Struggle in the Steam Age

The previous life of the Loca murlocs had been mainly based on hunting and gathering, and such a life was naturally not very stable. It can be said that a lot of time depends on the weather. Once some slight changes in temperature or ocean currents may lead to changes in the trajectory of fish migration and the growth of various marine plants, and then lead to terrible famines.

On the other hand, because they live by gathering and hunting, the largest organization they can have is a tribe of several hundred people. Once more people gather, the number of people will exceed the carrying capacity of the local environment. The surrounding environment then deteriorates irreversibly leading to a series of catastrophic events.

And this is why they are vulnerable to the sahuagin attack, because compared to the well-organized command system and well-trained regular army of the sahuagin kingdom. Among the hundreds of roka murloc tribes distributed in a very wide space, the hunters with an average of less than a hundred people in each tribe are not their opponents at all.

In fact, before the catastrophe caused by the sahuagin, some wise men among the locagin had already discovered this. It's a pity because the size of each tribe is too small to afford the risk of reform.

However, there was no great king like Qin Shihuang among the Loca murlocs to unify them, so the shortcomings of their own side were limited to separate discussions, and no practical operations were made to solve these problems.

So now that they are under Lawrence's command, the social structure of this group of Loca murlocs has been artificially accelerated and evolved in an instant.

Under the leadership of Lawrence, their current only leader, the remaining power of the Loca fish who originally belonged to hundreds of tribes was quickly reintegrated and put where it was needed.

After the Loka fish people settled down temporarily, large-scale construction started soon. Except for some loca murlocs who rebuilt a collective hatching pond for their fish eggs in another shallow bay a few kilometers away from the city, most of the rest of the murlocs have devoted themselves to an unprecedented construction. .

Since they are now the citizens of Lawrence, Lawrence, as the lord, naturally bears some responsibility for them. Therefore, before the full-scale start of work, Lawrence asked the machine processing factory to manufacture a series of various metal tools suitable for Luoka to be used by people and distribute them to them.

These metal tools were manufactured by a small hardware processing factory on the island. In fact, Lawrence did not plan such a heavy industrial enterprise on the island at the beginning.

Because he felt that the island not only lacked all kinds of minerals and fuels needed for the development of this type of industry, but also had certain contradictions with the core industries of the island.

But later, with the passage of time and the increasing number of people belonging to Lawrence, he gradually discovered that some industrial products could not all be imported from the outside world.

In other words, tens of thousands of people can do this at the beginning, but when the population exceeds 500,000, the pure import model becomes outdated.

So he immediately adjusted the allocation of resources, and began to establish a series of light and heavy industries with average technical level and small scale on the island, but closely related to the lives of ordinary people.

Fortunately, because there are many industrial workers immigrated from the Eagle Fort of the White Eagle Federation on the island, he has enough manpower in this regard.

Of course, the types of industries built on the island have also been carefully selected, and there is only one core of selection, which is to make up for the shortcomings of the island's industrial production.

Therefore, the kind of large-scale machine manufacturing and metal smelting that require a lot of resources and manpower, and industries engaged in the manufacture of production tools or raw materials are naturally abandoned.

At least for Lawrence. It is not difficult to purchase a large amount of textiles or some steam engines, and these things are basically not too time-sensitive. So this kind of thing can be imported from those surrounding countries without the need for time-consuming and laborious production.

At the same time, because of the remote location of the island where Lawrence was located, the shipping costs for different items were naturally very different. For example, after purchasing something like a steam engine or a large amount of cotton cloth, the seller can send a ship for it, so the shipping fee is naturally very normal.

But this is not the case for some daily consumer goods. Although it can be said that basically everyone needs things like a pot, a set of tableware, a shovel, and a piece of clothing, they don't need a lot at one time. If you hoard too much at one go, you can't sell it if you smash it in your hands, resulting in a double backlog of funds and commodities.

But if a large amount of goods are not transported at one time, those merchant ships will inevitably have a large amount of tonnage vacant when transporting goods. After all, the island where Lawrence and the others are located and the surrounding islands are not only remote, but also not very populated.

So those ships either have to consume a lot of fuel and supply to make a turn, or there is a lot of empty tonnage wasted. In this case, the shipping cost shared on each item will naturally become much higher.

And unlike bulk raw materials or heavy machinery, these small consumer goods have a large shipping cost. At the same time, most of the consumers of these commodities are price-sensitive. So it's obviously not a very good idea to import all these things.

In addition, with the development of agriculture and medicine. Lawrence also realized that he needed some factories to further process those agricultural products and lay a certain foundation for the future pharmaceutical industry. Otherwise, it is not a good idea to only export raw materials of agricultural products or only produce pharmaceuticals in small batches in the laboratory.

Therefore, after they gradually established a firm foothold on the island, Lawrence quickly discovered these problems that had been made in the previous planning. So after a series of discussions and investigations, they established an industrial zone in a series of small coastal harbors more than ten kilometers away from the city.

This harbor is almost as good as the Port of New Sauer where Lawrence and the others are currently located. It can at least berth 1,000-ton ships, but it is obviously much smaller than the Port of New Sauer where Lawrence and the others are located. Also divided by some rivers and hills, the space for future development is very limited.

That's why Lawrence gave up these seemingly okay bays at first, because the largest land behind these bays can only support a small farm of 100 people. If there is a larger area of ​​land, develop these The place is obviously a bit uneconomical, not to mention that the local soil is not only salinized but also thin, making it difficult to develop agriculture.

But if these lands want to develop industries, it is another matter. Whether it is the water source provided by the tributaries of the river flowing through the port of New Sauer, the scattered small islands outside the port area that can shelter from wind and rain or the local The stony ground in the area is very conducive to the development of industry.

For example, transportation, they can rely on some flat barges for sea transportation in the early days. After development, the small hills and dense rivers blocked between these small flat lands by the sea and the port of Nova Sauer will not hinder the construction of railways, but will facilitate land and water transport.

Therefore, after the area was selected as an industrial area, the first factories were erected immediately. Considering the needs of the island and various capabilities, the number of the first batch of factories is only four, and the scale is not large. Of course, there is enough land behind these factories for the second or third phase plans in the future.

These four factories are a fish processing factory, a rice processing factory, a woodworking factory and a hardware factory. They are respectively arranged on the flat land behind the two bays.

And before the construction of these factories, the members of the Church of Agriculture and the Church of Knowledge made an overall plan for the entire industrial area to ensure that the locations of these factories were scientifically reasonable.