Resurrection Forum for latest discussion and private empire subforumsWhat is Aurora?Long ago, during the Creation, the gods set the cosmos in motion and lit the stars. As powerful as they were, they were not all-powerful, nor all knowing. As such, they created servants- humans, the diligent laborers of the Gods. We traveled the stars, built the gateways, and worked the worlds of the cosmos in their name, and in return, they made our lives comfortable and plentiful. Eventually, however, conflicts arose between men and the gods. In this conflict, the gods built new servants, titans, which would guard their great temples, and wielded great and terrible power, blotting out stars and crushing entire planets.
Finally, the Dissidents discovered a weakness; it was the most secretive of conspiracies, and no one individual knew the entirety of this secret. To this day, all that is known for certain is that it was put into action after many, many years of conflict, and it mortally wounded all of the gods. In the throes of death, the Gods mustered the last of their power and cursed mankind. This curse did not distinguish between Loyalists and Dissidents, and they promised that this sickness would ravage the galaxy for no less than 10,000 years as a penalty for the blasphemy.
Soon the galaxy was quiet again. The only survivors of the mighty and terrible war were a few tiny enclaves on the fringes. A colony of the Dissidents, and a similar group of Loyalists, each surviving in their own Arks- gigantic space-stations, providing secure habitation for 1,000,000,000 survivors.
They have lived there for 10,000 years, waiting for the day they can leave and reclaim their birthright. Now, the long-sealed gates have opened, and the two factions can now once again reach real soil, and grow once more. Both sides hope to regrow, yes. But they know that somewhere out there, there is a foe that there can be no peace with. They still have the tools of the gods- the secrets and fundamental knowledge of the universe is still accessible to them- but they are weakened and will be forced to climb back to the stars from the bottom of the gutter.
-----------------
In this campaign, the singularity occurs sometime in the next hundred years or so. Highly intelligent AIs emerge (and merge and split and what have you, forming a kind of amorphous godhead) and unify and direct humanity. They develop TN technology and quite a few other things, most notably Stargates. In the same way that Termites account for more biomass than humans do (thus, from a certain point of view, being more successful), humans remained a powerful force in the universe despite the hegemony of the benevolent AI. Sooner or later, a dissident group did invent what was effectively a computer virus and used it in a war for independence from AI control.
The AI and the loyalists fought back. When it became clear they would be defeated, the "deities" were in fact somewhat accepting of the whole thing. However, the Loyalists, shocked at the loss of what were effectively thought of as gods even then, developed a nanomachine virus which would kill off humanity non-specifically, hoping to contain it to territories controlled by Dissidents. This effort failed immediately.
The AIs created sanctuaries above two distant planets, and made sure that both sides would survive the cataclysm. They decided, in their own ineffable way, to see that neither those loyal to them nor those opposing them would have an advantage in the following conflict. Perhaps it was a final experiment they orchestrated to see which one was more deserving, or perhaps they chose to see that their existence did not ultimately lead to the destruction of all human cultures. The AI did discover that in about 9500 years, the nanites would start to break down due to the half-lives of their internal radioactive power supplies, so they warned the humans how long to stay sealed away.
The humans in the Arks survived for hundreds of generations, retelling the story of their sequestration. When the game takes place, the upper echelons know more of the real history, while the lower ones think of it more in a mythical sense.
-----------------
In game terms; there are two empires, the Loyalists and the Dissidents. They start off in equal positions. There are no NPRs, except for Precursors. There are jump gates on all JP... but jump drives are useful as tactical elements. Both sides start out with all techs costing less than 2,000,000 RP, putting this game firmly in the late-game stage, but no ship or component designs, nor any advanced infrastructure.
They do each have one huge space station, the Ark, equipped with life support for 1 billion settlers. Each side also has enough CI to employ 2 billion people; note that they are using pretty late-game technology, meaning that mines and CF will be extremely productive, as will most other things. To keep things fair, I will roll HW minerals three times, and take the highest score for each mineral and set that to be the minerals for both homeworlds... but I am going to halve accessibility, to give you reason to seek out new life, civilizations, and mining opportunities.
I'm using real stars, but the two opposing forces will be distant from one another in real space. If anyone discovers Sol, something interesting will happen.
There will not be significant differences between the sides to start with; they will get 50 VIPs to start, which will definitely include a variety of researchers which will have differing specialties, but given the high starting tech level, that will be pretty trivial. By the time you want to start researching really expensive things, you'll have had plenty of time to get more scientists.
-------------------
So, who wants to be a member of the Dissident Council and who wants to be on the Loyalist Council? Your duties will be, I will ask you questions, and you will voice your opinions. Then each side's NPC leader will make decisions. I am only marginally knowledgeable about this game, so teach me what you like in your council discussions... but even people who don't know anything about this game will be able to contribute. If you want to design ships, please do so; you can simply give yourself all techs costing less than 2000000 RP to know what is available, and I can upload copies of the database for review as well.
I will password both sides, so if needed, players can do more involved battle-planning by downloading the DB, setting ship orders, and sending it back. I will only do this for special situations, as it would otherwise take a lot of time. If things get involved, I will appoint Council Chairs and/or Admirals who will regularly take care of each sides' tactical actions.
Discussion can take place here or within faction threads; Otherwise, players can send me PMs to determine the course to take. If we get a large population, I may make locked, private council forums on NWP, but that will only be important if this gets very large...
I'll be starting the game this weekend, but it will no doubt continue for a very long time. If people have suggestions for some simple changes to the starting conditions, let me know, and we can adjust things. Ideally, there will be a little while for both sides to expand before they contact each other.
One last thing, I'm counting on people being honorable. Don't double-cross people or try too much out-of-game backstabbery. That said, I will play out intelligence actions, so in-game backstabbery is A-OK. Just don't hack emails or PMs or anything over this.
So, for this thread, please post if you're interested in participating, watching, or acting as a neutral third party. This isn't exactly a forum game, since it's formally being played in a real computer game, so I am putting it here for the time being.
-------------
Councilors and Officers (Provisional):
LOYALISTS:-USEC_OFFICER (Councilor)
-Jerick (Councilor)
-Sheb (Councilor)
-Hostergaard (Councilor)
-Gidoran (Naval Officer)
DISSIDENTS:-Flying Dice (Councilor)
-Karlito (Councilor)
-Jikor (Councilor)
-Andrea (Councilor)
-ThatBlondeGuy (Councilor)
-Sirus (Naval Officer)
To be determined:
