Takara Prime

Geography

Takara Prime is divided into two main continents with various islands and archipelagoes. Each of these continents was home to one ethnicity of the Takarran people. The eastern continent was the homeland of the Purple Takarans, and the western was the homeland of the Red Takarrans.

Life

Takara Prime is the home-world of the Takarrans, an amphibian people long and bitterly divided into two warring ethnicities. Later, it was also the home of the clandestine war-robots that killed off most of the Takarrans. (the Defendrons and the Cryptobots)

History

Separated by geography, the Takarran people were divided into two warring factions. The western Red Takarrans lived in a relatively egalitarian society where each Takarran voted on elected officials and the weightier issues based on their “estimation”, a numerical score each Red Takarran was assigned by a coalition of the government and other prominent organizations. The Purple Takarrans lived in a far more hierarchical empire ruled by those who possessed the “Sparks of Honor”, a set of powerful talismans (originally forged of precious metals, and later imbued with AI technology) that typically passed from vanquished to victor in contests of battle to the death. These two factions waged long and bloody wars from the time they discovered long-distance ocean travel until the apocalyptic war of Crypto-botics, when the majority of Takarrans on both sides were wiped out by war-robots disguised as innocuous pieces of technology.

In GSC 179 explorers from the PLAS discovered the planet, covered in large, but seemingly abandoned technologically developed cities, with the few surviving Takarrans living primitively in the wilderness, mortally afraid of technology. See: Exodus

Following first contact, many of the surviving Takarrans were rescued by the Planetary League Alien Assistance Agency (PLAAA), as the planet was taken over by the Cryptobots eventually leading to the Second Robot War.

The Main Debris Zone

The Main Debris zone on New Albuquerque is the biggest and oldest of the planet’s scrapheaps, where the terrain is dominated by the wreckage of the many ships that end up as derelicts in the area. Scrap started being intentionally dumped in the area late in the 1,000 Years War by the Empire of 1,000,000 Suns after the Battle of the Three Moons. The area is regarded with a degree of reverence by both the Empire as well as the Cult of Troniac due to the large numbers of dead from both sides of the 1,000 Years War who were lost with their vessels that ended up in the zone.

The zone was shaped again during the Grey Exodous, when the Greys working salvage and recycling operations for the E1MS left to join the Convergence leaving behind substantial ruins.

The Main Debris Zone is sparsely populated, with the majority of the inhabitants being nomads or scavengers organized into roving bands and a few scattered towns. The biggest city (and unofficial capitol of New Albuquerque) is Colony City on the eastern edge of the zone. It was founded when the colony ship Garcia’s Hope from the Planetary League crashed there. The local Vorgon population as well as the many survivors who either crash or are marooned here make their living by recycling the mountains of debris that give the zone its name. Most roads in the region are simple dirt or gravel paths, with a few paved with the thick armor of the downed ships that pile up there.

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The region of space near New Albuquerque is prone to shipwrecks due to both a high level of ambient debris as well as strong cosmic winds from various nearby black holes and neutron stars. This natural tendency for junk to accumulate on and near the planet greatly enhances the local scavenging economy, but at the cost of making it both difficult and dangerous to leave the surface. The presence of so many dead stars in the region (the area is known as a stellar graveyard) also limits communication with the outside world, and causes irregularities in the local flow of time.

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Bravaxia

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History

Bravaxia is a fairly young (~ 3 billion standard years) terrestrial planet on the western fringes of the Perseus arm of the galaxy. About half a million standard years ago, the intelligent species known as Bravaxians evolved there, living a hunter-gatherer lifestyle.

Bravaxia was conquered by the Convergence around 30,000 years ago. The Convergence taught the Bravaxians agriculture, and subjected them to brainwashing and hard labor producing food supplies by bio-engineering “gods” for them to worship and sacrifice their produce to.

During the Third Convergence War, Bravaxia was liberated by the Planetary League, and became an independent planet.

Later, around Y.E. 12162, the planet was conquered by the Holy Empire of Man as part of the 4th Holy Struggle of the Outer Realms.

In Y.E. 65473 Bravaxia threw off the Imperial yoke, and joined the Galactic Republic, where it has remained.

Geography

The surface of Bravaxia is mostly covered in oceans, with one large continent dominating the western hemisphere, two smaller continents in the east, and one small continent in south polar region. The planet’s close proximity to its sun and dense atmosphere keep a strong prevailing wind blowing from west to east across most of its surface. Seasons are relatively mild, and most of the surface has a tropical to subtropical climate. Several mountain ranges run north to south, and most of the land is dominated by a unique biome, known as the wind-forest. The wind-forests are dominated by trees with large triangular leaves that constantly blow in the wind, so that the sunlight reaching the forest floor is mottled and flickering.

Life

Bravaxia is home to a number of unique life forms:

Bravaxians are the native intelligence. Short, green, eight-legged beings with a “b-type” palate (they prefer flavors and scents that humans find disgusting).

Garbage-fruit is a large, edible melon favored by Bravaxians and Greys, but bland to humans.

The Grunkle-fly is a insect-like animal, about the size of a watermelon, and a favorite food of Bravaxians and Greys alike.

The Soup-beast is a large land predator with a hard outer shell. On death its internal organs turn into a soup-like liquid that is delicious, yet disgusting to humans.

The Sagittarius Gap

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The Sagittarius Gap is the void between the Orion and Sagittarius arms of the Milky Way.  Shown here are several of the major systems in the vicinity of the gap, circa GSC 500.

Berwynne's Reach was crucial in the early settlement of the Sagittarius arm, and it grew into one of the greatest ports in the galaxy due to the spatial rift connecting it to a point near the Paradise system. 

In the early stages of expansion to this region, numerous corporate states and independent nations arose along the gap, however most of these eventually joined the Planetary League for access to vast markets and nearly unbeatable protection from outside threats.

Major Locations on the map:

• Earth

• Albion 4

• Aldebaran 2

• Berwynne's Reach

• Bonnard's World

• Cielius 5

• Dionysus

• Dogur-Dann

• Fitzgerald's World

• Gibson

• Mefitis

• New Promise

• Paradise

• Shoji

The Stilted City

Geography

The Stilted City is a city on New Albuquerque, built in a lake bed that remains dry through half of the local year, but during the local wet season, fills to form a temporary lake.  The two river valleys that fill the basin are the basis for major trade routes, and the city is built at a natural crossroads where they meet.  The Stilted City is located on the northern edge of the planet's southern rain-band.

People and Government

The Stilted City was built by the native Vorgon people of New Albuquerque, and they make up the majority of the population, though many others can be found there as well.  The city is constantly being settled by new groups who travel along the trade routes that intersect there.

  The city is divided into eleven districts plus the Grand Water Tower that stores the water supply during the dry season, and acts as the seat of government.

During the wet season, the government consists of an informal council, with a member elected from each of the eleven districts.  This council has little power, and the wet season is relatively lawless.  This state of affairs is sustainable because, during the wet season, the city is situated in the middle of a lake, and is connected to land only via three pontoon bridges that are easily defensible, and can be disconnected in an emergency.

At the start of the dry season, a gladiatorial tournament is held in the central market, and the winner is declared the Drought King.  The Drought King rules from a palace atop the Grand Water Tower, and exerts absolute authority.  Generally, the Drought King levies taxes on trade in the city, and in exchange defends the city from invaders and bandits, who generally attack during the dry season, when the city is most vulnerable. 

The Valley of the Avatar

On the planet New Albuquerque, wedged between a mountain range and the main debris field lies a valley where one of the Avatars of Troniac crashed, largely intact, having survived the end of the 1000 Years war.  Separated from the direct guidance of Troniac, but possessing substantial intelligence of its own, the Avatar set about constructing a temple of Troniac with the help of other discarded and wrecked robots from the main debris zone.

The temple supported a large and active chapter of the Ascended Children of Troniac, and some of the local biological intelligences joined the temple as well.  Over time a small town sprang up around the temple, populated mainly by robots, with a few organics as well.

One of the main features of the temple was the Rotary Encoder of Fate, a large disc that functioned as an extremely sensitive rotary encoder that was used as a fortune-telling device.

Eventually, when the Avatar's mechanical body broke down, it was permanently installed on the temple grounds, and it's electronic brain, which continued to operate, was consulted for wisdom, and sought out for advice by pilgrims from across the planet.

Ovid

History

When human explorers from Cosmid first reached Ovid in GSC 443, it was a barren rock, devoid of life with a thin atmosphere of methane and nitrogen deep in the Tartarus Sector.  Cosmid managers decided that it would be an ideal place to test out new terraforming techniques, and perform experiments far away from the human core-worlds.  Terraforming started almost immediately, and Cosmid settled a corporate colony there in GSC 480.  Ovid was named for the Roman poet who authored the Metamorphoses, in anticipation of the radical changes that could be brought to the planet.

Being in such a remote corner of the galaxy caused Ovid to develop an insular culture, connected only to Cosmid, inc. 

One of the largest experiments that dominated the colony was a study on the effects of gene-therapies and modifications on society.   All manner of experiments were conducted, creating one of the more diverse populations of any planet in the galaxy. Since many of the experiments failed in one way or another, Cosmid also set up a fairly robust safety net for those unable to contribute to the bottom line (as it was cheaper than dealing with a rebelling population of high-powered mutants).

In GSC 1016, Cosmid (now a part of the Holy Empire of Man) officially abandoned its research colony on Ovid, so it could focus its resources on fighting the Great Reckoning.  As a result, the colonists and test subjects abandoned on Ovid were left to find their own way.  In GSC 1070, Ovid would become one of the first planets to join the Galactic Republic, after refugees from the Planetary League flooded the sector.  The garden-world would be the breadbasket of the fledgling Galactic Republic.

Ovid, circa GSC 1070

Environment

As Ovid was terraformed, the land on the planet settled into four main continents.  The eastern-most continent (known as Cronenberg) was the location of the capitol city (Biopolis).

All the life on Ovid was imported by Cosmid, or developed locally through that company's R+D efforts. Ovid was the first "Garden World", specially engineered to have a mild climate with a mix of ornamental and edible life without any apex predators.

Ovid orbited a stable orange dwarf star that rarely had significant solar-flare activity.

Ovid had three main moons, and several orbiting stations that were initially built to aid in terraforming.

Notable Ovidians

Sarnak the Immortal was accidentally created on Ovid.

Berwynne's Reach

Berwynne's Reach is a binary star-system in the middle of the Sagittarius Gap, far from any other stars or inhabited planets.  Millions of years ago, an asymmetrical supernova near the current location of Paradise tore a rift in space-time (later to be known as Berwynne's Rift) that leads almost directly to the Berwynne's Reach system.  

History

First reached by Ichigo Berwynne in GSC 160, Berwynne's Reach was a promising locale as a jumping-off point for journeys to the Sagittarius Arm, and the Centaurus Arm from the original human core-worlds.  In GSC 168, the city of Berwynne's Gate was founded as the capitol of the new Planetary League colony on the surface of Kempe (named for Margery Kempe), the lone terrestrial world in the system. Kempe was also the home of a large and well known temple of Eris.  Later the system capitol was moved to Dunningston.  The System also contained significant asteroid belts, and several other planets.

Berwynne's Reach quickly became a major hub for trade, and for colonists leaving for the frontier.  As the Sagittarius and Centaurus arms developed through the third and fourth centuries of Era-1, Berwynne's reach prospered.  A few dozen star-gates were built leading to major systems, and a large number of space-habitats sprung up.

During the Great Reckoning, most of the star-gates were destroyed by the defenders of the Reach in order to prevent the Holy Empire of Man from attacking the system, which had become a major evacuation point for the old-core systems.  This left only Berwynne's Rift as a feasible route of attack, and this was constantly guarded by the remnants of the Planetary League fleet that had sought refuge there.  

Over time, the memory of the war faded, and Berwynne's Reach became a major center of commerce during Era-2.  The remnants of the Planetary League, and various rebel elements used it as a center of organization, although officially the system's government was politically neutral.  Berwynne's Reach became a haven for pirates, bounty hunters, rebels, heretics, and other assorted riff-raff.  The Yatagarasu (aka the Star Crows) had a substantial presence within the system, and often used it as a base of operations.  Berwynne's Reach remained independent throughout Era-2, although the HEM often laid siege to it, and actually succeeded in briefly occupying the system during the War of the Empires.

Businesses

Mr. WOW!, inc., maker of Mr. WOW! soft-drinks was headquartered on a large space station orbiting Kempe.

Points of Interest

Berwynne's Gate is an arcology on Kempe, and was briefly the capitol of the system.