Random Interstellar Empires/Star Kingdoms

[taalismn]

I have been working on this for a little while and thought I would share it. Be nice.
----

Principality of Ironholm

Qwlcome aboard!
And this is a nice start to building your online galactic empire(s)

[SolCannibal]

Just noticed something - has Rebliss as a member state of the United Systems Alliance ever been described? I feel like it seems to be missing an entry of its own.

[taalismn]

Just noticed something - has Rebliss as a member state of the United Systems Alliance ever been described? I feel like it seems to be missing an entry of its own.

The Rebliss as a SPECIES has been described)and posted in the Fan Races thread), but I haven't yet done up their solar system in detail yet.
They were an ex-Golgan territory until they used passive resistance to sit out the Golgans, and then went fun make up for lost time as a shipbuilder system.

(adds stating out Rebliss home system to 'To Do' box pile)

[SolCannibal]

Just noticed something - has Rebliss as a member state of the United Systems Alliance ever been described? I feel like it seems to be missing an entry of its own.

The Rebliss as a SPECIES has been described)and posted in the Fan Races thread), but I haven't yet done up their solar system in detail yet.
They were an ex-Golgan territory until they used passive resistance to sit out the Golgans, and then went fun make up for lost time as a shipbuilder system.

(adds stating out Rebliss home system to 'To Do' box pile)

Yes, i did come across their entry in the "Fan Races thread", but that along with entries on vehicles produced in their shipbuilding facilities and their importance to the infrastructure of the United Systems Alliance led me to ask more on the subject.

(As an aside, they have been quite lucky that the Golgans didn't consider pulling a "Zyganian Payback" on Rebliss too...so far)


Also, one of the reasons i remembered the world of Rebliss was a citation in the Gonotrist Indusservo entry, from the Corporations of the Three Galaxies thread, that references how the corporation, specialized in building large ‘walker platform’-style robot vehicles for industrial and security applications, settled on the Rebliss homeworld in the United Systems Alliance, having fled Taganese/Golgan space after splintering of Tangainacorp, a Golgan-satrapy heavy industrial conglomerate created by the forced merging of several Taganese military firms to produce equipment for the Republikan Guard - and that collapsed after the Republik began buying higher-end equipment from Naruni Enterprises.

How have been Tangaina and the Taganese satrapy/state since, no more info, afaik.

[taalismn]

Oh, I'm punching ahead on the Rebliss home system and some descriptions of their extrasolar colonies.
Thanks for bringing up the Tanganese...I have to finish their walker, and provide some description of Tangaira(even if I just wind up adapting an Aliens Unlimited or PFRPG species to cover them).

(*sigh*, some of us don't get to rest on the seventh day.....)

Probably the reason why the Goldans haven't attacked the Rebliss are because currently the Rebliss are surrounded by allied neighbors, they didn't provoke the Golgans like the Zyganians, ...and the Rebliss threw up heavy defenses around their worlds damn fast.....The Tangairan angle also suggests that the Rebliss may have offered refuge to a good amount of engineering talent feeing the Golgans(like Great Britain did for Poland in WW2). Eventually the Golgans might have gotten around to raiding Rebliss space if only because of their USA connection(and the correct assumption that they're helping the Zyganians rebuild their forces), but by the time the Republik thinks of that, the Argosy's fleet strength will have been so overstretched, they'll lack the numbers to make a proper go of it.

[SolCannibal]

Oh, I'm punching ahead on the Rebliss home system and some descriptions of their extrasolar colonies.
Thanks for bringing up the Tanganese...I have to finish their walker, and provide some description of Tangaira(even if I just wind up adapting an Aliens Unlimited or PFRPG species to cover them).

(*sigh*, some of us don't get to rest on the seventh day.....)

As long as it helps with getting the creative juices flowing, it's all fine. Or just go weird and connect an AU species with a PF one.
(Must also admit ‘walker platform’-style robot vehicle bit got me thinking of Battletech and some funny ideas involving the Gun Brothers brewing)

Probably the reason why the Goldans haven't attacked the Rebliss are because currently the Rebliss are surrounded by allied neighbors, they didn't provoke the Golgans like the Zyganians, ...and the Rebliss threw up heavy defenses around their worlds damn fast.....The Tangairan angle also suggests that the Rebliss may have offered refuge to a good amount of engineering talent feeing the Golgans(like Great Britain did for Poland in WW2). Eventually the Golgans might have gotten around to raiding Rebliss space if only because of their USA connection (and the correct assumption that they're helping the Zyganians rebuild their forces), but by the time the Republik thinks of that, the Argosy's fleet strength will have been so overstretched, they'll lack the numbers to make a proper go of it.

Fairly good points and it makes quite a lot of sense that the Golgans would be much slower to notice the Rebliss shenanigans - and growing ties with the USA - in light of the noise the Zyganians keep throwing, not to mention Binjo's own rush to prepare things for the (foiled) Altess invasion creating a degree of institutional blindness and inertia.

[taalismn]

[
Fairly good points and it makes quite a lot of sense that the Golgans would be much slower to notice the Rebliss shenanigans - and growing ties with the USA - in light of the noise the Zyganians keep throwing, not Binjo's own rush to prepare things for the (foiled) Altess invasion creating a degree of institutional blindness and inertia.

Especially with the growing dependence on the Tachyonic Antitelephone. Which might be screwed up if it's not communicating back in LOCAL time, but across DIMENSIONAL time.
Which might come to a head when Binjo realizes that the future Golgans seem to be describing a different time line lacking such (fan-inserted) factors as the USA, and thus the info is increasingly irrelevant to the actual unfolding strategic situation.

[SolCannibal]

[
Fairly good points and it makes quite a lot of sense that the Golgans would be much slower to notice the Rebliss shenanigans - and growing ties with the USA - in light of the noise the Zyganians keep throwing, not Binjo's own rush to prepare things for the (foiled) Altess invasion creating a degree of institutional blindness and inertia.

Especially with the growing dependence on the Tachyonic Antitelephone. Which might be screwed up if it's not communicating back in LOCAL time, but across DIMENSIONAL time.
Which might come to a head when Binjo realizes that the future Golgans seem to be describing a different time line lacking such (fan-inserted) factors as the USA, and thus the info is increasingly irrelevant to the actual unfolding strategic situation.

Binjo's reliance on the Antitelephone for defining the backbone of his strategy only serves to underscore how desperate - and unprepared - he truly is to conduct the monumental task he has taken upon himself. He's pretty much drawing his nation's policy based in the equivalent of reading comments of an Youtube history video or speculative history threads in a social media channel. And his desire for a miracle, any miracle to give a republik-saving edge makes him intentionally oblivious to the fact his "grapevine" is little more than a bunch of armchair historian-strategos. Their value was limited from the get-go, even without accounting for the inevitable growing divergence of timelines, another issue he willfully ignores.

(Good thing for him that he's pretty much a dictator, so there's hardly anyone to "challenge his vision" by trying to advance alternative projects or call out just how rushed, elusive and confusing his administration might be for someone unaware of the Tachyonic Antitelephone. Anyone with ambition will probably play sycophant or try make its own nest while riding on his coattails, if not both. That said, due to ever mounting red tape, elusive and confusing might be the Golgan Republik's natural state anyway and part of the reason he can get away with what he does)

[taalismn]

Regoniss Tard-Rebla./Res’shel( USA Member)---Homeworld of the Rebliss(Anvil Galaxy)

“If you ever visit one of the Rebliss’s older and larger orbital habs, be careful; they still use rotating sections to generate centrifugal gravity and they like to set some levels up to emulate their ‘mudsoon’ climate from their homeworld. Means that if you’re standing in the wrong place at the wrong time, you could get bowled over and pulled along by a standing wave of brown water going all around the perimeter of the ring. The Rebliss love bodysurfing the ring, but not everybody’s got submergence-lungs or flipper-limbs. The Rebliss claim the water and mud also help seal holes in the hull in case of a puncture incident; it’s just also handy to double as a spaceborne swimming pool that’s a lot larger than most human setups. ”

The Golgan Republik once annexed and occupied the Rebliss home system for some fifty years, but a long-running campaign of passive resistance ultimately convinced the Golgans that trying to govern the obstinate Rebliss was a lost cause, and they withdrew. Once free of the Golgan overlords, the phlegmatic Rebliss suddenly got a global second wind and set to making up for lost time, becoming a major sector industrial power within thirty years.
The Rebliss are best known as shipwrights and builders, especially when they joined WZTechYards, and from there to being members of the United Systems Alliance. They have a friendly rivalry with the minotaurs of Kai-Shem, competing for design work and production contracts supplying the USA and its clients with ships. This rivalry is seen as a good thing, sharpening the engineering skills of both USA members, even to the point of several inter-office ‘games’ being held(though it took some negotiatig to find events that the two physically very different species could fairly compete afainst each other in).

The Rebliss worlds lucked out in being on the far edge of Golgan space expansion in the Anvil Galaxy; when the Kultural Revolution struck out in force, they largely ignored Rebliss space in favor of settling grudges with adversaries and annoyances like the Altess and the Zyganians. The perception of being a refuge attracted many refugees fleeing the Golgan expansion(or reclamation) areas, resulting in the Rebliss facing a humanitarian crisis dealing with the displaced people, but also receiving a boost in manpower and technical talent from the Golgan satrapies. The Rebliss have graciously opened up some of their colonies to refugees and embraced transplanted expatriate companies or ‘corporate branches’ into their own industrial constellations.
By the time the Golgans learned of the Rebliss membership in and importance to the United Systems Alliance(now identified as an enemy of the Republik) and rightly guessed that the Rebliss shipyards were doing their part in supplying the Golgans’ adversaries, the Argosy lacked the fleet concentrations in place to strike at Rebliss targets the same way as they did against the Zyganians. Though several raids were made, the Argosy has so far failed to have any real impact on Rebliss industry, owing in part to the build-up of USAJCforces around one of their member worlds. Golgan third party and proxy forces, such as privateers, fared marginally better, but could not halt the flow of materials to Rebliss industry nor the flow of finished products out to the USA’s forces and clients.

Besides their extraplanetary colonies in the Tard-Rebla system, the Rebliss claim 6 extrasolar colonies of note, though two of them, Mulacreg and Diauhsa, elected to remain within the Golgan Republik(though the Golgans regard their true loyalty with suspicion). As the two colonies are small(no more than 50,000 colonists), the Rebliss consider them of little consequence and are simply waiting for them to become disenchanted with the Golgans and eventually rejoin the rest of their people.

Extrasolar Colonies:
-Talor-Abess---Cold, wet, and lacking atmosphere, Talor-Abess was settled by Rebliss Belters looking for a large gravity well to act as a nursery for Belters in the Ruh’kul system (Tard-Rebla‘s nearest interstellar neighbor). It’s since become a major stopover got traffic in the sector.

-Tangar’alhen---Cold, wet, and supporting a thin atmosphere and an even thinner microbial ecology, the colonists of Tangar’alhen live in submarine domes around geothermal vents in the crust. The farming of gene-tailored algae and other cold water marine organisms is the main occupation on Tangar’alhen.

-Elga’sahn---Temperate, but covered by desert, this Mars-like world still sports the remains of a sophisticated ecosystem. As with Tangar’alhen, Elga’sahn sports geothermal vents(hot springs) that have provided the colonists with locations to establish garden domes. It’s also yielded ‘liquid gold’ with the discovery of substantial deposits of the pertroleum-like remains of ancient microbial life that can be refined into a potent healing drug. Though considered a hardscrabble world by the amphibious Rebliss, prospering on Elga’sahn is seen as a worthy challenge by the more adventurous Rebliss.

- Udrel---Temperate, wet, and possessing a modest(primitive) ecosystem, Udrel is a potential garden world. It’s also been opened up as a refugee colony to handle the surge of displaced sophonts fleeing the Golgan warzones . The Rebliss Space Navy(and later the USAJC) maintain a strong presence over Udrel.

- Mulacreg---A cold and arid, but still very ecologically active world, albeit one with large mineral resources, the Rebliss colonists decided that they could prosper independently selling their minerals to the Republik for more than Res’shellan concerns were offering. They’re still waiting for the Republik to make them a good offer ...and to pay for what was already shipped to them. That’s not likely to happen with the current Golgan official assigned to Mulacreg who’d like to secure the planet’s resources and the labor of the locals, but not at prices unfavorable to Golgan business(i.e. anywhere near the true value of materials and labor).

-Diauhsa---Hot and arid, but with an aggressive ecology. The Rebliss colonists made nice with the local Golgan garrison sent to secure them. Part of this stemmed from the protection the Golgans were offering the Rebliss from the local wildlife, and the rest was due to Diauhsa being settled by a group of dissident Rebliss discontent with the plodding Res’shellan bureaucracy permeating and dominating even the extrasolar colonies. The Diauhsans are enthused to be part of something as dynamic as the Republik. Given that Diauhsa has yet to produce anything of real value(it’s still mainly an agricultural commune), the Golgan garrison troops assigned to the planet aren’t exactly spit and polish front-line personnel and are only still there because a) they wouldn’t make any difference assigned anywhere else, b) the Golgans want to make a political statement that the Rebliss have NOT entirely driven them out, and c) the Argosy is hedging its bets that having SOME sympathetic Rebliss loyal to them might pay dividends down the road sometime. The garrison troops, knowing only a) and b), have broken discipline and frequently fraternize with the locals, leading the Diauhsans to believe the Republik truly likes and values them. The fact of the matter is, though, that all the Rebliss central government would have to do is send a warship cruising by Diauhsa and the Golgans would pull out in a hurry.

Solar System( Tard-Rebla/Heign-Res’shel)
Number of Stars: 1
Types of Stars: Orange Dwarf
Number of Planets: 9
-Gas Giant (Phtanos)---Phtanos is a ‘hot gas giant’, though it is very much diminished(effectively Miniscule) , owing to solar ablation of its atmosphere. The Rebliss, however, have launched some interesting deep atmosphere probes into the gas planet’s turbulent clouds ad even some daring ‘bathyscaphe’ manned missions.

-Terrestrial (Res’shel) ---System Lifeworld

-Gas Giant (Leblan)---Large Leblan’s energetic radiation field initially hampered efforts to exploit its atmospheric riches, but with Galactic technology providing improved shielding, the Rebliss have established a thriving atmo-scooping operation. O’thanus, the outermost moon of Leblan, has been turned into a sprawling gas refinery and storage facility.

-Terrestrial (Pandocca)---Large Pandocca’s heavy gravity and dense atmosphere are the stumbling blocks to exploiting this otherwise promising outworld. Orbital scans have shown a crust rich in minerals. A common exercise among Rebliss industrialists is figuring out the best way to get at Pandocca’s potential wealth; grav-shielded vehicles and habitats, robots, hired high-gee workers, or some new novel technology(or magic).

(Asteroid Belt)---Shepherded beween Leblan’s and Lybonew’s gravitational influences are a substantial number of asteroid bodies. These are providing material to support Tard-Rebla’s local Belter community. Notable clusters include the Loftis Cluster, De’trec Constellation, and the Panu Archipelago.

-Terrestrial (Deyhun)---Tiny, but heavy with water-ice and possessed of a dense ammonia-rich atmosphere, Deyhun also has a cryogenic extremophile ecology. Aside from occasional atmo-scoop runs through its upper atmosphere and several heavily insulated robot science stations, Deyhun is left pretty much alone, as even incidental contact with warm technology would kill the salamander-sized ‘dendrite-worms’ who are the highest form of life on the planet.

-Terrestrial (Yelfum)---Small, cold, shrouded in ice, but possessing a thin atmosphere that still allows for aerobraking, Yelfum attracted attention because of its easy accessibility. Rebliss Belters established a presence on Yelfum even during the Golgan occupation. This shows a certain daring on the part of the Rebliss as Yelfum was the site of a massive Golgan Republik base that was meant to be a sector hub. It was never completed as such, before the Republik pulled out of the Tard-Rebla system and the Rebliss moved in on Yelfum for much the same reason as the Golgans ahd been there. When the Republik withdrew, they tried to destroy the facility out of spite(or out of experience, as many abandoned ex-Golgan bases and depots provided less advanced species and ex-satrapies with bootstrap-value technology), but left the job half-done. The Rebliss simply repaired the surviving sections, then built an even BIGGER facility around it. Modern Yelfaport is a major commercial spacestation and colony for the Rebliss, with 1.1 million inhabitants.

-Gas Giant (Lybonew)---Large Lybonew sports a large set of debris rings and one sizable moon, Gharcard. Gharcard seems to have survived whatever catastrophe destroyed Lybonew’s other moons to form its rings, but apparently suffered a big impact that left the moon scarred in such a way that its ice-and-rock surface resembles a giant bloodshot eyeball. Orbital flybys of Gharcard have become a popular part of system tour itineraries, with some tour operators calling the moon the ‘Eye of Abshuk’ after a Rebliss sea goddess of myth.

-Gas Giant (Vastew)---Miniscule for a gas giant, Vastew does exhibit some unusual electromagnetic activity that causes ionic jets to emerge from the planet’s poles, creating faintly glowing ‘reverse auroras’(in that the main particle source is not the solar wind interacting with the planetary magnetic field, but particles coming from inside the planet that provide the reagent). This suggests some sort of exotic energetic process happening in Vastew’s deep core. This intrigues scientists both local and outsystem, and several studies have been made of the planet, without conclusive findings so far.

-Terrestrial (Enckatt)---Little bigger than a planetoid/planetissimal, this miniscule icy world is considered by many to be the planetary ‘boundary’ of the Tard-Rebla system. Enckatt sports a small scientific base run by a university on Res’shel.

Planet (Res’shel)
Type: Terrestrial
Diameter: 13,000 km
Gravity: 1.1 g
Temperature: Temperate, shading towards Cool. Climate tends towards extremes; hard rainy and flood seasons alternating with hot dry summers and dark cold winters. Ice caps virtually disappear during the summers and form thick and quick during the long dark winters.
Unusual/Special Features:
-Axial Tilt---Res’shel has an extreme( 61 degrees---Earth;s is 23.4 degrees) axial tilt that results in extreme tides, seasons, and day-lengths.

-Moons(8)---Besides further complicating tide tables, Res’shel’s eight moons serve as natural platforms for the Rebliss orbital industry and defense.
(This is in addition to the growing number of orbital stations, space habitats, and freefloating shipyards over Res’shel).

-Craters---Res’shel has a number of high-walled crater valleys. If there are no breaks in the walls or water hasn’t percolated in from underground, many of the lowland craters provide sheltered dry ground from the surge floods and mudsoons.

-Long Orbital Period---A Res’shellan ‘year’ is 1.7 Earth years

Atmosphere:
Breathable nitrox mixture. Given the planet’s large axial tilt and long year, weather on Res’shel can be quite extreme.
Terrain:
Varied, but dominated by large silty floodplains subjected to alternating biannual tidal floods and dry spells. Extremely high tides sweep through much of the terrain. so much of the heavy industry is located in the highlands.
Notable Mineral Concentrations:
- Zinc
- Colombite
- Scheelite
- Lead
- Graphite
- Arsenic
- Ruby
- Borax
Hydrosphere:
48% if the planet’s surface is covered at any given time in open water, marsh, or mud-flats.
Biosphere:
Verdant, with a complex and diverse ecology that’s managed to survive the Rebliss’s industrialization, thanks to careful management and conservation efforts. Large migratory schools of wild gli-flagen and crest-wanda, both prized food animals, have returned to Res’shel’s waterways, though the once wild tardigrade-like mud-burrowing colmec has been thoroughly domesticated. Since joining the USA, the Rebliss have availed themselves of their new allies to ask the Streleg of Manticus for help in bringing back several extinct or near-extinct species, such as the seal-like dulgahagen.
Civilization:
Settled(Species Homeworld)
Population:
9 billion Rebliss
Technology:
Galactic; what they didn’t develop themselves or copy off the Golgans, they bought on the open market or got in tech-exchanges with the USA.
In short order the Rebliss have built up an impressive set of orbital defenses around their world; while passive resistance may have ousted the Golgans, the Rebliss are wise enough not to trust it will work EVERY time, and have set up what are referred to as ‘sleeping mountains’ to deter future would-be aggressors.
Economy:
Industrial, especially shipbuilding
Wealth:
Rich---The Rebliss are waxing wealthy off sales of equipment and starships to their neighbors. They’ve plowed some of their new wealth into erecting defenses around their worlds.
Government:
Democracy---The Rebliss merged their nationalist factions into a larger democratic union, with elections for regional governors and for a presiding global president.
Law Level:
Lawful---The Rebliss have codified a fair and elegant system of common laws and punishments. Even the Golgans adopted kept it in place during their occupation(but of course reserved the power to override it and impose their own judgments when they saw fit).
Popularity:
What’s not to like about the Rebliss government? It’s stable, it’s responsive and responsible to the people, it drove out alien overlords without violence, and it’s cut deals that have thrust the Rebliss into a growing prosperity, so the Rebliss people are wildly supportive of their government.
Stability:
Long-Standing---Rebliss are creatures of habit and they’ve supported their current government setup for as long as anybody can remember. They see no reason to change, especially now, when things are looking very good.

Rebliss
“I’m afraid I don’t undertsand this infatuation with chasing a small ball around an open space...surely there are more efficient ways to increase hand-eye co-ordination? Nevertheless we have followed your specifications and made accommodation for this ‘squash court’ you asked for---though for the same amount of space, we could have added an additional magazine for the portside missile launchers or simply saved eighteen tons of mass...Oh, well, it’s your money...We just build to spec.”

The Rebliss are a starfaring society and species who, until fairly recently, were a vassal state of the Golgan Republik. They are a hard-working, business-like people who evolved from amphibian stock; hunter-gatherers who once lay in quiet ambush for the vast schools of frog-like iffapodeks that travelled the vast mud-shallows of the homeworld of Regoniss Tard-Rebla. The need not to spook their preferred prey taught the prot-Rebliss the importance of patience, and engrained in them an almost Zen-like calm. Another prominent factor in their evolution was a severe axial tilt to their homeworld that resulted in extreme changes fo tide and climate...from hot, wet summers to cold dry winters. Those tribes that could not migrate with the belts of warmth had to go into hiberation in the drying mud, until the warmth and water returned. Despite these long periodic annual disruptions of life, the Rebliss nevertheless have managed to slowly build an advanced technological civilization and make their way out into space.
The opinion of many races is that the Rebliss are a staid, boring, unimaginative race that lacks normal social conventions and traditions of play. Rebliss just don’t seem to devote the same time and energy to recreation as other species do. However, the Rebliss are just as concerned with the need for relaxation and recreation as anybody else; they just prefer more esoteric and mental approaches to recreation. Rebliss society is dominated by multiple belief systems and philosophies devoted to the improvement of the self through internal realization, meditation, and self mind-body attunement. Whereas a Wulfen or Human might pass time with a jog or pick-up game of catch-ball, a Rebliss would rather devote the time to meditation and mental imagery. Culture-wise, this has led to a rather drab arts scene...color palettes are designed to sooth, rather than excite, music is low-key, and mass-media lacking in much action. The few art works that do diverge from this pattern tend to be extremely intense, the result of LOOONGGG contemplation of all the factors involved.
When the more physically active Golgans annexed the Tard-Rebla home system of the Rebliss, they, too, assumed the Rebliss were slow-witted and passive for the most part, and that their occupation would be a easy one.
The Rebliss simply passively outwaited their Golgan overlords by striking and shutting down their factories in rolling ‘work-downs’, with workers going into meditative trances for hours, and even days, at a time, while still at their work stations(many even chained or otherwise fastened themselves in place). Faced with the unpleasant and economically well-nigh impossible prospect of having to take each factory and production facility by force, winkling the strikers out of their industrial warrens, and replacing them with more compliant workers, the Golgan occupation administrators finally just wrote the rebels off. Factory by factory, farm by farm, the Golgans were forced to sign off the planet until they finally couldn’t even get anyone to help them load their ships for departure or close the door behind them as they left. With a global passive resistance campaign that would have made Mahtmaha Gandhi proud, the Rebliss had regained their world without firing a shot.
Despite their mentallistic stance and strong emphasis on philosophy, the Rebliss are NOT pacifists; they recognize that there are far more beings who respond more readily to force than to words. The Rebliss have have a strong romantic streak in their culture; when they choose to act on something, they don’t do it in half-measures. In military terms, this means their soldiery are totally dedicated to the task at hand, unmindful of the pain and suffering they endure in the process, and tending towards the merciless. Their military is thus stoic and Spartan in its mindset; their equipment functional and lethal, with few of the bells and whistles that other races favor.
The Rebliss economy is primarily industrial...Since their breakaway from the Republik, the Rebliss have been doing more and more starship manufacturing with foreign sales in mind. This has required a lot of revising of Rebliss practices in shipbuilding, since most other species like a bit more room in their ships for recreation and comfortable accommodations. While initially this caused some problems, the Rebliss have gotten the hang of meeting customer specifications, and recent Rebliss designs have begun to make a good showing on the galactic markets(especially since they joined the WZ Shipyards consortium--Their Mogami-class Cruisers have made a promising breakthrough into the warship markets).
Not all the Rebliss were happy with the breakaway from the Republik; in fact two sizable offworld colonies refused to secede. Many younger Rebliss, feeling that being part of the Republik injected a welcome sense of being part of something bigger, better, and more adventurous than staid, boring, old Reblin society, have flocked to these two worlds which remain staunchly pro-Republikan. Unfortunately, the Golgans, biased by their experiences with mainstream Reblin society, regard these loyal worlds as little more than collections of Rebliss just waiting for the opportunity to slack off when the Golgans need them most, and the business that was hoped would go from the rebel homeworlds to the loyal Rebliss communities has failed to materialize. This growing economic downturn has begun to cause strain within the pro-Republikan enclaves. The mainstream Rebliss regard the loyalists as a ‘lost generation’ and have ignored them, awaiting the time the rebel Rebliss see the light and return back to the fold.
Alignments: Any
Lifespan: 80 years
Size: 4-5 ft tall, 90-120 lbs
Gender: Heterosexual
Physical Description/Appearance:
Resemble giant upright tadpoles with two bent-back legs with long-toed webbed feet, large bulbous upper torsos, short muscular arms ending in four-fingered paws, large blunt heads, large black eyes, wide mouths with small, sharp teeth, and short, rat-like tails. The back and shoulders are covered in leathery armadillo-like armor plates. Body coloration is a gray-silver, occasionally with darker streaks of gray or lighter patches along the belly.
Disposition/Attitudes:
Generally laid back and introverted. Rebliss like to do their own thing in their own time, and hate to be pushed around...They can understand the need for things to get done on time and in an orderly fashion, and can act quite quickly on matters of urgency, but otherwise they take their time. ‘Anything worth doing is worth doing RIGHT’ would be an accurate summation of Rebliss attitudes.
The downside is that when Rebliss lose it, they LOSE it, becoming extremely violent or succumbing to severe addiction(substance abuse/alcoholism/VR addiction), seeing whatever led them to the self-destructive behavior as a failure of their wills. The same introspection that gives them quiet strength ironically can turn on them, magnifying their depression; detox and therapy, as well as rolls to overcome their addiction, are DOUBLE what they should be and take twice as long to carry out, on account of the Rebliss being unable to let go of its pain.
Physical Attributes:
IQ: 3d6
ME: 4d6
MA: 3d6
PS: 2d6+3
PP: 3d6
PB: 2d6
PE: 2d6+4
SPD: 3d6 (swimming x6)
(ISP): By Psionic Class
(PPE): 3d6
Hit Points: 2d4x10+P.E. +2d6 per level of experience
SDC: 1d4x100 SDC
MDC: By Technology
Horror Factor:----
Natural Abilities:
*Hold Breath up to 20+P.E. minutes, and can survive depths up to 800 ft.
*Resistance to Cold--Cold-based attacks do HALF damage
*Fat Reserves---Rebliss can go without food or water for extended periods of time; 1 week+2 days per P.E. point
*Hibernation---Rebliss can put themselves into a protracted state of deep sleep that allows them to conserve energy and body warmth. Mucus secretions build up around the mouth, eyes, and nostrils, protecting sensitive tissues, and a waxy mucus coats the skin(like that of a lungfish), providing further insulation. They can maintain this state for as many months as they have P.E. points, during which they consume NO food or water, and use only an eighth of the normal amount of air. They can also survive being frozen in this state. Waking them prematurely from this state leaves them groggy and disoriented(no initiative, half bonuses for physical activities, and -20% to all skill skills for 2d4 hours).
*Other Bonuses: +2 to save vs Torture, Psionic Assault, Possession, and Mind Control. +2 vs Horror Factor(in addition to any other bonuses)

Psionics: Standard
Note that any Rebliss with psionic abilities actually regains ISP at DOUBLE the normal rate when in meditation, as a result of their race’s profficiency at mental introspection

Magic: The Rebliss do NOT practice magic, but they do have the potential if they could ever be convinced of its existance.
Cybernetics/Bionics: Rebliss have no objection to cybernetic/bionic augmentation, but find showy or unnecessary implantation/augmentation work to be socially distasteful
Available OCCs: Any
RCC Skills:
Meditation(+20%)
Skills of Note:
Technical skills receive a +10%
Any Philosophy Lore skills recieve a +15%
Art skills receive a +5% if the practicing Rebliss has 2d6 hours of uninterrupted meditation beforehand, +10% if that’s 2d4 DAYS of meditation, and +20% if it’s 2d4 WEEKS of preparation.
Culture:
Starfaring democracy, holding dominion over a confederation of six worlds(homeworld and five colonies).

[taalismn]

How have been Tangaina and the Taganese satrapy/state since, no more info, afaik.

Volgard(Golgan Republik)(Anvil Galaxy)---Homeworld of the Tangan

“You’ve heard of the ‘planet of hats’ syndrome where a planet seems based around one thing and one thing only? Well, when you’re a galactic empire with superior presence and superior firepower, you can force that on cultures less advanced than you. The Golgans for a time had an idea of The Big Picture, and they applied it to their client states, making many of them into mono-economies. Times change, though, and when things changed, the Golgans didn’t make an proviso for helping their subject worlds adapt to the times. Of course, by then, the Golgies didn’t really care what happened and might have even thought it was for the best that the worlds they left behind weren’t in a condition to pose a threat to the Republik’s backside in retreat.”

“Volgard’s golden age was actually during the Occupation; the Golgans gave the Tanganese global peace and access to the stars, the factories were working overtime, the trade, technical, and engineering schools were bursting at the seams with students, and galactic trade was bringing in the credits. Even though the Golgans were ultimately calling the shots, the Tangan were reaping handsome rewards...or so they thought.”

“Big steel and walking steel were the big breadwinners on Volgard, but when Naruni undercut the market for meks, the good times ended for the Tangan. Not everybody lost out of course; there’s still wealth on Volgard, but the Republik’s planned galactic economy plans essentially made the Tanganese homeworld into a one trick pony that became too expensive to feed. And that trickled down to the street level, with the cutting of the services that the Tanganese were getting during the boom times. Wasn’t long before they were selling the old mek-works for scrap just to pay to keep public utilities running.”

Volgard is a terrestrial world in the Anvil Galaxy and is the homeworld of the Tangan people, a subsept of mechanically-inclined orcs. The planet (and system) were at a sublight spacefaring stage when they were ‘invited’ to join the greater co-prosperity of the Golgan Republik, benefitting from the greater experience and learned guidance of the senior Golgans. Once Volgard was a major producer of military land vehicles for the Republikan Guard, the Golgans having found several of the native Tangan designs to be of sufficient interest to adopt them for service in the ranks of the Auxilia.

For the Tangan, annexation by the Golgan Republik was both a blessing and a curse; the arrival of the Golgans broke a centurylong cold war between the various nationalist factions of Volgard, and forced the Tangan to form a global government. The Golgans ruled the Tangan with a light hand, allowing the orcs to retain many of their practices and institutions, but steadfastly guided their development along lines beneficial to the Republik. The Golgans gave the Tangan access to Galactic technologies, allowed them limited access to star flight, and awarded very profitable contracts to Tangan industries producing products of use to the Republik, but the Golgans also gave the Tangan a planned economy, adjusting Tanganese industry to fit Golgan needs. This included streamlining the economy by globalizing some industries, forcing former rivals to cooperate under one roof producing goods to spec for Republik contracts(the consolidation of several former military defense firms, some of them from formerly opposing nations, into the monolithic Tangainacorp is a prime example of this industry restructuring). The Republik in the process made Tangan dependent on the Republik economy and offworld sales.
While Tanganese captains of industry reaped what was to them obscene profits selling material to the Republik, trouble was brewing in the form of the arrival of Naruni Enterprises. Eager to sign the Republik on as a client, the Naruni unveiled a catalogue of weaponry and associated technologies better than what the Golgans were producing for themselves, and at lower cost than what the harnessed satrapy worlds were producing for the Republik. More and more, the Republik began turning to Naruni first for their armaments.
As Naruni became more and more entrenched as the Republik’s arms supplier, entire worlds who had dedicated their industry to supplying the Golgan warmachine began feeling the pinch. Orders for new equipment became smaller and smaller, before petering out all together.
In the case of the Tangan, with the Republik no longer making large orders, the factories began falling idle. The industries couldn’t turn to local military contacts because the Tanganese governments had all been unified under the Republik, and their military-industrial complex corporations unified as well. The Tanganese couldn’t arm themselves, and they couldn’t sell to outsiders because the Republik still held control over Tanganese offworld trade. Unable to sell to the Golgans, themselves, or others, the Tanganese economy began to stagnate.
Ironically, now that the Republik is at war with Naruni Enterprises over failure to pay for armaments purchases, the Golgans need their satrapy industries even more than ever. However, in many cases the collapse of the industrial economies is too great for them to rebuild and in many cases, the talent and organization able to do so has up and left for greener pastures, unable to work effectively under the Golgan system.
Modern Volgard is an impoverished, dispirited place. Their technology has stagnated, their technical education has slumped, and their planned economy, so dependent on offworld orders, has coasted into decay. Global unemployment is at an all-time high, many of its best and brightest have left seeking work elsewhere(headhunted by other polities or interstellar corporations) or else have joined the second-tier Republikan Guard to make salary. Unrest is growing with some grassroots organizations calling for deindustrialization and economic restructuring along ‘green’ lines. There’s also growing resentment of those government and corporate officials who waxed wealthy from trading on insider information and holding on to the payoffs made to loyal supporters of the Republik. More and more often talk is heard of secession from the Republik, and government crackdowns are increasing, fearful of inviting the ire of a reinvigorated and more aggressive Republik that is feared as being less tolerant of dissent.

Though nominally still under Golgan occupation, the Republik has pretty much lost interest in Volgard. The Argosy still maintains several naval stations and the Guard a base in the system, and startravel is still regulated, but by and large the planet itself has fallen by the wayside.

Note: The Tangans as a society know they are not native to Volgard. Tanganese scientific progress may have been slow, but it’s advanced enough that they have enough comparative biology and genetics to determine that they didn’t evolve on Volgard(this was later confirmed by imported Galactic science). Their ancient legends tell that their ‘gods’ transported them from another land to Volgard for purposes unknown(vary, according to which legends one reads). This awareness may account for why so many Tanganese have left Volgard to seek their fortunes elsewhere, and why the recent ‘green’ movement comes as a surprise to many observers.
That having been said, the orc stock from which the Tangaese evolved has adapted to life on Volgard; Tanganese get a +1 to save vs airborne pathogens and tainted air.

Solar System(Sucjlan)
Number of Stars: 2
Types of Stars:
- Blue Dwarf(Sucjlan-A)(‘Noha’/’Bright’)
- Orange Dwarf(Sucjlan-B)(‘Tocla’/’Dim’)
Number of Planets: 5
-Terrestrial(Volgard)----System lifeworld

-Terrestrial(Palenz)----Despite being similar in size to Volgard, its twin planet Palenz is cold and Mars-like, dry with a thin atmosphere. A number of mining colonies have been established on Palenz, booming along with Volgard during the Golgan heyday. The colonies fared about as well as the homeworld when the economy collapsed, and several were abandoned, while several others forted up and made a go at semi-independence. The Republikan Guard maintains a large base on Palenz and the Golgan Argosy maintains a cruiser base on Hamlis, Palenz’s single moon.
The Tangan managed to reach Palenz via nuclear-pulse rocketry before Contact with the Golgans. The Tanganese never really developed a ‘Belter’ culture as such, with Palenz being so conveniently nearby; the closest they have gotten is the wildcatter colonies. With extrasolar immigration prospects being sharply curbed, many Tanganese seeking a fresh start are looking to use locally-produced transport to make a go at forming their own settlements on nearly Palenz. The Volgard government is letting them, seeing it as a possible safety valve for pent-up frustration on Volgard. It’s had mixed results so far; not all startup colonies succeed, the mortality rate’s been appalling, and those earlier and successful settlements feel pressured by demands that they do more to help the later waves of colonists.
The Republikan Guard garrison on Palenz has complained about the growing size and number of the Tangan colonies, feeling that some of them are encroaching on the large military reservations negotiated for the Golgans, but as long as Tanganese keep signing up for what amounts to one-way hitches with the Golgan military, the Republik really isn’t complaining to Volgard to curtail immigration.

-Gas Giant(Golmetz)----Tiny Golmetz is sometimes skimmed for atmospheric gases by passing ships. It was visited by Tanganese robot probes before the Golgans arrived.

-Gas Giant(Hederloy)----Jupiter-sized Hederloy sports Saturn-like rings. This was the farthest planet visited by Tanganese space probes before the Golgans arrived.

-Gas Giant(Gomllis)----Tiny Gomllis’s meager three moons are nevertheless home to another Argosy naval base.

Planet(Volgard)
Type: Terrestrial
Diameter: 11,350 km
Gravity: 0.9 g
Temperature: Temperate, within Earth-norms. Climate can vary in extremes due to differential heating by the planet’s twin stars and the amounts and types of gases released during earthquake events. ‘Greenhouse years’, ‘micro-ice ages’ , ‘monsoon springs’ and other prolonged and violent weather are not unknown, even all taking place in the course of an individual Tangan’s life span.
Unusual/Special Features:
-Energy Field---This is a weak electromagnetic field buildup that discharges concurrent with the planet’s many earthshocks. The ‘Spike’ or ‘Tingle’ isn’t enough to do more than give folks a weak static electrical ‘zip’, and most natives are so accustomed to it that it barely registers, but it can prove startling to visitors. Some sensitive electronics may be adversely affected by it, and the acutely sensitive Golgans find it uncomfortable. Special insulated garments and structures compensate for both negative aspects.
Atmosphere:
Dense terrestrial nitrox mix, with high levels of volcanic gases suspended in the air. Some visitors may find it necessary to wear filter masks and supplemental breathing gear.
Terrain:
Varied, and subject to change.
Seismically very active, with minor earth tremors being an almost daily occurrence almost everywhere on the planet. The land masses on Volgard reshape themselves much faster than other planets, though not catastrophically so. Geoelectric buildup and discharge is blamed for the unique electromagnetic ‘Spike’. Volcanic zones tend to be a bit more active than on other terrestrial worlds, as are steam fumaroles and hot springs.
Notable Mineral Concentrations:
- Mercury
- Sapphire
- Molybdenite
- Manganese
- Emerald
- Graphite
- Titanium
- Borax
Hydrosphere:
Moist: 62% of Volgard’s surface is covered in open water
Biosphere:
Dense, with a variety of psuedo-mammals descended from dinosauroid ancestors. Climate extremes, rather than meteor collisions, provided the impetus for mass extinction and pressurized evolution on Volgard.
Happily, despite widespread industrialization, Volgard still retains a dense global biosphere, thanks in part to the ‘green’ movement’s conservation efforts. However, monoculture in agriculture still threatens the ecology, and there are growing ‘dead zones’ or pollution around the industrial cities and derelict factory installations, giving the greeners ammunition for their demands that Volgard turn to more environmentally-friendly technologies and practices.
Civilization:
Settled
Population:
8.9 billion Tanganese(orcs)
Is down from 9.1 billion, owing to mass immigration.
Technology:
Stellar Age---The Tangan have sublight spaceflight capabilities(they tend towards brute force technologies like nuclear pulse rocketry), but do not have the ability to build their own FTL starships, as they became dependent on Golgan-supplied ships. The government currently owns the few starships operated by Volgard; previously corporations were allowed to freely own and operate starships, but the Volgard syndicracy discovered that many of these were used to move people offworld seeking better economic prospects. Afraid of the brain- and talent-drain, the syndicracy revoked most private ownership and seized the ships. Currently only a few licensed and strictly regulated concerns are allowed private ownership of starships...and a few smugglers(some of who have bought licenses with bribes).
Economy:
Industrial---Was a producer of military and industrial vehicles for the Republik, but overspecialization and ‘brain drain’ has led to a collapse of the economy without external stimulus.
Wealth:
Was Prosperous, but has sunk to Poor.
Government:
Volgard’s nationalist blocs merged into a Syndicracy. Though this supposedly put power in the hands of local business interests, the final decisions ultimately came from a Golgan-headed economic planning and review board.
Law Level:
Overbearing, shading towards Authoritarian. Growing civil disorder has caused the government to crack down with increasing aggression, since nobody wants to see the Golgans angry enough to step in and put down another ‘rebel world’.
Popularity:
Stability:
Unrest. There’s growing popular desire for change in Volgard politics. Besides the Greens who want to ‘go back to nature’, there are various socialist- and communist-variant groups who want the ‘elites’ to pay their fair share and redistribute the wealth they feel was stolen from the general population. Others demand that the government make a more forceful pitch to the Republik to reinvest in Tanganese industries, hoping for a return to the good old days.

[SolCannibal]

Some "Yeltsin era Russia meets Detroit" vibes to this system, much to the chagrin of the poor Taigans, on whom the Golgan keep such a stiffling stranglehold to no great benefit for the Golgans themselves, ironically.

The matter of their awareness of their alien origins is interesting too, in that it may provide something of a cultural/spiritual incentive for an exodus, in a search for their "true home" or "forerunners", what may also involve a variety of theories going from ancient cosmonauts to transdimensional migration and any mix of things in between.

[taalismn]

Some "Yeltsin era Russia meets Detroit" vibes to this system, much to the chagrin of the poor Taigans, on whom the Golgan keep such a stiffling stranglehold to no great benefit for the Golgans themselves, ironically.

The matter of their awareness of their alien origins is interesting too, in that it may provide something of a cultural/spiritual incentive for an exodus, in a search for their "true home" or "forerunners", what may also involve a variety of theories going from ancient cosmonauts to transdimensional migration and any mix of things in between.

Exactly...Volgard got the 'old steel town' vibe for me...or the 'secret cities' of the Soviet Union that were set up to service their armament programs(especially their nuclear program)...and are , from one can tell, suffering from withdrawal symptoms.

And the 'we're not quite so attached to Volgard' explains the brain drain in part.

Now I gotta finish up some of teh products that the Golgans had the Tangan building for them.....fine line between 'cheap and low tech, but not too low tech...and more expensive than Naruni',,,though Naruni could have hiked their prices back up to book-list once they hooked the Republik.

[SolCannibal]

Some "Yeltsin era Russia meets Detroit" vibes to this system, much to the chagrin of the poor Taigans, on whom the Golgan keep such a stiffling stranglehold to no great benefit for the Golgans themselves, ironically.

The matter of their awareness of their alien origins is interesting too, in that it may provide something of a cultural/spiritual incentive for an exodus, in a search for their "true home" or "forerunners", what may also involve a variety of theories going from ancient cosmonauts to transdimensional migration and any mix of things in between.

Secret cities - talk about enviromental nightmare zones of an insane degree.

Exactly...Volgard got the 'old steel town' vibe for me...or the 'secret cities' of the Soviet Union that were set up to service their armament programs(especially their nuclear program)...and are , from one can tell, suffering from withdrawal symptoms.

And the 'we're not quite so attached to Volgard' explains the brain drain in part.

I also imagine Volgard and Res’shel are systems in the same sector, or at least adjacent ones, considering a branch of Taiganacorp managed to establish itself and begin anew there.

Now I gotta finish up some of teh products that the Golgans had the Tangan building for them.....fine line between 'cheap and low tech, but not too low tech...and more expensive than Naruni',,,though Naruni could have hiked their prices back up to book-list once they hooked the Republik.

Maybe tinkering with some robot vehicles from RMB - or the Destroids from Macross, for something quite different stylistically from either Rifts Earth's or 3GS' models - for a starting point of sorts?

[taalismn]

[

I also imagine Volgard and Res’shel are systems in the same sector, or at least adjacent ones, considering a branch of Taiganacorp managed to establish itself and begin anew there.?

Depends how far away the Tagan were willing and able to go before they felt they were far away enough from the Golgans infesting their homesystem to feel safe(though not likely TOO safe, since Res’shel had -also- been a former Republik satrapy).

I'm already well on the way with a Taigancorp war walker...It's just a matter of hammering out the weapons systems and a few variants.

In the meantime, here's another "was mentioned offhand in the past but never followed up on":


Yssuria Domate(Corkscrew Galaxy)
“We were a culture of happy merchants, storekeepers, and psi-conjurors, content in our little measure of local prosperity. But apparently even that small prosperity was enough to whet the appetite of our larger and more rapacious neighbor. Gods curse the Kreeghor!”
---Anonymous Usulan refugee

“Every free Usulan child is precious. They are the last jewels of real value our people possess. We dare not risk losing those who bring those jewels into the world, nurture and polish them, if we are to survive as a people.”
---Anonymous Usulan freedom fighter, on the decision not to let Usulan women into the frontline resistance.

The Yssuria Domate was a small(4 stars) polity of the Usulan people, and was quite prosperous in its short heyday before being conquered by the TransGalactic Empire.
The Usulans emerged relatively late on the scene, but that didn’t stop them from establishing a vibrant commercial network between their colonies, and later with their interstellar neighbors, and they were looking forward to a possible golden age of peaceful commercial expansion and growing prosperity.
Though busy starfarers, the Usulans maintained only a small standing military, relying on civilian police agencies to enforce domestic law, and small specialized taskforces to conduct the few military matters they had. As their military consisted of elite psychics and mages for the most part, this was considered enough, and indeed tended to carry the day when conflicts broke out.
The TransGalactic Empire invasion proved the Usulan reliance on an elite cadre wasn’t enough. The TGE took the Usulan military seriously enough to target them with Invincible Guardsmen who slew the majority of the Usulan champions(and most of the government) in the first days of the invasion. The colonial militia and police were overwhelmed and mopped up by sheer weight of numbers of the Imperial Legions. The lucky Usulans were those who had the means to flee to exile in foreign polities and establish refugee enclaves.
Current-day Usulan space contains little sign of the Yssuria Domate that once flourished there. The choicer Usulan worlds have been turned into Kreeghor feudal estate-worlds, with the native Usulan population numbers carefully regulated; ‘excess’ is deported offworld as slave labor to the remaining Usulan worlds or to other worlds in the TGE.
The Free Worlds Council feels Usulan space is ripe for rebellion, but has thus far been unsuccessful in establishing any resistance cells in the old Domate. The current TGE ruler, Kreehgor Governor-General Dralus-Sath, runs the former Domate with an iron fist, and his attached regional ISB agency has proven especially adept at sniffing out dissent. Weekly televised public executions are a thing on Usula Prime, and the people fear the Imperial troops, hunters, and the locally-raised Darvot, a traitor organization made up of the worst Usulan criminal elements allowed to free reign to terrorize the population as long as they don’t turn on their TGE sponsors, or disrupt forced-quota productivity.

A. Size
4 worlds:
-Usila/Usula Prime---Usulan homeworld; Earth-like and hospitable, it was developing as a magnificent capital world during the heyday of the Domate. It is currently a much grimmer place under TGE occupation, with a disturbing decline in global population.

-Tajoki---Mildly terraformed world. A garden world in the making, its paradisiacal features have since been eroded by the establishment of Kreeghor-supervised plantations and forced labor.

-Nagaliska---Cold, but still habitable(or it would be considered habitable if the TGE didn’t just dump relocatees on the surface with no provision to face the cold climate; it’s estimated over a third of the refugees perish of exposure before the locals can get to them).

-Ahashi---Ahashi was in the process of being terraformed when the TGE invaded. The planet has since become a prison world, the TGE modifying the terraforming process to suit a systematic program of strip-mining. The mineral operations are facilitated by slave labor shipped in from the other Usulan worlds; the mortality rate is even higher than on Nagaliska.

B. History
Newcomers, though possibly descendants of a splinter evolution/culture of the Shissans(see Aliens Unlimited)

C. Level of Technological Sophistication
Interstellar Age, with a few signature technologies, such as the very promising Electro-Static Free Cosmic Energy Accumulator. It is also rumored that the Usulans created some potent psi-tech, especially in the form of equipment for their Champions.
Most of these technologies and the means to produce them were destroyed during the course of the invasion, either deliberately by the TGE, or by the Usulans themselves to deny the Imperials their prizes. Much intelligence work in the TGE’s Yssuria territories is aimed at uncovering any surviving Usulans with the knowledge to reproduce the more promising technologies.

D. General Attitude/Culture
Usulan society was fairly harmonious, carefree, and friendly.

E. Racial Composition
Usulans(a splinter variant of the Shissan race)

F. Government
Was a cooperative of aristocratic Houses. Currently a satrapy of the TGE

G. Administrative Control
Under the TGE, administration is Draconian; Usulans are third-class citizens (or more likely PROPERTY) on their own worlds.

H. External Trade
Trade Nexus; the Domate was shaping up to be a local sector trade center
H1. Commodities
Exports: Consumer electronics, luxury goods
Imports: Luxury goods

I. Status
Was Ascendant before the TGE invasion; now considered Defunct, due to the occupation and effective devastation of any contiguous government. Efforts to establish an Usulan government-in-exile have proven ineffective.

Usulans
A humanoid species and possible offshoot of the Shissans (see Aliens Unlimited). A starfaring people, they were rolled over by the TGE and survivors were forced to assume nomadic existences on the spaceways. They are more cold-tolerant than the Shissan, but also less heat-resistant, and have developed psionics more than magic.
At the height of their power, the Usulans were governed by a cooperative parliament of aristocratic Houses that ruled geographical districts. Additional districts were created and new Houses spawned off as the Domate expanded into space. Men and women ruled equally in Usulan affairs, with little bias based on gender.
The TGE occupation has not been kind to the Usulan people; they were not afforded the opportunity like others such as the Tmelain to organize orderly exodus evacuation fleets and set up governments-in-exile before the TGE wiped out their leadership and took over.

Alignments: Any
Life Span: 180 years
Size: 5-6 ft on average. Weight ranges from 100-280 lbs.
Gender: Heterosexual, similar to baseline Humans.
Physical Description/Appearance:
Appear as human(oids) distinguished by two small horns(often highlighted in color), skin colors that range from ruddy orange to blue-white, and similarly diverse hair colors. Eye color ranges from gold or orange irises, with jet-black pupils.
Disposition/Attitudes:
In their heyday, Usulans were a gregarious, wildly-tempered people given to boisterous celebration and ritual contests and combats, enhanced by their physical psionics and patched up by their healing psionics. Post-invasion, the Usulans are much grimmer people, the ritual combats now staged to the death for the entertainment of their TGE overlords. Expatriate Usulans are given to much more extreme mood swings ranging from towering rage to acute depression.
Physical Attributes:
IQ: 3d6+1
ME: 4d6
MA: 4d6
PS: 3d6
PP: 3d6
PB: 3d6+1
PE: 3d6
SPD: 3d6
(ISP): M.E. +4d6 +2d4 per level of experience
(PPE): 4d6
Hit Points: P.E. +1d6 per level of experience
SDC: 60+OCC+any from skills
MDC:---
Horror Factor:---
Natural Abilities:
*Heat Resistance--Take HALF damage from heat
*Cold Resistance--Take HALF damage from cold

Psionics:
Considered Major Psionics(save as Major)
Select EIGHT powers from the categories of Physical and Healing psionics only
Magic: None, but have the potential to learn. Some Usulan refugees and freedom fighters are looking into magic as a possible weapon against the TGE.

Cybernetics/Bionics:
Originally none; the Usulans having no truck with anything that would interfere with their natural abilities. Under the TGE, cybernetic and bionic implants are used on slaves to curb their abilities. Refugee Usulans, separated from the advanced healing psionics and magicks of their people, often must make the hard choice between permanently losing a limb or organ, or losing some or all of their abilities in favor of medical implants.

Available OCCs: Any, including MasterPsychics.
Those of the more powerful Psychic classes were, under the old regime, recruited if possible into the elite Champions’ corps. Sadly, most of these heroes and heroines were effectively assassinated by Invincible Guardsmen. These who survived are either now fugitives with an Imperial price on their heads, or are actively traitors who are part of the turncoat Darvot organization.
The Domate also had a growing number of Psi-Mechanics, and their work was producing a number of psytech innovations that promised to revolutionize their overall technology. While much of this research was destroyed(or captured by the TGE), some of it is rumored to have escaped with its creators with the refugee exodus.
Many expatriate Usulans are looking to study and acquire more powerful disciplines of psioncs and magic, with the ultimate goal of taking the fight back to the TGE. It’s been rumored that there are Usulan Mystic Knights.

RCC Skills:
+1d4 Language/Literacy skills of choice at +5%
Skills of Note:----
Culture:
Were once a vibrant commercial culture of free-travellers and merchants. Post-TGE invasion, they have become a slave-species of the Empire. A number of free enclaves survive outside the TGE, though these rarely exceed 10,000 individuals and are governed by a variety of leadership models(headsman/headswoman, corporate, democracy, etc.) depending on the original composition of the refugees.

[SolCannibal]

[

I also imagine Volgard and Res’shel are systems in the same sector, or at least adjacent ones, considering a branch of Taiganacorp managed to establish itself and begin anew there.?

Depends how far away the Tagan were willing and able to go before they felt they were far away enough from the Golgans infesting their homesystem to feel safe(though not likely TOO safe, since Res’shel had -also- been a former Republik satrapy).

I imagine it kind of like german-descent people from Russia or the ex-soviet republics migrating to Germany and other countries of eastern europe - a balancing act between moving far away as one can manage in their somewhat impoverished condition, with some degree of cultural/linguistic familiarity mixed in,

I'm already well on the way with a Taigancorp war walker...It's just a matter of hammering out the weapons systems and a few variants.

Really curious about how that one will turn out. As an aside, the fact Indusservo went civil seems to point out to the ex-Taiganacorp workers' pointed awareness of their designs less than ideal situation when it comes to competing with state of art military mek models.

In the meantime, here's another "was mentioned offhand in the past but never followed up on":

Current-day Usulan space contains little sign of the Yssuria Domate that once flourished there. The choicer Usulan worlds have been turned into Kreeghor feudal estate-worlds, with the native Usulan population numbers carefully regulated; ‘excess’ is deported offworld as slave labor to the remaining Usulan worlds or to other worlds in the TGE.
The Free Worlds Council feels Usulan space is ripe for rebellion, but has thus far been unsuccessful in establishing any resistance cells in the old Domate. The current TGE ruler, Kreehgor Governor-General Dralus-Sath, runs the former Domate with an iron fist, and his attached regional ISB agency has proven especially adept at sniffing out dissent. Weekly televised public executions are a thing on Usula Prime, and the people fear the Imperial troops, hunters, and the locally-raised Darvot, a traitor organization made up of the worst Usulan criminal elements allowed to free reign to terrorize the population as long as they don’t turn on their TGE sponsors, or disrupt forced-quota productivity.

Looks like the FWC - or any other group wanting to run interference against the TGE in this "subsector" - will have to play their cards very carefully and close to the chest, since it seems the current governor has a pretty tight ship running for the moment.

I suspect some stealth piracy, focused mainly in the capture of "deportation ships" to liberate their sapient contents might be a (relatively) safer route to collect local supporters in the region at the moment.

Also, the "dump relocatees on the surface with no provision to face the cold climate" attitude in Nagaliska is peculiar. If you're going to put no effort in maintaining your indentured labor force of political prisioners, just executing them instead wouldn't be cheaper than all the relocation work? Looks like someone in middle management is getting petty or sloppy.

As an aside, do they even need prisioners in Ahashi if the TGE is just going to strip-mine the whole planet through novel (mis)uses of terraforming technology?

Maybe the governor-general's ship is not as tight and well-managed as i initially envisioned it. Guess he's more of an iron-fisted commander than sleazy, slick bureaucrat-opressor.

B. History
Newcomers, though possibly descendants of a splinter evolution/culture of the Shissans(see Aliens Unlimited)

Oh, that is very interesting indeed, specially because if memory tricks me not, AU:GG implies the Shissans might be themselves transdimensional emigrees to the HU's Milky Way.
The possibility of some group past or present within Usulan society having a knowledge of rift-using could bring a series of hook and venues to the table.

Also, having the image of Leia and/or Amidala with devil horns now. The fact they had a psi-warriors elite cadre only makes little nods to Star Wars that much more tempting.

[taalismn]

[

Also, the "dump relocatees on the surface with no provision to face the cold climate" attitude in Nagaliska is peculiar. If you're going to put no effort in maintaining your indentured labor force of political prisioners, just executing them instead wouldn't be cheaper than all the relocation work? Looks like someone in middle management is getting petty or sloppy.:

The Kreehjpr are sods.
And yeah, some underling looked at the physiological reports on the Usulans and w'Hah! They're resistant to cold! They can handle a little cold! It will cool them off!", and didn't think, they're RESISTANT to cold, not IMMUNE to cold.
Later deportees were dumped closer to the existing settlements, but the guy responsible for the initial landings was never punished for the mistake(Indeed, the more sadistic ISB offices RECRUITED him/her).

[SolCannibal]

Also, the "dump relocatees on the surface with no provision to face the cold climate" attitude in Nagaliska is peculiar. If you're going to put no effort in maintaining your indentured labor force of political prisioners, just executing them instead wouldn't be cheaper than all the relocation work? Looks like someone in middle management is getting petty or sloppy.:

The Kreehjpr are sods.

"The Kreehgor are sods" encapsulates the whole of the history of the TGE perfectly indeed. But well, having a bunch of past Splugorth minions that climbed the hierarchy so far they toppled their bosses to be anything near wholesome would be going a little too much against the grain i'd guess.

And yeah, some underling looked at the physiological reports on the Usulans and w'Hah! They're resistant to cold! They can handle a little cold! It will cool them off!", and didn't think, they're RESISTANT to cold, not IMMUNE to cold.
Later deportees were dumped closer to the existing settlements, but the guy responsible for the initial landings was never punished for the mistake(Indeed, the more sadistic ISB offices RECRUITED him/her).

Intelligence departments being more about petty games of dominance & sadism than actual effectiveness, mistaking sloppiness for brutality, who would have thought?

And so they wasting valuable resources, material and sophont, for the sake of a power flex gone wrong. Things can only get better when someone with an axe to grind with the Kreeghor starts to hijack these slave ships instead.

Little aside but sort of related, is it ever cited in the books which of the three galaxies the FWC territory two dozen plus systems are located?

[taalismn]

[
Little aside but sort of related, is it ever cited in the books which of the three galaxies the FWC territory two dozen plus systems are located?

No...There's most DEFINITELY an FWC chunk of the Thundercloud at the end of Oswoe's Arm just before you hit CCW space, but whether Good Hope is located there is unknown. There's no mention of any specifically FWC-affiliated rebel world in the Anvil Galaxy(though there is a rebellious world), and Good Hope is mentioned in the first Phaseworld book, though that may have been before the writers deduced the Thundercloud was going to be the Big Frontier, so Good Hope and the original FWC worlds may be either in the Corkscrew or the Thundercloud.

AS the FWC is depicted as having a presence in the Thundercloud, but no mention is made of them in the text, it's still up In the air whether the FWC movement started in the Corkscrew and later spread to the Thundercloud, or the whole of the FWC is in the Thundercloud.

[SolCannibal]

[
Little aside but sort of related, is it ever cited in the books which of the three galaxies the FWC territory two dozen plus systems are located?

No...There's most DEFINITELY an FWC chunk of the Thundercloud at the end of Oswoe's Arm just before you hit CCW space, but whether Good Hope is located there is unknown. There's no mention of any specifically FWC-affiliated rebel world in the Anvil Galaxy(though there is a rebellious world), and Good Hope is mentioned in the first Phaseworld book, though that may have been before the writers deduced the Thundercloud was going to be the Big Frontier, so Good Hope and the original FWC worlds may be either in the Corkscrew or the Thundercloud.

AS the FWC is depicted as having a presence in the Thundercloud, but no mention is made of them in the text, it's still up In the air whether the FWC movement started in the Corkscrew and later spread to the Thundercloud, or the whole of the FWC is in the Thundercloud.

What leaves it completely up for grabs and GM fiat/preference if the Usulan past territory would be anywhere near accessible for the FWC to intervene and help the dominated population, though the direness of the Usulans current situation and difficulty to reorganize in any meaningful numbers tempts me to say no, they lack the support of any group apart from themselves, at least for the present.

[taalismn]

Indeed. It could be sheer distance from any organized FWC territory that's the problem for outside intervention in the Usual situation. Unlike Golgan space, where you have ex-satrapies all around to get support from...of course, that's also part of the problem; not all ex-Golgan worlds like to play nice with their neighbors, and it was only the presence of the Golgans(acting as a common enemy or neighborhood policeman) that kept them down and off their stellar neighbors.

[SolCannibal]

Indeed. It could be sheer distance from any organized FWC territory that's the problem for outside intervention in the Usual situation. Unlike Golgan space, where you have ex-satrapies all around to get support from...of course, that's also part of the problem; not all ex-Golgan worlds like to play nice with their neighbors, and it was only the presence of the Golgans(acting as a common enemy or neighborhood policeman) that kept them down and off their stellar neighbors.

As shown quite well at times by the Zyganian Empire or the Indrel Khonate, for example, might be said.

[taalismn]

Sovexus---USA Colony(Thundercloud)

“Even though the oni came here as refugees, the way things have worked out, what with the other refugees settled here, the oni are coming out looking like intrepid investment tradesmen setting up shop close to their business. In the tentative assessements of our cultural psych-ops people, that’s done a lot of good for our new oni neighbors; they’re less pitiable castaways dependent of the charity of others, and more willful captains of business, here to help a struggling colony with its trade flow issues and refugee settlement problems. Puts them up front in the shotgun seat, not in the backseat or the trunk.”

“Talk about life imitating art....the Kamasaugh were invited in to provide some verisimilitude to the Giseis’ cover of being exotic tidbit-seeking merchants. Turns out the Kamasaugh really -do- like genning-slugs, though pickled in -tasi-*, rather than braised in copa-seed** oil like the Amateratsuans like them. So now we got commercial demand from both the Bushi Fed and the Kamasaughans for slug-meat. Our OPO liaison’s sure this can work to our advantage in giving us a door into the Bushi-fed, but we’re having to scramble here on the ground to learn how to mass-farm slugs....and not all of us Wolfen are all that fond of the little slimers. ”

*Tasi---An alcoholic beverage popular in the Kamasaughan worlds. It’s been described as a ‘saki-rum wine’.
** Copa-seed Oil---The nearest Terran equivalent woudl be seasame seed oil.

Sovexus is a United Systems Alliance colonial outpost in the Thundercloud Galaxy. Though relatively far out from its primary, the planet is warmed by two sources; its sun and a brown dwarf in the same system. Sovexus has been settled largely by Wulfen refugees from Sqaada aggression way on the other side of the Thundercloud.
Sovvexus is also the site of a secret Amateratsuan oni enclave, a refugee ninja clan from the Bushi Federation. The Gisei were fleeing potential genocide at the hands of more aggressive rival clans during one of the unpublicized(but no less bitter) feuds boiling over in Bushi society in the chaos surroinfing the Minion War. The quick-thinking USAn sector authorities who offered to help the Gisei hatched the idea of disguising the Amateratsuans as the variant sept Kamasaugh, to explain the presence of galactic Oni-ans without compromising the security of the refugee Gisei if and when they were observed by outsiders.
Thugh initially aghast at the idea of being associated with the ‘heathen’ Kamasaugh, the Gisei have come to recognze the inspired artistry of the deception played by their USA hosts. and indeed have come to embrace it. This has even gotten to the point that the Gisei have invited actual Kamasauni to visit the Gisei enclave, so the Gisei can observe and become familiar with Kamasaughan fashions and mannerisms, the better to emulate them and build on the deception.
The fact that most habitation on Sovexus is underground to survive the dry daytime heat and bitter night cold, further hides activity from casual observation. This has further helped conceal the Gisei numbers and activities. It also works to conceal several secret joint training ground where the Gisei are instructing their USAn hsts in Oni-style fieldcraft.

Solar System(Soden)
Number of Stars: 1
Types of Stars: Yellow Dwarf
Number of Planets: 8
-Gas Giant (Pocktyr) ----Saturn-sized Pocktyr is a ‘warm’ gas giant ablating away under the solar winds streaming from Soden. On closest approach between both Soden and Demensis, Pocktyr’s atmosphere becomes particularly turbulent, and has been observed to create massive cyclonic storms with enough velocity to throw off gas jets into space.

-Exotic(brown dwarf) (Demensis)---Demensis is an enormous gas giant that was on the cusp of becoming a proper star, but failed to achieve thermostellar fusion ignition. Instead, Demensis glows with infrared radiation and its atmosphere is roiled by violent electroplasmic storms.

-Terrestrial (Sovvexus)--System lifeworld

-Exotic (The Whorl) ---The Whorl is a large gaseous cloud that has assumed a semi-spiral shape. While the Whorl consists mainly of gases familiar to planetary nebulae, scans have detected a large percentage of organic compounds and a smaller quantity of metallic dust in the Whorl’s composition. There is speculation that the Whorl may be the decomposed remains of some sort of large exolife or possibly the remains of a Dominator globe-ship.

-Terrestrial (Lenisis) ----Large, cooked by Venus-like warmth, and arid, with high gravity and a super-dense poisonous atmosphere, Lenisis would not seem an attractive prospect for colonization or exploitation, but for mineralogy scans that have shown substantial deposits of Nekirite locked in the planet’s crust. The United Systems Alliance is undertaking studies of the feasibility of mining the nekirite, using cyborgs or robots, though any implementation is likely several years away.

-Terrestrial (Tadosk) ---Small, cold, possessing low gravty and a thin atmosphere, and covered in ice, Tadosk is more amenable to landings, if one means to set up dome habitats and harvest water. Mineral surveys are still ongoing, but Tadosk seems a good prospect for future Adaptist colonization.

-Gas Giant (Baltan)---Huge Baltan possesses 21 moons of significant size. The USAJC has set up a small naval station as a communications backup on the largest moon, Yelist. The moon system also serves as a convenient testing ground for UAJC and Gisei trials of stealthed smallcraft.

-Gas Giant (Pemrer) ---Tiny Pemrer is a cold dark Uranus-style ‘gas midget’ that has little to recommend itself to the galactic tourist.


Planet(Sovvexus)
Type: Terrestrial
Diameter: 11,025 km
Gravity: 0.9 g
Temperature: Temperate, but on the tropical side. The planet has very small icecaps whic seasonally disappear and reform, but no standing glaciers or ice formations, though night-time snow showers are a common occurance, as moisture precipitates out of the atmosphere during the cold dark hours. Combined with the dry thin atmosphere, most colonists stay under sun/thermal shades during the day and most habitation is built underground.
Unusual/Special Features:
-Moons(5)---The largest moon, Taransk, is the site of a USAJC naval station. The second-largest, Promilius, is site of a large and largely automated metals mine and microgravity factory complex. The mining complex also hides a small dock facility used by the Gisei and their USA hosts for clandestine operations.
Atmosphere:
Thin, but breathable nitrox mixture. There’s also a higher amount of ozone in the atmosphere, which may pose problems for some air breathers. Supplemental oxygen-concentrators are a common accessory for getting around on Sovvexus. Most communites are domed or enviro-sealed to compensate. There is some discussion of limited terraforming to increase the density and oxygen content of the Sovvexusian atmosphere, though that is being weighed versus effects of such alteration on the native life.
Terrain:
Unusual Seismology--Earthquakes on Sovvexus are exceptionally regular in that, in the time that such has been observed, they occur with almost clockwork regularity and predictability. Their progression along the planet’s fault lines is also exceptionally regular, and they never seem to exceed certain magnitudes. It’s almost as if something were scheduling seismic events and regulating them. The almost boring job of predicting earthquakes on Sovvexus is balanced by the frustrating effort to try to figure out what might be responsible for the anomalous regularity.
Notable Mineral Concentrations:
- Magnesium
- Amethyst
- Chromium
- Cobalt
- Thorium
- Quartz
- Gypsum
- Ruby
Hydrosphere:
Roughly 43% of Sovvexus’s surface is covered in open water.
Biosphere:
Dense, with a diverse ecology and a number of commercially exploitable species. Local evolution hasn’t risen above small terrestrial invertebrates and boney fishes . Interestingly, evolution on Sovvexus arose from underground hotsprings, and currnt thinking is that life ascended from cave-life. Hence, the optical senses of Sovvexusian lifeforms aren’t as well-developed as on other worlds that had ‘open water’ evolutionary origins. However, Sovvexusian life has well-developed senses of smell and taste.
Complicating these speculations, though, is evidence that life on Sovvexus got at least ‘booster shot’ of offworld DNA from previous extraterrestrial visitations, on the strength of distinctive offworld DNA sequences found in some Sovvexusian species.
Civilization:
Colony
Population:
150,000 (90% Wulfen, 10% other)
( 18,000 Amateratsuan oni )
Technology:
Galactic--The USA is supplying the refugee colonists with good Galactic-median technology to make their new homes.
Economy:
Agriculture-Industrial
While most agriculture on Sovvexus is aimed at feeding the refugee colonists and expected future settlers, there is already some cash-crop cultivation of native lifeforms. Gyloid-pods are tasty and nutritious, as long as they aren’t infested by gyang-larvae, while twoip-grass yields a sugary and slightly alcoholic pith. Genning-slugs are shell-less mollusks that, once their mildly poisonous quills have been removed, can be eaten and becoming known as a delicacy.
Part of the oni cover on Sovvexus is that they are Kamasaughan merchants purchasing exotic foodstuffs native to the planet, while in return they are supplying the other colonists with offworld luxury goods.
Wealth:
Currently, as a beginning colony, Sovvexus can be considered Depressed, as it is still importing more than it is exporting, and still receiving offworld aide. It is catching up. however, to Average, and it is the need for income that is being used, in part, to explain Sovvexus’s interest in Kamasaughan investment.
Government:
Democracy---The colonists elect their own representatives to the colonial governor, and can vote the governor off.
Law Level:
Lawful---- Sovvexusians are still too busy making a living and taming their new world to make much trouble for themselves, so, beyond the expected domestic disputes, drunken brawls, or usual social drama, there’s no real tension for law enforcement to be concerned with. Refugee trauma was an issue, but the USA has supplied Sovvexus amply with psychiatrists and counselors. This has had the added benefit that most people are too busy dealing with their own problems that they aren’t prying into the affairs of the oni.
Popularity:
Popular; currently the refugees are just too grateful to have a new home to make a fuss, and the miners are happy with the fair deal they’re getting for their minerals.
Stability:
Stable; Sovvexus is still too young a colony to have much in the way of internal tensions or growing pains. Though some of the refugees have problems related to their relocation, these have been anticipated and accommodations made.

[SolCannibal]

Sovexus---USA Colony(Thundercloud)

“Even though the oni came here as refugees, the way things have worked out, what with the other refugees settled here, the oni are coming out looking like intrepid investment tradesmen setting up shop close to their business. In the tentative assessements of our cultural psych-ops people, that’s done a lot of good for our new oni neighbors; they’re less pitiable castaways dependent of the charity of others, and more willful captains of business, here to help a struggling colony with its trade flow issues and refugee settlement problems. Puts them up front in the shotgun seat, not in the backseat or the trunk.”

“Talk about life imitating art....the Kamasaugh were invited in to provide some verisimilitude to the Giseis’ cover of being exotic tidbit-seeking merchants. Turns out the Kamasaugh really -do- like genning-slugs, though pickled in -tasi-*, rather than braised in copa-seed** oil like the Amateratsuans like them. So now we got commercial demand from both the Bushi Fed and the Kamasaughans for slug-meat. Our OPO liaison’s sure this can work to our advantage in giving us a door into the Bushi-fed, but we’re having to scramble here on the ground to learn how to mass-farm slugs....and not all of us Wolfen are all that fond of the little slimers. ”

That is an interesting arrangement indeed the USA has in the planet with the Gisei clan. The cover as Kamasaugh exotic tidbit-seeking merchants not only serves to misdirect any people that do come across their enclave but in playing to one of their supposed strengths as a ninja clan, impersonation, can serve as a convenient venue to mend a collective pride partly damaged by forced exile and needing to depend on the goodwill of foreigners.

AND following the road of doing more effective impersonation of the Kamasaugh, one that might effectively trick people who ARE familiar with either Bushi Federation or Kamasauni Stellar Coalition natives, a point of both pride AND survival at the present, requires them to break at least a little of their distance from their "cousins" and expose themselves to Kamasaugh culture, what might potentially led to a process of reevaluation, a degree of acceptance and some future crosspolination.

[taalismn]

AND following the road of doing more effective impersonation of the Kamasaugh, one that might effectively trick people who ARE familiar with either Bushi Federation or Kamasauni Stellar Coalition natives, a point of both pride AND survival at the present, requires them to break at least a little of their distance from their "cousins" and expose themselves to Kamasaugh culture, what might potentially led to a process of reevaluation, a degree of acceptance and some future crosspolination.

Not without its risks, though. If the factions that were responsible for the Giseis' original discomfiture learned of their continued existence, they'd be even more enraged by the heresy practiced by the clan in associating with the 'unclean' Kamasaugh , and might even try to use the fact to sway other conservative clans to support their efforts to annihilate the Gisei(right now, the Gisei are just regarded by the rest of Amateratsuan Oni culture as being unfortunate to pick(or get into) a fight with more powerful rivals...shading to Too Stupid to Live if the Gisei took certain actions they shouldn't have) .

[SolCannibal]

AND following the road of doing more effective impersonation of the Kamasaugh, one that might effectively trick people who ARE familiar with either Bushi Federation or Kamasauni Stellar Coalition natives, a point of both pride AND survival at the present, requires them to break at least a little of their distance from their "cousins" and expose themselves to Kamasaugh culture, what might potentially led to a process of reevaluation, a degree of acceptance and some future crosspolination.

Not without its risks, though. If the factions that were responsible for the Giseis' original discomfiture learned of their continued existence, they'd be even more enraged by the heresy practiced by the clan in associating with the 'unclean' Kamasaugh , and might even try to use the fact to sway other conservative clans to support their efforts to annihilate the Gisei(right now, the Gisei are just regarded by the rest of Amateratsuan Oni culture as being unfortunate to pick(or get into) a fight with more powerful rivals...shading to Too Stupid to Live if the Gisei took certain actions they shouldn't have) .

True, but considering that the Bushi Federation as a whole seems to be embroiled into what could turn into a civil war, if not a whole "warring states era" kind of crisis, they might already have their hands full with other issues, like filling the power vacuum left by the Gisei before some other faction reaps the benefits of filling the gap, not to mention opportunistic rivals that might see an opportunity to strike at them while those factions are busy with recouping losses and realocating resources spent in causing that same discomfiture. Wars in multiple fronts, specially when you have to actively track down a possible rival that seems to have left the field, can too easily turn sour for those leading them. Possible, specially if some of the Giseis' rivals were motivated by things more complex than a straightforward dispute for power, but that's something of a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" set of options in some ways.

[taalismn]

Barricans-------(Anvil Galaxy)
“The syndicates running Chang and its outposts sank too much of their own capital into the pirate fleet project, figuring the returns on their investments would pay off handsomely, what with the chaos surrounding the Golgan fronts. So when their supposedly secret anchorage got nuked, pretty much every power bloc too a big financial loss...and what with their criminal activities being outed, their legitmate trade’s been drying up fast. The ‘I told you so’s’ in the Baros government might be rejoicing at this, if the other factions didn’t see them as a convenient scapegoat, and civil war looks very likely i the near future. Would it have been better to let them unleash their fleet and try to negotiate with them afterwards as a single power bloc? That’s an uncomfortable question, but when it comes down to ‘our lossses, or their losses’, it’s a lot simplier to decide; the Barrican armada had to go.”

The Barricans were originally a large pirate band that haunted the borders of the Golgan Republik before being chased from the denser regions of the Anvil Galaxy by the Republik Argosy and the Molo organization. While many in the region feared the Barricans would cause trouble elsewhere, the Barricans claimed they were peaceful refugees looking for sanctuary. Indeed, they did find an unclaimed world(Chang), colonized it, and lived more or less peacefully for several centuries, little bothering their neighbors. though reports often surfaced of bitter infighting and occasional outsector raids by freelancers based in the Barrican system. The Barricans persisted in claiming they’d gone legit, though, and pointed to an increased amount of trade flowing unmolested through their system and with their world.
Changing sector economics, however, seem to have proven too much of an incentive for the Barricans in who, it seems, old habits die hard. The Barricans were actually building a massive pirate fleet...new construction as well as refitting older ships brought in by freelancers willing to join their cause. The neighboring Ensa Spur and Redekka Path hyperways seemed the most likely targets, specially with the increased traffic along them due to re-routing around the increasingly unstable Golgan zones.
The United Systems Alliance unleashed their own freelancers/Irregulars on them in a daring sneak raid on the Barricans’ secret shipyard, doing massive amounts of damage to both drydocked ships and the yard structures themselves. Though the Barricans have said little publically about the incident aside from leaked news reports of a ‘major zero-gee industrial accident’, intelligence reports show that the Barrican rearmament efforts suffered a major blow, setting back their plans years, if not forcig their abandonment altogether.

A. Size
3 systems
Chang is the lifeworld among the three systems, while Hagamond and Ascor are desert systems developed for resources. One of Hagamond’s outer planets was the site of the secret shipyards.
B. History
Resettled pirate band driven out of the Golgan sphere.
C. Level of Technological Sophistication
Low Galactic
D. General Attitude/Culture
Peaceful Traders, or so they have claimed.
E. Racial Composition
96% Dwarves, 4% other
F. Government
Syndocracy---Multiple business interests, desscended from the various ship departments of the original Barrican pirate organization, run the polity. There’s several power(enginering) blocs, food and industry(quartermaster) blocs, and general services(officers and general crew) groups shuffling for dominance at any given time.
G. Administrative Control
Lax---The Barricans exercise very loose control over their citizenry. In fact, that’s what the central government is claiming in response to accusations that they were planning a campaign of brigandry; the shipyards were the work of renegade Barricans and did not reflect the ‘true’ will of the Barrican people.
H. External Trade
The Barricans do a fair amount of trade with the rest of the galaxy.
H1. Commodities
Exports: Consumer Goods(furnishings and appliances); Barrican industry exports a good amount of inexpensive home appliances, personnel communications devices, and consumer electronics, though these are geenrally consdiered to be of lower qiality and knockoffs of others’ designs.
Imports: Narcotics----The Barrican populace has a drug problem, and the government does little to stem this, citing personal choice(and, it’s suspected, because many of the syndicates are actually getting a cut from the drug trade)
I. Status
Crumbling----The Barricans have hit a low note in their history. While evidence has since emerged that the Barricans may have been building their fleet at the behest of groups like the Zilo Cartel, the various power blocs in the Barrican government were also more or less supportive of the prospective profits to be had from the venture. Now that the cover’s been blown off the scheme and the fleet sunk at anchor as it were, and greater scruntiny paid the Barricans, the syndicates are falling all over each other trying to lay the blame and seize power for themselves. Analysts are giving the Barricans at best another decade or two of lingering ‘polite’ infighting before they fall apart.

[SolCannibal]

So many, many ways these guys can come crashing down hard it's kind of difficult to number them all. Either they implode or someone will take over to put a lid on things and stop the mess blowing all across the sector and beyond, possibly both things.

Damn, the Golgans could exploit the situation to play good guy "we are bringing law & order back to this branch of the galaxy" card for once, like the Zyganians did in the alliance against the Chukta.

Hmmmm, a little detail that now strikes me as very curious is the matter of Barricans quite strong species unity (96% dwarf) while being descendants of a people from outside Chang of most uncertain origin - at least from an outsider perspective, so far. It seems to add a kernel of truth to the idea of their being a group of refugees looking for sanctuary/new homes instead of (wholly) an alliance of pirate bands, that are kind of notorious for their hodge-podge/mixed character.

It beggars the question of where did the hundreds of thousands to millions of dwarves moving away from Golgan space, past or present, came from, as their society as described seems to show no signs of traits associated with dwarves coming straight from transdimensional relocation, like those seeded by the enigmatic culture of the ‘Palladites’, ergo the barricans' parent stock was already well-established in the 3 Galaxies in a non-magical context long before their imbroglio with the Golgans & Molo in past centuries and migration.

[taalismn]

(Reality Breach Detected. Reality Inconsistencies detected. See anomaly detector output RED PENCIL#2144344323 for dimensional mismatches. Detected anomaly cordoned, contained, and isolated from main line. Adjust for continua anomalies.
Instituting 'Nothing to See Here' field in affected area. Placeholder gravitics emplaced to negate negative effects of gravitic drift caused by absence of removed system. Forwarding compensation to resident oversight entity(re: Cosmic Forge) for the inconvenience. Kicking remedial replacement construction of substitute spacial/temporal fill up priority list buffer. Report when ready to replace and remount reality sub-region)

(Attachment: Okay, who didn't do their homework? I know that region of space isn't exactly critical event crossroads, but it IS getting more attention with events ramping up around it. Somebody in your office ####ed up and your response better not be a L@bekian fire drill. Get things in order before the next Dimensional Orthodoxy Inspection, or better yet, before the next Quarterly Regional Trackline Review, and maybe, just maybe, we can overlook this slip-up. Otherwise, AlternityAudit's going to be the dreaded words. Get to it.)

[SolCannibal]

Sendeshal(Anvil Galaxy)

“Rumors that the Sendelshalans worship an enormous invincible nuclear fire-breathing god-lizard are exactly that; rumors. The Sendelshalans just like nuclear weapons a lot, that’s all.
But best to be polite and not make them invoke the wrath of their gods, just in case.”

One of the independent worlds that banded together to oppose the Chukta. Ruled by a surprisingly benign military junta, Sendeshal has also suprisingly survived a Splugorth raid, not through force of arms, but through diplomacy-the invaders displayed such professionalism, they were awarded the planet's prestigious award for aerobatics, given during the world's annual Arms of Liberty Fest. The Sendeshalan response so befuddled the Splugorth Minions that they left without harvesting slaves or loot(though the presence and conspicious activation of several thousand previously cloaked nuclear weapons platforms around the planet may have had something to do with that).
The Sendeshalans are a variant sept of Lizardmen. They claim to have come to their world through a ‘tunnel of winds’ thought to be a dimensional rift.

Solar System(Rolvis/Sendek VIII)

Not wanting to rain on that parade, but i remember some bits being a little different.

[taalismn]

[
Not wanting to rain on that parade, but i remember some bits being a little different.

Thanks, I'll pull the post and make some corrections....perhaps the locals have some Wolfen mercs(augmented like Star Marshals?) or resident aliens padding out their ranks?

Or else the Sendeshalians have managed to develop some nifty reality-warping weaponry....

[SolCannibal]

[
Not wanting to rain on that parade, but i remember some bits being a little different.

Thanks, I'll pull the post and make some corrections....perhaps the locals have some Wolfen mercs(augmented like Star Marshals?) or resident aliens padding out their ranks?

Well, the female wolfen interviewed is identified as Field Marshal Callis D'woren, Semetan Dominia Armed Forces, so i'd say local minority with some quite major representatives at least.

Or else the Sendeshalians have managed to develop some nifty reality-warping weaponry....

Or maybe they are like Kobolds, who get described as reptilian, canine or just generically humanoid depending on particular universe?

[taalismn]

Well, female wolfen interviewed is identified as Field Marshal Callis D'woren, Semetan Dominia Armed Forces, so i'd say local minority with some quite major representatives at least.



Or maybe they are like Kobolds, who get described as reptilian, canine or just generically humanoid depending on particular universe?

Your suggestions are intriguing. I will take them into consideration while reality adjustment is underway.

You may experience some surreality, deja vu, phantom memories, and inexplicable sense of loss during reality shifting. Do not be alarmed; these feelings will be glossed over as the new reality parameters take hold and your unshielded mentality is adjusted by chronodimensional pressure. If these feelings persist or you experience discomfort from them, repeatedly tell yourself 'It was all a dream' or go on an ice cream binge to drown the feelings.

[SolCannibal]

Indeed. It could be sheer distance from any organized FWC territory that's the problem for outside intervention in the Usual situation. Unlike Golgan space, where you have ex-satrapies all around to get support from...of course, that's also part of the problem; not all ex-Golgan worlds like to play nice with their neighbors, and it was only the presence of the Golgans(acting as a common enemy or neighborhood policeman) that kept them down and off their stellar neighbors.

As an aside and back on the subject of where the heck is the FWC actually located or not in the Three Galaxies, i just found something that might be relevant (if not superseded by later books lore, that is).

Relations are more strained with the Transgalactic Empire. Territorial disputes are frequent and they sometimes result in skirmishes.
The UWW has, in turn, given aid to the Free Worlds Council, in the hopes that the liberated worlds might one day choose to join the Warlock federation.

While it doesn't outright state it as such, that kind of expectation/hope in the part of the UWW's leadership does seem to imply the core of the FWC is relative close to theirs, if not outright sharing borders.

[taalismn]

[
While it doesn't outright state it as such, that kind of expectation/hope in the part of the UWW's leadership does seem to imply the core of the FWC is relative close to theirs, if not outright sharing borders.

Which would seem to rule out the core FWC worlds being in the Thundercloud, since Rifts Thundercloud Galaxy pg. 15 does not show any UWW presence in the Thundercloud, meaning either a) they don't have ANY presence there, or b) they have scattering of worlds that aren't numerous or contiguous enough to constitute a proper territory that can be depicted on the scale of that map.

Heck, the UWW might just connect its worlds via dimensional rifts as much as by starships, so their definition of a UWW 'territory' might differ from other star nations confined to Newtonian space and married to the idea of 'borders' in space.
I also get the vibe that the UWW isn't as rabidly expansionist as the TGE, CCW, or GR.

[SolCannibal]

While it doesn't outright state it as such, that kind of expectation/hope in the part of the UWW's leadership does seem to imply the core of the FWC is relative close to theirs, if not outright sharing borders.

Which would seem to rule out the core FWC worlds being in the Thundercloud, since Rifts Thundercloud Galaxy pg. 15 does not show any UWW presence in the Thundercloud, meaning either a) they don't have ANY presence there, or b) they have scattering of worlds that aren't numerous or contiguous enough to constitute a proper territory that can be depicted on the scale of that map.

Not to mention the FWC is not all that large to begin with: "only a couple dozen worlds compared with the Transgalactic Empire 's thousands of planets", according to the original blurb in DB2: pg. 73 - info that might or not have been superseded by some bit of evolving canon in later books that i forget.

Heck, the UWW might just connect its worlds via dimensional rifts as much as by starships, so their definition of a UWW 'territory' might differ from other star nations confined to Newtonian space and married to the idea of 'borders' in space.

Damn, true, doubly so considering that the polity as a whole, already rooted into a "going where the rifts & ley lines takes us" kind of exploration/expansion would fully form through a war campaign and victory over a Splugorth dominion, that they would proceed to absorb.

I also get the vibe that the UWW isn't as rabidly expansionist as the TGE, CCW, or GR.

Indeed, considering it has been around for much longer the CCW - and butting heads with the TGE while at it - the UWW could have been much, much larger if expanding itself were in its list of priorities.

Anyway, it definitely helps with drawing something of a image of a few of the setting's essentials for certain.


edit: Damn, just remembered something. AU:GG cites the Sishan being familiar and having contacts with both Naruni Enterprises and the Cibolans.

If the Usulans descend or are directly related to the AU Sishans (what doesn't have to be the case, the Sishans themselves seem to have migrated from another dimension though they won't admit, so two separate migratory waves with utterly different associations is perfectly possible), one might expect them to also have such familiarity to some degree - what even if far from enough to save them from the Kreeghor, could perhaps be enough for an Usulan community/clique/sub-faction of sorts to still survive within the low to mid ranks of NE's offices or among the camps & instalations of Cibola.

[taalismn]

Wow. Zounds, this was just supposed to be a rewrite after I didn’t do my continuity homework of my own material. Instead I wound up writing up a whole SECTOR’s worth of cosmology, history, and astropolitics.

Rodan Sector(Anvil Galaxy)
Rodan Sector borders both Golgan Republik territory and the Zyganian Empire. It was a former Republik backwater that marked the high tide mark of Republik expansion in the region before the Republik began shrinking, and the sector was one of the earlier abandoned regions, as the Republik focused on more populous and industrialized areas, such as Zygania, despite the Rodan Sector having a number of inhabitable worlds, especially in the fertile Dan’al Cluster. This allowed a number of inhabited worlds to continue on, unaware of the passage of a great empire(the Republik) through their heavens, long enough ago that the emergent Chukta thought the Golgans had abandoned the region(and the galactic arm) much earlier.
The Chukta, the Zyganians, the Semeten Dominia, and the prospect of a Golgan return, are the major players in the sector. Piracy is a ever constant threat, even with the ‘backwater’reputation of the sector, given how much interstellar traffic is, in finding ways around major travel ways threatened by the new Golgan wars, routing through the sector. The recent appearance of the Splugorth in the sector alarmed many, especially after reports that they had found a wormhole leading into the region, but later intelligence leveled down the threat after information developed that the entry point was unstable.
Rodan Sector continues to evolve politically as with vacillating Zyganian presence in the region, the growing economic power of the Semeten Dominia, the continued Chukta threat, and the possible return of the Republik.

Worlds of Note:
Alebia---Human world, ex-slave world liberated from the Chukta. Currently a Zyganian protectorate.

Chenitz----Homeworld of the Chukta and the Chuktan Star Empire.

Solgar-Oregg/Orevv------Homeworld of the Coltoff, an orc-variant sept. Closest inhabited system to Chenitz and a vassal territory of the Chuktan Star Empire.

Vascard------Former slave world of the Chuktan Star Empire. Now a protectorate of the Semeten Dominia. Inhabited by an early Kisent offshoot.

Dan’al Cluster---- Cluster of several young stars and location of the Semeten Dominia worlds.
Afra----Founding members of the Semeten Dominia. Settled by a d-stranded expedition of Aluta humanoids.

Rustol----Homeworld of the Lizardmen Rustolans, founding members of the Semeten Dominia mutual defense pact between Rustol, Sendeshal VIII, and Afra.

Sendeshal VIII, Seradec System-----The military government of this Wolfen world, settled by dissidents from the old Wolfen Empire, has successfully held off, by diplomacy, Splugorth, Golgan, and Zyganian encroachment. Founding members of the Semeten Dominia.

Species prevalent in the Rodan Sector:
-Humans(Alebians, Zyganians)
-Wolfen(Sendeshallans)
-Lizardmen (Variant:Rustollans)
-Chukta(Native species)
-Orcs(Variant:Coltoff )
-Aluta(Afrans)
-Kisent(Vascari)

Note: The number of species with a history of being d-stranded in the sector(the Vascari, Alebians, Coltoff, Vascari, and Afra-Aluta) has suggested to some cosmologists that the sector may be subject to a higher than average random dimensional rifting phenomena. If reports of the recent Splugorth experience with an unreliable and erratic wormhole are correct, it would suggest a common connection. Charting the positions of the aforementioned species’ homeworlds in the Rodan Sector, against cosmic drift, would suggest a wandering dimensional flaw responsible for the d-strandings.


Sendeshal VIII(Anvil Galaxy)

“Martial pride and prowess is fundamental to the Sendeshallan psyche. Service is citizenship. So is audacity in thinking and tactics. Not DUMB audacity, but CUNNING audacity. That’s hard to cultivate, and sometimes harder to recognize.”

“After re-evaluating the military situation in the Rodan Sector it’s becoming more evident that having space supremacy only through Golgan castoffs and after tearing through the local aboriginal worlds like toilet paper, the Chuktans ultimately stood substantially less of a chance against the united Semeten Dominia worlds. Those planets would arguably have fought the Chukta to a standstill, even without Zygania to provide the heavy metal cleavers.”
----CCW CAF Intelligence Report, Rodan Sector, Anvil Galaxy Command.

Sendeshal is a relatively new power in the Rodan Sector, and a founding member of the Semeten Dominia, a defense pact of several worlds in the Dan’al Cluster, Rodan Sector. that formed to oppose the expansion of the rapacious Chukta, but which also proved unexpectedly effective at thwarting a Splugorth probe of the sector, and keeping the Zyganians from getting any expansion-by-annexation ideas in the area.
The Sendeshallans are Wolfen of a relatively hardline conservative faction hewing to the old ideals of the Wolfen Empire. They trace their origins to the following of a conservative Wolfen, Senator Dirkfang Sendesel, a former military man and outspoken advocate of military leadership who grew increasingly disenchanted with the direction the Wolfen Empire was taking(and was becoming increasingly unpopular with other Wolfen). They left during one of the periodic political shakeups on Motherhome when the Senator decided to retire to a ‘better adventure’ on the frontier rather than face what he saw as inevitable censure by his fellow senators, Some ninety thousand ‘Sendeselites’ followed their leader into effective exile to the Anvil Galaxy, where they eventually found an inhabitable world in the Rodan Sector. They colonized the eighth planet of the Seradec system and established a new society along martial lines; military discipline, regimented society, and service to the state, ruled by an Imperator High-General, supposedly after the traditional conquest camps of ancient Wolfen legions.
When Senator-General Sendesel died after over a hundred years’ service to his people, but not before seeing a successful transition of power to a younger successor, his people voted unaniniously to change their community’s(and planet’s) name to Sendeshal in his honor.
Sendeshal developed and slowly expanded. They deliberately isolated themselves from contact with their former homelands in the Wolfen Empire, and thus were late in getting word of the Empire’s partial annexation by the TGE. Given how the Sendeshallans’ ancestors left the WlfE, there was little sympathy for those left behind. Many saw vindication in the Founder’s political beliefs. Then, they returned to work carving out a new polity of their own.
Sendeshallan society is built along military lines, with officers as civil officials admonistering government. Though not as ‘tooth and claw’ fundamentalist as the Dadalane Jihad, the Sendeshallans are still geared towards a warrior creedo in nearly all aspects of life. Hardly any civil administration position is filled by anyone who has not served in an equivalent military position and proven themselves. Militia drills and military exercises are seen as community-building exercises. There is some whiff of Wolfen superiority complex in Sendeshallan attitudes, but it is tempered by the knowledge that the Wolfen Empire also had that belief...and found itself surrounded by enemies. Awareness that there might be enemies in the darkness of Rodan Sector helped keep Sendeshallan society wary and ready for danger, and they boast one of the largest number of trained men-at-arms in the sector. Without a ready enemy to pit themselves against, though, there were some fears that this trained and armed society might turn on itself, loyalty to its founders’ principles or not.

For a time, after their mutual discovery of each other, it looked as if the Sendeshallans and the reptilian Rustolans, another martially-organized species, would be sector opponents, the two dictatorships eying each other and marshalling their military forces for war. However, either because they saw the dangers to both their societies if the two equally-matched warmachines were to go at each other or because of the emergence of other common threats, the polites never engaged in combat. Instead, after a long period of ignoring each other, they found common ground in fending off pirates and other dangers. Later on, especially after they formed the Semeten Dominia to oppose Chuktan expansion, the two nations became good trade partners and have been holding joint martial games and exercises. There’s been remarks in the region of the ‘Union of Wolf and Lizard’, though no official talk of anything more political beyond the current trade and mutual defense treaties.
The Sendeshallans have the distinction of having stopped a Splugorth attack by unorthodox diplomacy; they greeted the Splugorth raiders with a ready army and an award for professional martial prowess during the Sendeshallan annual Arms of Liberty festival, that the raid threatened to interrupt. The Splugorth accepted the award and ran without firing a shot. Though the more jingoistic Sendeshallans were disappointed not to make a fight of it, more than a few Wolfen breathed sighed in relief that a bloody incident was avoided, and all Sendeshallans agreed it was worth some quiet laughter for long afterwards.
After such close calls, the Sendeshallans have been revamping their training regimens and looking to update their armed forces. The increase in trade traffic and trade treaties with their neighbors has led to a spike in Sendeshallan revenues, giving them more money and resources to spend on defense projects. Though the ongoing blockade of the Chukta coreworlds is a reource drain, it is also a spur to build up and improve the Sendeshallan military inventories and gives the armed forces a peer opponent to test themselves against. Awareness of Zyganian and possible renewed Golgan interest in the sector are also an incentive to upgrade Sendeshallan capabilities, and to strengthen ties between the Semeten Dominia worlds(this has been a cold drench to the Wolfen supremacists in Sendeshallan society).
Like the Rustollans, the Sendeshallans are increasing their trade with outsiders. Their facilitation of and safe conduct of interstellar trade through the Rodan Sector has improved their economy and put them, positively on the map for several trade-oriented organizations.
Besides their home system, the Sendeshallans claim several desert systems and maintain small outposts and navigation aides/life stations in them.

Note: The Sendeshallan Navy maintains three Wolfen Empire-vintage ‘legacy’ warships that accompanied the original colonization effort; the Legatus-class battlecruiser Lupus Rao, and two Lictor-class heavy cruisers. These units had been stripped of half theri armaments to allow them to accompany the disident expecition, and stuffed with additional supplies. Though powerful units even in their ‘downrated’ state, the three aging warships have often been sidelined by maintenance and logistics issues, a more thorough refitting being beyond the Sendeshallans’ current industrial capabilities(regular refueling and maintenance of the AM powerplants being the best that they can do, and even the AM supply is at the peak of their capabilities). It is hoped that interstellar trade, especially with the old Wofen worlds, can remedy the issue of spare parts supplies and allow the Sendeshallan Navy to properly overhaul their most powerful units.
The Sendeshallan Navy also maintains several squadrons of earlier-mark Gladius and Falx Supina aerospace starfighters, with a limited ability to build more, supplemented with WZT-produced Starcrosses acquired through contacts with the Zyganians.

Solar System(Seradec )
Number of Stars: 1
Types of Stars: Yellow Dwarf
Number of Planets: 9
-Gas Giant(Terven)---Large gas giant. Its proximity to Seradec means that its upper atmosphere is noticeably shedding a ‘halo’ of gases. The passage of its twelve small moons through this nimbus leaves noticeable ‘contrails’, leading to them being nicknamed the ‘Tadpoles’.

-Asteroid(Dosmasus)---This large asteroid/planetoid hosts a naval base. Seevral destroyers(Hunter-pattern) and cruisers(roughly equivalent to Warshields) are based here.

-Terrestrial(Renalle)---Small Mars-like world with a thin atmosphere. Long-term, Renalle would be a candidate for terraforming. Seevral small experimental stations and prospector settlements dot its surface.

-Terrestrial(Zaltrasc)---Earth-sized with a cold methane atmosphere, Zaltrasc is being developed as a resource world, with several surface settlements harvesting minerals and chemicals. Long-term, Zaltrasc would be a good candidate for terraforming.

-Gas Giant(Hemyx)---Huge Hemyx’s 14 moons provide an attractive source of minerals and habitat sites for Seradec’s small, but growing, Belter community.

-Terrestrial(Dayatryarc)---A virtually microscopic planet, it’s joked that its name is longer than the planet’s diameter. Dayatryarc’s craggy surface makes for tough exploring, its many crevasses, caverns, and rubble foelds lending it the nickname ‘warren-world’.

-Gas Giant(Gheswulden)---Small, but important as a source of helium-3 and other gases scooped from its atmosphere. Its single moon, Nuranda, is a base for harvesting operations. It is also the site of the Sendeshallan military’s small, but heavily guarded, antimatter production facility, that produces just enough AM to keep their navy’s three heavy warships refueled.

-Terrestrial(Sendeshal)---System lifeworld, arguably really a satellite of Coless.

-Gas Giant(Coless)---More of a particularly bright brown dwarf, Coless arguably makes Seradec a binary star system. Coless provides enough heat and light to sustain life on Sendeshal.


Planet(Sendeshal)
Life on Sendeshal is by no means easy, and the Wolfen who settled it would not have it any other way, seeing it as a challenge to their warrior spirits. The dim conditions do take some getting used to, the Sendeshallans haven’t radically adapted to this(though nightvision has increased to 60 ft range on average), and infrared goggles are still standard issue for everybody when venturing outdoors.

Type: Terrestrial
Diameter: 11,000 km
Gravity: 0.93 g
Temperature: Cool; similar to nrthern Alaska
Unusual/Special Features:
-Odd Orbit----Sendeshal describes a wide orbit around Seradec IX/Coless, rather than a solar orbit, making it arguably a moon of the gas giant. Sendeshal is also offset in the inclination of its orbit by some 70 degrees from the mean plane of Seradec.
-Craters---Sendeshal shows signs of past massive meteoric bombardments, with large craters dotting the planet.
-Rings----Several thin rings encircle the planet, possibly the remains of the source of the impactors responsible for the aforementioned craters, or a small satellite that got in the way of a meteor storm.
Atmosphere:
Dense, but breathable nitrox mix. Some claim the raw atmosphere has narcotic effects on non-Wolfen who visit the planet, leading to erratic and demented behavior, at least until they become acclimated to the local air. This might be attributable to airborne native microbes or microfauna suspended in the atmosphere, but the jury’s still out on whether it has any pronounced mind-warping effects. Part of the Splugorth expedition’s odd behavior has been blamed in part on allergic reactions to Sendeshal’s air.
Terrain:
Varied.
Sendeshal has also been discovered to have substantial deposits of crystalline Colal( Rifter #0-1). The Sendeshallans have found these crystals useful in manufacturing durable optical and laser systems.
Notable Mineral Concentrations:
- Chromium
- Zinc
- Mercury
- Lead
- Samarskite
- Nickel
- Sulfur
- Diamond
- Colal
Hydrosphere:
Wet; some 78% of Sendeshal’s surface is covered in open water.
Biosphere:
Sendeshal’s native ecosystem is thin at best, never rising above the fern and simple inverterbrate stage, and has been largely displaced by terraforming. The nature of available energy(dim light from distant Seradec and high infrared emissions from Coless) means that local plant life and adapted terrraforming organisms favor red dwarf planet life in having dark colors to absorb as much energy as possible.
Civilization:
Settled
Population:
5.8 billion Wolfen
Technology:
Galactic; the Sendeshallans possess contragravity technology and heavy weaponry as befits their martial organization. Their spacefleet is relatively small and focused mainly on system defense, with a few FTL vessels(no localy produced units heavier than a light cruiser, however, and they have had had issues with spare parts to maintain their three legacy capital warships). Interestingly enough, in addition to having a well-equipped army and small, but professional, space force, the Sendeshallans also have a well-developed wet navy.
Economy:
Agricultural---- The Sendeshallans have a WELL-fed military. Indeed, the army often deploys to the fields during harvest season, and many exercises involve protection or procurement of resources such as croplands, granaries, and food storage facilities.
Wealth:
Prosperous----Despite the challenges of their environment, the Sendeshallans have done well enough that they have surplus to sell to their neighbors and passing traders.
Government:
Military Dictatorship. An Imperator is selected by his or her merits by a Council of Generals. Somehow, though, a Sendesel or beneficiary of Sendesel influence always manages to get selected.
Law Level:
Lawful
Popularity:
Unpopular. Despite the various victories and beneficial treaies, there are increasing grumbles that the dynastic Sendesel clan has been in power too long and claiming too much credit for the work of others. Sendeshallans still revere the Founder with near-religious devotion, but many feel his several-times-removed successors have been coasting on political inertia and it’s time for some fresh blood in the upper echelons.
Stability:
Was Dynastic, with the scions of the Sendesel family dominating the leadership for centuries, but there have been increasing calls for change. The Sendesels contend that this call is a ploy by rivals to seize power fot themselves.

[taalismn]

Rustol (Anvil Galaxy)

“Rumors that the Rustolans worship an enormous invincible nuclear fire-breathing god-lizard are exactly that; rumors. The Rustolans just like nuclear weapons a lot, that’s all.
But best to be polite and not make them invoke the wrath of their gods, just in case.”

One of the independent worlds in the Rodan Sector that banded together to oppose the Chukta. Ruled by a surprisingly benign military junta, Rustol has also surprisingly survived a Splugorth raid, not through force of arms, but through diplomacy. Forewarned by their neighbors the Sendeshallans, who repelled the Splugorth expeditionary force by awarding them the planet's prestigious award for aerobatics, the Rustollans decided to emulate the Sendeshallans and held their own celebration to greet the incoming Splugorth, beaming greetings and holding fireworks displays in anticipation. The Rustolan festive greeting so intimidated the Splugorth Minions that they left without harvesting slaves or loot (though the presence and conspicuous activation of several thousand previously cloaked nuclear weapons platforms around the planet may have had something to do with that).
The Rustolans are a variant sept of Lizardmen. They claim to have come to their world through a ‘tunnel of winds’ thought to be a dimensional rift. Whether this was an accidental rifting, or deliberate, is unknown. The Rustolans retain only a basic understanding of magic and a somewhat more comprehensive knowledge of magical creatures. Instead, they have embraced technology, and got a helping hand(they acknowledge this) from ancient galactic merchants who came across the Rustolans early in their development/presence on Rustol. However, even from early in their history, military governments have run affairs on Rustol, dealing with inter-clan rivalries and factionalism, as well as natural disasters early on, and later with space pirates and local strong-arming galactic polities. Ultimately, regional factions joined their military commands into the current global junta.
The Rustolan junta remains in power in part because of a near-permanent state of military mobilization. With several larger and more belligerent neighbors in their cosmic neighborhood, there’s always the risk that the Rustol System might get rolled over. That threat from the skies has been plied into a virtually permanent state of martial law. In time and with the passing of generations, the regimentation and militarization of the population has become accepted as the natural order of things. As Rustolan military officers are expected to know logistics, communications, contingency planning, and proper team management, it’s actually worked out well for the ‘civilian’ portion of the population, though by now pretty much everybody wears a uniform and carries out some sort of military-associated duty-function.
The Rustolans have been compared, attitude-wise, to the GNErs of Rifts Earth---cheerfully martial, exceedingly well-armed, and reasonably trigger-happy. Nuclear weapons are almost a hobby with them, and nonproliferation is an alien concept to them. Even the fairly jingoistic Zyganians and the expansionistic Golgans are rather intimidated by the Rustolans.
The Semeten Dominia was a compact between Zygania, Rustol, Seradec, and several other worlds formed to oppose the Chukta, and it’s so far worked out pretty well for the Rustolans, who get to throw around nukes at the would-be galactic conquerers. They conduct some trade with the GNE/USA and other neighbors, but otherwise avoid galactic entanglements.

Besides their home system, the Rustolans have claimed three other desert systems in theri region of space as future resource sytems. The red dwarf and two brown dwarf systems have established outposts and small mining/geosurvey colonies and are regularly visited/patrolled by the Rustolan Navy.

Note: The Rustolans are Lizardmen adapted to living under heavy gravity; +2d4 to P.S. and is in this case considered Supernatural, -4 to P.P. , increase Spd x3 when offworld in lower gravity.
Appearance-wise they are more muscular and heavily-scaled. +2d4x10 to SDC.


Solar System( Ledmaeer)
Number of Stars: 1
Types of Stars:
-Blue Dwarf
Number of Planets: 8
-Terrestrial( Rustol) ---System lifeworld

-Gas Giant(Gottleb)--- Tiny gas giant. Its low gravity(for a gas giant) has allowed the Rustolan Navy to skim its atmosphere for gas relatively easily. It’s also rumored that the RN has managed to conceal several militarized floater platforms in its atmosphere, the platforms armed with interplanetary heavy missiles or drones.

-Asteroid(Muvus)---This planetoid was visited early via nuclear pulse rocket due to its eccentric orbit that brings it just inside of Gottleb’s orbit before sweeping back out to short of Acktaloyd’s. The Rustolans have fortified the planetoid into a strategic way-station and spaceship harbor.

-Terrestrial(Acktaloyd) ---Earth-sized planet with a heavy gravity. It has been considered to be a good prospect for colonization despite having an exotic atmosphere that requires equipment to be specially treated(or else plastics become embrittled over time). Acktaloyd has its own native ecology ( registers as Thin), so the Rustolans have taken some care not to inadvertently obliterate it while exploiting the planet.

-Asteroid(Alab) ---Another large Luna-sized asteroid, though one with a more regular orbit. Like Muvus, it hosts a Rustolan Navy outpost and an adjacent outworlder transit station..

-Terrestrial(Tweemar) --- Tiny Tweemar barely qualifies as a planet, but it also plays host to a large military installation; military cadets regularly come out to Tweemar to practice microgravity exercises. Tweemar is also known as ‘Washout World’ because many of the high gravity-acclimated Rustolan cadets find, despite previous practice, microgravity to be overwhelming and they wash out of military combat training to logistics and trades(the ‘civilian sector’).

-Asteroid(Dorell/Secus) --- This unusual planetissimal is actually two large asteroids orbiting one another close enough that they regularly touch, grinding scar-paths in each other to the point that they resemble a pair of scratched-up billiard balls. The jury’s still out on whether they’ll finally collide and combine or eventually fly apart from each other.

-Terrestrial(Aducus)--- A small rocky world with a thick methane-ammonia atmosphere. It’s rumored that after their strangely unsatisfying ‘victory’ at Seradec and the Rodan Sector, the Splugorth attempted to sneak back and establish a base on Aducus, but seem to have skipped extensive geological survey before building it atop the caldera of a dormant supervolcano. Details are fuzzy, but something happened and there was a massive explosion that wiped out the Splugorth base. The Splugorth haven’t been back since and are rather mum on the details of what really happened.

-Gas Giant(Torek) --- This enormous gas giant and its attendant moons is regularly visited and patrolled by the Rustolan Navy since it would make a good hiding place for pirates or Splugorth infiltrators. Torek is a regular ‘target’ for calibrating new FTL drive ships on their maiden cruises. The RN has several small automated stations on the moons of Torek to monitor such exercises and report in if anything goes wrong.

Planet( Rustol)
Type: Terrestrial
Diameter: 17,000 km
Gravity: Heavy; 3.9 g
Temperature: Temperate, if on the cool side.
Unusual/Special Features:
-Moons(6)---Most of these moons play host to lunar fortresses armed with heavy weapons
Trodhem Station is a giant facility on one of the moons that serves as a galactic trading post and way-station.
Atmosphere: Terrestrial nitrox mix, slighter denser than Earth-normal.
Terrain: Varied, but dominated by rolling hills and broad valleys.
Notable Mineral Concentrations:
- Cobalt
- Tin
- Scheelite
- Sapphire
- Titanium
- Graphite
- Fluorite
- Thorium
Hydrosphere:
Badlands; Rustol is rather dry, with little surface water, though with massive underground reservoirs(the locals learned early to drill wells to obtain the precious water).
Biosphere:
Moderate; the Rustolans almost wiped out their own ecosystem through over-exploitation, but managed to reverse the decline just in time. Their established ‘Eco Army Corps’ now manages the recovering ecology like a military operation.
Civilization:
Settled
Population:
6.9 billion Lizardmen
Technology:
Stellar Age---They possess M-factor technology, energy weapons, low-level FTL drive systems, and interstellar flight. They’ve traded for and copied a good number of other systems, such as low-end antigravity systems.
The Rustolans are avid nuclear weaponeers, and they have erected a very powerful, if not exactly galactic state-of-the-art, ‘asteroid defense system’ around their planet(one Terran observer has joked that ‘it’s as if the Rusties have heard about the ‘dinosaur-killer’ asteroid that hit Earth...and they don’t want it happening to their corner of the megaverse’). Others would describe it as a ‘nuclear curtain’ .
The Rustolans have a fairly large space fleet for a small world/polity, mainly consisting of local-space fusion-propelled or nuclear-pulse warships for system defense, a few low-end FTL light warships of native design(or heavy ‘nuke barges’ outfitted with FTL drives), and several warships of Galactic providence. The Rustolans have also been buying samples of Galactic aerospace fighters and other equipment to see what the ‘state of the art’ is, so they can develop their own equipment lines accordingly.
Economy:
Commercial---The Rustolans actually make very good money facilitating trade through their sector...just don’t threaten their worlds and you won’t get hurt.
Wealth:
Rich---Efficient economy, excellent commercial connections, and supposedly high-interest bank accounts in the right banking systems have made the Rustolans a heap-load of money. Much of this is put into defense, but there’s enough to provide the general populace with good utilities and services
Government:
Military Junta----Command experience is seen as equivalent to management experience.
Law Level:
Authoritarian, along paramilitary lines.
Popularity:
Ambivalent----Not everybody’s happy with the constant regimentation, the continual state of martial law, or the distribution of the wealth. There’s some grumbling about how not as much of the dividends from trade should be plowed into civic improvements is being so distributed. On the opposing side, there are those who feel that the government should be more aggressively pursuing an expansionist policy and fortifying more systems, maybe take a fleet into Chukta space and END that particular threat once and for all. Most call for change, though, is for the replacement of specific officials, rather than a replacement of the whole system.
Stability:
Dynastic---Many of the military officials in government are from distinguished military families or have benefitted from patronage of allies in the High Command. This patronage in some cases has been generational, with successive generations of officers helping out the families of loyal subordinates who have paralleled their superior officers in military and the government.


Afra----Home of the Afra-Aluta (Anvil Galaxy)

“Most anybody poking around the Senkouse system dawdles around the big ringed gas giant. Nobody bothers looking at the outer ice ball sitting on the edge of the local ort cloud, so nobody suspected that there was a whole civilization lurking out there. Of course, it helped that the Afrans did all their previous trading at a remove from their home system, and passed themselves off as elves or some other humanoid species. It took a damn tyranny bearing down on their neighborhood to bring them out from under their camouflage.”

Few were even aware that the Senkouse system was even inhabited until a squadron of starships claiming to be from the system arrived in the Ledmaeer system and requested to be allowed to join in on the negotiations between the Rustolans and the Sendeshallans to form a mutual alliance against the expanding Chukta Star Empire. The starships were crewed by Alutans(see Aliens Unlimited), a humanoid species with elven features, psychic abilities, and a preference for cold worlds. The new arrivals claimed to be the descendants of a d-stranded scientific expedition from another dimension. Lost in another universe, the ancient explorers were guided by their psychic abilities to a refuge on icy Afra, where they settled in and used their advanced technology(fortunately the large expedition carried a near complete copy-library of their techbase, and also carried gene-banks) to carve out a colony. There, under the frozen crust of Afra, the refugee Aluta made lives, growing in number, occasionally venturing forth to trade with passing spacecraft. In general, though, the new Afrans, advised by the clairvoyants among their number, lay low and did not engage with the rest of their stellar neighbors, at least until the time was right. The aggressive movement of the rapacious Chukta Star Empire into the Dan’al Cluster seemed to be the right trigger event, and the Afrans to offer their assistance to the mutual defense and action-intervention pact the Rustolans and the Sendeshallans were considering. With the new arrivals acting as if it were a done deal, the Rustolans and the Sendeshallans agreed to join with the Afrans to form the Semeten Dominia.
When the Semeten Dominia joined forces with the Zyganians to smash the Chuktans at Mazzerhine, Afran psychics and cyborg marines helped in the effort. Though lacking in the numbers that the Rustolans and the Sendeshallans are able to field, Afran psionics and advanced technology make up for the small numbers of ships and troops they have. The Afrans have also lent their psychic help to efforts to rehabilitate Vascard’s ex-slaves.

Solar System(Senkouse)
Number of Stars: 1
Types of Stars: Yellow Dwarf
Number of Planets: 4
-Terrestrial(Konkyll)----Enormous Konkyll is possessed of a heavy gravity(x4 Earth’s) , but only a trace atmosphere and a temperate surface. A few Alutan full conversion cyborgs and heavily grav-insulated prospectors have stood on its surface against its gravity. Verdict is still out on its prospects as a resource world.

-Gas Giant(Balthan)----This Jupiter-sized gas giant boasts a spectacular ring system.

-Gas Giant(Mondez)----Miniscule gas giant.

-Terrestrial(Afra)---- System lifeworld and the homeworld of the Afra-Aluta

Planet(Afra)
Afra lies on the outer edge of the Senkouse system. This may not have always been the case, though; the Aluta explorers found ample evidence to suggest that the planet once lay closer to the central star(or A central star; they haven’t discounted the possibility that the planet may be a captured wanderer), evolved warm life, and then went through several stages of extinction and re-evolution, or adaptation, as the planet became colder.
The Aluta established their colony settlements in massive ice and rock caverns under the planet’s frozen crust, and enough fissionables to power nuclear systems to give them just enough heat to melt ice, grow crops, and power their industry. The Afra-Aluta have worked to copy the fabulous ice-cavern cities of their original homeworld Rizza, but some differences unique to the emergent Afran culture have crept in.

Note: Adaptation to Afra’s heavier gravity has given later generation Afra-Aluta a bonus of +1d4 to P.S. and P.E.

Type: Terrestrial
Diameter: 14,500 km
Gravity: 1.6 gees
Temperature: Freezing. Average surface temperature is -221 F.
Unusual/Special Features:
-Rings--- Afra possesses several rings of ice and rock, the result of an ancient collision of small moons
Atmosphere: Thin and toxic Methane-Ammonia
Terrain: Varied
Notable Mineral Concentrations:
- Colombite
- Magnesium
- Cobalt
- Pitchblende
- Nickel
- Graphite
- Diamond
- Ruby

Hydrosphere:
Balanced; roughly 59% of Afra’s surface is covered in substantial amounts of water-ice.
Biosphere:
Surprisingly, Afra has a thin ecology of cryogenic life(ice-slugs, helium-mites, and sleet-scuzz), and a slightly ‘warmer’ burrowing ecology of life adapted to following thermal springs and deposits of radioactives. The early Aluta settlers had some problems with burrowing thermaworms undermining carved ice structures and even attacking the Aluta themselves, but they have managed to find means to control the problem .
Civilization:
Settled
Population:
678 million Afra-Aluta
Technology:
Galactic----The Aluta arrived on Afra with a fairly advanced techbase and they’ve managed to retain it, refine it, develop new technology to help them adapt to Afra’s unique environment, and they acquired some through trade. They have megadamage armor and bionics, psi-tech, and anti-gravity, as well as the understanding of FTL(and adapting their AG tech to Three Galaxies contra-gravity was a fairly simple matter). However, they lack the heavy industry to manufacture starships without a lot of lead time.
Now that their existence has been revealed, the Afra-Aluta are trading more openly with their neighbors. They are especially interested in Hartigal and USAn hardware to make up their losses and shortfalls in equipment.
Economy:
Agriculture----The focus of the Afra-Aluta economy continues to be on growing enough food to feed their population.
Wealth:
Could be considered Average/Stable. They have enough resources to support their population and forecast growth, with a little annual surplus for special projects. However, it took the Afra-Aluta considerable time and resources to build up their space force to the point they could confidently announce themselves and join in military ventures.
Government:
Psicracy---The most powerful psychics rule the Afra-Aluta through the use of their powers to the most benign effect for the benefit of society. This isn’t always easy to judge in the short term, but those psychics out to empower only themselves and their cronies tend to be detected and dealt with massed psychic power by the community.
Law Level:
Lawful
Popularity:
Popular. Most people support the current government. The psicracy hasn’t always sat well with everybody, though, especially those of weak psychic ability or those who have lost their abilities to severe injury(the cyborgs in particular) who feel disenfranchised.
Stability:
Long-standing. Despite some pains over the years, the Afran culture has remained solid.

[taalismn]

The Shalgal Expedition---Splugorth Raid Force
“At last they won an award; that has to count for SOMETHING.”
---Anonymous Krendelythh Minion, before the beheading of High Lord Shalgal

The Shalgal Expedition was an ill-fated Splugoth probe into the ‘soft underbelly regions’ of the Anvil Galaxy around the Dan’al Cluster.
Expeditionary forces of the Realm of Krendelythh were dispatched opportunistically through a wormhole discovered terminating in the Rodan Sector of the Anvil Galaxy. A probing force of three Servitude-class cruisers, a refurbished tribute battleship and several dozen transports was dispatched to test the waters, and acquire a sample of ‘merchandise’(slaves and loot), especially after early scout missions indicated several populated and defensively weak worlds in the target vicinity.
The Krendelythhan force proved inadequate to the task when their intelligence proved in error; at least two of the ‘backwaters’ were well-organized militarily and were able to stand off the raiders, the Sendeshallans with particular audacity, elan, and panache. Further misfortune was visited upon the raiders when the wormhole they’d been using proved unstable and unreliable. An effort to send several ships back through it resulted in a the catastrophic loss of those ships. Raid Master Krenden and his forces would be unable to be reinforced or recovered in any timely fashion via the wormhole. Though High Lord Shalgal, who’d recommended the expedition to Krendelythh, had no part in directing the other end of operations, the angry Splugorth Intelligence sent the dismembered councilor as part of the last supplies to reach the stranded expedition through the wormhole..
The Shalgal Expedition attempted to make its way back to Splugorth territory through normal space, but was on the wrong end of the Anvil Galaxy; besides regional powers like the Zyganian Empire, the antithetical Golgan Republik stood between them and the nearest Splugorth realm, that of Rynncryl, who was no friend of Krendelythh. Nevertheless, the expedition apparently made the attempt, hitting targets of opportunity along the way to acquire supplies, but also inciting a defensive reaction in response that cost the expedition an increasing number of vessels in encounters. Krenden and his ships would disappear soon afterwards from the radar of the regional powers, and there are unconfirmed reports of three Splugorth cruisers being destroyed in separate incidents, However, no hard evidence of these sinkings has surfaced and it is widely rumored that that survivors of the Shalgal Expedition have gone pirate, possibly still lurking around the Rodan Sector, or have dispersed into smaller bands and are attempting to sneak back unseen to Krendelythh’s kingdom.

[SolCannibal]

Was thinking that now might be a good moment to expand a bit on the info previously given on the worlds of Alebia (no one beside the Zyganians actually involved in that hot potato of a planet of broken people?) and Mazzerhine, that seems to have been an important factor in the multiple powers cited moving together against the Chukta.

[taalismn]

Was thinking that now might be a good moment to expand a bit on the info previously given on the worlds of Alebia (no one beside the Zyganians actually involved in that hot potato of a planet of broken people?) and Mazzerhine, that seems to have been an important factor in the multiple powers cited moving together against the Chukta.

Well, I'm already working on the Coltoff and Vascari worlds as they are two subject/ex-subject worlds of the Chukta Star Empire, and I may as well get in Chenitz, as the homeworld of the people who started so much trouble(I'm already laying out some of the hardware...based on old Golgan tech, but it has to be good enough that somebody with a modern frigate doesn't just roll over them). Basically, the Chukta Star Empire such demonstrate just how nasty and brutal even low-level MDC star weapons and technology can be when turned on SDC folks.

Yes, then Mazzerhine because it's the Chuktan Midway. It's Zyganian territory now, but with all-out war between Zygania and the Golgan Republik, every world matters.
Alebia should be a fast write-up stat-wise, but a dismal culture-read write-up because it's a 20/21st century Earth expy that's a cultural rape victim. Not a happy place because several generations have been treated to unrelenting terror and extreme cancel-culture.

Of course, depending on what random rolls generate, I may have a few surprises to work in....

[SolCannibal]

Was thinking that now might be a good moment to expand a bit on the info previously given on the worlds of Alebia (no one beside the Zyganians actually involved in that hot potato of a planet of broken people?) and Mazzerhine, that seems to have been an important factor in the multiple powers cited moving together against the Chukta.

Well, I'm already working on the Coltoff and Vascari worlds as they are two subject/ex-subject worlds of the Chukta Star Empire, and I may as well get in Chenitz, as the homeworld of the people who started so much trouble(I'm already laying out some of the hardware...based on old Golgan tech, but it has to be good enough that somebody with a modern frigate doesn't just roll over them). Basically, the Chukta Star Empire such demonstrate just how nasty and brutal even low-level MDC star weapons and technology can be when turned on SDC folks. .

The other two Chukta-conquered worlds alongside Alebia? Good to hear. Along with homeworld Chenitz that makes four, meaning there's a Chukta colony unacounted for from their apex size of five (still in their possession, as the Chukta Empire write-up, in page 1 of this thread, mentions they currently have two, though under blockade).

(As an aside, is there a write-up of the Chukta as a race, since it seems they are not a variant of a previously appearing one?)

Yes, then Mazzerhine because it's the Chuktan Midway. It's Zyganian territory now, but with all-out war between Zygania and the Golgan Republik, every world matters.
Alebia should be a fast write-up stat-wise, but a dismal culture-read write-up because it's a 20/21st century Earth expy that's a cultural rape victim. Not a happy place because several generations have been treated to unrelenting terror and extreme cancel-culture.

Of course, depending on what random rolls generate, I may have a few surprises to work in....

Generations? Oh, that explains much about the messed up condition of the people (that i was already asking myself about). We are talking human cattle, bred for domesticity among other things even, one might say.

Combined with the Chukta's inflated view of their actual potential and capacity for conquest, i'm starting to think that Mazzerhine was the first time the Chukta invaded a world that also had FTL resources (even if the core of those were in communications) and contact with other civilizations to help. Before that the Chukta got away with their abuse because most star polities didn't even know they and their dominated "vassals" existed, it seems....

[taalismn]

[

Combined with the Chukta's inflated view of their actual potential and capacity for conquest, i'm starting to think that Mazzerhine was the first time the Chukta invaded a world that also had FTL resources (even if the core of those were in communications) and contact with other civilizations to help. Before that the Chukta got away with their abuse because most star polities didn't even know they and their dominated "vassals" existed, it seems....

The Chukta can be found here: https://palladiumbooks.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=68194&start=1500

A better sense of the timeline of events in the rise and fall(?) of the Chuktan Empire will emerge with the descriptions of Orevv and Vascard.

[SolCannibal]

[

Combined with the Chukta's inflated view of their actual potential and capacity for conquest, i'm starting to think that Mazzerhine was the first time the Chukta invaded a world that also had FTL resources (even if the core of those were in communications) and contact with other civilizations to help. Before that the Chukta got away with their abuse because most star polities didn't even know they and their dominated "vassals" existed, it seems....

The Chukta can be found here: https://palladiumbooks.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=68194&start=1500

A better sense of the timeline of events in the rise and fall(?) of the Chuktan Empire will emerge with the descriptions of Orevv and Vascard.

That should give an interesting sense of perspective.


Also, reading on the Chukta - and checking on Alebia and Mazzerhine in the process - got me thinking of the other "prospective member worlds" of the Zyganian Empire and a little seed of an idea for the world of Oagaigar (though admitedly riffing a bit on Temus thematically, i guess).

[taalismn]

[

Also, reading on the Chukta - and checking on Alebia and Mazzerhine in the process - got me thinking of the other "prospective member worlds" of the Zyganian Empire and a little seed of an idea for the world of Oagaigar (though admitedly riffing a bit on Temus thematically, I guess).

Go for it with my blessing.
The Zyganians, besides having a crazy name, are fun because they can be underdogs one can root for, but also zealots one can fear and despise when they do things ' necessary to keep the peace'. They strive to present themselves as good guys and want to consider themselves a positive force. but realpolitik gets in the way.

Close real world analogues might be Iran, without the fundamentalism and the terrorism, or Pakistan, or Indonesia without the ethnic cleansing and the rampant corruption..or the Narn in Babylon 5. They're a post-colonialism nation trying to make up for lost time by asserting their cultural identity and flaunting their independence in their former overlords' faces...and they sometimes take it too far, which gets them in trouble(in B5, the Narn are initially presented as rather mean-spirited lizard-people and G'Kar's something of an a@$$hole beating up on poor Molari....but as the series goes along, the Narn become more amenable types and it's the Centari who are enslaving empire-lusters who had already exterminated one species...the Xon..before they even left their homeworld).

[taalismn]

Orevv---Homeworld of the Coltoff (Anvil Galaxy)
“It’s not an invasion or even THE invasion; it’s referred to, if at all, as a ‘misunderstanding’, a ‘miscommunication’, or a ‘little confusion’ before the Chukta star-brothers welcomed the Coltoff to join them in the Great Adventure to the stars. The Coltoff are valued partners on the grand scheme to bring order to the galaxy, and are honored to be chosen to benefit from the wisdom and energy of the senior Chukta. At least that seems to be the official line in the Coltoff public media.
It’s not entirely clear what hold the Chukta have on the Coltoff to keep them loyal. It has to be more than just generational habituation. Could be the threat of bioweapons, or antimatter, or relativistic bombardment pre-aimed to crack Orevv open that keeps the Coltoff in line. We just don’t know the details for certain. What is certain is that the negative publicity campaigns depicting the aliens---that would be us by the way----as essentially baby-eating interstellar monsters, isn’t helping the case for the Coltoff throwing off the Chukta and surrendering peacefully to us.”
---Star-Captain Blumane Skard, Sendeshallan Executive Army Intelligence for the Semeten Dominia

“Bah! What you call Mazzerhine let us see the cracks in the frog-lords’ fascade of invincibility and showed us they weren’t Great Ones of destiny! We could have used this opportunity to prize ourselves loose of our unwelcome ‘partners’. Instead those would-be lordlings in the High Command huddle closer to them, afraid of the frog-lords’ anger and of the retribution of the forces without!”
---Sath-Colonel Benej Nis’roth, ex-High Commad staff officer, pariah and exilee on Alebia.

Solgar-Oregg system is an inhabited system in the Rodan Sector. Orevv is the homeland of the Coltoff, a variant Orc species.. They also have the dubious honor of being the first system conquered by the emergent Chukta Star Empire in its rampage across the sector.
The Coltoff are characterized in being more intelligent than the baseline orc line, and have leathery growths on their faces and heads. On Orevv, orckind attained a fairly advanced technological civilization roughly equivalent, and in many ways surpassing, 21st century Earth. The Coltoff possessed advanced power generation systems, computers, nuclear power, interplanetary flight, and were experimenting with interstellar drives. They also had an extended cold war situation going on between various factions on their homeworld with nuclear and directed energy weapons in orbit ready to strike.
When the technologically more advanced Chukta arrived to conquer Orevv, the Coltoff set aside their differences to fight the aliens, turning their strategic weapons on the aliens. It was in vain; superior Chukta war-tech blew through the Coltoffs’improvised defenses and left Orevv wide open to attack .
Still, the final defense of Orevv with nucleonics might have left the Chukta with little to lord over in their victory had not the surviving Coltoff joint military commands offered them surrender, with conditions....
The Chukta allowed the surviving Orevvan governments to continue living and in nominally in power...but as puppets of the Chukta. Furthermore, the Coltoff would contribute proxy troops to the Chuktan expansion. Coltoff-piloted ships would spearhead invasion forces and Coltoff troops would be the face of the Chukta wave sweeping over other planets.
For a while it looked like this would work out for the Coltoff; supported by advanced Chukta technology and generalship, the arrangement conquered two additional worlds nearly effortlessly. As the senior co-belligerents(or subjects), the Coltoff seemed set to be useful junior members of a greatly successful rising galactic power. The Coltoff regardeded themselves as especially lucky when they saw how the Chukta treated the enslaved populations of Alebia and Vascard, and were determined that they would be so useful that the Chuktans would never think to see fit to reduce the Coltoff to similar states of servitude. Better to be a grindstone than to be ground up by the Chuktan Star Empire’s war machine.
Then came Mazzerhine. In the massive defeat handed the Chuktan Star Empire, the Coltoff saw multiple indications that there was a MUCH larger galaxy out there and that the Chukta were not the biggest fish around, and not even mid-range predators at that. However, those Coltoff officers who openly stated this found themselves almost immediately censured, ostracized, investigated, or worse. In a few cases, before Chukta inquisitors could get to them, Coltoff staff officers with unpopular opinions were ‘let off’by sympathetic colleagues with exile to ‘retirement’ on the slave worlds.
The Coltoff government fears that any flagging of their support for the Chuktan Star Empire will likely result in the extinction of their people, or at the least leave them wide open to the rage of other alien species seeking retribution for what the Coltoff did for the Chukta. Others fear that the time just isn’t right to attempt to win free of the Chuktan overlords and the loyalist Coltoff.

Current day, the majority of Coltoff regard themselves as fortunate and productive members of the Chukta Star Empire, but the fact of the matter is that only a very few in the high echelons of government have anywhere near the same rights and privileges as the Coltoff enjoyed before the Chuktan conquest. The general population is directed, herded really, by government decrees that orignate ultimately in Chuktan lordships. What the Coltoff eat(rationing is common), see(education and media are severely controlled and censured), where they travel, and even who they mate with, are managed by a bewildering welter of directorates, offices, and bureaus covering education, resource management, labor, health, internal security, mental hygiene, eugenics, and the like, with the ultimate goal of controlling and manipulating the Coltoff population into being loyal slaves in all but name to the Chuktan Star Empire. Conscription into the military offers a few perks and privileges unavailable to the common populace, but the military is under more intense scrutiny for loyalty, even as the officer corps has access to education and information to allow some of them to realize just how bad their people lost.
The only real advantage the Coltoff can claim is that they are aren’t as treated as abjectly as the Alebian human and Vascari-Kisent slaves brought in from offworld to do the sorts of labor even the Coltoff would balk at.

Aside from those on the Coltoff homeworld or serving aboard Star Empire warships, there are a few scattered enclaves of Coltoff spread among the remains of the imperial frontier. Most of these are soldiers who learned enough about their true situation and decided to desert, or exiles(especially officers) who were left behind to face the justice of the Star Empire’s enemies as it withdrew back to its core.

Note: Coltoff are orcs with a bonus of +1d6 to I.Q., +1 P.S. and +1d6 SDC.

Solar System(Solgar-Oregg)
Number of Stars: 1
Types of Stars: Orange Dwarf
Number of Planets: 4
-Terrestrial(Orevv)-------- System lifeworld and the homeworld of the Coltoff

-Asteroid(Lhi)----This metal-rich planetoid is slowly but steadily being cut up to supply Chuktan industry. It’s made the Chuktan lord-bull in charge very wealthy and influential back on Chenitz, but it kills Coltoff and imported human workers at a steady rate.

-Terrestrial(Phgru)----Tiny, rocky Phgru has been dotted with fission and fusion reactor farms feeding atom smashers to produce antimatter. Coltoff overseers and engineers manage the technical aspects, slaves(mainly human) handle labor(and die in appalling numbers due to radiation sickness), while the Chukta are in charge of the actual antimatter production and collection. The planet is heavily fortified against expected attack.

-Gas Giant(Ebreh)----Jupiter-sized Ebreh and its moon system are the site of much industry. The Chukta mine several of the moons and harvest atmospheric gases. There is also a naval station.

Planet( Orevv)
Type:Terrestrial
Diameter: 13,000 km
Gravity: 1.4 g
Temperature: Temperate, albeit on the cooler side.
Unusual/Special Features:
-Moons(5)---Orevv has several small moons. The two smallest were almost melted during the invasion, destroying the space stations that had been built on them. Two have been turned into orbital fortresses. The fifth and largest of the moons, Nayda, has become a fortifed fleet base. The High Command maintains a ‘resort’ for the gamilies of the General Staff on Nayda, but many in the know consider the facilities to be a hostage camp for keeping members in line with their families(including elders enjoying the lower lunar gravity for health reasons) under the gun of the Chukta and their zealots.
Atmosphere: Breathable terrestrial nitrox mixture, with a higher proportion of air pollutants from industry.
Terrain: Varied
Notable Mineral Concentrations:
- Antimony
- Cobalt
- Iron
- Pitchblende
- Fluorite
- Arsenic
- Thorium
- Quartz
Hydrosphere:
Roughly 63% of the planet is covered in open water.
Biosphere:
Moderate---- Over-exploitation of the environment has thinned out many species and caused extant extinctions. The invasion did conservation efforts no favors either. Most surviving species are farmed or domesticated.
Civilization:
Settled
Population:
8.9 billion Coltoff(orcs), 48 million Chukta.
Technology:
Interstellar Age. Could be low Galactic, but the Chukta have deliberately stunted Coltoff technological development to favor themselves.
Economy:
Industrial---- Most production capacity goes to supporting the Chukta empire.
Wealth:
Productivity-wise, the Coltoff should be at a Prosperous level of economic security, but socially the level is more akin to Depressed. The Orevv economy has been re-engineered to serve the Chukta. While the arcology-cities are clean, public transport runs on time, and there’s always enough to eat(if rationed and not always the same things), there hasn’t been a new civilian hovercar design introduced to market in over fifty years and styles haven’t changed appreciably in the same period of time.
Government:
Military Junta, and one more typical of the kind. The High Command weeds out any dissident elements in their population, quells any differing oponinion in the officer corps, and nervously listens to what the Chukta are saying.
Law Level:
Totalitarian. The State is in charge, the State is good, the State is all-knowing.
Popularity:
The majority of Coltoff go along with the State line because they don’t know any better; they’ve grown up with this all their lives. The older generations may grumble and occasionally wax poetic about how things were ‘back in the day’, but the smart ones are quick to follow thay up with a ‘but we willingly give up such foolish things for a stronger world and brighter future’. The not-smart ones get reported and a visit from the Mental Hygiene Bureau. Thing is, even with the mental conditioning, the Coltoff know things could be better, but are largely resigned to going along with the current situation, hoping that somehow, someday, things will get better.
A few pockets of dissent exist, small groups meeting and organizaing, trying to preserve their (banned) past, look past the censorship, and learn anything useful about their Chuktan overlords. A few Coltoff even extend sympathic help towards imported slaves and try to alleviate their suffering. However, all such groups are at risk of being caught by the authoritarian state watchdogs, if only to make quota on rooting out rebellious elements.
The majority of active disident activity is in the armed services, where the soldiers are more likely to be exposed to proof that the Chukta are running a tyranny and the war isn’t going as well as is publicly announced. However, the lower ranks are more ruthlessly culled of ‘defeatist’ activities. Higher-rank officers, if they’re lucky, are assigned or forced to retire(effectvely marooned) to pointless dead-end isolated positions by sympathetic fellow officers.
Stability:
Solid. Here the ancient orcish perchance for herd-like following strong leaders has unfortunately resurfaced in that the Coltoff are marching to the High Command’s tune. The recent turn of fortunes has only been turned around into a greater reason for everybody to stand together(with the Chukta) against the alien threat(the outsiders) that will inevitably be coming for them.

[SolCannibal]

The Coltoff are characterized in being more intelligent than the baseline orc line, and have leathery growths on their faces and heads.

Care for a little more detail on those growths? Not really drawing a solid image of the Coltoff here.

-Asteroid(Lhi)----This metal-rich planetoid is slowly but steadily being cut up to supply Chuktan industry. It’s made the Chuktan lord-bull in charge very wealthy and influential back on Chenitz, but it kills Coltoff and imported human workers at a steady rate.

This might be a somewhat decent place for sedition to brew, high attrition of personnel generating dissatisfaction, lots of space to move to and fro where one might set up hidden conversations, messaging & meetings, plus high-tech materias and equipment to work from. Plus the human workers here HAVE to be more quick-witted and lndependent than the average alebian slave to even function in such enviroment.

Unusual/Special Features:
-Moons(5)---Orevv has several small moons. The two smallest were almost melted during the invasion, destroying the space stations that had been built on them. Two have been turned into orbital fortresses. The fifth and largest of the moons, Nayda, has become a fortifed fleet base. The High Command maintains a ‘resort’ for the gamilies of the General Staff on Nayda, but many in the know consider the facilities to be a hostage camp for keeping members in line with their families(including elders enjoying the lower lunar gravity for health reasons) under the gun of the Chukta and their zealots.

This hostage situation, along with orc cultures predisposition to accept the authority of those they see as particularly intimidating/powerful, can go a long way to explain the General Staff's show of dogged loyalty/servitude toward the Chukta. Definitely something to be adressed by any prospective liberators or rebels in the future, for good or for ill. specially if a good chunk of the millions of Chukta in the system are concentrated in the moons.

(Also something those exiled/rogue coltoff officers could clue the Semeten Dominia to, might be said)

Wealth:
Productivity-wise, the Coltoff should be at a Prosperous level of economic security, but socially the level is more akin to Depressed. The Orevv economy has been re-engineered to serve the Chukta. While the arcology-cities are clean, public transport runs on time, and there’s always enough to eat(if rationed and not always the same things), there hasn’t been a new civilian hovercar design introduced to market in over fifty years and styles haven’t changed appreciably in the same period of time.

A stealth hint of the occupation's duration in stagnation, perhaps?

[taalismn]

The Coltoff are characterized in being more intelligent than the baseline orc line, and have leathery growths on their faces and heads.

Care for a little more detail on those growths? Not really drawing a solid image of the Coltoff here.

I picture them as having a lot of leathery facial and forehead creases...not Klingon 'lobster-onda-head', but rougher-textured permanent brow folds and mottled skin...same for the forearms and back of the hands...like thick rough callus you might get on your knees from a lot of kneeling or irritation. Also they have a rather gray complexion that looks downright pasty in the pollution back home.

Yah, they're East Germans under Soviet rule.....right down to being forced to make do with Zils and Trabants when they could be building Porsches and Daimlers.

[SolCannibal]

The Coltoff are characterized in being more intelligent than the baseline orc line, and have leathery growths on their faces and heads.

Care for a little more detail on those growths? Not really drawing a solid image of the Coltoff here.

I picture them as having a lot of leathery facial and forehead creases...not Klingon 'lobster-onda-head', but rougher-textured permanent brow folds and mottled skin...same for the forearms and back of the hands...like thick rough callus you might get on your knees from a lot of kneeling or irritation. Also they have a rather gray complexion that looks downright pasty in the pollution back home.

Yah, they're East Germans under Soviet rule.....right down to being forced to make do with Zils and Trabants when they could be building Porsches and Daimlers.

And with the Zyganians, who are the largest member in the "outsider alliance" at the moment prioritizing a number of other problems instead of breaking the detente with the Chukta that matter could extend itself for some years or more still - if no other power intervenes to shake up things further, that is.

(That said, the Afra have a much larger proportion of psychics than the other member-nations, so they might potentially be of considerable help in dealing with the matter of the spiritually broken population of Alebia)

[taalismn]

Alebia(Anvil Galaxy)
“About the only thing the Chukta didn’t do to the Alebians was eat them...at least not directly....instead they fed them to imported predators who the Chukta would then eat.”

Alebia is an Earth-like terrestrial world inhabited by humans. Like many ‘early period’ human-inhabited worlds. the inhabitants believed that they had naturally evolved on their planet, their true origins lost in the mists of time. They were also unaware of other life in the cosmos, much as they liked to speculate about it. In Alebia’s case, unfortunately, they found out the truth, in the worst possible way.
Alebia was the second world conquered by the Chukta Star Empire. Unlike the technologically sophisticated Coltoff who arguably had enough firepower to force a standoff of sorts and negotiate even slanted terms of acquiescence to the Chukta, the humans with their 20/21st century technology didn’t even offer much SPORT to the Chukta who came out of space unannounced and slaughtered what scant resistance the Alebians tried to throw up. Efforts to conditionally surrender to the alien invaders failed, because the Chukta saw no point in negotiating with animals, as they regarded the humans(there’s also been some speculation that the Chukta nursed some festering resentment from having to negotiate at ALL with the Coltoff, feeling it below them to treat with inferiors, and took out that frustration on the even weaker Alebians).
After casually wiping out the armed forces of Alebia, the Chukta settled in to mold the cowed humans into slave labor to feed the Chuktan imperial warmachine.
Just about everything that could be done to break the Alebians’ moral was done to them. Culture was outlawed. International travel and even inter-community movement banned unless it was approved of by the alien overlords. The global population was forced to undergo evaluations of worth; those who had no value to the new Masters were executed. Those who resisted were publicly executed as a lesson to anybody else who might have ideas of resisting. Random humans were hunted down and killed. Whole continents were isolated from each other, and populations segregated to the point that many believed themselves the only surviving humans on the planet. The technically adept were driven into giant underground factory complexes and set to work producing war material. Those on the surface would work farms and other facilities for the benefit of the new Chuktan Masters. this would be the pattern for Alebia for the next several generations under alien occupation.
Alebians live like organic robots; they live in communal barracks with no privacy, eat in communal dining facilities, go to work in schedule, return from work, eat, rest and repeat. They are bred like cattle, give birth in automated facilities and are immediately separated from their offspring, who are subsequently raised in heavily automated crèches, and raised indoctrinated to obey the Masters. If they get sick or are injured, minimal medical care is given; most are left to decline and die, or are euthanatized as surplus and replacements ordered up. If the Alebian in question has special skills, aptitudes, or is otherwise of some greater interest to the overlords, they may receive special medical care, as long as they quickly return to work. A rare few are allowed extra privileges and act as overseers or weasels to ferret out any remaining freethinkers among the other humans. Depending on the region and the presiding Chuktan overlord, most humans are conditioned to instinctively react with abeyance to the mere sight of a Chukta. In other more isolated slave communities, the humans don’t even know what a Chukta looks like, only dealing with their machines, Coltoff middlemen, or human wardens(this has the added security feature of readily identifying any would-be escapees who reach other zones; their reactions to the sight of Chukta shows them up).
Unlike the Coltoff-orcs, the Alebian-humans are not considered worthy enough to serve as vassal soldier-cannonfodder. Instead, Alebians are used offworld as brute manual labor and shipped in consignments to offworld hellholes like the reactor farms of Phgru and the heat-lands of Vascard where they died in droves.
This was the world that a Cosmoknight came across, soon after Mazzerhine. The Chukta had steamrolled Alebia; the cosmoknight sandbagged the Chukta , single-handedly fighting her way aboard and through the Chuktan dreadnought in orbit, and triggering its antimatter powerplant to explode catastrophically. What followed was a week-long slaughter of Chuktan and Coltoff forces over and on Alebia, that sent the survivors into a panic. Arriving on the heels of the cosmoknight, a Zyganian taskforce found the system in chaos, the remaining Chukta forces unable to put up an organized resistance of any importance. The Zyganians landed in force, mopped up those Chuktans who hadn’t fled, committed suicide, or surrendered, and then discovered the global trauma that was Alebia.
Under the Zyganians, the Alebians became a massive psychiatric care case. The Alebians simply don’t seem able to show enough initiative or courage to try taking care of themselves as a global society. The Zyganians have been training and repurposing the Alebians to at least keep the factories and facilities keeping utilities running and food coming into the communities, but, as one Zyganian put it, ‘it’s like reprogramming industrial robots....you might get them to play sosc, but never get a conversation out of them or spontaneous celebration”. Even the relatively-educated Alebians freed from the factory pits act overwhelmed and horribly deferential to the new ‘masters’, as they see the Zyganians. And of the few Alebians who will actually -talk- to the newcomers, the Zyganians have discovered that most of them are Chuktan sympathizers with their own dark agendas.
Alebia faces an uncertain future, especially with the Zyganians’ conflict with the resurgent Golgan Republik heating up. The Zyganians would like to withdraw forces from garrisoning Alebia and deploy them more meaningfully on other fronts, but there’s the fear that if left unsupervised and unprotected, the planet will collapse into a massive humanitarian crisis, or be snapped up by some other less scrupulous group. Turning the whole mess over to the Semeten Dominia would put them too into a position of being over-stretched. Zyganian social workers who have come to genuinely care for their charges refuse to abandon their responsibilities and are petitioning their government to remain committed to protecting Alebia. Meanwhile, officials in the Zyganian government are looking at whether other friendly polities and organizations could help them with the ‘Alebia Issue’.

Solar System(Maeve)
Number of Stars: 1
Types of Stars:
-Yellow Dwarf
Number of Planets: 9
-Asteroid(Colcus)----Named for an Alebian fire god of antiquity, this sun-grazing planetoid is irradiated and lifeless.

-Terrestrial(Calsca)----A large ‘super-venus’ with a dense, turbulent atmosphere. The Alebians pre-invasion were dropping heatshielded space probes into its atmosphere.

-Terrestrial(Alebia)----System lifeworld

-Terrestrial(Demik)----Heavy gravity(x4 g) keeps this huge terrestrial planet from being safely visitable with the Alebians’ modest technology. Its thin atmosphere shows a surface pockmarked by volcanic chains and ancient lava flows and giant frozen seas. Huge dust storms can cover the planet for months on end.

-Terrestrial(Shavra)----Large, but cool, with modest gravity and a dense atmosphere, Shavra attracted Alebian attention because spectrographic analysis of the planet’s atmosphere revealed gases associated with metabolic processes. Under its cloak of thick atmosphere, Shavra actually supports a rich ecology of microorganisms; chemotropes living off ‘black smoker’ volcanic vents. Shavra would have become a target for an epic long-duration manned mission from Alebia had the Chukta not invaded. The Chukta briefly surveyed the planet and considered harvesting the biomass ocean covering much of the planet, but shelved the plans in favor of easier resource extraction from their slave worlds.

-Gas Giant(Dilon)----Large gas giant with 7 moons. The Alebians sent several flyby probes by Dillon pre-Invasion.

-Gas Giant(Vaythar)----Huge gas giant with 16 moons. Another gas giant that fascinated Alebian astronomers. The Chukta set up a mining facility and gas scooping operation on one of the moons, and may have been planning to build an antimatter-production plant, but before they could, the cosmoknight destroyed the facility and the warship that was then docked with the fuel refinery.

-Exotic(Lumunai)---- The Alebians had long been fascinated by this small bright object orbiting between Vaythar and Telphan and have wondered what it was. There was even speculation that it was an artificial artifact such as an alien sapcecraft. It took the Chukta with their more advanced instruments to figure out that it was a fragment of a ‘ghost star’ or white dwarf material that somehow has not expanded into vapor and evaporated.

-Terrestrial(Telphan)----Small icy planet on the far edge of the Maeve system. The Alebians had only brief glimpses of this world through telescopes, and had sent a space probe to fly by it. The probe was in the approach course of the Chuktan conquest fleet and they destroyed it.

Planet(Alebia)
Type: Terrestrial
Diameter: 12,200 km
Gravity: 1.01 g
Temperature: Temperate, but is currently suffering from a slight greenhouse effect due to industrial pollution and still lingering effects of the Chukta invasion(burning cities and destroyed nuclear facilities)
Unusual/Special Features:
-Moons(2)---Pre-invasion, the Alebian space program put manned landers on both of them and were beginning construction of a lunar base. The Chukta destroyed the base and established their own fortified facility. This base was partially destroyed by the cosmoknight, and the Zyganians finished off any resistance befire building their own base near the ruins. This base cotinues to be the main offworld headquarters for the expanded garrison protecing the Maeve system.
Atmosphere: Breathable nitrox mix
Terrain: Varied
Notable Mineral Concentrations:
- Sapphire
- Magnesium
- Lead
- Tin
- Borax
- Platinum
- Nickel
- Samarskite
Hydrosphere:
70% of Alebia is covered in open water.
Biosphere:
Was Verdant. Has since slipped to Dense. The Alebians weren’t the only victims of Chuktan greed and management. Some regions have become wastelands or toxic ecologies, thanks to industrial pollution and introduced xeno-life.
The Chukta overlords set aside some choicer regions and set up the means to isolate them from the rest of the planet, to preserve their wildness for their own enjoyment. Others set up exotic game preserves on their new plantations; the alien species introduced there have in many cases gone feral and now pose a danger to the native Alebian life(and, in some cases, unwary offworlders).
Civilization:
Settled(Conquered)
Population:
4 billion humans(down from 7.8 billion), 5 million Coltoff, 500,000 Chukta
Post-Liberation, currently a little less than 4 billion humans(mass starvation was a problem), 18,000 Coltoff, and 860, 000 Zyganians
Technology:
Information Age prior to the invasion; the Alebians had sent landers to the moons, space probes as far out as the outer planets and a manned flyby mission to the nearest planet.
Post-Invasion, the general level has dropped to early Industrial Age. Advanced technology exists only in the Chuktan-run facilities and is off-limits to understanding by the Alebians who work in the forced-labor factories.
Economy:
Industrial---Most Alebians work in factories in the service of the Chuktan warmachine. Under the Zyganians, some effort was made to attempt to shift the focus to agriculture, to allow the Alebians to feed themselves.
Wealth:
Squalor & Poverty----The human population lives on what is rationed out to them. The more technically-trained Alebians can be put to work repairing machines like transports and farm machinery to keep things going, but taking the initiative is seemingly beyond them.
Government:
Pre-invasion, was a patchwork of nationalist states. Was effectively an Alien Oligarchy under the Chukta. Now effectively a Federalist Welfare Agency- or Bureaucracy-run state administered by the Zyganians.
Law Level:
Minimal. The Zyganians have imposed martial law where they can, but in the majority of regions, they’re simply outnumbered by the zombie-like Alebians. If violence broke out among the Alebians somewhere away from direct Zyganian observation, it’s unlikely the authorities would learn of it until it was well past too late.
Popularity:
Unpopular, at least among the conscious residents. The Zyganians are creeped out by the ‘zombies’ or ‘sleepwalkers’. The Coltoff exiles are ambivalent about being stranded on a slave-world, especially one that see as ‘damned’. And there are a few conscious, but Chukta-sympathizer/worshipping Alebians who want the Zyganian usurpers out and the Chukta Masters back.
Stability:
Difficult to ascertain; the sleepwalker Alebians exhibit little sense of unrest, but without supervision, the whole planet could fall apart, or fall into the wrong hands.

[SolCannibal]

Now that's a planet you definitely do NOT want a Mindolar infestation to ever happen indeed....

Anyway, even without the discomfort of the eerieness of "zombieland" as a whole, the Zyganian garisson has to deal with the logistics issues with what to amounts to 16% of the numbers of the "old management", while having less 0,3% of the "original personnel" around to even explain to them how the old system "worked" and what goes where so to speak, for them to effectively unravel and reorganize things in a halfway decent manner.

I really, really do NOT envy their current situation at all.