Element categorization...

I'm creating a game... similar to a RTS... A space RTS where the player has to get materials from planets to create necessary components... and have different levels of technology, large enough to create those different level but small enough to be comprehensible... so the first step is trying to figure out what elements belong in what categories and then cut that to a reasonable number... so here are the categories...


Fuel
Construction Materials
Electronics Materials
Life Support gasses
Food Materials
Medical Materials
weapons


The elements can be repeated in multiple categories, but preferrably not...
Please make suggestions and comment on what i got so far... I'm guessing on a lot of this stuff as I almsot never think about this stuff and the elements are placed in one category with what i have now...

> Fuel
Lithium
Uranium
Plutonium


> Construction Material
Carbon
Aluminium
Chromium
Iron
Cobalt
Nickel
Copper
Titanium
Tin


> Electronics materials
Magnesium
Silicon
Zinc
Zirconium
Palladium
Silver
Platinum
Gold
Mercury
Lead

> life support gasses
Hydrogen
Helium
Nitrogen
Oxygen
Neon
Argon
Xenon

> Food materials
Sodium
Phosphorus
Sulfur
Potassium

> Medical materials
Fluorine
Chlorine
Calcium
Arsenic
Iodine
Caesium
Barium


> uncategorized materials...
Boron
Beryllium
Scandium
Vanadium
Manganese
Gallium
Germanium
Selenium
Bromine
Krypton
Rubidium
Strontium
Yttrium
Niobium
Molybdenum
Technetium
Ruthenium
Rhodium
Cadmium
Indium
Antimony
Tellurium
Lanthanum
Cerium
Praseodymium
Neodymium
Promethium
Samarium
Europium
Gadolinium
Terbium
Dysprosium
Holmium
Erbium
Thulium
Ytterbium
Lutetium
Hafnium
Tantalum
Tungsten
Rhenium
Osmium
Iridium
Thallium
Bismuth
Polonium
Astatine
Radon
Francium
Radium
Actinium
Thorium
Protactinium
Neptunium
Americium
Curium
Berkelium
Californium
Einsteinium
Fermium
Mendelevium
Nobelium
Lawrencium
Rutherfordium
Dubnium
Seaborgium
Bohrium
Hassium
Meitnerium
Darmstadtium
Roentgenium
Ununbium
Ununtrium
Ununquadium
Ununpentium
Ununhexium
Ununseptium
Ununoctium



Thanks for any help

ps. funny that a number of the element names are marked as spelled wrong ^.^

Carbon belongs to Food and Construction. Hydrogen, Oxygen, and Nitrogen also belong to the Food category. Noble gases don't belong to the Life Support Gasses unless you are dealing with alien life support systems. I think Argon is used as a construction material. If you want to keep it as realistic as possible, then you have to have some elements in more than one category. Easiest way is type each element into wikipedia and see if you can use it for anything. I would disregard any elements that have a minor influence or no influence like Americium in smoke detectors. Could be used in construction, but not a main feature.

These could easily be used in construction.

Boron
Beryllium
Vanadium
Manganese
Niobium
Molybdenum
Cadmium
Neodymium
Tungsten
Rhenium
Iridium

As some real world examples; several car manufcturers are going to use boron in car construction to help lighten future vehicles in the form of so-called "super steels". Beryllium has been used extensively in the aerospace and medical industry, vanadium, manganese, and molybdenum are common alloying agents in steel, niobium and neodymium are components used for magnets and electric motors. Cadmium is commonly used as a protective coating for steel. Tungsten and rhenium go together like peas and carrots especially when they are used in incandescent light bulbs. Iridium is also used heavily in the auto industry at least for fine wire spark plugs.

Looks like they've updated it since my last visit, but the Los Alamos National Laboratory has a neat-o interactive periodic table of elements.

http://periodic.lanl.gov/index.shtml

Its my go to place when I'm cooking up some yummy technobabble.

Life support gasses are based on chemical reactions with the body. Even though Argon exists in decent amount of quantities in the air, it is not essential for a person to live. The only one that is absolutely necessary is Oxygen, but Nitrogen can be added as well. Might want to check Breathing gases for some ideas on what type of air tanks to craft. Iron, carbon, and some other elements to make the tank or some other alloy and decide which type of air tank to make based on the need of the player.

OK, first of all, I don't see why you want to include so many elements. It seems like vast over complication of your system. Unless it is an educational system teaching the use of elements, I would chop the selection down to a manageable number. Putting too much micro-management into an RTS will ruin the game play.

Then you need to decide what races we're talking about. Is everyone human? If so that simplifies the selections since we know the needs in that regards. If not, than the options open up.

As mentioned by others, life support you have wrong since those generally have to be reactive gasses. An inert gas can't support life (it's inert).

Your categories are fairly arbitrary and elements overlap into many of those. Tin should be an electronic material, not a construction one as should copper. Many of your life support elements should also be food ones.

I could go on, but honestly this would take too long to really address. Better than you simplify the element selection with generalities. This is why Starcraft has crystals and gas. Something like organics for food and medicine; metals, for weapons; ceramics(and metals), for construction; radioactives for fuel would simplify this greatly and make playing the game a whole lot easier (not to mention programming it).

the reason behind the elements is simply because i want different groups to use different things because the develop with different levels of materials or want different tech... Some tech might favor gold or might favor platinum or they'll essentially do the same thing but might have different weaknesses and getting the other tech is likely going to be a pain or just not worth it.

I suppose I could just make up materials which I'll likely do anyhow, but I want to allow for that variation to stimulate trade...


I'm not sure if I want to do a grid for planetary construction or if i want to start from already having a sartship capable of interstellar travel or have them start at our level of tech...

Once you get to get out of the solar system though you'll be able to travel to other star systems, claim them, colonize, mine, set up star bases, set up defenses, set up communication relays, and interact with other players...

I'm gonna use a fairly big grid that generates as players explore and have new players placed via algorithm around the center... starting out players won't be able to communicate due to a filter that will translate their messages into various cyphers but with higher tech or what not that will be fixed... also players will be able to enter into various governments between them ranging from a democracy totalitarian dictatorship (conquoring your enemies!)

Like i said i suppose i could make up elements, but no reason not to use actual elements too...

Even if you choose to use real elements (which there is nothing wrong with), I would still select only a subset. There's too many which are both rare, and have very little in the way of use. The actinides and lanthanides are all mostly useless and rare for example.

I think I would do(assuming we do a small subset to keep it simpler):

Structural:
Iron
Aluminum
Titanium

Conductors
Silver
Gold
Copper

Biological:
Hydrogen
Oxygen
Nitrogen
Carbon

Semi-Conductors
Silicon
Gallium
Arsenic
Germanium

Radioactives/Energy sources
Uranium
Plutonium
Thorium

If you wished things to be more complicated you could (for example, carbon could also be structural, conductive and semi-conductor). That could be predicated on tech. Hydrogen could also be under energy sources as fusion drives are a science fiction staple.