Fria Ligans forum

Hi All
I've been making notes on possible plot hooks using the setting lore. In the core rulebook, Chapter 9: Ship City, page 151, we get the first mention of magdan: "The import of ice, noble gas and magdan are vital for survival – without water, the people die; without gas, the turbines stop; and without magdan, the starships grind to a halt." Which is a good list of likely items to build an adventure around. We are told that the "Mining Combine that dominates the extraction of gas and magdan" and that "magdan-rich regolith" exists on Amalum’s moons; which would imply it is extracted from the regolith.
But what is it? Where is it described? What vital function (or functions) does it serve on starships? What would an amount of refined magdan or magdan-ore be worth? What are magdan's weight and volume, colours, textures, the heft and feel in the hand?
I can imagine a group of explorers being sent to recover a cargo of magdan from a derelict vessel or a desperate resupply to a starship in a decaying orbit or finding out who has been stealing magdan from the Mining Combine and for what purpose, etc. But would it be powder stored in barrels, refined into bars, have to be held in a stabilising liquid medium under pressure and temperature control..?
Anyone know where I can find any further information? Thanks.

After doing a very shallow internet search, regoliths seems to often be referred to when speaking of loose formations of rocks and dust. This makes me think magdan is a form of dust. This also fits with the theme as magdan could be an allegory for coal, which was needed to fuel the great ships of the 19th century, which Coriolis TGD is partially inspired by.

Hi Inlander
Thanks the reply.
I agree regarding the likely regolith extraction, although the quantity needed seem to be quite small. As “without magdan, the starships grind to a halt” and not system ships I'm incline to think it is used with the Gravitonic Projector / Slipstream Turbine; as shown in the Flowers of Algorab ship blueprints. I cannot find any magdan storage areas noted on the blueprints (why would there be?). If the amounts of magdan are quite small and you have to process a lot of regolith to get it then it could certainly be highly valuable and portable; making it an ideal MacGuffin for adventures.
Coaling a spaceship, with the officers and even the captain pitching in (as per British naval history), does have a certain appeal. And historical events around Coaling (such as Pearl Harbor) could provide inspiration for Great Dark background building and plot points in a Coriolis adventure.
Ultimately the choice is ours. If we do create something which later Free League canon contradicts we can have a significant Blight Manifestation ripple through space and time to reorder our version of the Great Dark. After all, as a Delver can vanish out of space, time and memory (Cease to exist, page 70, Core Rules) how changeable and inconstant is the rest of the Great Dark?

We are told that the "Mining Combine that dominates the extraction of gas and magdan" and that "magdan-rich regolith" exists on Amalum’s moons; which would imply it is extracted from the regolith.
But what is it? Where is it described?
[...]
Anyone know where I can find any further information? Thanks.

It comes from Coriolis: The Third Horizon, and it's a big deal in the Rimward Reach. In Djachroum and the Rimward Reach, which was a Swedish sourcebook that was not officially published by FL but was translated to English by fans (with FL's permission), maghdan (with an h) is described so:

"Shortly after the re-colonization of the abandoned space station, a group of prospectors belonging to the Free League discovered the existence of a previously unknown mineral in the Kandah Cloud. At first it was thought to be Selidium, a substance used in the construction of graviton projectors. However, this new substance proved to be much more potent than Selidium. The precious mineral was named Maghdan after the researcher Ariste Maghdan and caused a veritable gold rush among Kuan prospectors."

Djachroum and the Rimward Reach is, thematically, close to The Great Dark, and its obvious antecessor. Many ideas from the Reach were used to create the new game, which is not surprising as both products were written by Kosta Kostulas and Nils Karlén. I suspect that if The Third Horizon had been a wildly successful IP, the sourcebook would've been published in English, followed by a campaign (hinted in the existing sourcebook), and we would not have The Great Dark.