Geography
New Promise is a temperate world with two main moons, Wen ( short for Wenchang Wang: 文昌王 ) and Caishen (財神). The planet itself is dominated by two major east-west oriented continents ideal for farming with most of the land consisting of gently rolling plains, punctuated by numerous river deltas.
The Capitol of the Planetary League settlement was Annan City (named for Kofi Annan, an early leader of the United Nations). The major cities in Planetary League territory included Annan City, Alexandria, New Clinton, Franklin City, New Denver, Union Delta, Port Sushi, Key Center, and New Alvarez.
Annan City was the first city in human-controlled space to achieve a population of over one billion. Port Sushi was named for the abundant, high-quality seafood found nearby, off the coast.
History
First reached by human explorers in GSC 130, New Promise is a very Earth-like world. It was the first world discovered by the Planetary League that was immediately suitable to agriculture. New Promise was discovered at a time when the human population was exploding, and agricultural lands were straining at their limits to feed everyone. Upon discovery, various scientific surveys and studies were rapidly undertaken before starting full-scale agriculture. Where possible, care was taken to preserve local ecosystems, but the nutritional needs of the core-worlds dominated the development of the planet.
New Promise was settled before any official contact had been made with intelligent alien species. First contact was made as a result of the First Convergence War, a conflict between the settlers (backed by the Planetary League) and a group greys from the Convergence who had set up an outpost nearby. The Convergence was trying to dissuade human settlement because of the radio noise that comes along with human settlements, and interferes with their hive-minds.
At the height of the war, during the Battle of Key Center, the Planetary League battleship Le Guin fired her massive dispersion gun while still technically below the horizon at the Convergence mother-ship, instantly carving 100 Meter Canyon (named for the exact width of the dispersion beam, which, not coincidentally, is also the width of the canyon) in the flank of the Burton Range, south-west of Key Center.
