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A New World, a World of Conflict and Sorrow

OP and Setting Basics

Aaron Fox

SB's Minor Junker Descendant and Hunter of Nazis
Author
This is a setting that has been poking me at the back of my head for a while since bullethead of SB read the novelization of the pilot episode of seaQuest DSV. It is inspired by Anno 2070/2205, Front Mission, seaQuest, Submarine TITANS, SubWar 2050, Nexus: The Jupiter Incident, among others. While the previous worldbuilding threads were focused on either creating in-universe versions of the US and Japan, unfucking the shitshow that is Gundam SEED, and creating a world where it's a bastard child of Frostpunk and Day after Tomorrow with all the shit that such a setting would entail... this is more of a 'mixed bag' setting. A mix of optimism and pessimism, where ideologies can be used for good and evil, with hefty 'the moral calculus is almost alien to us' bits...

The Setting Basics
  • The world is an 'almost worst case scenario' for global warming
    • Here we're talking about entire sections of continents being underwater and entire sections of the Earth literally uninhabitable due to the heat
      • To put things into perspective, Washington DC and New York City are both restructured to be underwater cities while Memphis has become a major sea port
      • The entire Saudi peninsula and some of the surrounding area is literally a death sentence, and it is used by Iran and Israel to exile anyone convicted of a high crime that didn't get the death penalty
    • Due to the massive change in weather patterns, the food supply had been constantly in flux for the better part of one and a half centuries
      • This is exacerbated by the reality that vertical farming was far harder than it looked and most nations defacto or genuinely banning GMO research
        • Most nations would later reverse this or literally collapse into anarchy
      • This led to mass starvation -which would kill billions-, resource wars -which would kill even more billions-, and ecoterrorism -which, again, will kill billions-, all of which has caused the greatest death toll since the time of the Black Plague...
        • The death toll from all that is 5 billion over a period of five decades, or averaging a hundred million per year or roughly 5,475.7 people per day
        • Ecoterrorism carries the highest punishment on the planet, as any eco-terrorist will have to live with the fact that when they get caught their family is going to hell with them
          • Most Ecoterrorism is unleashing synthetic plagues or creating monsters (be animals created from the ground up or modified uplifts specifically designed to be weapons) designed to kill as many people as possible
          • However it is recorded that whenever these terrorists manage to get an atomic device, they will use it to kill as many people as possible, much like what happened to LA and San Diego or Hamburg -among others- during the first two centuries of the new era (i.e. smoking radioactive craters)
          • It should be noted that any pro-Ecological group is at best highly suspect, given that much of the ecoterrorism has come from these groups
            • The only group that isn't considered to be suspicious is the companies under the Ecological Initiative Corporation, which has a strictly self-defensive mandate for its member corporations… and anyone who breaks this mandate is usually cast out, with those that violate the Eco having the perpetrator's families executed and the perpetrator marked for death
    • Instead of the worst case scenario being 80 or 114 meters of sea rise, it is 65 meters
  • Nation-States effectively no longer exist in the current era
    • The world -and all of Sol- is split up between several political-economic blocks called "Federal Confederations" or 'FedCons' for short
      • The governments of these FedCons vary from standard cybernetic representative democracies to monarchies and everything in between
        • It should be noted that it isn't uncommon for FedCons to literally own corporations outright, many development corporations are actually government divisions for development of new islands
      • There are several FedCons that aren't based on Earth at all, and are usually break-away states that broke away from their parent FedCons during the early days of space colonization (NWE 150-250)
    • Outside the FedCons, the mega-corporations ('Meg-Corps') rule
      • Numerous mega-corporations exist, with various technologies and capabilities
      • Should be noted that like the FedCons, the Mega-Corps run the gambit of 'being decent despite being for profit' to 'Shere Khan Machiavellian' to pre-New World 'psychopathic'
      • It should be noted that some of these corporations have made alliances to ensure that the FedCons don't intrude on their business
        • Two of the major 'corporate alliances' are the Global Resources and Energy Trust (GRET or simply 'Trust' for short) and the Eden Ecological Initiative Corporation (EEIC or simply 'Eco' for short)
          • While the EEIC would rely mostly on defense forces, the GRET has the mercenary group White Sharks on their payroll
        • The Scientific Academy for Advanced Technologies (or SAAT for short) generally doesn't care for politics, only advancing science with few moral scruples and is known to be an ally of not only these corporate alliances but also independent corporations
          • SAAT is similar to GRET that it has its own mercenary force to protect its interests; this mercenary force -known as the Black Octopi- is also armed with some of the latest military equipment that SAAT can produce
        • The SpaceTech Conglomerate is a minor but growing space-based Meg-Corp that has been making waves since its founding in NWE 250 out of several space-based corporations
        • There are independent corporations (called IMCs for short) like the Crayven Corporation that are rather successful in this new world…
    • There is only one supranational organization that isn't a Meg-Corp, that would be the organization SolForce
      • SolForce is a slowly growing organization, but is constantly screwed in terms of funding, material, and personnel
      • SolForce has been forced to be largely independent of any group within the Sol system
        • Despite this, SolForce has been slowly growing in power, but not enough to challenge the FedCons and Meg-Corps in decisive battle in NWE 320
  • In addition to the radically changed landscape thanks to global warming, new islands of numerous sizes have been discovered
    • These islands have popped up across the globe, and are rich in natural resources and provided fertile soil for farming
  • In addition to these new islands, numerous undersea colonies have sprung up
  • Technologically, this new world is quite advanced in many ways compared to our own, particularly in terms of submarine, biotech, cybernetics, robotics, AI, comp-tech, nuclear energy, and space tech being the most obvious
    • With the push for nuclear technology, fusion has started to replace fission… although at an immensely reduced rate due to the Helium 3 requirements
    • Most fission reactors are of the Thorium or Molten Salt type, although there are still some traditional fission reactors in operation, mostly as breeder and reprocessing facilities
    • Various uplifts are relatively uncommon in Sol, and this is mostly thanks to SAAT's morally dubious experimentation and some ecoterrorist groups trying to weaponize uplifts to kill off humanity…
      • Despite this, the vast majority of FedCons and Meg-Corps treat uplifts with some respect at the minimum, those that don't generally don't last all that long
  • The vast majority of the solar system is under the control of various Meg-Corps and FedCons, with SolForce trying to keep the peace…
    • Luna is one of the few bodies in Sol to be owned by only one group, and that would be SolForce, and anywhere else is split between the various factions
      • Mars and Jupiter are two of the most common battlegrounds in Sol, with fighting almost constant over the various resources and research opportunities
  • The current era is called 'the New World Era' or NWE for short
    • The "New World Era" started in 2100
    • The 'current' year is NWE 340, which is 2440 in the old calendar
    • The "New World Era" started after the events of 'The Upheavals', a series of wars, disastrous climate change events, and other horrific events which caused immense hardship and death
    • The current population of humanity is 10 billion on Earth, 2 billion across the solar system (with Mars being the largest with 850 million humans); uplifts number in 4 billion on Earth, and another 1 billion across the solar system
  • War is a common occurrence in the New World Era, particularly over resources like drinkable water and other vital necessities for life
    • Thanks in part to these new technologies and the limited resources on Earth, war over vital resources and land is extremely common
      • Nuclear weapons aren't as taboo as they once were, the only reason that they're not used as often is due to the fact they're expensive pieces of ordinance, especially since the depletion of weaponizable fission materials (be elements like Uranium and Plutonium or the newly discovered element Starcorium) on Earth and the Helium-3 requirement for laser-initiated fusion warheads
        • In the years since the Upheavals, a new element has been discovered called 'Starcorium' (or simply Corium for short), which sits on 276 on the periodic table
          • The discovery was made when a series of meteors created deposits of the material on Earth
            • Most of the deposits on Earth are centered around the central Atlantic and Pacific
          • A series of probes on various planets and moons across the solar system showed that there were deposits on various planets and moons of the solar system
            • The major producers of Corium are the colonies of Mars, Titan, Triton, and Iapetus
          • Starcorium's energy density when undergoing fission is 82% of fusion
            • Starcorium 297 -a somewhat rare isotope of Starcorium- is incredibly useful for creating what would be considered 'extreme efficiency' fission warheads, which produce very limited long-term radiation
              • The White Sharks mercenary group and their GERT backers have one of the largest Starcorium-based nuclear stockpiles across the solar system
      • Powered exoskeletons and powered armor is common, requiring far better armaments to combat them
      • This is on top of combat-grade cybernetics and gene-augmentations, vastly improving the user's combat performance
        • To combat these new threats, a new type of round known as 'Hypervelocity Rounds' -or HV and whatever other designation at the end of it like HVAP- have been developed for most small arms
        • In addition to HV rounds, there are rifle-sized lasers as well…
        • Due to advancements in containment technology, plasma has become available as a warhead for missiles and shells, and depending on the containment setup, it can be used to defeat hard or soft targets
      • Vehicular armaments include Electrothermal Chemical Triple Coaxial Plasma Igniter cannon, electro-motive (i.e. rail/coilgun), lasers, and with some groups plasmoid and particle beam weaponry
      • Sol in general is rife with conflict, be between FedCons, Meg-Corps, and/or SolForce
      • This has given birth to a new phrase: "Livable land is rare, but human lives are cheap"
 
Well, here is a portion of the introduction, introducing to some of the protagonists as it were:
1.1 Introduction
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The world in NWE 340

The New World Era had such promise for all of mankind, but various groups sought to ensure that this promise never came to fruition. Most of this is due to men who lusted for the past that didn't exist, those whose greed was greater than their sense, those that believe that their utopias are justified with genocide, and those who want humanity exterminated. As Anno Domini came to a close in its last century, it saw the collapse of the UN, the horrors induced by greedy corporations that would rather see the world burn than their profits decline, the ideas of enforcing a utopia no matter the cost, those who wanting to return to 'the glory days' that never were, and blaintent use of genocide to settle ethnic scores.

This, in turn, had radically transformed the landscape of Earth in more ways than one.

Between the rising sea levels and the heavy use of nuclear ordinance, the landscape has changed immensely. Memphis is now a major sea port; LA, San Diego, Hamburg, St. Petersburg, and more are now craters thanks to nuclear terrorism; fresh water is in short supply while mass desalination is used to keep the water needs satisfied; entire bands of the Earth are literally too hot to be inhabitable by human life; great swathes of land uninhabitable due to various acts of bioterrorism… all that and more contributing to this new world.

The world is now split into numerous factions, mostly between the various Mega Corporations -or Meg-Corps for short- and the three major corporate alliances (Global Energy and Resources Trust (GERT for short), Eden Ecological Initiative Corporation (EEIC), and Scientific Academy for Advanced Technologies (SAAT)) and large super-national states called 'Federal Confederations' -or FedCons for short. Now there is a sort of 'third' faction in NWE 320 called SolForce, and in NWE 340 it is not effective enough to keep the peace but not weak enough that anyone will simply run over it without repercussions. SolForce is basically the armed peacekeepers of this new era. It enforces several international laws that everyone -outside of the most idiotic and insane (in more ways than one) groups- has agreed to abide by… and ruthlessly executes anyone that breaks those laws if the FedCons or Meg-Corps don't get to them first.

1.2 The Federal Confederations
The Federal Confederations -usually called FedCons for short- are somewhat complex social-political constructs that are far larger than any nation-state of the pre-Upheavals era. As a whole, they're similar to the Supranational nations of Front Mission, just far more expanded due to the shear length of time they've been operating. For the most part, nations within the FedCons are only of historical and administrative significance. This is partially due to the fact that normal nation-states can't survive in the New World era, especially since corporations can filibuster -in military terms its is someone(s) who(m) engages in an (at least nominally) unauthorized military expedition into a foreign country or territory to foment or support a revolution- smaller governments into being subversive to whatever corporation did the filibuster.

As such, the various FedCons are the only traditional governments left.

FedCons come in all sorts of shapes, sizes, and governments and can have politics ranging from tempered optimistic to Machiavellian to outright tyrannical and everything in between. One of the few things that these FedCons have in common is an electronic panopticon, usually governed by some sort of AI. This is partially due to the Upheavals and certain technologies -mostly biotech, but also weather manipulation tech, nukes, and nano-tech- that has proliferated to almost universal levels without the people having countermeasures, allowing any yahoo with a little know how and the tech to simply cause immense havoc. It should be also known that without weather manipulation tech, the world would be in a far more dire spot than it already is, and all Weather Stabilizer stations are under the sole control of SolForce as per the Treaty of Luna, which established SolForce's exclusivity to Weather Control tech (and the punishments for the breach of this exclusivity) and the rights of the organization.

Culturally, the FedComs can be varied. Some have one dominant culture while others are more of a mixing pot, and there are those that are in between these two extremes as well.

1.3 The Mega Corporations
The second group of factions are the Mega Corporations or 'Meg-Corps' for short. With the dissolution of power from nation-states before and during the Upheaval, these businesses are -in many cases- the government in numerous locales across the planet. Through overt and subversive force of arms, these corporations have taken over great swathes of the world that aren't part of the FedCons or groups like SolForce. The situation outside FedCon and SolForce territory is generally either land that no one has claimed yet or belongs to the Meg-Corps.

The Meg-Corps are one of the legacies of what led to the Upheavals, and while some of them aren't as bad as what birthed them (the Eden Ecological Initiative Corporation being the 'nicest' of the bunch), others are completely exploitive and will do anything to get more profit. However, it should be noted that the most common type of corporation can be described as 'Machiavellian', as being too exploitative tends to incite things like revolutions and uprisings. As a cartoon tiger once said: "I desire only power and money, unrepresentable workers provide me with neither."

1.3.1 The Trusts
Might makes right, that is the core aspect of the world that this is set in… and with the FedCons trying to take power away from the Meg-Corps, alliances between Meg-Corps to ensure that they don't loose power (and thus profits) formed. There are four major corporate alliances, usually called 'trusts': the Eden Ecological Initiative Corporation (a conglomerate of 'Green' business), Scientific Academy for Advanced Technologies (SAAT for short, a conglomerate of tech corporations that specialize in numerous fields including cybernetics, biotech, nanotech, nuclear physics, among others), SpaceTech (a conglomerate of space-based industries and corporations), and the Global Energy and Resource Trust (or GERT or 'Trust' for short). Other Trusts exist, but aren't as influential as these four.

1.3.1.1 Eden Ecological Initiative Corporation (EEIC or 'Eco')
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(a major Eco city in a crowded archipelago in the South Pacific, population 1 million humans)

The EEIC is a conglomerate of 'Green' business trying to show the viability of 'Green' tech as a profitable venture. The brainchild of Ulysses 'Mr. Green' Williams and originally headquartered in Berlin, it had shown some success in its original mission. The problem with the mission is that, at the end of the day, it is far cheaper (and thus more profitable) to simply tear the environment up than doing environmentally friendly methods.

That has always been a major problem with being ecologically friendly as it's far less expensive to simply destroy the environment in order to get the resources you want than extract them in an environmentally friendly way. One of the more problematic problems that EEIC has is the extreme resistance to gene-modified organisms. Despite their use being an outright requirement in this era, the vast majority of the EEIC aren't willing to pursue GMOs too far and aren't too fond of uplifts either.

It also doesn't help that environmentalism has become a byword for eco-terrorism… as the numerous acts of biological and nuclear terrorism perpetrated by the various eco-terrorist organizations like Greenpeace, the World Purity League, and the Eco Pact. These atrocities in the name of environmentalism stained the name and ideology of environmentalism to the modern day and beyond.

The EEIC is 'governed' by what amounts to a constitution known only as 'the Ecological Mandate'. The Ecological Mandate is an immense document that has been amended numerous times over the two centuries that it existed. It outlines rights, basic laws, what the EEIC can and can't do, establishing judicial and political protocol, among other aspects of governance. This allowed a certain level of control over the vast territory that the various corporations under the EEIC's banner have procured over the centuries, which helps in ensuring that the EEIC doesn't have problems with factions within the Trust causing PR problems out the ass.

The biggest difference between the EEIC and other trusts is that they don't have a mercenary group on their payroll. The most military gear they have is basically enough only for defensive purposes. A Self Defense Force writ large as it were. While this kept costs low, it also has limited the ability for the EEIC to expand, a problem that has also extended to it's space-based holdings.

1.3.1.2 The Global Energy and Resources Trust (GERT or simply 'Trust')
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(a major GERT city, in an archipelago in the Pacific)

The Global Energy and Resource Trust is the culmination of one woman's -one Skylar Banes, who is currently the Chairwoman of the Board of Directors, the CEO, and company president- desires and dreams, built upon sweat and blood that started in NWE 225. Starting from a simple exploration and prospecting firm, Madam Barnes created one of the largest Trusts that humanity has ever seen. Outside the FedCons, GERT owns about a third of Earth's energy and resource output. Many other corporations (and several minor FedCons) have some level of reliance on GERT to ensure that they can continue functioning.

Despite their cornering of the world's resource and energy markets, GERT is far more pragmatic than one would assume, despite the occasional 'bad egg' like Thor Strindberg -who was responsible for the Site 13 Debacle and the Break the World Crisis before his execution in NWE 250. Skylar Banes puts pragmatism, rule abiding, and competence above all else. While this isn't shared with her colleges within the trust, this has garnered a lot of goodwill and positive PR for the Trust… and the unquestioned grumblings of Banes's underlings.

To defend its immense holdings, GERT had acquired the mercenary nation of the White Sharks in a hostile takeover in NWE 252 after the Break the World Crisis demolished GERT's security and military forces. The White Sharks are notorious for being brutal combatants and basically follows the 'David Drake' style of Rules of Engagement (or, to be more specific, 'every tool at your disposal to end the conflict if you can get away with it' and 'the moment your opponent uses protected locations and vehicles, treat all other protected locations and vehicles as targets' rules of engagement, although for the latter it is used by all militaries across Sol). Most independent groups tend to simply surrender than fight, allowing GERT to create a massive empire for itself across the planet and on numerous planets, moons, planetoids, and asteroids.

As a whole, the leadership of GERT is pragmatic when it comes to uplifts and gene-modified organisms, allowing uplifts to work and live in higher-security areas so any problems with anti-Uplift groups are minimized and make extensive use of GMO plants and animals to maximize production and minimize environmental impact and disease.

1.3.1.3 Scientific Academy for Advanced Technologies (SAAT)
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(a major SAAT city, please note the numerous emergency services buildings)

SAAT is the biggest technology conglomerate in human history. Out of all the groups within Sol, only SolForce is more advanced (and SolForce maintains the immense climate control network that keeps everyone from dying from the worst that climate change has to offer).

Born out of the group known as 'The Old Crew' (or TOC for short), SAAT became a major juggernaut in terms of scientific exploration. Growing out of a conglomerate of laboratories and advanced prospecting and resource extraction corporations, it became a juggernaut in terms of scientific and metamaterial output. It is also the group with the most advanced GMOs in Sol. SAAT is also infamous/famous (depending on how you look at it) for the development of the various uplifts that exist.

The treatment of uplifts, however, is a different story.

Uplifts are treated like second class citizens within SAAT borders… and got away with this for the longest time due to the fact that SAAT is the center of technological development and produces a significant portion of the GMOs and metamaterials needed for modern existence. However, as of NWE 320, SAAT's grip on metamaterial and GMO production has been waning which allowed SolForce to effectively wage a 'lukewarm' war against SAAT for this and other atrocities. It also didn't help that a massive 'underground railroad' network made up of less amoral citizens and workers and various uplift advocacy groups across the planet to ship as many uplifts as they can to FedCons like the Oceania Cooperative Union and the Union of North American States or MegCorps like GERT.

Much of SAAT's technological prowess is the fact that they rarely put ethics into their research. Outright human experimentation using 'unnoticeables' or 'undesirables' across the world is sickenly common. This lack of ethics rarely shows up in their branch offices in various FedCons or MegCorps, however, and due to the lack of a powerful supranational entity to enforce these laws (although as of the present day in NWE 340, SolForce is becoming that to pretty much everyone) no one can really touch them.

SAAT has its own private military in the form of the Black Octopi. Originally a major undersea prospecting and exploration corporation, the Black Octopi transformed into a mercenary group in the second century. The Black Octopi showed itself as a major military force during the Break the World Crisis as it fought the first incarnation of the Orbital Watch terrorist organization/rogue state.
 
  • In addition to the radically changed landscape thanks to global warming, new islands of numerous sizes have been discovered
    • These islands have popped up across the globe, and are rich in natural resources and provided fertile soil for farming
How were these islands formed? Were they yet undiscovered islands, remnants of pre-New World landmass, or artificial?
 
How were these islands formed? Were they yet undiscovered islands, remnants of pre-New World landmass, or artificial?
A little of column A, a little of column B, and a little of column C in various amounts. Elementary versions of various terraforming tech got out into the wild as it were and caused all sorts of havoc... which caused the technology to be heavily regulated, with SolForce having a monopoly on the latest terraforming tech and selling black-boxed versions of older terraforming tech (a monopoly that no one sane is willing to break given the last time some idiots tried it, let's just say there's an island that was made into radioactive glass in the aftermath) to everyone else.

Yeah, the Treaty of Luna came about because everyone wanted some stability out of the mess that is the New World Era, which made an unofficial UN successor into an official UN successor.
 
Another prototype for you guys, this time focusing on introducing SpaceTech and SolForce:
_______

1.3.1.4 SpaceTech
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(An older SpaceTech Stiletto class Corvette fighting a ship from one of SpaceTech's many
rivals)

SpaceTech (and yes, that is how it is spelled) is a major space industry trust that is a rising star in today's world. AstroTech Industries (headed by Michael Garibaldi), Star Transport Limited (headed by Richard Williams), and the Space Prospector Group (headed by Ismail Edgar) make up the core of the SpaceTech Trust's core corporations and all of it began during the Space Boom that started in NWE 210s when the first viable permanent space stations became operational. Numerous corporations either created new space divisions from scratch or got enough investment to start entirely new companies in the high-risk, high-reward environment that is space exploration, prospecting, and colonization.

In this ruthless environment, it wasn't uncommon for skirmishes and outright conflict to erupt… and it has quite often when one can lose and gain everything. This is especially true with various resources that are either rare or nonexistent on Earth. Exotic elements like Starcorium and Starmetal are in immense abondance in space alongside more conventional ones like uranium, helium 3, the rare earth metals family, among others. This is much of the impetus for space colonization and exploitation.

SpaceTech's nucleus would gain much power during this period, which created the aerospace behemoth today.

This didn't stop the creation of numerous enemies however. Minor Trusts like the Kassaki Syndicate and OSEC vie for power across the outer planets of the solar system alongside SolForce and FedCons like the Oceania Cooperative Union and the Union of North American States. This is why SpaceTech is tied with SolForce with the largest space force in Sol, with almost thousand warships and two thousand assorted freighters, star liners, and assorted logistical vessels to it's credit.

SpaceTech is notable that it sells modified versions of their spaceships in market, causing much of the spacelanes to be filled with SpaceTech gear as few MegCorps and FedCons can afford to not only build their colonies on moons and other planets WHILE creating their own spaceship construction infrastructure.

In addition, it had to fight it's way to become what it is today, as the Jovian and Cronosian Skirmishes, in 235 and 244 respectively, showed. With corporate espionage and outright wars becoming more and more common as time went on SpaceTech's military has become one of the few crack militaries in Sol.

1.4 SolForce
full

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(Top: SolForce's Flag Bottom: SolForce's Battle Standard)

SolForce is the supranational organization that is the successor to the UN, indeed several of its organizations (World Health Organization (WHO), Universal Postal Union (UPU), International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), International Maritime Organization (IMO), and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)) are part of the nucleus that created SolForce in the first place. Unlike its predecessor (which could only do as much as the Security Council would allow it), it is almost entirely self-sufficient and effectively a nation unto itself. As such, it is looked upon with suspicion by the majority of the FedCons and MegCorps.

Despite this, SolForce is a major force within the Sol system, trying to ensure that the few international laws that remain are enforced. It is also known to enforce these laws with lethal force as necessary. This includes SolForce's monopoly on terraforming tech.

Other international laws that are enforced includes the universal restrictions on bioweapon technology (all overseen by SolForce AI and 'twined' inspectors), the universal restrictions on nanotech (also overseen by SolForce AI and 'twined' inspectors), enforcing SolForce's monopoly on antimatter, SolForce's monopoly on psionics in its entirety, and the complete ban of gene-line bioweapons outside of devising countermeasures (overseen by SolForce AI and 'twined' inspectors, enforced by SolForce itself via agents called 'Silencers').

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(an early permanent orbital stations, in this case a permanent orbital research laboratory designed to carry out various 'low'-risk research, in this case in the biotech, agriculture, electronics, and heavy industry fields)

SolForce started out as simply as the space equivalent of the ICAO in 210 as orbital launches became more and more frequent, leading to the first permanent orbital stations only 5 years later. This, predictably, caused orbital traffic to be effectively impossible without one organization ensuring everyone else has the same training, standards, and equipment. This puts SolForce into an interesting position to effectively control space and orbital traffic. This iron grip on orbital traffic, an iron grip that hasn't abided with the creation of the space control AI almost a century later.

SolForce quickly gathered the remnants of the UN and integrated them into the organization, allowing for a major shot in the arm in terms of political power. This allowed SolForce to start creating its own space force in the 230s which became powerful enough to dictate terms in what would shape into the Treaty of Luna in 292 after the OSEC-Kassaki/SolForce War, allowing it to dictate terms alongside certain aspects of 'enlightened self interest' from the vast majority of humanity.


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(Top and Bottom: The Novikov Crater Outpost, a typical SolForce 'quick and dirty' lunar outpost of about thirty thousand; please note that this setup is only viable via modern hybrid Anti-Kinetic/Radiation Fields)

SolForce slowly grew from what would be effectively a laughing stock to a powerful faction in it's own right. By 250, SolForce had some of the most lucrative areas of the moon under its control, led by Luna Headquarters in the southern hemisphere, which has allowed for much of SolForce's growth in the years that followed. SolForce would expand its reach to across the solar system, setting up settlements and bases to expand on its power and enforcing international law.
 
Promising so far, though I'd say there is no way Mecca, Medina and the area surrounding the two cities will be abandoned, unless someone lobbed a dirty bomb or two in the area.
 
Promising so far, though I'd say there is no way Mecca, Medina and the area surrounding the two cities will be abandoned, unless someone lobbed a dirty bomb or two in the area.
Not when it gets literally too hot for humans to live (as in, regularly over 140 degrees Fahrenheit -or 60 degrees Celsius if you prefer metric- for the area around Mecca alone... and that is well within the danger zone for the human body as hyperthermia will set in rather quickly) and basically berried by sand via the horrific dust storms and intense desertification. The House of Saud constructed biodomes for these cities, but it proved fruitless as even the best that money could buy couldn't keep up with the demands (and this practically bankrupted the country mind you). No one came back for the cities after the House of Saud fell in the late 21st, and by the time things stabilized, both cities had been consumed by the desert, never to be seen again.

Remember, the climate control tech currently operating only stops the situation from getting worse, not reverse centuries of atmospheric pollution. A lot of resources in SolForce's RnD are being thrown at finding a way to reverse this, but even with helium-3 fusion this is basically impossible as every solution so far requires anti-matter levels of energy potential at best to change the climate back on a global scale.
 
@t-dugong, @Terra Novan, I've been working on how to introduce everyone into combat, and I had the idea that the average blue-water navy of the various factions having a minimum of 6 to 8 hundred combat vessels (about half of which are submarines) each to cover their various assets and undersea colonies. In addition, line infantry squads with transports number somewhere between 10-man squads and two-man transports to 15 man squads and 3-man transports.

Attrition is god in this world, as platoons of 60 to 90 men regularly die in skirmishes, with entire companies (which usually consist of 4 or 5 of these platoons, which means somewhere between 240 to 450 troops for line infantry companies) being either being rendered combat ineffective or annihilated within days during a war. These large unit sizes are able to be fielded thanks to 'replicator' tech -an incredibly powerful 3D printer/nano-fabber hybrid that can produce practically everything that it can fit through the exit (be ammunition, armaments, parts for vehicles, entire smaller vehicles, armor plate, or portions of ship for most models, with the rare naval drydock sized fabricator that eats energy like a pig, hence why most most shipyards tend to be basically a fabber plant with a more traditional shipyard attached) and has the feedstock for- decreasing the costs of equipment with the fact of gene and cyber augs eliminate the problem of having entire portions of the population incapable of being part of the military (and the fact that there is actually not much work outside the military helps as well).

... and why drones aren't used? Because they require AGIs to be able to be on the battlefield thanks to drone spoofing techniques developed during the Upheavals and refined in the New World Era, and AGIs require Quantum Processors (or 'Q-Procs' for short) to function which has a tight production bottleneck compared to simply having augmented soldiers with more traditional computer circuits and processors...
 
Some of the weapons that I've thought up while writing the current portion of the introduction, sure they're SolForce armaments but the principles behind them are rather common:
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My newest pulse laser rifle thanks to Pimp My Gun. The battery essentially gets put into the handgrip ala the Wattz 3000 mod laser rifle:


Incredibly potent and the muzzle break is to keep the focusing array from getting damaged. It also uses thermal clips to help keep the heat down. It's capabilities is comparable to the next weapon, but at the cost of more weight and longer barrel.
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The above is a 'Burst Rifle', which is pretty powerful. It utilizes Electro-Thermal Chemical Triple coaxial Plasma Igniter technology and can fire a 5.56x35mm (this is the dimensions of the actual bullet) round at (to us) extremely high speed (2km/s for normal, 3km/s minimum for hypervelocity) Given that the usual cores of these weapons tend to be iridium or some other high-density metal, they can impart immense amounts of kinetic energy. This is mostly due to metallurgy advancing leaps and bounds thanks to what amounts to 3D printer style replicators and nano-tech fabrication as well as the proliferation of armored exoskeletons, powered armor, cybernetics, and gene-tech. When you can augment a person with gene-tech to make them act like SPARTANs on permanent 'SPARTAN Time' or make cybernetic bodies straight out of Ghost in the Shell meta-verse with ease, you'll need something that can actually hit them.

Also, explosives are far more potent than ours, as competently designed exoskeletons and powered armor can dampen the effects of explosives. Effectively, an 'Anno Domini' grenade would only cause slight disorientation for a man clad in an armored exoskeleton or be simply laughed off by a mostly-/full-conversion cyborg or someone clad in powered armor. On the other hand, a 'New World Era' grenade would turn normal humans into paste within 50 meters and into chunky salsa outside of that up to 100 meters.
 
Now, another 'assumption' that is considered truth is that human beings are still viable in military matters. Between the fact that AGIs require quantum computing and at least a month in AI Crèches to be even viable as a whole (alongside the large tail that each AGI requires to ensure maximum effectiveness all units) with the fact that cybernetic and genetic 'boosting' is an extremely common technology (the closest that popular fiction has to this sort of thing is what the Systems Alliance in Mass Effect utilizes for its own military, as many of it's soldiers are 'boosted' genetically to enhance effectiveness) and this allows the various factions to effectively have everyone able to do military service (a report that the US military did earlier this decade indicated that ~10% of the US population are non-viable for even 'bottom of the barrel' conscription due to how much has changed in terms of equipment, tactics, and doctrine).
 
Hm, something to go with a picture that I've found on Facebook that is prudent for the setting:

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"When mankind first came to Mars, it was mostly surveyors of SolForce, the Union of North American States, and several mega corporations, all looking for resources and locations to set up their future colonies. Despite this, the first American colonies on Mars would be located at several NASA probe landing sites including Opportunity and Viking 1. Each and every one of them would have those probes as monuments, the center of these colonies as it were. This was not only a testament to the willingness of humanity to anthropomorphize machines and animals (although the latter became the driving force for the Uplift Process), but also attempting to recreate the future that was..."
 
Now, thanks to the SB Mod The Dark Gods, I've found World Anvil and have made a prototype of a major problem that everyone can face: A Death Zone.

What these areas are is stated on the tin, they are literally zones of death. Usually they're synthetic plagues specifically designed to latch into the biosphere of an area and kill anything that it is coded to kill in horrific and disturbing ways, but occasionally you'll see an area where it has enough ambient radiation that unless you're using heavy power armor or what is essentially a mini-mecha, you are going to be glowing so hot that the Geiger counter won't be able to tell how irradiated you are outside of 'off the scale' (basically the last area in the game Metro: Exodus).

The largest of these is the Rome Metropolitan Death Zone, created by the most horrific bio-terrorism attack (by eco-terrorists) in the history of mankind. At the time that this act of horror was unleashed, the Rome Metropolitan Area had a population of 12 million. The synthetic plague killed 9 million and the survivors were barely able to live out the rest of their shortened lives.

SolForce has created a cordon of the Zone consisting of two armies and a sophisticated network of sensors and automated turrets with explicit orders to shoot first, ask questions never. This is mostly due to the fact that if the synthetic plague that has latched onto the biosphere within this zone was to become 'wild'... well... let's just say the best case scenario is at least another Rome Metropolitan Death Zone would be created. You don't want to know the worst case scenario, and if you want to know then prepare for me (and SolForce) to throw redacteds at you...
 
Attention Everyone! Now Available at World Anvil!
An outlawed weapon in this new age -thanks to the Treaty of Luna- is mimetic or 'meme' weapons. These weapons are designed to basically cause disaster wherever it goes. This is thanks to the fact that they can lie in wait for decades, even centuries before activating and then causing untold havoc. That is why all factions that have an ounce of self-preservation has entire departments specifically hardened and designed against this new weapon to find, track, and eliminate mimetic weapon users, with quite a few nations going for 'killing ten innocence and a guilty is better off than allowing the guilty to walk' approach (which, in all honesty, is sadly not unwarranted, given the mechanics of mimetic weaponry).



If SolForce finds out someone has been using this sort of weapon, well, let's just say that the mimetic weapons creator and his/her family will get killed by Black Section Black-Ops operatives alongside a Silencer, but it might end up having an entire state/island be nuked until it glows and nuked some more just to be sure with the internet literally locked down and thoroughly scanned by every faction to find any and all sleeper mimetics... which could mean the internet and every database might be offline for months if not years as they are carefully and thoroughly checked for mimetic weapons.



Mimetic weaponry started showing up in the second decade of the 21st -and last- century of Anno Domini, with Brexit and the US 2016 elections being the most prominent with events like the March 2019 New Zealand terrorist attacks having even very crude versions of mimetic weaponry being used to cause more havoc. This, eventually, led to the end of privacy and the free flow of information in it's entirety by the end of the first half of the century. With the proliferation of this type of weapon, anyone that didn't get with the 'end of privacy and unilateral free flow of information' program died very messy deaths.
 
I am thinking about using a WorldAnvil. Is it good or at least convenient to use?
It's actually pretty decent, just that you'll have to get used to some of the quirks like how it works with geopolitical organizations.
 
Thanks. Have a follow.
Thank you. :)

Also, been on the World Anvil discord... and something frightening has come up. The reason that the Imperium is so exterminatus/kill happy with anything related to Chaos is that the Warp itself is memetic. Basically, you think it, it happened, and OHSHIT!HORRORS!...
 
Also, been on the World Anvil discord... and something frightening has come up. The reason that the Imperium is so exterminatus/kill happy with anything related to Chaos is that the Warp itself is memetic. Basically, you think it, it happened, and OHSHIT!HORRORS!...
Think that was already pretty well established, even if mostly shown in novels and stories rather than Codexes. I am also reminded of Transhuman Space, where Memetics are serious business alongside the usual Transhuman stuff.
 
Think that was already pretty well established, even if mostly shown in novels and stories rather than Codexes. I am also reminded of Transhuman Space, where Memetics are serious business alongside the usual Transhuman stuff.
Yeah, I'm thinking of memetics as Serious Business(tm) here too, but memetics isn't just spread memes and shit happens. It has to be tailored for specific targets, rigged with countermeasures, etc. A memetic weapon that is designed with -for example- human-far right can't really effect human-far left or AGI/VGIs. It also has to be tailored for a delivery method as well...

... so basically there is a lot of work that goes into making a decent memetic weapon.

Also, I was working on a government for SolForce so I want to ask all of you to take a look at it.

Basically the Head of State is the Director-General, and he does all the heads of state do with very limited legislative powers. How he gets into power is that whenever a term ends, a pool of screened candidates (by Black (aka CIA and other 'external' intelligence agencies) and Grey (aka the FBI and other 'internal' intelligence agencies) Sections) is put before a combined joint (closed but recorded) session of the lower executive (a council of section heads with someone within these sections elected as 'head' of the council) and the three houses of the legislature (which includes what amounts to be the Senate (pre-17th amendment), the House of Representatives, and a house for the various bureaucratic sections) who then elect the next Director-General.

The Senate is essentially the pre-17th Amendment version of the US senator (that they're elected by state legislature instead of directly), and is what you expect from literal representatives of each state (although in this case, it's three senators per state instead of two). The House of Representatives is what you expect of a directly-elected, population based, legislative house. The House of Sections is basically a house of technocrats and bureaucrats and is designed to balance out the Senate and the Representatives.

The biggest thing I'm conflicted on is the judicial branch, which I want to be completely isolated from the usual politics and have the power to veto any law that passes the executive (and through the executive the legislative) if it feels would destroy the state or have very few positions appointed by the executive with both options having justices be awarded via merit...
 
The biggest thing I'm conflicted on is the judicial branch, which I want to be completely isolated from the usual politics and have the power to veto any law that passes the executive (and through the executive the legislative) if it feels would destroy the state or have very few positions appointed by the executive with both options having justices be awarded via merit...
Well, the possible solution is to have the branch operated by non-human beings specifically optimized for impartialness.

Like an AI, or maybe gene-modified humans.

Also, currently stuck with writing a description for my world. Edit: It's done.
 
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Well, the possible solution is to have the branch operated by non-human beings specifically optimized for impartialness.

Like an AI, or maybe gene-modified humans.

Also, currently stuck with writing a description for my world.
So a requirement of cyber-augs to be even hope to be part of the judicial system given that AGI is so hard to manufacture?
 
Guess so, but it is your choice.
I'll take a gander at that line... to see how it would work. I mean, I'm thinking of forcing the executive and legislative portions of the government the requirement to have 'sense interceptors' (something I'm shamelessly taking from Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, which is basically a series of augmentations that record any and all sensory data although the GitS version was specific to the eyes) among other augmentations to be part of the government with fail safes to ensure compliance.
 
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