilberries' (olives but non-mediterranean).
• Dark-green leafy vegetables (nutrients, carbs, potassium)   =   'Brassica' (generic cabbagey equivalent: some with turnip-tubers, some more leafy).

From here we're gonna do two things: we're gonna do the same calculations we did for the canon crops for these new additions. Canon explanation for the fic is that Ozzie's been prepping for years. We'll do that on another page, maybe, to save space... nah, what am I saying, you've scrolled this far. You'll keep scrolling. You're in this with me, now.

Come, take my hand. Let's be insane together.

So now we can find out how much space we need to feed a single person for a year on a balanced diet.

We'll do this using the solution from section A. The amount of kj needed (ballpark) to feed the average adult for a year, 8,700kj daily, x 365 = 3,175,500kj.

More graphs: this time we're trying to work out how much of this amount is generally comprised of each of the food groups. So:

Note: skipping over salt and potassium because those don't factor into crop space right now. Going to try to remember to do maths seperate for animals and byproducts.

D) Crop space

Now we're going to split the food into it's various nutritionary groups, and then determine the space needed to grow enough crops to feed one person on a balanced diet. That way the system is modular, and can be expanded to theoretically any population size.

Below, we're going to work out how much of each crop would be needed to fit the maximum kj for that food group. In other words, if you were eating radyams alone, how many square metres of radyams you'd need.

Note: Remember to work out fish + saturated fats seperately.

Now let's knock that down into minimum, average, and maximum because I'm lazy. These final numbers are 'per person' for the record. Minimum is a very unhealthy and unpleasant existence - but you wont die. You'll just want to. The maximum is a preposterous luxury no-one needs.

So the average is about 8 basketball courts / person, give or take.

For 20 people, that comes out (64054.6) square metres - or about four of these bad boys.

E) Game - Real Life Equivalents

Now is the part where I kill Todd Howard.

You see, in order for these numbers to be meaningful, we need to work out how in-game space translates to real-world measurements. Unfortunately, Fallout 4 has an inaccurate map! There is no single measurement that was used for all locations!

I could tie myself into knots trying to find a universal measurement anyway, but I think a better solution is to just use Fenwick park (Diamond City) as the scale of reference. It's an in-game equivalent to a real world place, it has easily referenced dimensions, it'll do. (If anyone wants to use something else as reference, you're more than welcome to plug the numbers into that instead. If you do, email me! I'd like to see if there's any difference, at the end of the day.)

A bit of very clumsy maths tells me the field is... (94.5m x 92m = 8694 metres squared, or 93,581 square ft)! The original Fenway park, like the area of the block and the stands and the building, that's apparently 365,000 square feet (or 33,900 square meters), so it's very possible.

I'm not measuring the full 'accurate' area of the field for two reasons. First, the most accurate way of measuring with those irregular boundaries... is, uh. Calculus.

Which I can't do.

Believe me, if I could, I would. The need to know is a terrifying thing. Second reason: I'm planning to use the in-game distances of the bases as a reference anyway, so it'll come to the same thing if I just do it like a square. However, the only way I can think of to do it is...

...walk that distance in-game, and count the steps.

Simple enough, right? Hahahahaha... if that's my only recourse, that means I would need to do that... for every settlement. But I've looked and looked, and I can't find another way to measure that works. God, it's going to take so long. That's 23 settlements. Some have really weird boundaries! I can't do calculus - I'm just gonna have to walk in a straight line, and do my best to be as accurate as I can!

Maths time. For Diamond City, we're going to assume (perhaps optimistically) that the distance is accurate to the pre-war park. If you didn't know, Diamond City has the bases scattered around its city plan, and if you run through all of them in a certain time, you get an achievement. I walked the distances multiple times to make sure I got an accurate average. I also tried to take as direct a route as possible.

In Power Armor steps, it is:

• From home to first: 18 steps
• From home to third: 18.5 steps

The distance from home to third is just ever so slightly longer. Still 18 steps, but just... almost that little bit more. As we look at the real life measurements, we get:

• From home to first: 302ft (92m)
• From home to third: 310ft (94.5m)

Putting that together (real life divided by in-game measurements, to see equivalent of one step to real life distance), we get:

• 302ft (92m) divided by 18 = 16.777ft (5.111m)
• 310ft (94.5m) divided by 18.5 = 16.756ft (5.108m)

Given those come out to about the same, we can call that a pretty accurate measurement.

Thus, to find the area equivalent, we only need to times steps to see how it measures up.

• Average area of Fenway Park 'field' = 310 x 302 = 93,581 square ft (or 8694m squared)
• Average area of Diamond City 'field' = 18 x 18.5 = 333 square steps
• Thus one square step is equal to:
• (93,581 divided by 333)
• = 281 square feet (26.1 metres squared)
• OR
• (16.776 x 16.776)
• = 281.43 (26 metres squared)

That's some super-compressed dimensions. These measurements seem like a lot. The actual question is... will they be enough?

You know what this means now, don't you. We need to find the area in steps of all the settlements, from Hangman's to Spectacle. We're going to do this as accurately as we can, using the method for irregular shapes where you break it down into rectangles or triangles, and use the formulas seperately, and add it all together. It's not going to be perfect, but it's going to give us a basic idea of the space we're working with, since once again, I can't do calculus.

Welp, it won't get any more done by avoiding it. I might just do the Sector 1 settlements, right now, and fill in the rest as I get time.

Conclusion

Now we can finally work out the actual population limits for available space, based on how much food those people would need, and how much it's possible to grow. For reference, 20 ppls worth of food on minimum rations is 2927.6 square metres, average is 63,621.4, and maximum is 217,460.8 square metres. Check the table in section E for how much space is available at each.

Fuck me, someone check my maths on Sanctuary. Surely it's not actually that big, that can't be right.

But wait, have I... have I done it? Is the maths part done - at least for now? Fuck me, I think it is.

And if we say supply lines are a thing, this means the comfortable average of all sector one settlements is... 14 people each. Cool.

What's the point?

By working out the actual space needed for people to live - or at least realistic estimates - the fic feels more grounded for me, and hopefully for anyone reading it too. But mostly for me.

The real answer is that the Question wouldn't leave me alone. The Question is 80% of my writing motivation, sometimes. It took hold of my mind. My skull was a cave with great burning letters on the wall spelling out the Question, in all caps - and I just couldn't stop until I had the answer: 'HOW DOES IT WORK?'

So this definitely won't be the only interlude where I go into detail to try and answer it - it was agriculture, this time, but it might be irrigation or culture or economy next time. Thanks for reading, you absolutely didn't have to. Hope to see you for the next time.