Worldbuilding

My world doesn't have many mountain ranges in a way that's easy to draw. Rather, the whole center of the continent is raised like one big mountain island.^1^

I'm drawing a map of an area about 200x219 km, to give an idea of the scale i'm working with, ranging in height from sea level to about 50km above that.

Single mountains or mountain ranges like the ones in the maps in The Lord of the Rings aren't too hard, but when one side of a mountain covers the entire map i don't know how to show that.

A map of Oz on Wikipedia has little hair-like lines to show elevation at Happy Valley (bottom left). Is there any other strategy for showing height differences on this scale?

^1^ This is because instead of tectonic plates, it has something like geophysical cooling that forms mountains. I won't get into that just now.

One of the three islands nestled in the outer seas of Tanzanite. Zeogard is a mysterious island nestled further south of the continent.

The environment is a large, bioluminescent mushroom land where it's more or less permanently nighttime. You'll know your close when it suddenly shifts to the dark. Best be careful wandering around carelessly if you can't handle shrooms.

Species include Spore Spiders and the Kiwisee; which are giant Kiwi Birds that roam the land. Not many major factions originate from here but there's some native life like crabs that blend in with the shroom caps and anthropormorphic flightless birds.

Part of the reason the Allied Worlds is so successful is the arrangement of the planets with respect to one another.

Welkinstead is a hot Neptune. Yih and Newhome are Welkinstead trojans. Sweetwater is at the 3rd Lagrange point of the Focus-Welkinstead system.

The planets of the alliance are at fixed distances from one another, making logistics easier. They're also a celestial extension of a "wide" empire. The theory goes that empires that are "wide", bigger from east to west compared to north to south, are more stable because they consist of a similar range of climates, resulting in similar cultures that are easier to keep together. "Tall" empires, that are bigger north to south, span a wider range of climates, have a less cohesive range of cultures, and are harder to keep together.

Similarly, the four planets in the alliance are all the same distance from Focus, receive the same amount of sunlight, and have the same year length. The two non life-bearing terrestrial planets, Newhome and Sweetwater, can be terraformed using similar techniques.

Mermaid.live doesn't let you download your diagrams without making an account, so I just NFT'ed it.

Here's an update to the YAP frame format. Ansible links are extremely low-bandwidth. No quantitative data rate yet, but let's just say you're limited to text if you want real time communication.

If two ansibles are to communicate, they must have wafers shaved from the same crystal of tailstone, and any ansible with a wafer sourced from the same crystal can listen in. Encryption is handled out of band, with a one time pad shared between the operators of the endpoints before turning the ansible on for the first time. The OTP is used to exchange a symmetric key used to encrypt future frames.

After turning on and establishing a secure connection, other negotiations take place, including frame length and time slot. YAP uses Time division multiple access, so the sender can be known from the time slot when a frame is received. I'd expect a K2 civilization to have sufficiently accurate clocks.

ARF (Aggregation and Reassembly of Frames) handles things like bundling links together for more bandwidth as well as allowing simultaneous transmitting and receiving (full duplex). If you want full duplex, both ansibles need two wafers, one for receive and the other for transmit, and the ARF tag helps keep track of that. It also aids in resuming a communication from an interruption. Data transfers can take a long time, on the order of days to weeks for large files like fabricator schematics, so you want the link to be failure tolerant.

The biggest chunk of the header is the handoff tag. This tells the ansible what the higher layer protocol is. Monkey foxes have been computing for 95 thousand years by the time of first contact, so they have a lot of layer 3 protocols, though YIP (Yinrih Internetworking Protocol) v1 and v3 account for most of the traffic prior to first contact, with Terran IP traffic finding a place afterward.

Last comes a checksum. It's physically impossible for data to be corrupted while traversing the Underlay, but the electronics used to sense the Science™️ going on with the wafer can misread things. There's a persistent superstition that the Underlay is actually Hell, and that the yinrih have been routing their FTL comms through the realm of the damned. Garbled packets are said to be the work of damned shades desperately seeking sensation of any kind. The Bright Way (who incidentally discovered tailstone and the Underlay and originally built out the star system's interplanetary telecom infrastructure) vehemently refuses to discuss the matter and strongly discourages the faithful from bringing the topic up.

Hopefully it's still legible.

I've recently made a bunch of friends interested in playing Pathfinder 2e, so I'm building a custom 1hr One-Shot for 6 players to learn the game (yes I know that time is a lie). The lore is amazing! It's got roughly 8 thousand years of history to create the current world of Golarion. The history is deep and rich, and some of that is because it's based on real world cultures and histories. There's obviously fantasy too, but a lot of nations and empires mimic real history, so it's very believable.

Nothing to do with anything I'm working on. The thought just occurred to me this morning. It could have a huge range of vocalizations.

A shorter barrel length means portable guns would be less affective as well. They could use piercing melee weapons like swords but they'd have to be more strategic where they strike. Of course with sufficient tech or magic these limitations could be overcome.

A sign placed on the door of an Earth apartment rented by an family of expectant monkey foxes. The Outlander text at the top of the page is glossed below.

kr rcdq brrCD
kr     rcd-q   br-rCD-0
2.IMP sire-PL SUB-brood-ACT'
Warning! Brooding sires

The word written in maroon /short high strong growl, chuff/ is literally the imperative form of the 2nd person pronoun, and can be translated "hey you!" But especially when written alone, it acts as a generic warning or attention-getter, "watch out" or "beware".

There is English text (in Comic Sans) below the Outlander:

WARNING: BROODING SIRES

Great news, we're expecting! Please do not come near our nest. Humans this includes YOU!

Hatching day is August 13th. Come by after and say hello to the new kits!

There is a blood splatter in the lower right corner.

It takes about 144 days for yinrih kits to hatch. Because yinrih only get one shot at parenthood, expecting fathers are compelled by instinct to guard their nest, and will attack other males who get close. This is one of the reasons why the medical profession is mostly women, as females do not trigger the paternal defense response.

Yinrih can smell the pheromones produced by expecting sires and know to stay away. Humans can't, so yinrih living on Earth or near large human population centers usually put up signs like this on their door to warn salesmen, delivery drivers, and neighbors.

Usually a dam (mother) will politely shoo away any hapless humans before they can get within mauling distance, but sometimes things just line up and a human gets seriously hurt.

The national symbol and motto of Partisan Territory.

qBF khj Gkq pan sgsf Gkq
qBF khj   Gkq-∅     pan sgsf  Gkq-∅
sky empty stand-ACT 1pl alone stand-ACT
The skies are empty, we are alone.

Y'all seemed to like the genre of in-universe notices hastily thrown together in a word processor, so here's another one.

While the yinrih's nonsapient ancestors were social, they did not engage in social grooming. Yinrih pups give and receive gestures of physical affection such as kisses (from sires and dams) and tail thumps (from litter mates), but as they mature they begin rejecting these gestures. Deliberate physical contact between adults, including between sires and dams in a childermoot, is vanishingly rare. Of course medical exams are an exception, and there is a gesture similar to an embrace, where one person presses the top of his head against the chest or side of another, that indicates deep gratitude or relief, but we're talking "you literally saved my life" levels of gratitude.

Not gonna lie, some of this is me craving the attention. I'm only human. But I also genuinely want feedback, and the more attention a post gets the more feedback I'm likely to receive. Seeking critique, I've posted a bunch of my Lonely Galaxy artwork (if you want to call it that) over on /r/worldbuilding over the last few weeks, all stuff I've already posted here, stuff I've spent days or even weeks on, Blender renders, pixel art, and so on. But somehow this thing I threw together in minutes in OnlyOffice while waiting to go to work this morning has garnered the most upvotes I've ever received across any of my Reddit accounts since 2012.

Link to original reddit post. I was asking about quadrupedal sophonts and hygiene, and got a mountain of excellent feedback, and I'm happy to say I also given others ideas who are working on similar projects.

Regulars here may recognize this as the poster hanging in the waiting room in Everybody Poops Together.

My usual MO is to post a piece of visual art (because humans are overwhelmingly visual and art posts seem to get all the attention over there), explain what it is, and ask for feedback on whatever part of the setting the art is supposed to depict. I get a few upvotes but seldom any comments.

I've since learned from other redditors who have posted genuinely skilled art that most of the attention is just complimenting the art itself and not engaging with the worldbuilding behind it.

So yeah, not sure what this is about lol.

Context: Diarcesia is a fictional nation project started on 2016 in the NationStates website with this premise — starting with a Greco-Roman cultural concept and deferring details until you need it/are sufficiently inspired, how far can you go?

Ten years later, as shown in this map, I still have quite a bit to go, but I have also gone far since I began. A lot of what I've canonized wouldn't have been possible if I decided to flesh concepts out at the beginning.

Lastly, ask me anything! I'm particularly interested if you're able to spot the inspirations or references in the map!

Another entry in the same universe: the Nankrai Archipelago

Co-op Credits

Andrenade - Neraserria (land of the Nerra)

Delmonte - Dionysia (island leased to Delmonte)

Here's a monkey fox with a gun. 🔫🦊

I have been using DokuWiki for a while to archive my worldbuilding stuff, but recently I've been playing around with Bookstack. DokuWiki is more versatile, but it looks dated and that versatility is achieved through a slew of interdependent plugins that may make future maintenance hard.

Some people have also said that it's harder to find stuff on DokuWiki. To that end, which of these two sites do you think is better?

DokuWiki: https://constructed.world/

Bookstack: https://book.constructed.world/

One of my favorite tidbits about Oblivion is that, when Bethesda brought Patrick Stewart in to play Uriel Septim, they gave him this big 90-page booklet detailing the character’s history and background and motivations, and they were really worried that they’d gone overboard and given him too much. Meanwhile, Stewart was delighted--he’s said that it was the best character prep he’d ever been given, and he wished more people would do that.

For these purposes "cold blooded" means having a low metabolism. Let's say we have a race of cold blooded sophonts. They have to regulate their body temperature externally by basking, and go a long time between feeding.

Between meals they only move to get in and out of the sun or artificial heat source. They're physically lethargic but mentally they're just as active as a human would be when awake. The result is a lot like when I have insomnia. Can't/don't want to move, but brain going a mile a minute.

They have grasping hands but can't use them well or at all when in this low energy state, but they can speak. Since most of their life is spent this way, they develop a strong oral culture, writing little but saying much. They spend these extended periods of torpor in groups, swapping stories and philosophizing.

Material culture is scarce, since any large structures must be built very slowly in stages during their active periods or in parallel with many many workers. They don't need to develop agriculture, since their caloric intake is much less compared to a human, and a hunter-gatherer lifestyle can support a much larger group.

I imagine them becoming a society of monks and philosophers, meditating and pondering the nature of things. They're not perfect pacifists but are less likely to engage in conflict because it wastes energy.

Here's something I haven't done yet surprisingly enough. This is the word for the Commonthroat language in Commonthroat itself.

It's romanized rJhqjHcMr which is pronounced /chuff, late falling strengthening growl; huff, early falling strengthening growl; short low strong whine; long low strong grunt, chuff/

It's a compound word that consists of the roots rJhg meaning throat or language and qjHc, which is the adjective universal or standard. gjHc in turn consists of the adjective qjH whole and the suffix -c meaning related to or associated with (compare English -y or -ish). Etymologically it means pertaining to the whole. -Mr is the 3rd person proximal noun suffix, roughly meaning this or this thing here. The dictionary form of a word is usually the indefinite 3rd person form ending in -g, but Commonthroat is a proper noun, so it can't really be indefinite.

Commonthroat is read right to left. The blue glyphs are vowels and the red diacritics (and the red glyph at the end) are consonants. If a consonant begins a syllable it's written as a diacritic. If it ends a syllable it uses a full letter.

This was a response I posted to a prompt on the worldbuilding subreddit.

The Partisans don't use prisons. They use oubliettes. you are placed in a capsule that fills with neurogel. The gel acts as a liquid ventilation medium and an interface between your brain and a computer system.

You can only see, touch, hear, smell, or taste what the computer shows you, and in an oubliette, the computer doesn't show you anything. You are completely devoid of sensation while remaining fully conscious, your naked mind floating in a see of oblivion. Worse, the computer can alter your time perception to make time seem to pass more slowly. Outside it was only six minutes, but inside it felt like a month of complete and total isolation.

Eventually, the neurogel drains and you collapse onto the floor, expelling gel from your lungs and stomach. After you're done coughing and vomiting, you try to get up, but you've forgotten how to walk. You're hefted onto a stretcher and unceremoniously tossed outside into the bitter cold like a sack of garbage.

The first tactile sensation you feel is the bitter cold nipping at your fingers and toes. You're only clad in a thin shirt, pants, and stockings, all still covered in a yellow patina of neurogel. You look up at the sky. The faint sun is near the zenith, but its distant feeble rays only manage to bathe the area in evening twilight.

You hear the clicking of claws on pavement.

"It's another human!" You recognize the words, but the melodic yips and growls are unutterable by the human vocal tract. More claws dig into your sides and you're flipped on your back onto a rickety furniture dolly. A thin shear blanket is draped over your entire body. It smells like it's been slept on by a thousand outdoor dogs. "This is just for show," says another alien voice, female this time. You barely have time to wonder what she means when the dolly starts moving.

In your periphery you can see the hind legs of one of your rescuers, covered in smokey gray pelage. His left rear paw seems to be missing its outer thumb. His long sinewy tail is wrapped around a handle near your side.

You hear the metallic thud of paw gauntlets on the pavement. "Halt, citizens!" barks a voice from behind a helmet. The guard lopes up to you. "State your destination and reason for travel."

"We're taking this body to the processing plant," says the male voice, loudly as though addressing an unseen observer above and off to the side.

"Processing plant?" the guard says skeptically, making an odd gesture with his tail.

"Correct," says the female. She awkwardly positions herself as though trying to avoid the gaze of the unseen observer. She rummages through a pocketed band around her right foreleg and produces a few plastic coins and palms them off to the guard.

"Processing plant," the guard repeats, rubbing the coins together and discreetly pocketing them. "Good and dead then, this one?" He walks up beside you, balls his rear paw into a fist, and donkey kick-punches you in the ribs. You bite your tongue to stop from wheezing. He rears up on his hind feet and lifts the blanket. Your eyes meet. His head is obscured by a bulky powered armor helmet but you know he's staring right into your slimy goo-filled human eyes. He grabs your head in his forepaw and slams it down onto the dolly. "Yup, only good two-legs is a dead two-legs," he's still projecting his voice to the same unseen observer. "Go about your business, citizens." The metallic thud of his paw gauntlets fade into the distance.

You continue along for several minutes. Your rescuers smell your confusion at what transpired back there. "Oh he knew you're alive," says the male under his breath, "but they don't get paid enough to care. But we gotta give him some plausible deniability, hence the blanket. Vid sensors are everywhere." He gestures with his muzzle up at what looks like a matte-black square flush with the dull gray concrete wall to your right.

A few more minutes pass, the only sound the rickety wheels of the dolly and the clicking of all eight of your benefactors' paws on the pavement. "We're here," yips the female. She throws the blanket off you and you get a good look at her for the first time. She's completely furless save for her whiskers, like someone grafted the head of a Xoloitzcuintle onto the body of a baboon with alopecia. Her back and shoulders are dense with musculature, a physique befitting a species built for swinging through the trees.

"Healer?" you manage to mutter. She tilts her muzzle upward in silent affirmation.

"Can you walk?" she asks. You try to move your legs, but can't.

"ugh," she growls. "We'll have to carry you down the ladder." She wraps her tail around your left shoulder and the male does the same to your right.

"Sorry in advance," says the male, "This is gonna suck for all of us." They pull you off the dolly and kick it down a shaft next to you. It clatters on the concrete a story below.

Their tails are gripping your shoulders so tightly your arms are losing circulation. Despite your feeble grunts of protest they drag you like a sack of potatoes to the edge and position your feet toward the hole. "Yeah yeah I know," says the healer, lifting a rear paw and making a grasping motion with her digits. "This place isn't easy for tailless bipeds on the best of days."

They heave you over the edge. There's a ladder leading down to the floor below. They begin climbing down, their rear paws a second set of hands gripping the rungs. They manage to clamber down and lower you onto the cold concrete floor.

Their tails uncoil from around your shoulders and for the first time you can move your arms. you flail them feebly trying to return blood flow to your fingertips.

"Ah! Progress!" the healer yips, walking out of sight and pulling some things from an old plastic bin. She waddles up to you on her hind feet. "Take a big whiff" she says, thrusting a rag soaking in some foul-smelling liquid under your nose. "It'll help with the residual effects of the oubliette."

A sharp scent burns your nose, but your brain fog slowly begins to lift.

You still can't remember why they put you in there, but flames of vengeance are already kindling. The healer sniffs the air. "Don't even think about it," she growls. "We don't know what you did to be shoved in an oubliette, but just be thankful you got out with your sanity. Anyone going on two legs here in the Outlands already has a target on their back. For all we know you sneezed in the direction of the wrong person. Trying to settle the score will just get you in more trouble."

"If you want my advice," says the male, "you catch the first ferry back to Moonlitter then take the mass router to Hearthside. It's much more human-friendly than the Outlands. Why any human would willingly live in this Light-forsaken pit in the first place I'll never know."

I'm writing a short call of duty fan fiction and wanted advice on writing one

Introduction…

Humanity has built an interstellar civilization based on the replication of technological artifacts of the Xenoculture, an extinct alien civilization. Interstellar travel is achieved through the “x-engine”. The first x-engine jump occurred in 1138 IE (Interstellar Era)

The wealthiest, most populated systems in the galaxy are the seven Primate Worlds. The highest among these is the planet Andar, a temperate world whose landmass is concentrated into one massive supercontinent. These are the other six Primate Worlds…

• Kasika: Considered the closest to nature, they are the most highly developed in the areas of environmental conservation and renewable technology.
• Njorde: The youngest of the Primate Worlds, theirs is a frontier-oriented culture of quiet toughness.
• Mavaros: The most martial and stratified society in the Primate Worlds. The military and police are integral parts of their government and social structure, with conscription as a long-standing policy. Forced labor is a common form of punishment and gladiatorial combat is their preferred sport.
• Chandora: Their culture is based around the study of cosmic cycles and ancestor worship.
• Shuiya: Their society prizes technological advancement and the experimental ethic, as evidenced by their development of the x-engine.
• Anlel: Seen as the most radical of the Primate Worlds, they have produced many of the most renowned writers and other artists, as well as skilled jurists.

The Primate Worlds were settled by sleeper ship colonists. Eight massive arks departed the mysterious Planet Zero, the homeworld of humanity, in 1 IE. These escapees were the last survivors of an apocalyptic event. The various Primate World cultures have different accounts of what doomed Planet Zero and what the planet was even called. The seven Primate Worlds are all located in the galaxy's First Quadrant. It was on these worlds that humans first encountered artifacts of the Xenoculture.

During the millennium of isolation from their peers, the people of the Primate Worlds developed physical adaptations to their new environments. Some developed stockier forms adapted to high gravity, others more graceful forms for low gravity, etc. Some people were also changed by their exposure to Xenoculture artifacts. Despite these changes the people of the Primate Worlds were still interfertile by the time they made contact after the development of the x-engine.

Long before humans left Planet Zero, the Xenoculture founded settlements on worlds throughout the galaxy. The galaxy is littered with their artifacts. It is estimated that they went extinct around 5000 BIE (Before the Interstellar Era). Speculation abounds as to what ended the Xenoculture. Some scientists theorize that multiple species composed the Xenoculture, while others surmise that extensive gene engineering wildly diversified their forms.

Xenoculture artifacts are often “alive”. They may generate fields with a variety of effects. One example is the refraction halo, which distorts the path of fast-moving projectiles within a certain volume. Combat in such a situation places a high premium on one’s melee fighting skills and equipment.

The Quadrants…

The galaxy is divided into five major regions...

• First Quadrant
• North Quadrant
• South Quadrant
• Lost Quadrant
• Core Zone

The First Quadrant encompasses the galactic West. It is where humanity arose millennia ago, on the now-mythical Planet Zero. Political power and economic leverage extends far from the Primate Worlds, influencing events throughout the galaxy.

The North Quadrant is richer in heavy elements than the rest of the galaxy, the remnants of a particularly violent cluster of supernova bursts millions of years ago. As a result, industrial operations dot this region.

The South Quadrant contains worlds that are the most pristine, with the least development by human industry or contact with the Xenoculture. Biodiversity is at its prime here, as evidenced by the existence of Loth: the site of the most prized trophy hunting creatures in the galaxy. Another such lush world is Rishma, the source of the galaxy’s most exquisite fabrics.

The Lost Quadrant encompasses the galactic East. is a large swathe of the galaxy full of hazardous anomalies like high-energy radiation belts and rogue nanite swarms. It is likely that these phenomena are leftovers from whatever destroyed the Xenoculture. There are no known worlds harboring multicellular life in this Quadrant. The largest expeditionary fleet ever fielded for exploring this region was turned back in 1781 IE after many of their ships were consumed by metal-eating lifeforms known as the feraxen.

The Core Zone is bordered by all four Quadrants. At its center lies Titantua, the galaxy’s supermassive black hole. The high density of star systems in this region means interstellar travel times are on average much shorter than in the Quadrants. As a result the Core Zone systems have frequently changed hands throughout galactic history.

Large stretches of galactic history revolve around the expansion of Primate Worlders into the various Quadrants, punctuated by periods of redivisional warfare for the interstellar spoils.

The Sectrons…

There is a reclusive faction of sentient machines called the Sectrons. They were created by a group of scientists in 2048 IE to serve humans as a labor force. The scientists then decided to purge them because they showed signs of sapience in the 2090s. By 2160 IE, all Sectrons who survived the Discontinuation fled to distant sectors of space in the Core Zone. In more recent years they have branched out to worlds in the Lost Quadrant, beyond the easy reach of humans. As mechanical lifeforms, the Sectrons are uniquely resilient against the Lost Quadrant’s dangers.

Some Sectron worlds are host to populations of humans who have elected to have their brains placed into life-sustaining vats as the culmination of many years of enlightenment training. Known as the Ascensionists, they are something between a monastic order and an ambassadorial corps.

The Ravelers...

The expansion of the Universe is a perpetual unraveling, a fabric that stretches at every point. Some people can sense the flow between every atom.

Most people are not sensitive to this because they have evolved to block out their awareness of this expansion. If one could perceive the flow, they would see their own cells drifting apart, the floor crawling under their feet, and air molecules slipping away into the distance. They would be driven to madness.

The brain has developed a neural dampener that blocks this sensation automatically. It is like ignoring the blind spot in your vision or the feeling of your own tongue.

There are ways to pass through the inner firewall. Different organizations use different techniques but it typically requires years of meditation, sensory deprivation, and controlled exposure to cosmic radiation to recalibrate one’s neurology. Many who tried to do this have died or lost themselves in a waking nightmare of dissolution.

Those who pass typically have an unusually thin firewall, a high degree of psychological resilience, and privileged access to trainers. But this ability comes with the price of constant alertness. Maintaining the sense is like holding a muscle flexed indefinitely. One moment of distraction, be it from fear or complacency, and the barrier will shut again. It may take weeks of intensive re-sensitization to pass through again.

With sufficient attunement to the expansion of the Universe these “Ravelers” can temporarily direct the cosmic flow and effect superhuman abilities. Telekinesis, levitation, and illusionary apparitions are but a few of the strange manifestations of these individuals’ extraordinary powers. Ravelers are the subject of legends and rumors, often the target of persecution. It is known that they existed in a raw and unguided form on Planet Zero; some say these proto-Ravelers contributed to that world's demise.

Sectrons, being non-biological, cannot become Ravelers. However their monastic allies the Ascensionists are famous for the strength of their raveling powers.

The most infamous Raveler in history was Jaredon, known to his enemies as the Mad Warlock. Claiming to be the reincarnated personification of the Xenoculture, Jaredon gathered a large mass of followers who looked up to him as a messianic figure. His greatest exercise of raveling powers was the creation of a new moon, Serina IV-K, out of the rings of a gas giant. This moon served as a base of operations held together by the sheer force of his will. He violently established his cult as a major power in galactic politics during the 24th century IE; interstellar travel throughout the North Quadrant was a hazardous proposition in this era. The Mad Warlock’s rule came to a sudden end in 2377 when he was assassinated by one of his many ex-lovers, triggering the disintegration of Serina IV-K into a debris field.

The fourth millennium…

The present date is 3134 IE.

The dominant power in the galaxy is the theocratic Andarian Kingdom, with its capital on the Primate World of Andar. There are outside powers that have varying relations with the Kingdom; chief among these are the privately-owned domains of Interworld Incorporated and the Sectron Autonomous Assembly.

The state religion of the Andarian Kingdom is a sect of the Demifaith known as the Ultimatum Brotherhood. The Brotherhood waged a bloody war against the Triadists, the founding sect of the Demifaith. Now the Triadists are all but extinct, their holistic and peaceful teachings corrupted by the power-hungry Brotherhood.

Power within the Andarian Kingdom is contested between the King, who derives his divine rulership rights from the Brotherhood, and the House of Worlds, a secular legislature composed of lawmakers from the settled systems throughout Kingdom space.

The largest corporation in the galaxy by revenue and employees is Interworld Incorporated. They own subsidiaries that provide nearly every good or service imaginable. Entire star systems have been purchased by Interworld executives and now operate like company towns. Unlike the zealously religious Kingdom, Interworld is known to do business with the Sectrons.

The most militant opposition to the Kingdom is the Allied Revolutionary Coalition (ARC), a network of urban councils, labor union representatives, dissident intellectuals, and militia groups. They were formed in response to the Brotherhood’s consolidation of power. Though various segments of ARC differ in finer ideological points, they share the goal of overthrowing the Kingdom and building a society beyond class divisions and private property. On more than one occasion ARC has fought against the extremist group known as Black Horizon, another faction which claims to oppose the rule of the Kingdom.

The Freewinders…

Another distinct culture is that of the Freewinders. They are the descendants of one of the eight sleeper ships that left Planet Zero. Unlike the other seven ships, these travelers found a world rendered uninhabitable by a cataclysmic volcanic eruption. They have since adapted to space-dwelling life and are the most noticeably distinct from baseline humans of all the sleeper ship descendants. They are playfully called Windies and derogatorily called Nonworlders.

They were chased out of the First Quadrant around 1500 IE and have since diversified into new branches in the North, South, and the Core. At various points throughout galactic history they were permitted to undertake pilgrimages to the Iton system, where they pay respects to the world that died to give them their way of life. The Freewinders live on the fringes of galactic society and face discrimination based on stereotypes.