Colony + Transport Fleet hybrid colonization effort

[virtutis.umbra]

I've got a player with a Colony Fleet and a Transport Fleet grouped together enroute to a prospective colony system. Assuming nothing nasty happens to his ships he'll be in a position to get a Census 2 colony going pretty quickly.

But

Census carried on Transport Fleets or military supply ships can only be disembarked on systems that already have Census, i.e. Census carried on Transport Fleets or supply ships cannot be used to colonize new systems. Only Colony Fleets are capable of creating new colonies.

... and furthermore all the discussion of embarking/disembarking cargo happens in the Movement Phase. Conversely colony establishment happens way later in the turn, in the Update Assets Phase. That seems to mean the Transport Fleet won't have a valid target during the current turn's Movement Phase and so won't be able to disembark Census until the turn FOLLOWING the establishment of the new colony. The folks on the transport fleet are stuck up there for an extra month while the Colony Fleet and its attendant Census are busy building hovels and lean-tos.

My question is, is this a correct interpretation of the official rules? Does the Transport Fleet technically have to wait until the Movement Phase of the following turn before it has a 'landing spot' to offload its additional colonists? I'm likely to overrule this if so, but if there IS a different official rule in here somewhere, or if my interpretation is wrong, I'd like to know it.

[mwaschak]

My question is, is this a correct interpretation of the official rules? Does the Transport Fleet technically have to wait until the Movement Phase of the following turn before it has a 'landing spot' to offload its additional colonists? I'm likely to overrule this if so, but if there IS a different official rule in here somewhere, or if my interpretation is wrong, I'd like to know it.

Technically, yes. The Colony Fleet by design is assumed to have the ships capable of establishing all the nice things colonists will need when they arrive (like very nice hovels and lean-tos). This also justifies the higher cost of the Colony Fleet too. As the CM you could say that it was just such a wonderful star system that anyone or anything could settle there of course.

-Jay

[virtutis.umbra]

I agree a colony fleet will need to be present to found a colony. I'm just wondering whether my reading of the rules is right that, should a loaded Colony fleet and a loaded Transport fleet show up TOGETHER in a system, only the Colony fleet will be able to offload its people on that turn?

[mwaschak]

I agree a colony fleet will need to be present to found a colony. I'm just wondering whether my reading of the rules is right that, should a loaded Colony fleet and a loaded Transport fleet show up TOGETHER in a system, only the Colony fleet will be able to offload its people on that turn?

Yes, that is how I always played it. Until the Colony Fleet completes its action there really is no safe place for the colonists on the Transport Fleet to settle.

-Jay

[Tyrel Lohr]

Jay is correct, the order of operations is that the player has to use the colony fleet to establish the colony on Turn X, then he can have the transport fleet offload its Census on Turn X+1. So you don't get the 2 Census colony in a single turn, but you can get it to that level within two turns.

Another trick players like to use is to purchase Productivity in a system on the same turn Census is to arrive so that they can earn money from it at the start of the next turn. This is perfectly legal in the 1E rules, but I have added a note to the 2E infrastructure rules that you can't increase infrastructure values beyond Census to prevent that from happening.