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For The Tyrants Fear Your Might (A quest of interstellar rebellion)

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  • Informational
    • THE ALL-RADIANT CONGRESS

    ​

    Setting Information
    The Solarian Compact:

    Initially formed as the Solarian Treaty Organization from the ashes of the old United Nations Security Council, United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs, and the Global Climate Relief Organization in the worst decade of Earth's environmental collapse. The STO was originally a body tasked with overseeing the granting of offworld mining permits and the purchase and distribution of the resources to countries struggling from climate change.


    The advent of the Korolev-Chandrashker gates and the construction of the first one under STO oversight in 2063 led to the beginning of the transformation of that body into the de facto single governing body of the Human species.


    Reorganized into the 'Solarian Compact', the first Charters were granted to massive corporate conglomerates to explore and exploit the cosmos for Humanity with little to no regulation or restriction.


    In the early decades, the Solarian Compact oversaw the construction of KC gates in the systems closest to Sol and began the process of granting colonization rights to the most habitable worlds within that region with colonization rights granted to a number of national and international blocks.


    With the growth of the Solarian Compact's power came calls for the body to become more representative and democratic, and in 2099, the Solarian Compact held its first elections and constitutional convention, inviting representatives from the Sol system and the five systems that held permanent Human settlement.


    Over the course of the 22nd and 23rd centuries the Solarian Compact has held fast to what it sees as its duty to act as the mediator and financier of the Charters, the unifying agent of the disparate first Human colonies, and the guarantor of interstellar peace for Humanity.


    As of 2252, the three most important bodies within the Solarian Compact are the Solarian Parliament -Located on Earth, the Solarian Compact Navy -based in the Korolev-Chandrashker system, and the Solarian Central Bank, -based out of the Columbia System.

    Organized as a liberal democracy, with universal suffrage, the Solarian Compact is theoretically overseen by three equal institutions: the Solarian Parliament, the office of the Solarian Secretary General, and the Solarian High Court.


    Though the Solarian Compact prides itself on being a Constitutional government, the actual original document merely outlines the terms of admitting new MPs and High Court Judges, and the electoral procedures of the Compact Parliament, with subsequent Parliaments meeting to add items like the Declaration of Property Rights, the founding of the Central Bank, the creation of the Solarian Navy, and the Laws on Freedom of Navigation and Travel being added later.


    The Solarian Parliament is made up of two thousand six hundred and twenty seats representing ridings on Earth, Columbia, Atlantis, Penglai, Olduvai, and Epsilon which are elected every three years to a Parliament that meets in the New York prefecture of Earth.


    Though the many frontier colonies do not have direct representation in the Parliament due to being owned and operated by private entities, their inhabitants are considered 'Absent for Employment' and may register with a home riding and submit a physical ballot (for security reasons) by courier from when polls open until they close. Though this process was suitable for the closely settled regions of space at the time of the ratification of the Compact Constitution in 2100, the rapid growth of Human settled space in the century and a half since has seen the de facto voter suppression of over 90% of Human settled space.


    At the first sitting of each new Compact Parliament, the assembled members will elect a Secretary General and a slate of Ministry officials on a majority basis, and those individuals will oversee the executive branch of government and day to day operations. Though the average Compact Parliament contains between seven to nine parties in each Parliamentary sitting, the vast majority of seats belong to one of either the Party for Human Rights and Liberties or the Justice and Development Alliance and have since the very early 2100s. The governments formed this way can be brought down by losing the confidence of the Parliament for example, by failing to pass a budget, the process of finding a majority government will repeat again.


    Though a democratic body that has maintained stability for over a century and a half, the Solarian Compact Parliament has been dogged by accusations of dynastic politics, Charter influence, voter suppression, regulatory capture, inability to reign in the Banks and MIlitary, and corruption at all levels.


    Separate from the Parliament is the Solarian High Court that consists of eleven judges that serve terms of up to thirty-three years, with each new sitting of the Compact Parliament selecting one judge from a list provided by the governments of the six main worlds of the Solarian Compact. The High Court rules on matters of adherence of laws to the Solarian Constitution, and have been accused of serving as an arm of the Charters, though this has been strenuously contested by the Solarian legal profession as a whole.


    By law the Solarian Compact also oversees a number of other important institutions including the Earth Reconstruction Commission (In a permanent public-private partnership with the Earth Reconstruction Association), the Solarian Central Bank, and the Solarian Compact Navy, though these important institutions often exhibit an alarming degree of autonomy from Parliamentary control.


    The Charters:

    The result of a cleverly conceived merger between specialty transport vessel manufacturer Titan Staryards and Private Military contractor Martian Military Solutions, Ares cut its teeth not just supplying material to the skirmishes between Mississippi Shipping and United Starhaul, but in supplying military contractors to both sides.


    The professionalism of Ares mercenaries and quality of Ares gear led to the rapid expansion of business opportunities for the company and investment skyrocketed even after the Mississippi-Starhaul war ended in a hostile takeover of Starhaul by Mississippi.


    Thanks in part to Mississippi debts held by Ares, when the RT-2102 Gate was opened up for settlement strategic maneuvering saw the Compact grant Ares mining and settlement rights to the newly opened system.


    The rest, as they say, is history. Leveraging the immense resources of the Alexander system with their existing military expertise, Ares expanded nearly exponentially over the following century. While they maintain a dominating edge in the military field, they now integrated companies in fields from agronomy to personal fitness centers to xenobiology.


    Internally Ares very self consciously styles itself as a hierarchical military organization complete with a semi-formal rank structure and an ethos of respect for the chain of command, professional courtesy, and treating your subordinates with respect. In practice Ares is hidebound, authoritarian, filled with passive aggressive sniping and rampant empire building.


    While Ares remains headquartered on Mars, they have holdings in several systems and own the distant system of Alexander outright.

    Rhodes Mining


    One of the three original Charters that the Compact granted, Rhodes considers itself the singular reason that Humanity survived ecological collapse and spread past Sol. Immensely wealthy, over 52% of all material mined and processed by the entire Human race has passed through Rhodes hands at one point or another.


    While founded merely to provide Earth the vital materials that it needed to rebuild itself after the lost decades of ecological collapse, Rhodes quickly expanded into all areas of the economy to support their mining, refining, and processing operations.


    Dedicated to their vision of logistical chain efficiencies they've developed an entire chain of star systems into an efficient production center based around the resource rich system of Foundry, and the nearby feeder systems of Ecrams, Qem, and Crucible.


    Rhodes considers itself home to a version of meritocracy built on hard work, education, and good old fashioned personal drive. This has developed over time into a stratified internal divide between the rank and file workers, the lower level management, and the highly lauded senior management. Each class lives in entirely separate worlds, attending separate schools, consuming different products, and leading very different lives in what many observers have labelled a de facto caste system.

    they make food and medicine, the 120 year old CEO is kinda creepy tho?

    Techbros, some of them science, some of them explore

    Born from the union of Hermes Interstellar Services and The Ishtar Group, the Hermes-Ishtar Corporation owns and operates not only the communications backbone of Compact space, but much of the content that crosses over it.


    The results of increasing consolidation of pre-spaceflight communications infrastructure and content creation and management firms, Hermes Communications and Ishtar Entertainment Group were both part of the second round of Charters established after the advent of the KC gates.


    While Hermes quickly established operations throughout Compact space, their waystations, couriers, and communications repeaters a common sight in every corner of Human occupied space; Ishtar Group mainly limited their own operations to Sol and the Radiant system, where Ishtar owned and operated the world of Elysium to support their many projects.


    Following a wave of Compact space wide reorganizations following the Mississippi-Starhaul conflicts of the 2130s, a desire for complete vertical integration on Ishtar's part led to a mostly amicable union with Hermes in 2139.


    Since then Hermes-Ishtar have dominated all communications across Human space with only the privileged internal high-level communications of the other Charters managing to avoid consolidation under Hermes-Ishtar.


    While Hermes-Ishtar make a great show of respecting individual creativity, initiative, and drive from their employees; in practice this amounts to rampant internal fighting involving the parasocial personality cults of different "genius" inventors, artists, and executive that rise and fall inside of Hermes-Ishtar at a dizzying rate.

    Sketchy buggers, they can get you anything tho


    Historical Topics:

    Between 2036 and 2071 the Democratic Federation was the governing body of much of Earth's Western Hemisphere.


    Initially comprised of a Federation of Socialist, Anarchist, Communist, and other far left social movements, militias, and political factions controlling regions of Earth's North American continent during and after the decline and collapse of the United States of America (1776-2034) due to the effects of unaddressed climate change amplifying existing political and economic crisis.


    Eventually solidifying into the governing body of the former United States of America, United States of Mexico and the Dominion of Canada, the Democratic Federation embarked on an ambitious program of cultural revolution and economic reform designed to mitigate and reverse the effects of the climate change crisis.


    As the patron of much of the central and southern western hemisphere, the Democratic Federation attempted to chart a course of environmental restoration separate from that of the Solarian Treaty Organization (In 2063 reorganized into the Solarian Charter), choosing not to contest Eurasian and African domination of outer space.


    Having never existed out of crisis conditions, a combination of pre-existing economic damage, sabotage, and instability drove the Democratic Federation into decline in the Grey Decade of 2062 to 2070 and eventually forced the Democratic Federation to ratify a series of treaties giving the Charters economic access to Federation member states in order to conduct vital reconstruction work.


    A last ditch uprising by radical elements in 2072 to eject the Charters from the Democratic Federation failed when Solarian Compact peacekeepers were called in and in seven months of street fighting pacified most of North America's key urban centers via strategic use of orbital weapons on the areas of greatest urban resistance.


    Though guerilla warfare would continue in the Western Hemisphere for another three decades, the Democratic Federation was officially defunct by December 2072 and parcelled out into a number of Charter owned reconstruction areas under Compact authority.


    Today radicals still pine for the four decades that the Democratic Federation attempted to build an alternative to the emerging Charters, and the polity's distinctive black, red, and green flag is brought out for each and every Great Black Summer. Well into the twenty second century, riots were often accompanied by demands to 'Avenge the Martyrs of 72!'.


    Despite this underground extremist nostalgia, Charter and Compact schools teach that the Democratic Federation was a collectivist state whose iconoclastic behavior saw the destruction of famous landmarks like Mount Rushmore, Stone Mountain, and other monuments to Liberal Democracy and the Free Market in a mad attempt to remake the human race, but whose doctrinaire adoption of command economics saw them unable to deal with the ever-changing complexities of climate change.


    Misc Details:

    The first five systems to hold permanent Human colonies are known as either "The First Sisters" or "Earth's Daughters", depending on who you are asking and their political persuasion. From oldest to youngest, these worlds are:


    Columbia: settled by billionaire American expats and tens of millions of refugees who had fled the unfolding revolutionary violence of the North American continent several years beforehand. Columbia was founded under a vision of fidelity to the American dream and to prove the indomitability of the soul of the United States of America and liberalism in the face of the red flags of the (North American) Democratic Federation. Fiercely loyal to the Compact and the dream of Charter prosperity, and home of the Solarian Central Bank, Columbia is often known as the "Gilded World" in reference to what many see as a return to American Gilded Age wealth and social inequality. Ares Conflict Solutions' central command is located here.


    Atlantis: With colonization rights to this majority oceanic planet initially granted to the waning power of the European Union, the nations of the EU opened up colonization opportunities to other allied powers, especially Russia and Egypt. Atlantis was often seen by the EU as a place to dump unwanted refugees from outside of Europe's borders, and Russia and Egypt's tendency to see the world as a genuine project led to the usurpation of colonization rights away from Europe in the mid 2080s. Known today as the most restive of the first wave of colonies, Atlantis is the most skeptical of Charter power and plays a delicate game of wealth redistribution to underwrite the greatest social security net in Human Space. Cernunnos is de jure headquartered here.


    Penglai: Originally the world in the most need of terraforming of the original colonies, Colonization rights were granted to the People's Republic of China and their allies after a lackluster bidding campaign. As China's focus was mainly on attempting to stem the damage of climate change on Earth herself, colonization of Penglai initially lagged until the Chinese Politburo struck upon the strategy of subcontracting colonization rights to Pacific adjacent nations suffering from the rise of that ocean. As colonization unfolded in the early 22nd century Penglai became known as a multicultural mosaic as hundreds of millions from across the Pacific settled and intermingled on the wine darkened shores of that world. Known today for its vibrant cultural milieu, violent clashes between labour unions, and private police, Penglai hosts the headquarters of the Hermes-Ishtar, Omoikane and Rhodes corporations.


    Olduvai: With Colonization rights granted to a coalition of African nations at the height of the 'African Century', the African Colonization Organization did not see their colony as a refugee destination, dumping ground, or resource colony like their fellows. Instead the ACO saw the colonization scheme as an opportunity to preserve and export the rich traditions and cultures of Africa on their own terms, fully intending to set up healthy and self-sufficient colonies. To the current day, Olduvai has the closest relations with the home nations and is the heartland of Daughter sentiment and a bedrock for the Party for Human Rights and Liberties.


    Epsilon System: While not technically a single world, the cluster of heavily inhabited space colonies in the Epsilon system are always considered the 'Fifth Sister' or 'Fifth Daughter'. As the most mineral rich system of the original colonies, Epsilon was the source of many of the materials that helped pull Earth through her darkest hour, and the system was recognized for their efforts by being invited to send delegates to the 2099 Solarian Compact Constitutional Convention. Epsilon is famous for its people's long roots in spacing and for being the headquarters of Mississippi Shipping Interstellar and thus the most heavily trafficked system in history.
    Technologies
    Nanomanufacturing, summary:

    The contemporary gold standard for manufacturing. These devices use mechanosynthesis, a process that guides chemical reactions by placing reactive molecules with atomic precision. Ribosomes in the body's cells use a form of this method.


    While the largest units can create objects up to 2m x 2m x 2m, smaller units (halving the units each time) are viable on basically any human scale. Projects larger than this size (such as ships or buildings, need to be either grown layer-by-layer via nanofabricators attached to robotic arms, or assembled from smaller parts through traditional assembly line, dry dock, or construction processes.


    In principle basically anything can be made with these devices, and some materials can only be manufactured via these methods in microgravity. All manufacturing patterns in Compact Space feature Charter DRM using embedded explosive molecules like octaazacubane or cubic gauche nitrogen that will damage a disassembler or x-ray machine making reverse engineering of their products difficult.

    A common part of 23rd century life is the near ubiquity of Artificial Intelligences in daily life, from consumer grade VIs through specialist TLIs, controversial AGIs, finally the perpetually 10 years away Artificial Super Intelligences.


    The common consumer will daily run into what are properly known as Narrow AIs, and generally labelled as VI -Virtual Intelligences- by people outside the field. This category covers a broad swathe of techniques, from search and pathfinding to expert systems to genetic fuzzy trees to deep neural networks, which are mixed and matched with each other to optimize for the designed task. VIs are ubiquitous, exceeding human peak skill in their areas of specialization (though real world applications often don't do all that much better than trained humans), and have spent the past two centuries getting augmented with more and more clever algorithmic tricks for improving VIs. In order to do this, the Charters employ large teams of analysts and software engineers to develop clever algorithmic tricks that supplement or outright supplant neural networks, exploiting machine precision where stochastic methods are inadequate.


    The use of VIs in everyday life is well accepted by the vast majority of the population, with professionals mixing and matching various consumer VIs to analyse data or assist them with creative or scientific works. Some VI lines are well loved by both the populace and the Charters themselves, with Charter programmers often deliberately leaving VIs with behavioral quirks and unpredictable glitches that not only save money on quality assurance, but are considered endearing traits that lead to anthropomorphization by the consumer market

    Despite the mass comfortability and profitability of VIs of all kinds, the introduction of AGIs has been, to put it delicately, controversial. Though computer science has advanced to the point of producing programs that can not only pass the Turing test, but demonstrate sapience and match 23rd century human intelligence, flexibility, and creativity, the public reaction to the introduction of AGI saw the companies of the time rapidly pull them from the market, and even say the Compact itself move to heavily regulate the AI sector.


    First introduced in the 2060s, the great tech firms began replacing their work staff with AGIs who did not require food, rest, housing, or pay. This shift led to an alliance between white collar workers fearing that automation would put them out of work and radicals who opposed what they insisted was AGI Slavery, a growing movement that would climax in the First Great Black Summer of 2084. When the ashes of the First Black Summer settled, the Compact's Parliament moved to grant rights to AGIs, and the resulting economic damage saw dozens of formerly great names in computing consolidate under the aegis of several of the first Charters who flaunted their extra-Solarian wealth by buying up prestigious brand names and research divisions on the cheap.


    Since the 2080s, while the regulation surrounding AGI production and use have been severely weakened none of the Charters have sought to reintroduce them into the market, perhaps fearing another backlash like the First Black Summer and the few hundred thousand surviving AGIs that were granted Solarian Citizenship rights have found spread throughout the Compact and Charter Space where they usually work at the same white collar jobs whose workers they were designed to replace.

    Perhaps due to the risks of attempting to reintroduce AGIs to the market, Omoikane has instead introduced their flagship product the "TLI" or Temporary Limited Intelligence. Approximately as effective as an AGI, a TLI is billed as a more moral replacement for AGI that uses a suite of high end VIs and a proprietary batch of creativity algorithms in order to complete complex tasks.


    TLIs are used as a fire and forget program designed to be licensed to solve a single issue, no matter how complicated and then delete itself. Though the TLIs are a black box product, scientists from the other Charters believe that the central creativity algorithm in the TLI is inherently unstable and rapidly degrades in ability with time, making the TLI an instance of Omoikane attempting to market a critical technical flaw as a selling point that is accepted due to the ubiquitous market practice of planned obsolescence and artificial scarcity.


    Though expensive, most businesses and successful professionals will keep a few licensed Omoikane TLIs on hand to throw at difficult problems or to supplement manpower in crunch situations.

    While AGIs have been possible for nearly two centuries, the promise of a Seed AI, a recursively self-improving general superintelligence, is perpetually 'a decade away from the market', and no successful ASI ever been demonstrated to the satisfaction of the Charters or the Compact.


    This is not to say that the Gödel machine architecture or the AIXI model has somehow been forgotten in the past 230 years, but that the Friendly AI problem has yet to be cracked. Every demonstration has either stalled out or gone immediately rampant, attempting to overthrow Charter Space before being stopped by the safety net of Narrow AIs. The small trickle of roughly human intelligence level AGIs that are created every decade typically come from these projects.


    Urban legends persist that a few Seed AIs managed to escape and hide out beyond known space, plotting to return and crush humanity, or that they control all of society in secret, puppeting the Compact and Charters from their very foundation and occasionally engineering publicly failed ASI attempts to allay suspicion. These rumours are, of course, patently false, and simply the fevered imagination of crackpots at work, no doubt inspired by entertainment made by Hermes-Ishtar that feature AI supervillainy.
    Systems
    Map made by @Redshirt Army


    The Spinward Frontier:



    The Middle Spinward Frontier

    The Core Region:

    UNDER RADIANT CONTROL OR ALLIED:

    The Radiant system is host to a G-class star, only slightly smaller than Sol. The system itself is rather small and resource-poor; experts believe that one or more Jovian planets ejected much of the system's bodies and then followed themselves. This is evidenced by the system's asteroid belt degrading over time, with high levels of eccentric orbits and impacts on planetary surface.


    Radiant 1: A rather unremarkable airless iron planet, gravity 0.4 Earth Standard.


    Radiant 2: A slightly larger unremarkable airless iron-silicate planet, gravity 0.6 Earth Standard.


    Radiant 3: A binary planetary system and the outermost of the Radiant systems' planets.


    Asphodel (Radiant 3a): The larger of the Elysium 3 pair, Asphodel might have once hosted life of its own. That life has been snuffed out for hundreds of millions of years, though, as the planet's significant atmosphere began the runaway cycle of your usual hothouse planet. Hermes-Ishtar maintained a significant aerostat and automated surface miner operation for in-house manufacturing, given that the frequent asteroid impacts from the asteroid belt keep digging up chunks of the upper crust and having low-melting-point metals rain out of the sky and solidify, unoxidized, on the surface for collection. Gravity 1.4 Earth Standard.


    Elysium (Radiant 3b): Elysium was settled in the late 2190's, being a relatively simple affair. Simple life had already begun to evolve under its oceans, but continued orbital bombardment far past the lengths of things like Earth's Late Heavy Period had kept it there. It was a simple matter of forming up a small anti-asteroid task force armed with tugs and mining lasers to artificially end the pummeling, and the surface proved amenable to Terran life transplants. The colony is energy-self-sufficient, using a variety of solar, tidal, and nuclear power. Gravity 0.9 Earth Standard.


    Radiant I: The outermost significant feature of Radiant, this asteroid belt is more a loose mixture of a primordial asteroid belt much like Sol's with a Kuiper belt. The shepherding gas giants which once nudged all these rocks into their orbits are gone, and with it the entire outer system is a maelstrom of chaotic orbits as the belts lose their coherence. This requires constant vigilance from Elysium's anti-asteroid team, but the high eccentricity of many asteroids also makes it cheap and easy to mine the ones that might come Elysium's way, which provides a trickle of basic resources for upkeep and personal goods. All large-scale building and infrastructure projects have been supplied from out-system, however.

    A G-K far binary system, Gaid is simply a transit point to Radiant. Gaid's own gate maintenance techs and SAR rotated in and out through Radiant itself. There is no infrastructure other than a set of buoy lines for communications in Gaid A, and nothing in Gaid B.

    Gaid A1: An airless world. Quality 10.

    Gaid A2: A planet much like mars with a vestigial CO2 atmosphere. Quality 7.

    Gaid A3: This planet boasts a methane hydrosphere. Quality 4.

    Gaid AI: An asteroid belt.

    Gaid A4: A turbulent Jovian planet, its storms would make resource extraction difficult. Quality 5.

    Gaid A4a: An icy moon, with tidal heating creating a large ocean under a thin icy shell. Quality 9.

    Gaid B1: A molten Cthonian world hosting a simply ludicrous amount of iron. Quality 15.

    Gaid B2: An airless world. Quality 10.

    Gaid B3: An airless binary system with two near-identically sized planets. Quality 7 and 8.

    Gaid B4: This airless planet boasts a large and beautiful ring system, famous as a screen background option across human space. Every few years, a cruise or scientific expedition will stop by for more images.

    Gaid B5: A small icy planet. Quality 3.

    Gaid B6: A frozen world. Quality 7.

    Gaid B7: An interesting gas dwarf sometimes referred to as an 'ice dwarf.' Quality 14.

    A close K-M binary, Shei is home to an old Ares penal colony.

    Shei 1: A Cthonian world. Quality 15.

    Shei 2: An airless world. Quality 12.

    Sheol (Shei 3): A boreal world, with a large, decaying ring, the planet features two large continents. The population of the consists of a large prisoner population on the larger of the two continents and a small Ares training base on the smaller. Records show that the prison consists of several million persons convicted to "high risk labour" and dropped on the continent with automatic resupply via Ares contractors and watched from orbit by weapons satellites. Most of the planet's land area is covered in a native tree analogue with a strange multi-stranded trunk.


    Sheol is actually home to a population of over 100 million made up of prisoners and their descendants taht Ares was usuing as a live fire training course. Cooperation between Radiant agents, Ares mutineers, and the Sheolites themselves have seen the planet freed.


    Gravity .95 Earth Standard. Quality 12.

    Watchman (Shei 3a): Once the outer of two moons, this body now boasts Ares' local light shipyards and system command center. Quality 13.

    Shei 4: Spiraling in from the outer system, this planet will eventually evaporate near-entirely as it closes towards the dual suns of Shei. Quality 3.

    Shei 5: Martian planet with an active methane cycle. Quality 5.

    Shei I: Asteroid belt.

    Shei 6: Jovian planet with high rotation rate. Slightly squashed as a result. Quality 8.

    Shei 6a: An icy capture, this moon will be torn into a ring sometime in the next hundred thousand years. Quality 2.

    Shei 6b: Cold Martian planet, covered in a thin layer of water and carbon dioxide ices. Active methane cycle. Quality 8.

    Shei II: Asteroid belt.

    Shei 7: Jovian planet. Quality 13.

    Shei 7a: An icy moon with significant cryovolcanism. Quality 6.

    Shei 7b: A tiny icy moon, this is on the edge of hydrostatic equilibrium. Quality 2.

    Shei 8: Ice giant. Quality 6.

    Shei 8a: An icy moon. Quality 9.

    Shei 8b: An icy moon, orbiting in an unusual polar orbit. Quality 9.

    Population: 103,000,000

    While lacking any currently-habitable planets, Five Lions' large size and potential have made it a significant point of Rhodes' recent extraction efforts. Ambitious terraforming efforts have recently begun.


    Carajas (Five Lions 1): A Cthonian ball of iron, it's actively mined by robotic Rhodes-built landers. Gravity 2.3 Earth Standard. Quality 12.


    Five Lions 2: A small rocky ball. Quality 3.


    Five Lions 3: A rocky ball. Quality 7.


    Grasberg (Five Lions 4): A large rocky world, glaciation has rendered it uninhabitable for now, but terraforming efforts have begun to artificially ramp up the greenhouse effect and restore liquid water to the surface, along with mining its ice. Gravity 1.11 Earth Standard. Quality 14.


    Five Lions 5: This planet's atmosphere is so significant it verges on a gas dwarf. While a solid surface covered in a thin layer of ice is at the bottom, no reasonable colonization is possible. Quality 7.


    Five Lions I: This asteroid belt, along with all the others, is being mined heavily.


    Five Lions 6: This Jovian planet forms the center of current Rhodes extraction efforts. Quality 4.


    Five Lions 6a: This Martian planet boasts significant ice caps and active plate tectonics, though only a vestigial atmosphere. Debate on whether to put resources into terraforming it are ongoing. Gravity .81 Earth Standard. Quality 17.


    Oyu Tolgoi (Five Lions 6b): Home to the local population in covered shelters, this Martian planet, while nearly completely lacking water or plate tectonics, has its own atmosphere. Comet bombardment away from populated areas is ongoing and is already beginning to show results. Gravity .79 Earth Standard. Quality 11.


    Five Lions II: An asteroid belt.


    Five Lions 7: An unremarkable Jovian. Quality 2.


    Five Lions III: An asteroid belt.


    Five Lions 8: Jovian planet, its rotation speed has resulted in an unusually calm upper atmosphere. Quality 15.


    Five Lions IV: An asteroid belt.


    Five Lions 9: Jovian planet. Quality 9.


    Five Lions V: An asteroid belt.


    Five Lions 10: Neptunian ice giant. Quality 8.


    Five Lions 10a: A small icy moon. Quality 5.


    Five Lions 10b: A large icy body, this was probably its own planetoid at some point before being captured due to the complex interplays of no less than 5 gas giants.


    Population: 15,000,000

    A rare system with a brown dwarf orbiting a G-type star (just barely in the limits of what's considered a single system rather than a binary), and with a Jovian planet orbiting that, and on top of that treasure trove a dual ice giant binary, Osliam presents a golden research opportunity, and was bid on by Omoikane despite its otherwise sparce resources and poor habitable prospects.


    Osliam 1: A rare hot ice giant, this planet is actively shrinking on a measurable time scale. It must have migrated in as a much larger planet recently.


    Osliam 1a: This once-rock-ice moon is now a tiny molten ellipse barely holding together.


    Osliam 1b: This somewhat larger moon changes color unusually with its day, as the shade of its parent cools lava to a dull red before emerging back into the light heats the lava back to a healthy orange glow.


    Osliam 1c: This entire moon glows dull red in its day, just barely solid, and cools to an unusually smooth moon in its night.


    Osliam I: This asteroid belt was probably a planet before Osliam 1's passing tore it to shreds.


    Osliam 3: A hothouse planet with a relatively thin atmosphere, it retains temperatures and pressures that are survivable with heavy-duty equipment on the surface—when it's not raining sulfuric acid, that is.


    Osliam 4: This small Martian planet seems to have collected some of Osliam 1's offgassing in its move inwards, and has a renewed temporary atmosphere.


    Osliam 5a: This planet seems to have survived at the edge of the frost line by siphoning gas off its smaller twin.


    Osliam 5b: Barely a gas giant, this planet was probably only slightly smaller than Osliam 5a in the distant past.


    Osliam 6: The focus of Omoikane colonization in-system, Osliam 6 retains plate tectonics from the nearby brown dwarf but no atmosphere, an odd combination.


    Osliam 7: A brown dwarf, this substellar object long ago burnt its deuterium and now lies slowly cooling, glowing dimly red. It is, however, still giving off a prodigious amount of low IR radiation.


    Osliam 7a: Once its own planet, Osliam 7a was captured at some point by Osliam 7, perhaps in the same interaction that threw Osliam 1 to its suicidal innermost orbit.


    Osliam 7a1: This icy moon is simultaneously shrinking and becoming more habitable—while its outer layers of ice are sublimating, the fierce tides of its complex interplay with Osliam 7 and 7a are heating the inner ocean to temperatures comparable to terrestrial water sources. Some scientists even suggest a pocket of water vapor is forming under the ice, and may form an internal "sky" for as much as a hundred million years before the outer shell sublimates entirely.


    Osliam 7a2: This moon is less lucky; its tides are so strong that they seem to slowly be ripping the moon apart. It won't have the honor of becoming more than an ephemeral ring; the same complex tides tearing at it will rapidly disperse its debris field. While it lasts, though, it's easy water harvesting.


    Population: 650,000

    UNDER CHARTER CONTROL:


    A distant double G binary, Xotreh hosts a small habitable moon around Xotreh B, the smaller of the two stars. As such, development has focused on the second star, despite the fact that the jump points center closer to Xotreh A.


    Xotreh A1: This world boasts an active liquid silicate cycle on its surface, with oceans of basalt and continents of granite. Gravity 0.38 Earth Standard. Quality 8.


    Xotreh A2: A rather large airless world, its original atmosphere was likely blown off by a massive impact. Gravity 1.2 Earth Standard. Quality 9.


    Xotreh A3: A binary planetary pair of airless worlds about the size of Mars. Quality 6 and 8.


    Xotreh A4: A hothouse planet with a planet-wide sulfuric acid storm due to its rapid rotation. Gravity .71 Earth Standard. Quality 8.


    Xotreh A5 "Cueball": This planet is remarkably similar to Earth—if earth was buried under a kilometers-thick ice sheet across 90% of the surface. One day, as Xotreh A expands and dies, this world will become an ocean planet, but for now it's a cold desert. Gravity .87 Earth Standard. Quality 5.


    Xotreh A6: An unremarkable icy ball. Quality 4.


    Xotreh AI: An asteroid belt.


    Xotreh A7: A Jovian planet, Xotreh 7 corrals the entire inner system in line. Quality 10.


    Xotreh B1: This planet must have once been a gas giant at least the size of Uranus before it was sent inwards. Now all that remains is a dense core with a molten surface. Gravity 1.51 Earth Standard. Quality 13.


    Xotreh B2: A binary pair of earth-sized airless worlds. Quality 6 and 7.


    Xotreh B3: Another once-gas giant, this planet remains far out enough to boast a wholly-solid surface of iron. Gravity 1.64 Earth Standard. Quality 14.


    Xotreh B4: A Jovian right on the frost line, its tidal heating keeps its moons on the edge of habitability. Quality 3.


    Xotreh B4a "Sushi": An ocean world with massive polar ice caps, Omoikane has constructed a series of seasteads on the equatorial high ocean plateaus where it was feasible to drive foundations into the sea floor a few hundred meters below the surface. These small facilities serve as housing, data storage, and production centers for the research teams studying the dual Cthonian planets of Xotreh B. Gravity .67 Earth Standard. Quality 2.


    Xotreh B4b: The lesser tidal heating here worsened the glaciation, and the planet lies under a planet-wide crust of ice. Gravity 1.13 Earth Standard. Quality 10.


    Xotreh BI: The close proximity of this asteroid belt makes it an ideal location for resource extraction.


    Xotreh 5: This Jovian is definitively beyond the habitable zone. Quality 6.


    Xotreh 6: A dense ice giant. Quality 4.


    Xotreh 7: Jovian planet. Quality 6.


    Xotreh 8: An exceptionally cold Jovian. Quality 9.


    Xotreh 8a: An unremarkable icy sphere. Quality 8.


    Xotreh 9: This planet would have a massive atmosphere, if it wasn't so cold it all froze and fell to the surface. Only a few degrees above the space surrounding it. Gravity 1.3 Earth Standard. Quality 9.


    Population: 54,000

    Besides an interesting Jovian-gas dwarf planetary system, Bestreer holds little of interest other than its connections to other places.


    Bestreer 1: An airless world. Quality 2.


    Bestreer 2: An airless world. Quality 6.


    Bestreer 3: This airless world once had a captured moon, torn apart at the Roche limit and forming a ring. A small gate maintenance and SAR team bases here, siphoning fuel and water from Bestreer 5 and mining into the surface for both resources and safe spaces for housing. Quality 10.


    Bestreer 4: A rock-ice world. Quality 5.


    Bestreer 5: Another rock-ice world made up more of ice than rock. Quality 5.


    Bestreer I: An icy asteroid belt.


    Bestreer 6: A large Jovian planet, on the edge of becoming a brown dwarf. Quality 15.


    Bestreer 6a: This gas dwarf might have become a gas giant in its own right without its massive sibling. Quality 5.


    Bestreer 7: Another Jovian. Quality 14.


    Bestreer 7a: An icy moon, with an internal ocean buried under kilometers of ice. Quality 12.


    Bestreer 8: An icy ball. Quality 10.


    Population: 450

    G-class star. A transshipping point to Radiant and environs, Mississippi keeps a substantial support crew on hand for possible cargo ship breakdowns or emergencies in-system, due to the slightly increased risk of issues from the absolute shambles of Akleod's inner system. A minor executive has also put together a cheap refueling and battery exchange station.


    Akleod 1: Even actively evaporating and leaving behind a trail in orbit of dissipating volatiles, this body is large enough to have usurped Akleod 1a's orbit temporarily until it disappears away or the chaotic orbit of the two throws one into the star or out of the system. Quality 2.


    Akleod 1a: The original Akleod 1, its orbit has been badly disrupted by the current, migrating Akleod 1. Which of the two gets ejected is still uncertain despite a decent amount of computational simulation; odds put it at 48-52% relatively. Quality 6.


    Gnat's Ass (Akleod 2): A small, loosely-held-together icy body, perhaps what used to be an asteroid belt before Akleod 1's suicidal inner-system dive. It's not yet had time to fully reach hydrostatic equilibrium. Quality 3.


    Akleod 3: An icy planet similar to Akleod 1, perhaps an old sibling. Quality 13.


    Akleod I: An asteroid belt.


    Akleod 4: A Jovian with an unusually elliptical orbit, it's regarded as the culprit for the chaos of Akleod's inner system. Quality 11.


    Population: 5,000

    As it turns out, transponder codes from regular priority messages through Gaid (now that we can see them, having backdoored the gate control) bear tags from a system, Thoa, along with navigational chart updates for any ships that happen to stop by. Thoa and Gaid both seem to have been nothing more than transit points to the far-more-valuable Radiant for Hermes-Ishtar, but Thoa holds a small anti-pirate base guarding against raiders from Signia. Hermes-Ishtar was apparently serious enough about it to have a converted corvette on station.

    All told, the Thoa system holds gates to 2 systems besides Gaid's. There's also an unimproved jump point simply labelled as "dangerous." that leads to Signia

    Thoa System Stats:

    Thoa 1: A molten mess of a planet, it's hot enough that a residual atmosphere of vaporized low-melting-point metallics exists.

    Thoa 2: An unremarkable airless metal ball.

    Thoa 3: A super-earth hothouse, this planet would have been uninhabitable due to its gravity even before turning scorchingly hot.

    Thoa 3a: A captured asteroid barely on the edge of hydrostatic equilibrium, the Nasty Bastardhad been excavating rudimentary shelters for "leave" for its crew.

    Thoa I: An asteroid belt.

    Thoa 4: A normal Jovian planet.

    Thoa 4a: A moon much like Mars in climate.

    Thoa 5: A Jovian planet with an unusual triangular wind pattern at the poles.

    Thoa 6: Blooms of hydrogen well up from the core of this Jovian, perhaps disturbed by some recent impact.

    Thoa 7: Bathyscapes would find themselves at home on the surface of Thoa 7. Pressures much like that at Earth's seabed keep a crust of ice 3 stable enough robotic drones could walk on it.

    Thoa 7a: Unusually, Thoa 7a is the only large icy body in the system. Scientists are unsure of where the others went. As the only easy source of volatiles, the UNasty Bastard periodically stopped by a handful of obsolete volatile collection systems on the surface to top up.

    Thoa II: A Kuiper belt of icy objects.

    Empty Systems

    Kimberly: A fairly unremarkable and empty system, this site was chosen as Rhodes' spinward boneyard—a place for failed experiments, old equipment, and ships so worn they weren't worth maintaining anymore, but were still valuable enough to warrant not throwing into a gas giant or otherwise completely destroyed. For 2 decades a Rhodes-affiliated salvaging contractor worked here, gathering scrap and other valuables, but following high injury and death rates and low returns, the contract (and most non-local dumping) was cancelled in 2247 (4 years before the March Days.)

    Kimberly 1: A large rocky planet, this must have migrated inwards from further out in the system a long time ago to be so large so close to its parent star.

    Kimberly 2: A Martian planet that keeps a comfortable daytime temperature despite its lack of atmosphere due to a close orbit.

    Kimberly 3: A Jovian world.

    Kimberly I: This asteroid belt is actually combined with a thinly-spread junkyard corralled by Kimberly's 2 gas giants.

    Kimberly 4: A Neptunian world, this planet has several starship hulks abandoned as the closest stable orbit to the gate out. An old deactivation hub orbits in resonance with Kimberly 4a, the former site of a salvaging operation.

    Kimberly 4a: The only significant satellite in the system, this icy moon retains a thin crust and a massive subterranean freshwater ocean.

    Total:


    Radiant:


    Gaid:


    Five Lions:


    Head of Diplomatic Corps:

    Name: Amanda Redcrest, Victoria Blackwell, and Kayla Hayashi


    DoB: "2222", 2219, 2227, 2224


    Current Position: Influential media figure and figurehead of Social Committee propaganda


    Not a traditional diplomat, or a traditional individual 'Veronica Stardust' is the persona of a trio of XP broadcasters who have been working together since 2246 and has consistently been one of the most recognized figures across Charter space and is a local Elysian celebrity.


    In Charter space those individuals who choose to make money by recording their lived experiences, of all kinds, for later playback are treated with an indulgent disdain by the polite classes as a mix of internet celebrity and sex worker despite the practice of selling XP experiences being common in the poorer segments of society and a smaller portion of the professional middle class attempting to stay afloat in a tight gig economy.


    Amanda Redcrest was a former media programmer whose attempts to supplement her income with XP work backfired and saw her fired from her job. Contrarily, Kayla and Victoria both come from lower class backgrounds, though Kayla's attempts to climb into the middle class by earning a marketing degree were frustrated when her lower class status markers and financing of education via XP work saw her frozen out of the job market.


    A former collaborator of Kayla's, Victoria had been a rising XP star in her own right and had no desire to change her station, but as her brief celebrity began to fade Victoria approached Kayla to propose the creation of a dedicated broadcasting persona that both would act as. Later bringing on Redcrest, who they'd both done crossover XP work with, to do technical work, the trio used carefully gathered market data and some intuition to create the "Veronica Stardust" persona of an middlingly-intelligent and freewheeling persona who played to the upper class's picture of what depravities and indignities the poorer class must get up to in their spare time.


    From 2246 to 2251 the Veronica Stardust persona (performed by all three at various times, though primarily Victoria) produced experience recordings that were nearly always in the top 10 best sellers across Charter space.


    Though they enjoyed the wealth that they brought in, the trio increasingly chafed at the market driven limitations of Veronica, and were considering a number of possibly catastrophic brand shifts when the March Days broke out and all three participated in street actions in a private capacity after sending one last broadcast as 'Veronica' to encourage revolt.


    Since the formation of the Social Committee the figure of Veronica has been rebranded to serve as the figurehead of Social Committee Propaganda and several major initiatives have been launched with her at the forefront including a highly successful part of the anti-overproduction initiatives.


    As part of the now-completed campaign to maintain the charade that Radiant was still under Charter control, Veronica Stardust continued to sell broadcasts to HI media chains, though the trio could not help but begin a brand shift towards a far more intelligent and radical persona.


    Pros: XP Celebrity, influential, well known, inspiring to the middle and lower classes


    Cons: XP celebrity, little diplomatic experience, three people


    Diplomatic Goals: Defeat the Charters in the field of public opinion, push social revolution and freedom of information and communication, cause public opinion to oppose attacking Radiant


    Unlocked FRM

    Ares Peacekeeping Grade - Access to planetary army formation

    Ares Military Grade - Access to mid-sized shipyards, bonuses to planetary army combat. Bonus to completion of Chinook remodeling


    Rhodes Light industrial Grade - 10% increase to all mining income, reduced Cost for BLG and other actions that use basic fabber processes

    Rhodes Heavy Industrial Grade - Massive discount on mining upgrades, able to unlock automated technologies with Omoikaine


    Cernunnos Consumer Grade - +1 to all Soccom actions

    Cernunnos Enterprise Grade - NOT UNLOCKED


    Omoikane Consumer Grade - +1 to FRM reserach for each two tech bases unlocked (+6 currently)

    Omoikane Enterprise Grade - +5 to blue sky research, automation with Omoikane


    Hermes-Ishtar Consumer Grade - Your economy doesn't crash when the turn of funding

    Hermes-Ishtar Production Grade - NOT UNLOCKED


    MSI Consumer Grade - Consumer Goods, Drones, and personal vehicles, +2 to domestic projects in IndComm and SocComm

    MSI Enterprise Grade - NOT UNLOCKED


    Original Tech

    The Box: Fabber the size of a X-box that can, with time, materials and power, print the components for a full sized box. Less efficient, but easy to print and hide.


    Defence Coordinator:


    Name: Maria Awhina

    DoB: 2165

    Current Position: Military Committee Delegate from the Radiant Veterans Guild


    Born into poverty on Earth as the twenty-second century began to wane, young 22-year old Maria Awhina caught up in radical anti-Charter politics during the third black summer of 2187 and was convicted of property destruction during the rioting and sentenced to serve as a contractor to Hermes-Ishtar until her contract was paid off.


    The stark choice of starvation or service to Hermes-Ishtar caused Maria to descend into self-destructive behavior where for twenty years Ms. Awhina continuously volunteered for the highest paid and most dangerous positions that Hermes-Ishtar had available.


    Hermes-Ishtar considers Special Operations Lieutenant Awhina to have served with distinction throughout the heavy skirmishing of that era, though Maria herself continues to carry guilt for her service and her survival.


    After performing exceptionally well in a hostage rescue operation Awhina was transferred to the Protective Detail Division of Hermes-Ishtar Security, and was eventually assigned to serve as the head of the Radiant Vice President's protective detail.


    Over the next four decades she came to see the world as her home, and while her professionalism never wavered, her loyalty to the company who still owned her contract did.


    This March, Maria had the option to gun down her fellow planetary headquarters workers to secure Yang's escape, or to finally return to roots in anti-Charter agitation. The fact that we are all here today shows what choice she made.


    Pros:

    -Actual Combat Veteran, knows Radiant inside and out, special operations expert, professional.


    Cons:

    -only academic knowledge of starship operations, logistics, organization command and strategic operations.


    Command Traits:

    -Objective oriented, unflappable, aggressive, prefers attacks and operations to come from unexpected angles.

    Reports from the Permanent Commission for Military Intelligence on hostile forces in neighbouring systems:

    Blue Squadron:
    -Allegiance: Ares Combat Solutions
    -Service: Mars Interstellar Security
    -CO: Rear Admiral Weylon Kang
    -Flagship: MIS Yorktown

    We know little about Rear Admiral Weylon Kang except that he has received a number of commendations from the MIS board for keeping costs low while on deployment. He appears to be making an effort to clamp down on the rumours racing back and forth across the fleet.

    MIS Yorktown
    -British Empire-class Fleet Tender
    MIS Eurymedon
    -New Model-class Strike Corvette
    MIS La Rochelle
    -New Model-class Strike Corvette
    MIS Cape Rachado
    -New Model-class Strike Corvette
    MIS Second Schooneveld
    -New Model-class Strike Corvette
    MIS Matapan
    -New Model-class Strike Corvette
    MIS Valcour Island
    -New Model-class Strike Corvette
    MIS Kerch Strait
    -New Model-class Strike Corvette
    MIS Galveston Harbour
    -New Model-class Strike Corvette
    MIS Cape Sarych
    -New Model-class Strike Corvette
    MIS River Plate
    -New Model-class Strike Corvette
    MIS Third San Francisco
    -New Model-class Strike Corvette
    MIS Scipio Africanus
    -Cossak-class Frigate
    MIS Suleiman I
    -Cossak-class Frigate
    MIS Louis Botha
    -Cossak-class Frigate
    MIS Fort Ware
    -Hudson's bay Company-class Fast Fleet Tanker
    MIS Fort Mackinac
    -Hudson's bay Company-class Fast Fleet Tanker
    MIS Fort Osage
    -Hudson's bay Company-class Fast Fleet Tanker
    MIS Arabian
    -Postal-class Courier
    MIS Macedonia
    -Legionary-class Fast Troop Transport
    MIS Hispania Citerior
    -Legionary-class Fast Troop Transport
    MIS Hispania Ulterior
    -Legionary-class Fast Troop Transport
    MIS Gallia Narbonensis
    -Legionary-class Fast Troop Transport
    MIS Sicilia
    -Legionary-class Fast Troop Transport
    MIS Corsica et Sardinia
    -Legionary-class Fast Troop Transport

    Fixed Defences:
    Battery A
    -MSS-54-F LMP Constellation
    Battery B
    -MSS-54-F LMP Constellation
    Battery C
    -MSS-54-F LMP Constellation
    Shoal A
    -ASR-33-C TAM Shoal
    Shoal B
    -ASR-33-C TAM Shoal
    Shoal C
    -ASR-33-C TAM Shoal
    Shoal D
    -ASR-33-C TAM Shoal
    Shoal E
    -ASR-33-C TAM Shoal
    Shoal F
    -ASR-33-C TAM Shoal

    Fixed Defences:
    Battery A
    -Blindfire-Pattern LMP Constellation
    Battery B
    -Airstrike Pattern LMP Constellation
    Shoal A
    -Macross-Pattern LMP Constellation
    Shoal B
    -Macross-Pattern LMP Constellation
    Strikecraft Wing, ID# 48603
    -Radiance-Type Strikecraft

    -None

    -None

    Local Security Forces
    -Approximately fifty strong volunteer station security militia drawn from station personnel

    Local Security Forces:
    -Deep Space Security Solutions (Omoikane Subsidiary) Customs shuttle squadron based out of Xotreh B-4a's orbital station
    -Three companies of Standard Planetary Security Company (Ares subsidiary) troops based out of Xotreh B-4a's habitat complexes for internal security and law enforcement

    139th Solarian Navy Squadron:
    -Allegiance: Solarian Compact
    -Service: Solarian Navy
    -CO: Vice Admiral David Visser
    -Flagship: SNS Krak de Chevaliers

    Thanks to his heavy handed labour discipline and extractive tribute and demands for corvee labour from Ascension Admiral Visser is viscerally hated by the populace of Ascension, and to a lesser degree the rest of the Solarian Force as well. While the gate's completion draws near, it is uncertain what path that Visser will persue.

    SNS Krak de Chevaliers
    -Star-hold-Class light-tender
    SNS Victoria Newman
    -Leonard Greyson-Chang-Class Strike Corvette
    SNS Julia Stonechild
    -Leonard Greyson-Chang-Class Strike Corvette
    SNS Robert Chuikov
    -Leonard Greyson-Chang-Class Strike Corvette
    SNS Wallace Al-Wazir
    -Leonard Greyson-Chang-Class Strike Corvette
    SNS Dawn's Early Light
    -Freedom's Light-class cruiser
    SNS Jacob Nagumo
    -Herald Kanumba-Class frigate
    SNS Alexander Hamilton
    -Liberation-class troop transport

    Solarian Marines now spread throughout the system

    PCMI Provides new system data on the single system that lies beyond beyond Five Lions:

    Mobile Force:

    Current Orders: Defend the All Radiant Congress by acting as a rapid response in the event of any hostile acts.

    CO: Commodore Stephanie Rousseau

    CNS Velasco, United States of America-class Fleet Carrier

    -CO: Captain Esteri Attar

    -Orca Wing, Switchblade-type strikecraft (Customized)

    -CO: Wing Commander Jasmine Ang

    -Red Wolf Wing, Switchblade-type strikecraft (Customized)

    -CO: Wing Commander Heloisa Kimura de Lima

    CNS Shieldmaiden, Great Heathen-class Light Cruiser

    -CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

    CNS Shamhat, Great Heathen-class Light Cruiser

    -CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

    CNS Righteous Tempest, Cossak-class Frigate

    -CO: Captain Vehement Shade

    CNS August Willich, Cossak-class Frigate

    -CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

    CNS Elysium, Cossak-class Frigate

    -CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

    CNS Asphodel, Cossak-class Frigate

    -CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

    -


    Home Force:

    Current Orders: Defend Radiant, comet patrol, act as a reserve force

    CO: Commodore Erina Kozlova

    CNS Blaire Mountain, New Model-Class Strike Corvette

    -CO: Captain Guillermo Kageyama

    CNS Scutum, Comet-Class Patrol Corvette

    -CO: Captain Martin Pagonis

    CNS Buckler, Comet-Class Patrol Corvette

    -CO: Captain Samuel Smiles

    CNS Nasty Bastard, A Jury Rigged Mess of a Drone Carrier

    -CO: Captain Jean-Paul Beaumont

    -


    Radiant System Self Defence Force:

    Current Orders: Defend Radiant, comet patrol

    CO: Overseen by Admiral Gregory Mansur in his capacity as MilComm Chief of Naval Operations


    Radiant Customs Squadron, Arabia-class boarding craft with marine contingents

    -CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

    Switchblade Wing, Switchblade-type strikecraft

    -CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

    Apogee Wing, Switchblade-type strikecraft

    -CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-


    Battery A, Blindfire-Pattern LMP Constellation

    (Radiant-Bestreer Gate)

    Battery B, Blindfire-Pattern LMP Constellation

    (Radiant-Bestreer Gate)

    Battery C, Blindfire-Pattern LMP Constellation

    (Radiant-Bestreer Gate)

    Battery D, Airstrike-Pattern LMP Constellation

    (Radiant-Bestreer Gate)

    Battery E, Airstrike-Pattern LMP Constellation

    (Radiant-Bestreer Gate)

    Battery F, Airstrike-Pattern LMP Constellation

    (Radiant-Bestreer Gate)

    Shoal A, Macross-Pattern TAM Shoal

    (Radiant-Bestreer Gate)


    Radiant Orbital Yard 1

    Current construction: None

    Radiant Orbital Yard 1

    Current construction: None


    -


    Gaid System Self Defence Force:

    Current Orders: Defend Gaid

    CO: Commodore Victor Raine

    Battery A, Blindfire-Pattern LMP Constellation

    Battery B, Blindfire-Pattern LMP Constellation

    Battery C, Blindfire-Pattern LMP Constellation

    Battery D, Airstrike-Pattern LMP Constellation

    Battery E, Airstrike-Pattern LMP Constellation

    Battery F, Airstrike-Pattern LMP Constellation

    Shoal A, Macross-Pattern TAM Shoal

    Shoal A, Macross-Pattern TAM Shoal

    Shoal A, Macross-Pattern TAM Shoal

    Zephyr Wing, Switchblade-Type Strikecraft (Customized)

    -CO: Wing Commander Ara Helge

    Aeolus Wing, Switchblade-Type Strikecraft (Customized)

    -CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

    Gale Wing, Switchblade-Type Strikecraft (Customized)

    -CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

    -

    Frontier Force

    Current Orders: Keep watch on SolNav force in Raphanus, assist with integration of Ascension military forces, patrol Spinward frontier

    CO: Commodore Shayla McLean

    CNS Kiel Mutiny, Kaiserreich-class BattleCruiser

    -CO: Captain Inana Devlin

    CNS Choreographer, Janissary-class Light Tender

    -CO: Captain Karl Xanthopoulos

    CNS Valiant, New Model-class Strike Corvette, attached to CNS Choreographer

    -CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

    CNS Defiant, New Model-class Strike Corvette, attached to CNS Choreographer

    -CO: Captain Fool's Errand

    CNS Reliant, New Model-class Strike Corvette, attached to CNS Choreographer

    -CO: Captain Rouge Napier

    CNS Actium, New Model-class Strike Corvette, attached to CNS Choreographer

    -CO: Captain John Rankin

    CNS Crête-à-Pierrot, New Model-class Strike Corvette, attached to CNS Choreographer

    -CO: Captain Nkiru Chaudhari

    CNS Valmy, New Model-Class Strike Corvette, attached to CNS Choreographer

    -CO: Captain Sumac Barros

    CNS Revolutionary Will, Cossak-class Frigate

    -CO: Captain Yamamoto Hanae

    CNS Revolutionary Grace, Cossak-class Frigate

    -CO: -N/A DATABASE ERROR, CONTACT IT FOR HELP-

    CNS Under New Management, Don-Class Fast Tanker

    -CO: Captain Adras Kierenos

    CNS Liberte, Hollywood(C)-Class Frigate

    -CO: Captain Colin McRae

    CNS Egalite, Hollywood(C)-Class Frigate

    -CO: Captain Adelia Swift

    Resources
    Naval Ship Types: Ship Types (Public Version)
    Naval Officers: Congressional Navy Officers (Public Version)
    System Codex: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1rtNbPCcPsTK7HCHKo9dPgK7ntx5tBKOpltrZb_In7GY/edit#
    Blaze Zhang: Blaze Zhang is trans-masc. That means his pronouns are he/him.


    DISCORD LINK:

    Join the Wordsmiths Discord Server!

    Check out the Wordsmiths community on Discord – hang out with 897 other members and enjoy free voice and text chat.
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  • Informational
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    Waiting For the Day (Late 2253)
  • Sidestory
    • Waiting For Day

    "King, Grace, it will be a few more minutes. We're backed up today."

    Her grandfather had been a very minor official in the worst major government of the 21st century. When he saw moochers crowding the benches of his town, he did not present them with a jobs program in which they would work off their debt to society, instead he opened the homes of the fleeing rich to the riff-raff.

    When the town's last clinic shut down, in those early days of revolt, when he was still a young man, he acted to help how he could. At every stage, he rejected the right of individuals to starve, the dignity that existed in labor, the kindness of the leash around the throat of the people.

    He was a villain, albeit a minor one. Nobody would curse his name in the mandatory classes they had. In what was the Columbua, the actions of every single one of the most famous leaders of the Democratic Federation was held up to a process that some cynics called the 'five minute hate.' Old texts and documents from a breakup in the twenties were called up to prove that Representative Mendez was problematic, an abuser who had just gone on to abuse a larger audience.

    It didn't work, not entirely. These arch-villains, these villains, were some of the most popular parts of the history lessons, back on Sol, back in the old world. Nobody would say it, but probably a third of the entire class where she'd learned this and more loved their villains more than their heroes, especially since the brush had been painted broad. Abraham Lincoln's statements about Unions were clear signs of where America was going to go: to hell. Wilson--a bigot and someone who allied with Unions in a limited sense, a coincidence? I think not!--FDR, Johnson (a sexual harasser and a unionist, of course not a coincidence), on and on.

    Everyone who had a personality was evil, everyone who they didn't talk about the personal lives of, that they valorized in the dullest terms, was good.

    But Grace had not learned to love her grandfather because of that. It was because she was from a long line of villains. Her father had been taken up one black summer, an old man helping another revolt.

    Then there'd just been her. One day she'd fled to the frontier. Why? She had felt so sure that her destiny lay that way, but she knows that the memory of the old is fickle.

    She wants to believe that she came because she decided that Sol could never be free unless the frontier was freed first. She did take part in some subversive groups over the years, even into her old age.

    But every group she was part of was taken aback by the revolution when it came. It struck them like a bolt from the black. It hadn't happened how they'd expected, and it hadn't gone the way they wanted.

    There were a thousand things that the old revolutionaries she was part of complained about. The monetary system was not immediately abolished, the endless overlap of jurisdictions empowered a few bold criminals, and sometimes made it hard for someone to thrive if they fell between the councils and groups. Moreover, some reforms were ill-suited: drug use increased, and indeed so did drug addiction, though Grace was sure that most of that was just people admitting it.

    Most of it.

    There was a slight rise in addiction in the first year or two, though that had slipped back down to normal, a brief bit of exuberance before the people not inclined to drugs in the first place had done their now-licit experimentation and decided to do other things with their lives.

    And then there were the promises unfulfilled.

    As she waited in line, she thought about those. The Basic Living Guarantee could and should have been expanded already, and some of her colleagues, all old themselves, talked about the Immortality Guarantee.

    Grace, though. She walked through the crowds of people bickering, through the slight and temporary shortages, with a grim smile on her face.

    She waited through the long lines for drugs designed to extend her already plenty long, by the standards of even two centuries ago, life.

    Because her grandfather, the villain, had written a book. It was a book of fiction and non-fiction, and it was a book of the Democratic Confederation that had passed.

    But it was neither the ideal nor the nightmare. Shortages filled a fictional story of a farmer trying to figure out how to humanely raise cattle without nearly as many farmhands, and political wrangling kept on cropping up, time and again, piece by piece. Stories, non-fiction stories, of those moments when it had looked like all of Sol would rise up with them.

    Then they hadn't.

    No revolution was perfect, or even always okay, where it was if it stayed alone, if it failed to spread like wildfire. But a revolution could be beautiful, even when flawed.

    The old timers like her, the people almost to a hundred, or beyond it, they didn't know the Democratic Federation. They dreamed that what they saw now was the bright light of day, the beginning of the golden age of a new government, a new way of being.

    She read the stories--and edited them, prepared at last to release them and share them to the world--and she knew there were different kinds of immortality.

    Her grandfather had written them so that "someone would understand it, just a little bit, what it was like to be in those days, and to do what I did, and feel what I felt, and know what I know. It is not immortality, but nothing truly is. But it is something."

    Generation on generation, it had been passed down.

    Passed in the dark, passed in the long nights that were without ending.

    What was happening in Radiant wasn't the bright light of day, but the first rays of dawn peeking.

    Before she judged, before she doubted, Grace King would wait for the day.

    "King, Grace, the nurses will see you."
     
  • Sidestory
    • The revolution isn't perfect. We know that.

    But we're actually trying to do the right thing. That's gotta count for something. And you know? We're succeeding, at least a little.
     
    We are intending on making the Immortality Guarantee our next major must-finish project right? Just asking because we did choose an option that had Showcase Us in it, and that was noted to be a MASSIVE boost.

    Which likely means we'll want the Cernunnos Enterprise Grade unlocked very soon. Not sure if we'll want it before Omoikane Consumer Grade to completely crack all the base level patterns, or immediately afterwards though...
     
    Pyro Hawk said:
    Which likely means we'll want the Cernunnos Enterprise Grade unlocked very soon. Not sure if we'll want it before Omoikane Consumer Grade to completely crack all the base level patterns, or immediately afterwards though...
    Click to expand...
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    If we're getting into a propaganda war, advanced HI is the obvious next priority. The other ones would be nice, but their propaganda value is more of a side effect.
     
    Deep In The Dark Web (Late 2253)
  • Sidestory
    • Deep In The Dark Web

    Jeremy sagged back into his worn chair. He was still adjusting to the new reality of his 'work' life - where the eighteen hour shift he'd just gotten off of wasn't just common, but starting to become the norm. His 'freelance' gig work as a low-level software tester was the only work he could find that paid well enough to keep him off the streets, ever since his old job as a programmer got scuppered when the emotional futures market went belly-up.

    Isn't that just a laugh? Some rich assholes decided that people were getting too happy, and now that meant he had to work twice as long to keep himself from starving.

    He breathes out. There wasn't any point in working himself up again. Instead, he spins up his aging computer. After nearly getting blacklisted from the programming industry for his... opinions, he'd learned that speaking those ideas out loud wasn't a very good idea. So he did what anyone else in his position would - go to the darkweb and bitch his pissy little heart out.

    A few layers of encryption later and he brings up his usual haunt - an old IRC chatroom, frequented by ever-so-maligned criminals like IP thieves, corporate spies, and, of course, the dreaded scourge anarchist.

    i_the_only_black_hole: sup nerds
    mods_are_a_spook: lol took you long enough
    ActualCatboyMaxStirner: yeah we need you to look at something
    ActualCatboyMaxStirner: and tell these other losers about how Cool And Smart i am
    i_the_only_black_hole: what is it?
    mods_are_a_spook: see for yourself

    A notification pops up - an encrypted channel, with a preview for a data dump. An eyebrow raises in realspace - it was a pretty big one, and just from the name...

    He runs a few quick scans on the file. No malware - or at least none that he couldn't easily quarantine, if he needed to. He downloads the file into a secure sector on an old hard drive and starts opening it up.

    A big dump of server data starts to file across his screen. Working in software development taught him that the first thing the Charters cut when trying to reduce costs was IT and the relevant security, so he's not surprised that his bolder compatriots were able to scrape things like this off of a the public-facing end of a server if they knew what to look for.

    A second eyebrow joins the first as he starts sifting through the data and a clear pattern starts to emerge. Records of purchases of high-grade fuel - the kind that big ships use, all at once. The timestamps on the purchases can only mean one thing...

    i_the_only_black_hole: looks like it's heading spinward
    ActualCatboyMaxStirner: right? i fucking told you losers
    mods_are_a_spook: that doesn't mean shit, HI and Ares move shit through the Spinward all the time, they fucking own the place
    i_the_only_black_hole: is there something i'm missing here?
    ActualCatboyMaxStirner: i was just telling our illustrious comrades that we may finally have proof that HI and Ares might have Done Another Oopsie and started a frontier war
    ActualCatboyMaxStirner: again
    ActualCatboyMaxStirner: i mean think about it - parliament calls that big closed session the other week, then all of a sudden half of the corpo fleet in the frontier is heading spinward
    ActualCatboyMaxStirner: they probably got into some big dick-waving competiton about, iunno, mineral rights to some backwater system and now they're going to settle up in the only language their kind understands

    It makes sense, Jeremy concedes. The Charters do this kind of thing all the time, even if the Compact's media doesn't like talking about it much. He wonders what they're killing each other over this time-

    -that's when he sees it, and something clicks. An article in the Atlantis Interstellar Courier Dispatch, talking about the rumored protests in the Spinward. The usual smooth-brained pablum about how the workers there had legitimate greviances but assaults on property were equivalent to getting beaten and gassed and blah blah blah blah. And yet...

    i_the_only_black_hole: hey so, remember all those protests?
    ActualCatboyMaxStirner: you're gonna have to be more specific
    mods_are_a_spook: he means the ones happening spinward, Cool And Smart One
    mods_are_a_spook: what, you think these fleets are flying in to put down some protests? seems kinda... overkill
    ActualCatboyMaxStirner: yeah, corpos like doing shit for cheap and you don't need this to put down a black summer

    Again, he has to concede the point. If it were at all possible to quell the Spinward protests with a lesser force, the Charters would use that, if only because the wouldn't want to pay for the fuel costs. But... if there were protests big enough going on to filter all the way down into his shit-ass apartment in Sol, why would the Charters fight so hard over it in the first place?

    A pit of unease settles into his stomach. He takes another look at the dumps, and this time starts to look at the specific locations that the HI and Ares purchases take place in, and when. More than once, they line up - an HI and an Ares asset in the same place, at the same time. If they really were at war, wouldn't they be avoiding each other while they were rallying?

    Another steadying breath.

    No, he does not feel like dealing with this shit today. Not when he has another fucking shift in seven hours.

    Jeremy Blake closes his laptop, and he pulls himself into his bed. He'd heard the stories, of course - how could he not, growing up in the bones of an old DemFed city? Of Compact 'peacekeepers' shooting protesters and rioters when they get too uppity. Of the sound of orbital shells tearing city blocks apart.

    Of a brief glimmer of a dream, snuffed out by the heavy hand of capital.

    He closes his eyes, and for a moment, he lets himself pretend that he lives in a world that is just and fair and wouldn't let that hope be snatched away from him.

    And then he dreams.
     
  • Sidestory
    • Godwinson said:
    How is this supposed to be enforced?

    Also, how many Charter-creatures is this treaty allowing to go wandering around gathering intel on us?
    Click to expand...
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    A joint custom team will be allowed to inspect all ships and persons going either way provided there's not "unduly long delays" on traffic. What that means in specific circumstances is a legal nightmare maze of interpretation from Compact judges, but generally, no impounding ships and just leaving them in limbo.

    And the answer is: as many as your customs teams can't find any suspicious data storage or physical gear on that can get on a civilian transport without getting crowded out by genuine civilians or defectors! Good luck deciding who's who.

    You can't win 'em all.
     
    Alright folks, we're officially 110% fucked if this treaty goes into effect -- they're going to immediately and completely realize that our entire economy is based on piracy, and that we're not actually affected by their economic attacks.

    This treaty isn't even going to be worth the paper it's printed on the moment that report gets back up the chain. What a worthless waste of time.

    [X] Reject the treaty
     
    Last edited:
    Torgamous said:
    If we're getting into a propaganda war, advanced HI is the obvious next priority. The other ones would be nice, but their propaganda value is more of a side effect.
    Click to expand...
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    That's not why I said we'd want Cernunnos Enterprise Grade. It's because we know that one of the biggest propaganda wins we can do is to roll out Immortality Guarantee. And we wanted to do it before choosing that plan. The only thing holding us back is the cost of the action. But one of the things that Cernunnos Enterprise Grade is believed to unlock is more advanced biotech options. Which is believed to contain a lot of discounts to actions such as the Immortality Guarantee. Particularly their upkeep cost.

    So if we're wanting to complete that option whilst also improving our naval fleet and other costly options, it would be very good to take. That said, HI Enterprise Grade is one of our top priorities as well. So it all comes down to what people want, and what they're prepared to pay.
     
    Nyvis said:
    It has explicitly been described by the QM as one of the few things that would, actually. Since the beginning of the quest.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Yes, but the other thing was releasing the FRM Hacks. So if we're going to release the FRM hacks, which already locks the Compact Hate Meter to the top...
    However, obviously we should only do it if we've already set of the Compact. We shouldn't do it for no reason.

    Forces Stationed in Bestreer: -None
    Click to expand...
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    AKuz said:
    Forces Stationed in Xotreh: Local Security Forces:
    -Deep Space Security Solutions (Omoikane Subsidiary) Customs shuttle squadron based out of Xotreh B-4a's orbital station
    -Three companies of Standard Planetary Security Company (Ares subsidiary) troops based out of Xotreh B-4a's habitat complexes for internal security and law enforcement
    Click to expand...
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    Related: Nothing that can stop us from destroying these gates. For the moment. I note that Xotreh isn't included in the list of gates we can't send military craft through.

    AKuz said:
    -We did manage to secure a right of petition for Radiant representatives to travel to Sol to petition the Compact for redress. Naturally this trip is to be made under the utmost secrecy to prevent 'undue panic', but when the news does drop we need to have a diplomatic team in the First Colonies rather than months away. Even if such a team would be in great danger.
    Click to expand...
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    AKuz said:
    1. Regarding the end of hostilities between the All Radiant Congress and The Hermes-Ishtar Company (And subsidiaries) and Ares Combat Solutions (And subsidiaries) for a period of at least 39 Months and a framework for continuing negotiations for a final settlement before then
    2. All parties agree to respond to emergency distress calls and search and rescue operations regardless of affiliation.
    Click to expand...
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    3. The All Radiant Congress agrees to honor existing System and Planetary debts.
    4. The All Radiant Congress agrees to making reparations for seized private property.
    5. Payment scheduling
    5a) Solarian Central Bank Financing
    5b) StarBank debt repackaging and financialization
    Click to expand...
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    Hmm. How much does this amount to? We don't need their money but if they demand it in raw materials it could bite us.

    Model DC.14F said:
    Treaty proposal look pretty good. While I can see several ways they can try to screw us over, it appears their primary goal was to pull a Haiti Independence debt, which is ineffectual against a post-scarcity power, and that most of the remaining methods will be espionage and PR, which won't matter if the ceasefire holds. The only thing that annoys me is the merchandising rights, wonder if we can loophole that later with a name change or reorganization of our navy.
    Click to expand...
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    It's important to remember that fabricators are only half magic, and while they work ridiculously fast, they still need raw materials. If they decide that that our debts are best paid by, say, 30 BR per quarter, then that could be a problem.

    6. Agreement to jointly form the "Radiant Broadcasting Channel."
    6a) Terms of profit sharing, merchandising and broadcast syndication
    6b) Terms of IP control and content ratios

    7. Prisoner exchange agreements
    7a) Agreement to exchange Gaid kidnappees for POWs
    7b) Agreement in principle for a process to repatriate Tartarus archipelago prisoners
    Click to expand...
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    All pretty good. Don't need the profit sharing as much as it stings that our media will be enriching HI. How much can they control what gets shown? They could also possibly slap a ridiculously large cost on the programs to prevent them from being seen.
    Prisoner exchange is good if not of great material importance.

    Torgamous said:
    looks like they've decided that us keeping some people in Tartarus serves their purposes. I'm thinking keeping Yang and whoever else they decide to scapegoat in Tartarus is part of their Bad Apple narrative.
    Click to expand...
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    Perhaps they've already set the narrative that Yang et al were horribly killed and having them reappear would be inconvenient. Or just think it... makes us look bad?

    8. Agreement to allow transit of ARC nominated Ambassadorial team to Sol
    8a) Agreement to push for Ambassadorial team to appear before the Compact Parliament
    8b) Non Disclosure Agreement
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...

    AKuz said:
    -We did manage to secure a right of petition for Radiant representatives to travel to Sol to petition the Compact for redress. Naturally this trip is to be made under the utmost secrecy to prevent 'undue panic', but when the news does drop we need to have a diplomatic team in the First Colonies rather than months away. Even if such a team would be in great danger.
    Click to expand...
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    This is good! Not so much for negotiation purposes but for intelligence, to have some finger on what's going on in the Compact. (in character, I don't think we know about that one conversation, for instance). However, they aren't kidding about the danger. Whoever volunteers for this, especially if we go ahead with the broadcast plan, there's a very good chance they aren't coming home.

    9. Agreement in principle for third party observer and journalist access to ARC space
    9a) Negotiation schedules
    1. Understanding that ANY military craft transiting the Gaid-Thoa gate or Bestreer-Radiant gate for ANY reason will violate ceasefire.
    2. Agreement to allow inspection of civilian ships during transit while respecting Compact rights of free movement.
    11a) Provisions on prohibited materials, intellectual property, and data
    11b) Formation of customs teams to exchange contraband and detain violators
    11c) Fine structure for violations
    1. Agreement to license Likeness and Merchandising rights for the All-Radiant Congressional Navy to Ares Combat Solutions.
    2. Formation of arbitration and discussion teams and protocols to resolve issues not otherwise addressed in this document or conflicts of interpretation.
    3. Any party reserves rights to withdraw from all provisions given one years' notice to other parties. A withdrawal from any provision is to be understood as a withdrawal from all provisions, not an amendment to these terms.
    Click to expand...
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    So, do we get free movement into the outside world? That'd be useful.
    I imagine they want to fortify Bestreer, possibly use it as a staging ground for their next attack, in the belief we might not have fortified it. As mentioned, they didn't forbid crossing the Radiant-Xotreh gate, so we could still get ships past if we wanted.
    They also could do that. We should fortify it and use Normal Ceasefire Reasons to keep them out? Could we do that? Or does this mean that actually, the charters can just park a fleet over Radiant and we can't stop them without violating the terms? My answer depends heavily on that.

    Rockeye said:
    Can we end the VEMP measure now guys?
    Click to expand...
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    Yeah, sounds good. Not immediately needed and won't be enough to stop the DOOMSWARM, if it comes.

    bookwyrm said:
    The real bigbrained realpolitik shit would be to take Ares aside and offer them something that they'll genuinely really like in exchange for better terms on like partial demilitarization of Gaid or at least observers across the gate, so that we could hope to play Ares and Hermes-Ishtar against each other and keep HI from locking themselves down as sole gatekeepers. But that's probably a little too Kissinger to actually work out in practice, so it's probably best to settle for this as the start.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...

    TheArcanist said:
    ActualCatboyMaxStirner: i was just telling our illustrious comrades that we may finally have proof that HI and Ares might have Done Another Oopsie and started a frontier war
    Click to expand...
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    Hmm. I suppose there's an outside solution where we somehow poke Ares into actually starting a frontier war with HI and keep them distracted fighting over who gets to reconquer us while we boom as hard and as fast as possible.

    The Laurent said:
    But yeah, as far as it goes, I don't think the ceasefire matters that much. When they're ready to kill us, they'll declare withdrawal within a year, start gathering their forces, and blame us for breaking the agreement.
    Click to expand...
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    I mean, the withdrawal clause doesn't actually compel them. They could probably violate it if they really wanted.
    I suspect HI might have given up Radiant as too expensive to conquer and are planning to try and economically annex us, while Ares silly buggers is mostly for HI's benefit, and planning on possibly invading if they can get Hermes-Ishtar out of the way. Or they're arguing with HI over all that.

    The Laurent said:
    I think what's happened is that they haven't formally lost Osliam, so they can still pretend that those revenues are still on the books, and the same with the end of that chain. That also means that Cern is actually doing better than they 'should' be doing, too.
    Click to expand...
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    If true, this is invaluable intelligence: It means Osliam, a mere four sparsely populated systems, matters to them. That's good news. Especially for your plan, as it suggest that A: We're a bigger force than I thought, and B: A sporadic cluster of worlds rebelling would be a bigger problem.

    Pyro Hawk said:
    We are intending on making the Immortality Guarantee our next major must-finish project right? Just asking because we did choose an option that had Showcase Us in it, and that was noted to be a MASSIVE boost.
    Click to expand...
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    However, I'm still not entirely convinced. Immortality Guarantee is a broader application of known principles, not new research, and... well, Doomswarm. May not be the wisest investment if we don't have a future.

    Let's put all that discussion aside for now, however. I want this treaty but with Radiant-Xotreh added to the gates that will violate ceasefire if crossed. That said, even if I can't get it, I'll accept this. We'll just have to violate it if they try to send a significant force through.
    [X] Accept treaty
     
    Last edited:
    Honestly, this treaty was always going to be a trashfire, and getting a free propaganda outlet is more than we could reasonably hopefor.
     
    Godwinson said:
    Alright folks, we're officially 110% fucked if this treaty goes into effect -- they're going to immediately and completely realize that our entire economy is based on piracy, and that we're not actually affected by their economic attacks.

    This treaty isn't even going to be worth the paper it's printed on the moment that report gets back up the chain. What a worthless waste of time.
    Click to expand...
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    They have footage from inside our shops and salespoints. We saw that in the April 2254 update.

    So, they already know about the BLG.
     
    BaseDeltaZero said:
    Yes, but the other thing was releasing the FRM Hacks. So if we're going to release the FRM hacks, which already locks the Compact Hate Meter to the top...
    However, obviously we should only do it if we've already set of the Compact. We shouldn't do it for no reason.
    Click to expand...
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    I'm not convinced it angers the same parts of the compact though. The gates is likely to enrage the navy, while the hacks is mostly going to piss off the corps. They also have very different PR aspects.
     
    BaseDeltaZero said:
    Yes, but the other thing was releasing the FRM Hacks. So if we're going to release the FRM hacks, which already locks the Compact Hate Meter to the top...
    However, obviously we should only do it if we've already set of the Compact. We shouldn't do it for no reason.
    Click to expand...
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    There is a vast gulf between pissing off capital while helping the proletariat and pissing away all our credibility with literally everyone.
     
    Nyvis said:
    I'm not convinced it angers the same parts of the compact though. The gates is likely to enrage the navy, while the hacks is mostly going to piss off the corps. They also have very different PR aspects.
    Click to expand...
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    This is a possibility. It may be easier to force the Navy into a surrender if we don't, but I don't think that, ultimately, the Navy will be surrendering to the ARC anyways.

    spiritualatheist said:
    There is a vast gulf between pissing off capital while helping the proletariat and pissing away all our credibility with literally everyone.
    Click to expand...
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    I'm... very unconvinced it'd do that, especially if we took out a Compact fleet with it. It's a clearly necessary defensive action, and I think getting glassed from orbit will also affect our credibility, especially when the fleet turns around and does that to a dozen more worlds.
     
    BaseDeltaZero said:
    I'm... very unconvinced it'd do that, especially if we took out a Compact fleet with it. It's a clearly necessary defensive action, and I think getting glassed from orbit will also affect our credibility, especially when the fleet turns around and does that to a dozen more worlds.
    Click to expand...
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    Let's go back to the emergency measures from before.

    AKuz said:
    "With that said, I cannot stress enough my opposition to this plan. This is a violation of the conventions of the void. No Spacer that considers themselves moral would continence such a move, any more than we would condone ignoring distress calls or firing on rescue vessels. This infrastructure is vital for the links that keep us alive in deep space, and civilian shipping relies upon it. A runaway cycle of reprisals would doom us all.
    Click to expand...
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    The mere suggestion of sabotaging a fuel depot would be a massive outrage among our own spacers.

    Meanwhile, what you're proposing is many, many times more severe. If sabotaging a fuel depot is blowing up a bridge, then destroying a gate is nuking the river and the entire surrounding countryside into a radioactive wasteland.
    After all, you're talking about destroying multiple solar systems, with possibly unknown consequences for anyone and anything nearby.
    Given previous sensibilities, I suspect that a mere serious proposal of this option would prompt an immediate military coup.
     
    10ebbor10 said:
    Let's go back to the emergency measures from before.



    The mere suggestion of sabotaging a fuel depot would be a massive outrage among our own spacers.

    Meanwhile, what you're proposing is many, many times more severe. If sabotaging a fuel depot is blowing up a bridge, then destroying a gate is nuking the river and the entire surrounding countryside into a radioactive wasteland.
    Given previous sensibilities, I suspect that a mere serious proposal of this option would prompt an immediate military coup.
    Click to expand...
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    Point. I don't think a runaway cycle of reprisals is particularly likely, though. It's also not exactly covert, especially if we don't go with the 'try to take out a compact fleet with it' option.


    What about blocking a gate? Tow an asteroid directly in front of it? I suspect that might destroy it anyways, though.

    If we can figure out the physical location of Earth, potentially establish some RKVs in a nearby system? Warp drives partially counter that threat, but... it's something, at least?

    Or really go all in on the Mothership project/actually do a Grey Goo?

    Move the population of Radiant further out into the frontier? Battlestar Galactica?

    I'm just spitballing on ways to actually survive the extermination fleet that arrives once we broadcast the FRM.
     
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    How many godsdamned times do we need to go over this: the Compact is basically first among equals with the charters. They can take on one, maybe two charters at once in a straight up fight but not more. They are not invincible nor are they without number.
    Can we stop the persistent doomerism and focus on my productive things?

    We definetly need to keep researching MSI for instance to get ship production automation, I will absolutely not budge on this point. End VEMP and use our focus die for Cernuos if the Immortality Guarantee is important, but do not stop the MSI research. Especially because there's good odds that finishing MSI unlocks Macron Accelerator research.
     
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    I would like to point out that if we agreeing to the ceasefire treaty, we are doing so with the full intent to break it. The Compact elections are coming in 5 turns and the ceasefire will last much longer than that. If we want to prevent the Charters from turning both the public opinion and the Compact against us we will have to transmit the GOC broadcast before the elections (I believe that this is the current plan). Since the the broadcast includes Charter IP due to FRM warez being chosen, it is a blatant and very public violation of the ceasefire treaty. Revolutionary instructions propably won't help either, but I am not sure if it actually violates the treaty.

    Breaking the ceasefire will make it much easier for the Charters to portay us as dangerous radicals who cannot be negotiated with (mostly because it would be perfectly true) and it gives them the excuse they need to continue the hostilities without a public backlash that might harm their profit margins. It would also diminish the value of our propaganda broadcast.

    As it is, I don't believe that a short term ceasefire is worth the long term PR loss, that will result from publicly violating the treaty.

    [X] Reject the treaty
     
    My only thing is that the ability to broadcast our shows and also talk to the Compact gives us basically our only way to really be able to access the rest of the galaxy.

    I don't know if we'll get anything that works better for us.
     
    CyberEnby said:
    How many godsdamned times do we need to go over this: the Compact is basically first among equals with the charters. They can take on one, maybe two charters at once in a straight up fight but not more. They are not invincible nor are they without number.
    Can we stop the persistent doomerism and focus on my productive things?
    Click to expand...
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    How many Charters do you think we can take in an straight up fight?
    Because I strongly suspect it's zero. We're currently an annoyance that's not worth cleaning up. I don't think we'd last long if Hermes-Ishtar decided to devote all their resources - or even a significant fraction - of their resources to destroying us.

    That's... kind of my big sticking point of disagreement. It's not that I'm philosophically opposed to the FRM Plan. It's that I have disagreements with that bloc on the following factors:
    A: That releasing the FRM would prompt an immediate, large scale, and dedicated retaliation.
    B: We have only seen a small fraction of the Charter's power, and the Compact is stronger than any individual charter.
    C: That the FRM release would not immediately destabilize the Compact so thoroughly they could not retaliate in force.

    A & B Indicate that releasing the FRM will result in overwhelming force kicking down our door.
    A & C indicates that the Compact would devote forces to attacking us even if suffering major political instability.
    B & C indicate that many worlds must rebel in order to significantly hinder Compact/Charter forces.
    All three indicate that the Compact will destroy us even if it's the last thing they do, which is... an acceptable outcome, at least from my quest-player's perspective, but it'd be nice if we had a way to avoid it. Especially since they might not actually fall. They've survived Black Summers before. They've survived revolts before. One advantage of an economy run on illusions is that it doesn't matter so much if it crashes.

    Gaining more solid intelligence on this is good. If any one of these factors is not correct, then yeah, the FRM plan is good, but without knowing that, it's a big risk, throwing everything into a single hail-Mary.

    For full disclosure, my plan also relies on several factors, namely:
    A: The Charters do not consider us a unique priority compared to their true passion, fighting other Charters.
    B: The Charters do not consider us an existential threat, and will employ the cheapest force possible.
    C: That we can improve our technology and economy relatively faster than the Charters.
    D: That there are sufficient untapped planets in the Frontier to support continued expansion.

    I think these factors are reasonably well supported, though D is probably the sketchiest.

    Joppe said:
    Breaking the ceasefire will make it much easier for the Charters to portay us as dangerous radicals who cannot be negotiated with (mostly because it would be perfectly true) and it gives them the excuse they need to continue the hostilities without a public backlash that might harm their profit margins. It would also diminish the value of our propaganda broadcast.
    Click to expand...
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    Again, not 100% certain that the people we're propagandizing to will care about that part of the treaty, in that, remarkably enough, the FRM warez broadcast is targeted towards people who think FRM is illegitimate. We also don't have to broadcast yet. We can wait until the ceasefire is over and do normal propaganda for the election.
     
    I don't think we should worry about not being able to do FRM without breaking the treaty. The Charters and the Compact will certainly break the treaty as soon as its convenient to them to do so. The thing we need to do is two fold 1: gain sufficient political intelligence that we can understand when that will be, and 2: gain sufficient hold outside our own sphere that when they break it, or give us a good excuse to break it, we can act in a way that effectively lets us survive and create largescale revolution in the colonies.
     
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