“I shall not confront Planet as an enemy, but shall accept its mysteries as gifts to be cherished. Nor shall I crudely seek to peel the layers away like the skin from an onion. Instead I shall gather them together as the tree gathers the breeze. The wind shall blow and I shall bend. The sky shall open and I shall drink my fill.”
— Gaian Acolyte’s Prayer
Based on the Centauri Ecology technology, the Weather Paradigm enables the faction that constructs it to perform all of the terraforming actions that would be otherwise unlocked via upper-level technology. It also speeds up all terraformer actions (with the exception of removing the native fungus) forevermore. As this is a 4X game where exponential growth is expected, and since the key determinant of success in the early game is terraforming, it follows that this is probably the most important secret project from the perspective of winning the game.
So it’s interesting that the quote and the name strongly implies that the Gaians were the ones to build this project in the canonical timeline. After all, the Gaians probably gain the least from terraforming. And they have ideological reasons not to prefer building too many of the massive terraforming projects that are unlocked early by this project.
That’s because the game models ecological damage from human activity with a score based on the number of artificial improvements being worked by a base (farms, mines, etc.) and a large factor for the number of minerals that are being harvested by that base. The Gaians’ higher Planet rating represents their attempts to minimize the effects of industrial activity on the Planet, and as such, reduces the ecological damage score.
However, I think that the video and the quote are more interesting than even the massive gameplay effects here. This is the first real insight we get into what living among the Gaians is actually like. And it turns out that they’ve started essentially worshipping the alien planet from the moment they landed on it, generating an entire new religion and corpus of rituals in the process.
There are several modern pagan traditions that are held with varying degrees of seriousness. Many argue that the gods and goddesses that were worshipped are symbolic of certain universals that it behooves a person to venerate or meditate upon. Like, for instance, all of the fertility goddesses standing in for the prime role of femininity in bringing forth new life and establishing the links between the past and the future.
I’m guessing from the quote and the video that this is the spirit in which the Gaian acolytes pray. And the early effort necessary to generate and promulgate this religion and its new doctrines are probably what are being represented by the mineral cost of the secret project. If so, then it’s interesting to contemplate what the other factions would make of this if they were the ones to build it instead.
It’s not hard to imagine Lal and the U.N. adding sustainability and wise ecological stewardship to a high priority by building this Secret Project. After all, the U.N. does that today. Similarly, Yang and Miriam have a bunch of doctrine they expect their followers to take on something resembling faith. Their approach to the Planet upon building the Weather Paradigm might be somewhat similar.
The others, on the other hand, are a much tougher fit. The University can’t help but seek to peel away the layers of anything they analyze. The Spartans see everyone as an enemy. And a potential Morganite Weather Paradigm would be hilarious.
Perhaps with them, the Weather Paradigm is less ideological and more just ruthlessly practical. A set of tips and tricks arduously developed by their Former corps that provide them with better civil engineering than their rivals.
Paean to SMAC 
Yeah I’ve always had the idea that the canonical story has the faction represented as speaking in the secret project videos as being the ones who are supposed to have built it. I don’t know whether or not the trilogy of novels that were written based on the game are supposed to be considered canonical or not, and I haven’t read them so I cant say whether or not they support this or not.
However I think that the secret projects, while definitely being more approximations for gameplay, but things like this could just as much represent wide-spread technological application as it could a faction-wide social paradigm being established. OR as is the case in the socially constructed system here on earth, technological applications and material conditions exist in a reciprocal relationship with social paradigms, each influencing the other. So I’ve always imagined this as having a faction-wide terraforming/geoengineering application to modify the planet and the weather. Of course, this could take different forms in different factions, some emphasizing the exploitation of the material resources and control/extermination of the hostile native life, and others emphasizing harmony with the planet or at least sensible stewardship and a sustainable attitude towards the native life.
The fact that they can be captured and the benefits thereof conferred to a conquering faction, means that they have some specific technological nerve center of control (although this could be entirely for gameplay purposes.)
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A favorite author of mine once wrote than an Idealist is just a Realist with a longer timeline; the last line of the Gaian prayer would seem to suggest they feel the same way–learn how to work with planet, you’ll get more than if you try working against it.
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One of the most interesting things about the factions in SMAC is how they take certain stereotypes and archetypes about their character and completely subvert the player’s expectations of what their actual philosophy or ideology is. One example is Miriam and the Believers. At first, the player would believe them as an anti-science group of neo-luddites. However, the Believers are not anti-science or anti-progress, but are wary of their philosophical, moral, and theological implications.
My favorite example of this, however, is in the Gaians. Modern New Ageism is rife with pseudoscientific and mystical nonsense (Healing crystals! All natural herbal remedies! Homeopathy! Deepak Chopra!). I don’t have anything against New Age beliefs but their association with nonsense science. The Gaians definitely have an Age of Aquarius vibe to them in their treehugging and planet-worshipping, and the player might be led to believe this. The Gaians, however, are smart-as-fuck biologists and ecologists. The only other faction with similar scientific prowess I imagine would be the University.
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The quotes that go along with the technologies are perspectives, not directives. The Weather Paradigm, in practicality, is the science and engineering of changing the Planet’s surface to meet humanity’s needs — this can be done with delicate respect and care for the native environment to establish a mutually beneficial arrangement, as the Gaians would have it, or it can simply sweep the old environment aside and ruthlessly put down a new one compatible with Old Earth tradition, as Morgan Industries almost certainly would.
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I’m in agreement with Anon above — rather than trying to square-peg of Deirdre’s perspectives into other factions’ reactions, I think it’s important to consider that the material benefit (“bonuses”) the Weather Paradigm gives to the faction that builds or controls it, then infer their own perspective from their overall mission and goals.
I’ve taken the liberty of whipping up a possible alternate header quote from Morgan’s perspective to demonstrate what I’m talking about:
“Mankind has long recognized the power behind the brute forces of nature. Our ancestors’ first attempts at harnessing these forces with their windmills and waterwheels, primitive as they were, opened up new horizons of wealth creation that were unthinkable for prior generations, and yet in all the centuries since, we are still able to capture only the merest sliver of their full output. You have seen the raw fury that drives a cyclone or a volcano – now imagine what we will accomplish once we can seize that energy and shape it to our own ends!”
-CEO Nwabudike Morgan, “The Centauri Monopoly”
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Here’s a possible Weather Paradigm quote for the Spartan Federation:
“Terrain has always been of paramount importance in warfare. The key to the Roman military’s success was its ability to quickly build roads and fortresses. Sun Tzu dedicated an entire chapter of ‘The Art of War’ to the effects terrain has on troops. West Point traditionally sent its top graduates into the Engineers branch of the United States Army. Today, the Spartan Federation continues that tradition through the Weather Paradigm. Being able to rapidly change the surrounding terrain gives us the ability to re-shape the battlefield to our advantage, improving our chances of victory before a single shot has been fired.”
-Colonel Corazon Santiago, commencement speech to the Spartan Corps of Engineers’ first graduating class.
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