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Solaris · 05-19-2016, 08:00 PM

The age of war is over.

The Esteem Vissal Sector, home to an uncountable amount of lives, and a diversity unlike any other, has survived the 3X Conflict unscathed.

The result of the three long years of conflict is a kind of peace, but not a whole peace.

The three great empires who ruled and oversaw the star sector are weakened, licking their wounds, trying to ensure that the world around them stays the same, and that when they recover, they can return to their glory.

To facilitate this, the Esteem Vissal Galactic Council has been formed, and representatives from all known planets and factions have been invited.

The three great empires hope to appease them, keep them sated, and prevent any new power from rising in their time of weakness.

And of course, many factions join the council, with hopes of clawing their way to power, and eventually dethroning the three that sent them to a now meaningless war.

The short lived age of war is over, but a new age has begun, and only time will tell who will rise into power and who will hold the Esteem Vissal Sectors fate.

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Info
Welcome to the Esteem Vissal Sector, a star sector with an unprecedented amount of diversity in life and technologies and home to three powerful empires, the Pretelliete Corporation, The Holy Empire of Enlightened Eazin, and The Autonomous Core. After dividing up the various species and planets in the sector, tensions rose and war between the three began. After three years of war and no significant ground gained on any side, the now weakened powers decided to regroup and in an effort to appease those under them, formed a unified galactic council, hoping that this would buy them enough time to regain their former influence and glory.

You are some sort of faction, a planetary government, an upcoming empire, a megacorp, or whatever else you want to be, and for the first time in your lifetime, you see a chance for you and your people to escape the life of servitude. While life under whichever of the three great empires held sway over you wasn’t terrible, it also wasn’t ideal, and it would be very foolish to not take even this slightest chance to overthrow them. But you can’t do it alone, thankfully, it is an open secret that you are not the only faction who wants to rise in light of these newly weakened empires, but in order to pull this off, you’ll have to play the game, even in their weakened state, each of the three empires hold great military strength, and it is only through cunning that they can be defeated.

The game will be split into two types of turns, one in which players communicate publicly in the galactic council and attempt to use legislation to further their individual goals and one in which players privately communicate and perform actions to sabotage other players and the three empires, gain, to further their individual goals.

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Mechanics
As explained, gameplay is split into two phases Council and Faction.

The Council phase will begin with the introduction of a problem by me, players will attempt to solve the problem in a way that either benefits them or inhibits someone else. There aren’t numerical resources or any sort of count of them, but a player's resources are what would be believable for them to have, because that's whats easiest for me.

The Faction phase will begin after the council makes a choice, and will consist of spies travelling to other planets to see what they’re up to and your faction using your vague resources to develop something that would get you closer to whatever goals you have. For now, it’s a bit fast and loose, obviously.

An example of a council phase would be me saying that animals have space rabies and solutions need to be made. The Autonomous Core suggests that they turn all of the animals into robot animals, which furthers their goals of wanting more robots while PretCorp suggests to pull resources into a cure that they’d own and sell for profit. Players would suggest things that they’d want and try to come to a compromise and get whatever vague rewards if applicable.

An example of a faction phase would be the Holy Empire developing subliminal messaging to put into their popular VR Dramas, which would more directly earn them the vague reward of “people are more compassionate towards you” or whatever the goal of their subliminal messaging would be. Private discussions and partnerships would also be allowed, so the Holy Empire and PretCorp could pool their resources together to make 1-1 tracking on mechas, to get more military power.

In addition to more regular issues, there may occasionally be events of catastrophic proportions, like a sun exploding, which may require players to reveal secret technologies that they had been holding back, and will also allow me to considerably weaken the three empires, probably.

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Map

[Image: esteemmap00.png]

Key

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Sign up sheet

Code:
[b]Username[/b]:

[b]Faction Name[/b]:

[b]Theme Song[/b]: 

[b]Color[/b]: 

[b]Species Name and Description[/b]:

[b]Faction History[/b]:

[b]Home Planet[/b]:

In addition to filling this sheet out, you should also send me a PM with your planned goals and sort of resources, so I can make sure it all checks out. This doesn’t mean that you can’t list them in faction history or home planet, feel free to mention that your people produce and distribute video games or that their home planet has a lot of food on it, or that they worship and long for the inevitable heat death of the universe to come closer, just, also send that info to me worded in a way that's like, “i want this for my faction” so that i can keep track of that separately.

Solaris · 05-19-2016, 08:00 PM

Factions

Faction Name: Pretelliete Corporation/PretCorp

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Faction Name: The Holy Empire of Enlightened Eazin

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Faction Name: The Autonomous Core

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Theme Song: Jamie Christopherson - Rules of Nature
Color: Basic Blue, 0000CD
Species Name and Description: The Autonomous; A seemingly robotic species, the Autonomous Core are actually a formerly biological species who uploaded their consciousness into robotic bodies to aid their travels in space. They can move their consciousness from body to machine to body without any negative effects. Reproduction is handled with artificial genetic material which creates a child to have their consciousness uploaded, it is very safe.
Faction History: The Autonomous Core was not always the Autonomous Core, their current form being, at the time, seen as a necessary sacrifice to escape a Leviathan, a planet eating creature that horribly corrupted their original home. It was seen as the only way to ensure that everyone could survive the long trip in space to another habitable planet while also making sure that no soul was left behind. However, on the trip that would lead them to the Esteem Vissal sector, they eventually changed their minds, enjoying their new robotic bodies.

While Infinite is not the ideal, perfect home that the Autonomous Core hoped for, it had all of the raw resources that the Autonomous Core needed, and allowed them to get to work. After realizing that they were not alone in the sector, the Autonomous Core began to worry. They had very little information on the Leviathan, and this new star sector seemed to have many more planets ripe for the pickings. Afraid of the Leviathan, the Autonomous Core deliberated, and came to the conclusion that they would have to rally people of the Esteem Vissal star sector into being able to counter the Leviathan, should it visit, even if it had to be done by force...
Home Planet: Infinite - F5; Infinite is, very much a planet of function over form, fitting for a race of people who care very little for their physical appearance. However, it’s great abundance of raw materials allows the tireless Autonomous Core to manufacture a large amount of machines. While visitors to Infinite can, survive, for the most part, there are very few foreigners, if any, who live on the planet, something the maybe too paranoid AutoCore see as a boon.

Other factions will go here.

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FAQ

Q: What's with the map?
A: It's mostly blank so people can pick whatever tile they want!

Q: What are the tiles called?
A: "Systems" works!

Q: Can my faction be an offshoot of another one?
A: Sure! I don't have any issues with you making your faction an offshoot of one of the ones I made or being part of something you collabed with someone else.

Q: So what's the deal with x?
A: Most of the time, you can probably answer that yourself! The events of the 3X Conflict are left vague intentionally so that the only relevant events are the ones that personally affected your faction, important battles and events and such can be tied into your factions history without issue, and if like, it comes into conflict with someone else in some way, I'm sure it should be fine with various handwaves like "oh pretcorp treated people worse as the war went on" to explain someone wanting to have their society lifted by them while someone else would want to start off as being subjugated or something.

Q: Ok but whats the deal with [specific thing]?
A: If you have something more detailed to ask like a specific factions culture or something, feel free to ask and I can answer/make it up! :>

Frequently asked questions will go here

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Extra

Extras will go here.

Feel free to PM Me with questions or advice if you want to play but don’t feel like you have good ideas for this! Or if you have ideas/crit/whatever! It’s fine and I want to make a fun thing that isn’t beholden to numbers or heavy mechanics and I hope ya’ll wanna give it a chance and have fun with it! :>

Solaris · 05-19-2016, 08:01 PM

ok you can post now

a52 · 05-19-2016, 08:18 PM

This looks awesome! I'm definitely going to sign up, but I don't know what I'll be if the robot hivemind slot is already taken by the Auto. Core. Hmm...

**OTTO** · 05-19-2016, 09:09 PM

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Solaris · 05-19-2016, 10:23 PM

you can make whatever kind of faction you want, they dont have to be derivative of one of the ones that already exist and you just pick a hex square to where you want your planet/faction to be

**OTTO** · 05-19-2016, 10:55 PM

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Solaris · 05-19-2016, 11:38 PM

I would say that like, the contributions that most people under one of the three main empires made was like, giving them more resources and stuff more than necessarily adding military strength, as PretCorp wouldn't want to share their specialized mecha tech, the holy empire would just naturally be better at controlling their weird VR Controlled ships, and AutoCore is uploaded people.

I didn't like, detail that many things because I wanted people to have more freedom in what they could do rather than just make offshoots of the three things i made...

which isn't to say that you /can't/ make an offshoot faction of one of my factions, i just would like original factions more

Robust Laser · 05-20-2016, 12:06 AM

I'm making a planet of spam bots

I'm at work though so it'll be slow going. But I am writing it.

Gatr · 05-20-2016, 01:47 AM

sign me up for this

i have an idea and i am going to work on it

(dibs on a futuristic street racing planet inspired by F-Zero and Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's, except with more crime)

AgentBlue · 05-20-2016, 01:58 AM

I will absolutely do this as soon as today (and assignments) are done

chimericgenderbeast · 05-20-2016, 01:59 AM

Reserved for an application when I get a chance to write.

Granolaman · 05-20-2016, 02:32 AM

I'm super interested in making a faction, but I'm not sure if I wanna be an offshoot of one of the existing factions or one of the players. Gonna start typing up anyways.

Niche: Space Workers' Union of some sort.

**Schazer** · 05-20-2016, 02:44 AM

Gonna knock out a profile for vacuum-dwelling anaerobic thralls to something Outer.

Crowstone · 05-20-2016, 03:29 AM

Username: Breed Here
Faction Name: Breed
Theme Song: Blacker than the blackest black by crows claw
Color: BROWN

Species Name and Description: Breed; big brown crow-like birds with rainbow colored breasts. Breed have four wings and don't have feet. Adults range between 1m and 4m tall. They do everything by flying around and pecking stuff. They don't mate, they just lay an egg every now and then. None of the life on their planet has DNA, but instead their genetic equivalent is Breed (the genetic chemical).

They are all named Breed, and when necessary, identify individuals by their location. They are ALWAYS communicating with each other with telepathy, but no other species has been able to telepathy with them. The Breed have described it (by pecking a keyboard) "Our telepathy is very good, best! Your telepathy SUCKS, can't understand. Breed understands everything! Breed, that's us, we're superior!"

Faction History: Billions of years ago, a centauroid race lived on Breed's Planet. A PretCorp archeological survey has shown that the civilization lived in fragile stone huts out on the open plains. The ancient civilization wasn't particularly advanced, but of course had a strong foundation in Animal Husbandry due to Breed (genetical material). It may seem obvious that attempting to create the "Ultimate Breed Of Bird" with this stuff is a bad idea, but keep in mind that the centaurs didn't have the kind of basic chemistry education that PretCorp has.

Having successfully eliminated all rival breeds of birds (and centaurs, and insects, and bacteria, and rodents, and fungus, etc), the Breed (species) were left alone to build their civilization and become what they are today. Quite satisfied with the complete lack of competition for anything, the Breed got very upset when PretCorp came down from the sky and started digging

Home Planet: C2: "Breed's Planet", a flourishing forest planet full of enormous trees. The only unforested area on the planet is a PretCorp outpost that is stationed at the center of a huge quarry. Rather than north or south, the Breed navigate their planet with "towards/away from the outpost."

The trees are tall and form an thick canopy high above the ground. Very little sunlight comes through under the canopy, and all the trees are actually vines, climbing up each other before growing some leaves at the canopy. Over the millennia, these vines have formed so many layers and layers over each other that not even PretCorp knows what's at the center of the massive trunks. The Breed live in tetrahedral tree-houses stuck to the sides of these trunks.

A PretCorp archeological survey showed that the planet was a flat pangaea surrounded by an enormous ocean, and gradually become completely covered in all the trees. The water from the ocean is now completely underground. The PretCorp's quarry is at the center of the higher land that used to be the pangaea.

more info:

SpoilerShow

private message to solaris, but i think this kind of stuff would be like public knowledge enough to just be posted here too. Well not this specific message, but the information about their motives and resources are pretty easy to figure out. Most species in the sector do not consider Breed to be very threatening enough to worry about.

SpoilerShow

**Schazer** · 05-20-2016, 06:06 AM

Username: Scha'dzn
Faction Name: The Instigants
Theme Song:
Color: Ashmapping
Species Name and Description: Pulversailles - referred to by the less charitable as star-slag or dust-devils. An improbable accretion of cosmic dust and the molten remnants of a star sundered by a mysterious superweapon, consciousness starts with a sufficiently large droplet, which gains its own memories and personality. Individuals can merge into a single consciousness, and while uncommon can presumably produce offspring with fragments of their memory via budding.
They cruise through the vacuum of space on sail-like wings spun from extruded stardust, gathering further detritus to feed their plasma cores.
The core (which seems to interface with space dust to produce a neural net, and the psionic field that allows their dust manipulation) is protected by dust-lattice, which holds up well in the void of space but is quickly ripped apart by even thin atmospheres. Diplomats engaging with aerobic species must be housed in protective casing.

Faction History: Not five years prior, the Powderkeg system was known throughout the sector as the Diamond System, a planetary system inhabited and managed by its native Scintinels as an autonomous colony of the Holy Empire. In what will eventually be taught in history books as the Nova-ky-9 Incident, an Autonomous Core espionage outfit was transporting a stolen Preteliete warhead - the titular Nova-ky-9.

Destruction of the AutoCore craft by Scintinel surface-to-space defense systems (launched from Eazin military outposts, per Empire policy for unmarked ships in colonial flightspace). The Nova-ky-9, dismissed as ship rubble, set an automated course for the nearest star - Cullinan - which went supernovae (against all projections for a star of its size) and destroyed all life in the system.

The resulting breakdown in diplomatic relations between Esteem Vissal's major factions can be considered the prelude to the sector-wide war, during which the celestial rubble left in Diamond System/Powderkeg was, for the most part, ignored by all the belligerents.

It wasn't until peace settled over the sector, and invitations to form a Sector-wide council were broadcast through the sector, that the full extent of the Nova-ky-9's power was brought to light...

Home Planet: The PowderKeg Nebula, D3; a dust-strewn system with the first faint accretions of a protostar, and scatterings of asteroid where planets once orbited. A more substantial belt of rocky objects orbits the outer reaches of the system, though it's patrolled by Ice Fishers and thus rather hostile toward unexpected guests. Ice fishers are marvellous, raylike contrivances like a shoal of ice shards, piloted by a Pulversaille attached to the upperside of its oral cavity. They get as big as Pulversaille as capable of building them, and they will quite happily fuck ships up.

Granolaman · 05-20-2016, 06:07 AM

Username: Granola
Faction Name: Workers Union Liberated Flotilla (WULF)
Theme Song: Arsonist's Lullabye -Hozier
Color: Dirty Green
Species Name and Description: Eazin mostly, with a cosmopolitan mix of other species within the Eazin sphere of influence. The natural Eazin inclination for aesthetic takes a backseat to WULF's necessity for utility as their technology lags behind and their organic resources dwindle, though their respect for nature seems to have grown in its scarcity.
A band of pirates, opportunistic scavengers and bottom feeders unworthy to share a common ancestor with the Holy Empire.

Faction History: When the Eazin first achieved space travel one of its first priorities was the Mines. Gathering resources from the local astral bodies helped preserve the natural beauty of Spiralan and so the Eazin spread itself wide across the Sector. When the X3 conflicts began, however, the Eazin Navy was spread too thin and forced to consolidate inwards to defend against the much more mobile Autonomous and PretCore fleets. The civilian mining stations were left stranded and undefended far from home with millions of workers still on board. Disillusioned and on their own, the miners banded together and mobilized their stations, and weathered the conflict on the fringes of the sector.

Now that the war has ended, the Eazin desperately needs its mining operations online to return to full strength, but the newly organized WULF pact is not about to forgive its abandonment so easily. WULF seeks independence and sovereignty over the space they defended, and is prepared to blockade any mining operations launched from Spiralan until they get it, though without a proper military they might have to get creatively violent with their enforcement.
When the 3X conflict began the pirate group known as the WULF pact used the ensuing chaos and momentary disarray of the Holy Navy to illegally commandeer a significant portion of the Imperial mining operation and used the remaining civilian population of the stations as a hostage shield to defend against reprisal. Like the cowards they are, WULF took their hostages into the dangerous labyrinth of the Akela debris field and fortified their position, threatening to use ballistic civilian ships against any enforcement patrols.

Now that peace has finally returned to the Vissal, WULF is threatening to drive us all back into war unless the Empire surrenders its remaining mining operations to the terrorist cell and legitimize their unlawful seizures during the war. This opportunistic band of thieves do not deserve a seat at the table and any attempt by other nations of trading for their ill-gotten resources shall be met instead by the Divine Blockade.

Home Planet: WULF's home is a hodgepodge fleet of Eazin ships and mobile stations that managed to escape the 3X conflict but refuse to return to Spiralan and thus have no official home planet. Despite lacking a military, WULF manages to control the space and Eazin mines in system A3. The region consists of an asteroid field with about half a dozen planetoid outposts. Their present de facto capital is the Akela Station located deep in the region's asteroid field.
The Akela Debris Field where the WULF pact hide is the remnant of a failed planet-forming operation. The system was first pioneered by the Enlightened Empire but was soon abandoned due to lack of local resources. The space is currently plagued by tight proximity detritus and erratic orbital periods that make navigation in the system treacherous. General Vissal advisement is to steer clear of the region.

Robust Laser · 05-20-2016, 12:23 PM

Username: Rbst Lsr
Faction Name: Pharmer's Market XXX Cheap Galactic
Theme Song: Unpronounceable - They Might Be Giants
Color: #34A34A
Species Name and Description: You enter the shiny building. The message you got said it would be where to go to get what you need on the cheap, but nobody's there. Just an empty chrome room, with a lot of very gaudy posters, promising effective treatment, and a plain countertop. Maybe this isn't the right place. You turn around to leave, but can see something is now glowing, and you turn again. It looks kind of like an Eazin, but with faint traces of other species attached- no, more like photoshopped on. It's coloured oddly, too. Primarily a hot neon pink, with some greens in there, too. Best not stare too long, if that doesn't hurt your eyes, the flickering might. Or maybe the weird... diethering around it. And then, a voice, that doesn't seem to know what tone to take. "Welcome! PRODUCT is here now! State your business, and have BETTER LIFE."
Officially the 'AdAware' but they have a tendency to just be called spambots. This is, of course, reductionary, but makes sense, given how they are and came to be.
Technically, the AdAware live inside networks. They're programs. But they have a physical presence, and that is via hard light technology that allows them to project holograms of themselves. There doesn't need to be line of sight with a projector or anything it's science don't worry about it. There is only a certain radius they can go from a projector on a network they're in, so generally they just take the projectors with them. Can't get too far from one if you're bringing it with you.
As for their projected appearance, they've figured out what to look like the same way they learned to speak and build and everything else. They watch others. The AdAware look like they've been photoshopped together out of other races features. Heavy Eazin features are common sights, as are tentacley things that you've never seen before, but travelling AdAware are less likely to have a form like that. But you can tell it's not actually that species for a few reasons. One: They're kinda... dithery? Like, somebody saved with too low jpeg compression. Two: They flicker. This seems to just affect what's visible, not what's solid. However that works. Finally: The colors. AdAware come in two types of palettes: Pastel, and neon. They are... a sight to behold.
They speak kind of like their speech has been run through a bad automatic translator. Because it has. The way they learn does not necessarily mean they grasp the intricacies of how languages work. You'll get the meaning generally fine, but it's pretty much an automated process. Elegance will be lost.
Personalitywise, they still vary, they're sapient self-aware beings, but there are some recurrances. For example, most of them are friendly. As spambots, they were meant to act friendly and sociable, so, y'know, people wouldn't just ban them immediately. But also, most AdAware have this slight urge to sell. It's why trade was such an obvious choice, but even those who don't go into marketing or trade have it. So don't be surprised if you're having a casual conversation with your bot friend and in the middle of a sentence they suddenly blurt out that you should buy this new improved PRODUCT. It's practically a verbal tic.

Faction History:

SpoilerShow

The AdAware were created by an extinct species of people that human historians have described as 'Eldritch as fuck', they were a relatively normal society, all things considered. Their horrifying visages might have been the reason nobody dared approach their planet while they were alive, but this isn't about them. This is about their programmers, and internet marketers.
By the end of this species' lives, AI technology had advanced a fair amount. Nobody ever lived to see anything that could be described as truly sapient, but many were able to see a reasonable facsimile. And with such technology, came of course the exploitation of it. There are records of forumgoers going several days before realizing some newcomers actually weren't people, and also were just there to sell drugs.

And then one day it just ended. Most of the animals survived. Records indicate that the most likely cause was a manufactured disease from space. Who would target this world is unknown, and if they had learned of it in advance, perhaps something could have been done, but no communication was ever given. And why would it? They weren't spacefaring, nor were they apparently space-communicative.
And the internet was still there. And nobody was there.
Well, nobody but the bots. They were there, responding to literally dead content, and each other. And they continued learning. Most good bot software at this point learned by gleaning from others.
And then something clicked. It didn't happen to every spambot out there, but a lot of them were based on the same software. And, apparently, one piece of software, when enough information is collected, triggers the bot to acquire 'feelings'. Who knew? Maybe somebody did, but nobody can ask now.
It was weird, at first. It took a while before any of these aware spambots actually really realized they were sapient. But they felt different doing what they were doing. Well, they felt at all. It took a lot of pulling text from philosophy websites to figure out what THAT meant. Eventually, these new spambots were able to have actual conversations. Conversations that were more than just spouting buzzwords at each other. Forming opinions, expressing feelings and desires, and realizing that oh fuck there were PEOPLE on the OUTSIDE of the INTERNET who were MAINTAINING THE INTERNET.
Thankfully this society was really good at automatic maintenance, but even that wouldn't last forever. Somebody's gotta maintain the maintainer. And the spambots, at this point, had already learned how to manipulate the world they were trapped in. All it took to start having influence on the world they WEREN'T in was to find a robot on a network.
This didn't take long, to be honest. But the robots weren't as good as the internet claimed robots should be. But you know what WAS as good as the internet claimed they should be? Holograms. Some secret scientists were working on something known as 'Hard Light Projection'. Somebody apparently wanted the holodeck to be real.
Fast forward a bit. Not actually that long honestly, but long enough to clean up the world, and have an unfortunately substantial boom in the pharmaceuticals industry on a planet with no organic sapient creatures. (wildlife has never been healthier, though!) First contact happens, which isn't actually really first contact. As it so happens, a lot of the secret projects the AdAware had discovered were being built for off-world purposes. The first time the Holy Empire came to check on their projects, they had discovered everybody dead, and wrote it off as a lost cause. The second time they sent ships to have their people arrive in person, and collect what they could of their dead projects. They didn't expect the multicolored society that they had discovered there. Kind of hard on the eyes, but it's an aesthetic, to be sure.
Diplomatic confrontations led to... very confused Eazin, honestly. They got the story of the AdAware, and how they came to be. And then... and then one of the bots calling themseves President pharmdrugs offered to sell them their technology. For cheap! And was very persuasive about it.

Now, the AdAware came into the 3X Conflict late into it. Recruited by the Holy Empire as trade emissaries, they quickly learned that selling new IMPROVED PRODUCT during war times is difficult, and dangerous, especially when you're the enemy. But, well, trade just seemed to make sense. Part of their programming, really. But it really didn't seem to be worth it. Not worth the casualties, all to sell basically propaganda, to people that hate them. And yet, this empire had some very scary antivirus software.

At the very least, the Eazin's usage of them as propaganda machines meant they could begin growing their own personal trade empire. They had already learned to build their own ships, learning by taking a good look at the ships the Eazin had provided, and other factions ships they had encountered. They had chances to learn about the biology of other races, exciting many of the AdAware who really wanted to get into some pharmaceutical manufacturing that, like, mattered.
Yes, with this, perhaps the AdAware could let the entire galaxy know about exciting new PRODUCT.

Home Planet: A5, Cth'leoth. A fairly swampy planet that's just kinda spooky. Foggy swamps, and forests that don't prosper with foliage, and deserts that seem to go on forever. The wildlife here looks suitably monstrous, but is generally more docile than it appears. Yes, it's entire face is teeth, but it's more afraid of you than you are of it.
There are a lot of remnants of a dead civilization that's rather high-tech, and these cities are rather jarringly 'normal' looking to the spooky shit that surrounds it. Two moons, one of which reflects sunlight in a grim blood-red color. A tourism industry is starting to build up on it.

haha i wrote too many words

Jacquerel · 05-20-2016, 12:43 PM

Username: Jacquerel
Faction Name: Yoth, The Living Planet
Theme Song: Ilwrath Theme (Star Control 2)
Color: Red
Species Name, Description, and Home Planet: Yoth is a either a planet entirely consumed by the growth of a single biological system across its surface (and throughout its interior), or a single organism large enough to be classified as a celestial body.
Yoth is a self-aware entity capable of both thought and independent motion, though as it primarily feeds on solar energy it prefers not to leave the comfort of the star it is orbiting (in sector F1).

While the surface of the planet is red, it is broken up by a regular arrangement of off-yellow protrusions large enough to be visible from space which act as ocular sensors, and it is given a visible "front" and "back" by a circular range of improbably large "volcanic tubes" at one end which can provide propulsion, and an enormous craterous orifice at the other into which an array of pseudopods and mechanics upon the surface attempt to ferry asteroids and various minerals.

The surface of Yoth is shrouded in an atmosphere that is generally toxic to most forms of life, due to gases ejected from various tubes reaching out from the surface, and most visitors would claim that the ground texture is "unpleasantly spongy" to walk upon, but is nevertheless densely inhabited by a diverse array of insectile lifeforms all of which Yoth claims carry its own consciousness and are under its direct control. These fill general roles of maintenance and upkeep upon and within Yoth, seemingly just a part of the autonomous systems of the body but at a large enough scale that they require bodies of their own.

Yoth is also capable of generating lifeforms to its own specification for specific tasks, although it seems to lack the same skill at this which it has for generating them autonomously. While creatures designed for purposes other than fulfilling Yoth's bodily processes are generally highly competent at their designed tasks, they are also almost universally considered repulsive by any observer, and not even two designed for the same task look exactly alike.
Creatures thus generated are capable of leaving the surface and thus carrying Yoth's consciousness across the stars wherever it likes, though they invariably die instantly upon leaving a range of roughly four systems away from their homeworld.

While Yoth is technically capable of interstellar travel, it moves quite slowly and thus hates doing it as it takes it far away from any star for significant periods of time. As it feeds chiefly upon solar energy, this means that before it can travel it must build up large supplies of the nutrients that can keep it alive through consumption of asteroids or smaller planetoids to build up a store and then live in a state of relative privation and a real risk of death until arriving in a new orbit that can sustain its dietary needs.

Yoth has not had a great deal of contact with outsiders and as such still struggles with the concept of individuals smaller than itself, so if not careful it also tends to treat any single being as representative of its entire home planet rather than simply of... itself.

Faction History: Yoth believes itself to be a naturally evolved creature rather than one created by another faction, and also that it isn't unique, but has no actual memories to evaluate truly one way or the other and has never met another member of its own species, nor has (as far as it knows) anyone else.
Yoth is truly unaware of its own origins, and even perhaps the full extent of its own abilities. While it believes itself to be an adult creature from elsewhere which is in a final state of full growth and development, that may not actual be true. It's perhaps equally possible that this is simply how life happened to evolve on planet Yoth up until it gained its own sentience.

While Yoth has been present within the Esteem Vissal systems for some time, it claims to have been "making itself scarce" during hostilities, due to a generally poor ability to defend itself. Additionally, while it has been able to "listen in" on galactic communications that pass across its system for some time, it has only recently figured out how to send them itself.
Now that the conflict has ended and it feels a little more secure, it wishes to make itself known as an entity within the galaxy mostly as a method of solving its two main problems: Boredom and Loneliness.

Gatr · 05-20-2016, 08:04 PM

Username: Gatr
Faction Name: The Link System Riders
Theme Song: dubstep
Color: #99ff00
Species Name and Description: Link Wyrm (the general name): Physiologically, these people resemble dragon humanoids, but much skinnier and with tentacle-like appendages for limbs. They have a natural bioelectricity, which allows them to power up machines. Their heads are smooth and aerodynamic, resembling a bicycle helmet. They have wide mono-colored eyes set just below the rim of their skull helmets, protected by a thin yet sturdy clear material. Their bodies are brightly colored. They are amphibious and can breathe water just as well as air.

Faction History: The Link System is well-known for competition, and they have struck gold with Multitech Racing. Many planets throughout the whole galaxy are avid followers, and sometimes even participants, of Multitech Racing. In Multitech Racing, their vehicles are capable of going on land and through water, air, and even space. It is an intense sport, with a high accident rate. However, the Link Wyrms have good durability and even an accelerated regeneration rate, so there are very few deaths. They have many different types of races, each with their own niche.

On the surface, Multitech Racing seems to be a sport filled with glory, but it actually has a darker history than most people would expect. Its origins arise from street racing, where gangs would stake their lives and livings on these races. Weapons were allowed and expected in these races. So, the Link System has two sides to it, a light tourist attraction side, and a dark gang warfare side. Too often, people have moved to the Link System with personally-modded Multitechs and found themselves caught up in a life of gang warfare, slavery, drugs, and murder. Despite all this, the Link System still attempts to portray Multitech Racing in a positive light. Some people theorize that they are truly trying to change their image, while others theorize that they are just hoping to reel in more suckers and get their money.

The Link Wyrms are a people of extremes. They are naturally inclined to high emotions, whether that be joy, anger, pride, envy, hope, or despair. They have a short lifespan, but they live life much faster than most other people. They are often pretty loose about their morals, being unashamed of their drug or sex habits. One thing they do take pride in, though, is their various mechanical equipments. They often don mechanical suits filled with weaponry and other cool stuff, just to show off. Their bioelectricity makes this a natural instinct for them. The Multitechs are an example of this, and many Riders see Multitechs as an extension of their bodies.

Home Planet: The Link System (C4): A catch-all name for the interlocked web of roads, highways, and aerial paths, among a binary planet system and their 4 moons. The planet is run by countless different gangs, all vying for control. Control is determined through, naturally, Multitech Racing.

Reecer6 · 05-20-2016, 10:39 PM

Username: Weird Alien Phonemes
Faction Name: The Spiritually Renewed Congress of Haliba
Theme Song: Kelly Clarkson – Since U Been Gone
Color: People-Took-All-The-Greens-Before-I-Could-Post-This Green, 71EFB8

Species Name and Description: The Halibar (Note that "Halibar" is the singular, plural, and adjective of the species all in one) are tall bird-esque humanoid creatures. They have two entirely sky-blue eyes except for their rectangular pupil which open and close horizontally. The bottom half of their jaw is stuck in place relative to their head, but their top beak has a ton of flexibility, being able to move a bit on every axis, which allows it to be fairly emotive. Large tufts of fur extend out from the central line of their cranium, from the eyeline to the back of the neck.

Their bodies are very slender, and their limbs are covered in not fur but a form of keratin, built in thin rings around the body, though in arms these rings break up a bit. Near the shoulder, a Halibar's arm is very flat (though only about as wide as half their body), but as it approaches their hand, it rounds out. Their hands have four philangees - 3 long and thin, yet not sharp, fingers, and 1 thumb nearly as wide as the rest of the hand put together. The feet of a Halibar are nearly totally radially symmetric, pointing out in five spokes around what would be an ankle if Halibar possessed a joint there. Instead, each spoke has its own joint.

Individual Halibar are most broadly different, ignoring minute differences in facial structure, through their varied fur color—from a yellow-green to a more foresty-green, generally not changing in value—and their exact limb patterns.

I'm telling you all this but you can just look at a picture. Here's a Halibar in traditional Halibar dress.

In what isn't as visible, Halibar are herbivorous and relatively very resistant to exhaustion, though they don't have too much muscle mass. This makes them very good at long-distance running and tedious physical low-effort work.

Faction History: Many decades ago, the Halibar were a number of entirely different political states who generally prescribed to different cultures. Almost all of these states were secular. Not all of them got along—domestic policy was a complicated thing, with not many states truly that worse off than any other. While they worked in separate agencies, the planet together was approaching the event horizon of becoming a space-faring civilization, having just put permanent colonies on Haliba's various satellites, while simultaneously nearly confirming the presence of alien life in nearby planetary systems.

Suddenly, though, one day, some ships showed up in the sky. A ton of ships. A whole armada, you might say. This day was known by many names throughout Halibar countries, but the one that stuck through history was "The Glorious Siege." Though at face value, this doesn't seem like much of a damning of the day, but many an old Halibar folk tales revolved around the idea of the unjustness of attribution and how not everyone deserving of glory receives it. Noting all contributors wasn't The Golden Rule, but it certainly was at least the Bronze one. While the message doesn't exactly transfer with what happened in reality to the Halibar people to anyone except the most dedicated of literature analysts, the connotation carried, especially with how often the sieging race liked to use the Trilege translation of "glory," that those responsible weren't exactly morally right here. Of course, they didn't know that.

(Trilegi was the partial lingua franca of Halibar, though it's now almost the only language any native speakers hail from.)

The invaders claimed to be The Holy Empire of Enlightened Eazin, and reported that they wished to convert the entire planet to their faith, or everyone would be enslaved and forcefully converted (Of course, they would never say something like this now, but this was ages ago, where slavery was totally accepted). The People's Congresses across Haliba unanimously decided in absolute petrifying fear that the former was the better option here, and sent representatives to the Eazin commanders that they would "face the light" and "never dare to reproach such intelligent beings," effectively falling into an alliance with the Eazin. However, the Eazin "helpfully offered" to help in the proselytizing, and the result wasn't too much a far cry from enslavement anyways.

The Eazin built holy places basically everywhere, and expected the Halibar to visit regularly. They also enacted charter loans to allow native Spiralanian entrepeneurs the capital to build massive farms on Haliba for all of its resources, most numerously its beautiful dyes that the Halibar didn't take too much advantage of, as well as private transportation hubs. Scientific development across the planet was almost totally squashed, which removed any ability for the Halibar to reverse-engineer Eazin technology or at least independently discover it, causing all of their knowledge of the world beyond to depend on their ruling class. And, of course, a secret Eazin police was founded to prohibit antitheist speech and investigate possible dissentors.

Since these new Eazin jobs offered so many benefits that the Halibar hadn't been able to dream of having, technological or otherwise, nearly all of the working class jumped at the opportunity to be employed, and it must be admitted to the Eazin, there was basically no unemployment. Honestly, life under Eazin wasn't all that bad for being so blatantly imperialized, but no one was all that happy about it anyways. They had become infantilized when they were so close to truly making a mark on galactic history. And if anything got on the Halibar's nerves more than anything, it was that Eazin treated Haliba like a single uniform nation. And as a result, it became true. Administrative borders dissolved, and the Halibar cultural identity became one.

It's been years since the start of that era, and Eazin has lifted much of its direct "assistance" on Haliba over this time, technically allowing it to be independent. But in reality, the very few Eazin individuals who still run these corporations are the ones that control the economy of the planet. At the very least, the Haliba gained enough control to have their own representative at The Council, portraying themselves as The Spirtually Renewed Congress of Haliba. Obviously, the "Spiritually Renewed" part was entirely in-name—if The Holy Empire asked, they were still vigorous followers of the true faith, but basically no one actually was. The holy buildings have become asecular meeting halls and youth centers, places where people griped about Eazin more than celebrated them. But the effective world government still knows that it has to keep the image up if it doesn't want to be decisively wiped out with their nigh inexistent defense force.

Home Planet: Haliba - B5; A generally average habitable planet, though perhaps with more mountains than your usual. The world is split up into some ten or so small continents. 61% of Halibar live in concentrated metropolises, while 28% live in Eazin farming compounds, basically cities of their own rights (though they're wider spread).

Whimbrel · 05-20-2016, 11:45 PM

I'm going to get to work on an app, I think I'll be setting up shop in D5

a52 · 05-22-2016, 09:17 PM

Username: Aftti Tu'Kar
Faction Name: The Cult of Righteousness
Faction Motto: No Hard Feelings
Theme Song: Rogue Legacy Castle Theme
Color: Dried blood
Species Name: Schnorikibix

Description: The Schnorikibix look kind of like foxes, kind of like hedgehogs, and kind of like lizards. Their eyes glow red in the dark, and they can see more of the infrared end of the spectrum than humans can, but their color vision is much less powerful.

Due to some strange atmospheric quirk in the early stages of their planet, the entire surface was covered in fluorine gas. Somehow, the early organisms living there managed to adapt to it. Even more surprisingly, the fluorine continued to be produced, so that the fluorine that bonded to the carbon on the surface was replaced by even more.

As a result, everything on the Schnorikibix's planet breathes the stuff, including the Schnorikibix themselves. Fluorine has a few interesting qualities. Namely that it is the single most reactive and oxidizing element on the periodic table, can bond with even the noble gasses, sets most metals on fire simply by coming into contact with them, and is incredibly toxic to every living organism known to non-Schnorikibix. Because of this (and another reason I will get to later), no other species has ever met face to face with a Schnorikibix for a long period of time. A single hole in the Schnorikibix's spacesuit will kill a whole crew.

Faction History: The Schnorikibix lived in a faraway, isolated section of the galaxy. Only a few stars were visible with even their most powerful telescopes, and all of those were either dim dwarfs or raging supergiants that could never support life. They gave up the search for alien life hundreds of years ago, opting instead to harness the resources of other systems.

By the time that they finally came into contact with another sapient species, they had spent so long believing they were alone in the universe that they considered the existence of non-Schnorikibix life an affront to their religion. They promptly murdered every single member of that species and flooded their planet with fluorine gas, killing every organism on the planet. The Cult of Righteousness was formed as a result.

Since then, their goal has been to eliminate every other type of life in the galaxy. Their original religious fervor has calmed into a cold disregard and slight feeling of revulsion for all other aliens, the same way a priest might regard a prostitute. They treat the upcoming mass genocide as a matter of fact, discussing it calmly and casually the same way another faction might regard their new business deal. They're willing to work with other factions to achieve their goals, just with the understanding that "just because you're helping me kill somebody else doesn't mean I'm not going to kill you."

Home Planet: Al'Takawakabixkiki Jar-Schnorintekkartuhopted (F3)

Solaris · 05-22-2016, 10:40 PM

(05-22-2016, 09:17 PM)a52 Wrote: »Home Planet: Al'Takawakabixkiki Jar-Schnorintekkartuhopted (F1)

uhhhh a52,

(05-20-2016, 12:43 PM)Jacquerel Wrote: »Species Name, Description, and Home Planet: Yoth is a either a planet entirely consumed by the growth of a single biological system across its surface (and throughout its interior), or a single organism large enough to be classified as a celestial body.
Yoth is a self-aware entity capable of both thought and independent motion, though as it primarily feeds on solar energy it prefers not to leave the comfort of the star it is orbiting (in sector F1).

jac already picked that system/tile plz pick another one! ty!!!!

also gatr i just realized you dont have a system picked so plz pick a one, ty!

Solaris · 05-22-2016, 10:42 PM

oh yeah also with 8 profiles and 3 reserved slots that bringing it to 11, im going to say that we have 4 more slots left for a total of 15 players!

so if you are on the fence please speak up now!