The Twelve Dancing Princesses [a Hardish Sci Fi Campaign setting]

[Astromancer]

The basic idea is simple, we build a star cluster for a hardish Sci Fi campaign.

I'll set some paramiters, then anyone can kibitz throwing in their ideas. Please, we are trying for Hardish Sci Fi.

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No FTL travel durring the campaign (there was some in the past, that's how humans got stranded in this cluster).

Psionics are proven real, but no one knows how to make them useful or trainable.

Most tech is like Transhuman Space maybe a little more advanced.

Basic setting.

The Twelve Dancing Princesses is a cluster of twelve Sol-like stars that orbit around a common center of gravity in four sets of three stars. There are at least two terraformable worlds around each of these stars. All the stars are named for fictional and/or Mythical Princesses.

Each set of three stars has two stars that are three to five light days apart and the third is about five to seven light days away from the others. The trios of stars are in two groups of six, the trios average between eight to twelve light days apart, and the two halves of the cluster are generally about fourteen to twenty light days apart.

For comparison: Pluto is ten light hours from the Sun.

Humans got to the cluster through an artificially created and stablised wormhole (yes Rubber science, Hard Sci Fi allows one miracle, this is hardish Sci Fi, I'll keep it below five miracles). The materials to recreate the Wormhole device haven't yet been found in the cluster.

Twenty-five colonising groups came into the cluster. Thirteen of these came from the United States of America, but were multi-national in their make-up. Eight groups came from the European Union, these were less multi-national and drew almost exclusively from the EU. The Other four came from China, Indonesia, Iran, and a Sub-Saharran African group.

These groups are spread out amoung the systems living in space colonies or on the surfaces of planets being terraformed.

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If it's between the stars, it's set in stone. Otherwise, spin out any wildness you like. We might vote on some of it.

[Ze'Manel Cunha]

You'll want to keep some type of softish system for travel between systems, otherwise everyone will be restricted to their own star with hardish Sci Fi.

4 light days is about a year by the fastest tech we could theoretically build.

So 1 year to the nearest star within the trio, 1.5 years to the furthest star in the trio, 2-3 years to the nearest trio, 4-5 years to the other half of the cluster.

I suppose you could use some sort of cryogenic/suspended animation travel, but you'd still need to justify why anyone would ever expend the cost and resources on physically making humans take the trip when you could just send robotic/autonomous ships.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

The Twelve Dancing Princesses is a cluster of twelve Sol-like stars that orbit around a common center of gravity in four sets of three stars. There are at least two terraformable worlds around each of these stars. All the stars are named for fictional and/or Mythical Princesses.

Each set of three stars has two stars that are three to five light days apart and the third is about five to seven light days away from the others. The trios of stars are in two groups of six, the trios average between eight to twelve light days apart, and the two halves of the cluster are generally about fourteen to twenty light days apart.

Presumably, humans came here to investigate this obviously artificial configuration? Did they find the answer?

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by johndallman

Presumably, humans came here to investigate this obviously artificial configuration? Did they find the answer?

If there's an answer, it hasn't been found. Still, the idea that the system is artificial could inspire alsorts of Occult, fringe religious, and conspiracy, goodness and weirdness.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by Ze'Manel Cunha

You'll want to keep some type of softish system for travel between systems, otherwise everyone will be restricted to their own star with hardish Sci Fi.

4 light days is about a year by the fastest tech we could theoretically build.

So 1 year to the nearest star within the trio, 1.5 years to the furthest star in the trio, 2-3 years to the nearest trio, 4-5 years to the other half of the cluster.

I suppose you could use some sort of cryogenic/suspended animation travel, but you'd still need to justify why anyone would ever expend the cost and resources on physically making humans take the trip when you could just send robotic/autonomous ships.

We might be rubbery enough to speed that up just a little. But it's meant to be like going around the world in 1700AD to tour the whole cluster. Possible but wildly unlikely.

[Ze'Manel Cunha]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

We might be rubbery enough to speed that up just a little. But it's meant to be like going around the world in 1700AD to tour the whole cluster. Possible but wildly unlikely.

How about leaving in place a womhole chain?

Physical travel through normal space would still take years, but when using the existing wormhole chain instead, one could get to the neighboring stars in weeks, to the furthest cluster in months, it's just a matter of getting to the right wormholes through normal space.

For additional fun, have some of the wormholes on an unknown frequency rotation, so sometimes they take you one place, sometimes another, and no one has yet figured out what that rotational frequency is.

So everyone knows where the wormhole which would take them back to Sol is, but it even though it held steady when the cluster was discovered, it hasn't led back there in centuries, and besides going to the other systems in the cluster it's also on its 3rd extracluster system since synching out of Sol, maybe someday it'll connect back to Sol on its own, or maybe there's a way to change the frequency.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Ze'Manel Cunha

...
I suppose you could use some sort of cryogenic/suspended animation travel, but you'd still need to justify why anyone would ever expend the cost and resources on physically making humans take the trip when you could just send robotic/autonomous ships.

That's really the major stumbling block for any rational human presence in space, not just the most expensive forms of space travel.

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

If it's between the stars, it's set in stone. Otherwise, spin out any wildness you like. We might vote on some of it.

Where is this setting's built-in dramatic potential?

[Frost]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

The basic idea is simple, we build a star cluster for a hardish Sci Fi campaign.

I'll set some paramiters, then anyone can kibitz throwing in their ideas. Please, we are trying for Hardish Sci Fi...

If it's between the stars, it's set in stone. Otherwise, spin out any wildness you like. We might vote on some of it.

Interesting ideas.

I have a number of questions:

How do you see psionics working? Full blown ESP and mind reading or something more subtle say (in GURPS terms) danger sense and empathy etc with the psi limitation?

You mention drawing on Transhuman Space how wedded are you to some of the underlying concepts? From where I am standing strong AI (ok I have a downer on it anyway, but that is not the point) seems to be a potential deal breaker for suspension of disbelief (for reasons discussed below). On the other hand the genetic engineering, particularly some of the parahumans and bioroids offer the potential for things to get truly weird, which may add a bit more depth to the setting.

Lastly what do you see your PC's doing? And where do you see them doing it?

Depending on the answers to some of these questions the problem with travel times is possibly not as big as it might be, even using the strictly plausible numbers. While you might still want to cut them down by say half or two thirds, the long journey times by sleeper ship can be built into the setting as another mechanism for adding a bit of depth and flavour.

Ships are likely to stick to predictable routes with the bulk of traffic at local (intra-trio) level or short inter-trio routes probably just to the nearest trios with longer routes being pieced together from multiple trips on several different vessels. This will tend to replicate the situation of the classical, late medieval or (very) early modern world which seems broadly to chime with what you are aiming for.

If strong AI is removed from the equation then the why send people angle goes away or at least becomes less severe, if you plan to do anything at the far end you will need people to do it (or at least to oversee it).

(Although it takes place mostly in one solar system) Paul McAuley's 'In the Mouth of the Whale' or some of Liz Williams novels particularly 'The Poison Master' (despite being more or less fantasy) might provide a bit of inspiration.

[combatmedic]

Ideas for psionics in this setting:

• Psionics= further developments of neuroscience tech, like braintaping, may involve implants
  
• Psionics= advanced psychology and social sciences, like memetics or 'Psychohistory'
  
  
• Psionics= 'psychic powers' without a scientific/materialist explanation

If you go with the last options, I'd consider yanking braintaping, memetics, and maybe even SAIs from the setting.