Steve Jackson Games - Site Navigation
Home General Info Follow Us Search Illuminator Store Forums What's New Other Games Ogre GURPS Munchkin Our Games: Home

Go Back   Steve Jackson Games Forums > Roleplaying > GURPS

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
Old 10-17-2008, 04:50 PM   #1
Cowd
 
Join Date: Dec 2006
Default Roma Umbrata: Cyberpunk Caesarism

Quote:
Roma Umbrata, 258
Current Affairs: Weakened beyond plausible survivability by China, Persia and internal decadence, a dystopian cyberpunk Rome enters its second millennium as Carthage, Egypt and India watch in anticipation.
Divergence Point: 212 BC; Archimedes survives the assault on Syracuse and is taken to Rome, kickstarting the Scientific Revolution as the Carthaginians explore the Americas.
Major Civilizations: Roman (empire with satellites), Punic (empire with satellites) Hellenic-Egyptian (empire), Iranic (empire), Chinese (empire with satellites), Indic (multipolar)
Great Powers: Roman Empire (dictatorship, CR4-5 for citizens, CR6 for others), Carthage (representative democracy, CR2 for citizens, CR4 for others), Sassanid Persia (caste dictatorship, CR5), Neo-Aegypt (Technocratic oligarchy, CR4), Chinese Empire (dictatorship, CR6), Scythian Koinonia (dictatorship, CR6)

Worldline Data
TL: 8 (military, TL9; electronics, TL(8+1))
Mana Level: No mana
Quantum: 3
Infinity Class: Z3
Centrum Zone: Red
Archimedes survived the siege of Syracuse and was taken to Rome to construct machines of war for the army. Shortly before his death he founded an Academy in Syracuse, the Archimedia, which became the starting point of this parallel's Scientific Revolution. Meanwhile, the Second Punic War ended in stalemate, so that Rome, while expanding, remained locked in a balance of power with Carthage, Ptolemaic Egypt, Parthia and other, minor powers.

That balance lasted, rather unplausibly, throughout this parallel's ages of exploration, colonization, industrialization, the modern age, and into its present state of postmodern decline. The decadence of this world is palpable. It screams at you from every filthy, neon-lit, gang-riddled street of the Imperial capital, from the sanguine spectacle of gladiator sports, ever increasing in ferocity to keep up with the plebs' bloodlust (the adoption of kyborgos fighters gave the industry respite, but not for long), from the towering palaces and glass-and-steel skyscrapers where the corrupt consortio and government leaders hole up as the people suffer and die. Possessed with imperial arrogance and the pursuit of wealth, power and decadent pleasure, Rome scarcely cares about or even notices the growing power of the Chinese, Japanese and Indians, or that the environment is starting to rebel from centuries of abuse. Despite the furious pace of technological advancement, the world is gripped by a deep malaise, a sense of impending apocalypse. New religions arise like toadstools, from the Christians so wantonly slaughtered in the Circus Maximus (on live-feed, with top ratings) to new, strange teachings from the Far East. Will the Empire survive yet another century?

Apart from Rome, adventuring locations include the megacity of Alexandria - Teknopolis - world leader in science and technology; the smoldering nuclear ruins of Carthage (largely neglected by the new government at Neo-Carthago); the free city of Syracuse; the rotting Sassanid Empire, held afloat by nothing but oil money and bloody-mindedness; the Christian-totalitarian Koinonia of Scythia, and numerous "barbarian" nations around the globe, from the Nazca to the Nubians. This timeline asks: What if Ancient Rome survived until the future?. The answer, as it turns out, is that it would be totally awesome.

Roma Umbrata was the eighth Roman-dominated parallel discovered by Infinity and so has the official designation Rome-8. The local slang term "Roma Umbrata" ("Rome in shadows") is a triple entendre; it refers to the literal shadows cast across Rome by the consortio skyscrapers, the metaphorical same, and the Latin word for the ubiquitous mirrorshades which have become iconic of the present age.

The bloodsports business is only comparable to the Homeline soccer industry in sheer size and profitability. The ancient Colosseum still holds melee battles for a traditional crowd, but there's a lot more variety to choose from nowadays. The Romans simply can't get enough of death shows, and the tackier the better - how's about some naked Amazons on motorbikes with submachine guns, facing cyber-monkeys with arm-grafted grenade launchers? There are the labyrinthes: vast, complex arenas with ubiquitous surveillance, into which are fed heavily armed warriors and bets are placed on who survives. Monster trucks (megacari) are very popular. Roman biotech is still late TL8, so they can't create monster races from the ground up (not for want of trying) but they can and do create all sorts of ungodly hybrids to throw at the poor fighters.

Slavery is not that common. About one in twelve of the population are slaves. Slavery has gone from being a mainstay of the economy to being a status symbol; a sign of conspicious consumption, and an auxiliary labor force - a common punishment is to become a slave of the Imperial household, ala Stalin's Gulag.

Adventure seed

Homeline desperately wants the Romans' powered combat armor, something the Patrol (and every Homeline army) has sought for years but never achieved. The great utiliy of such devices to conveyor-limited operations is obvious, yet it has eluded Homeline until now. However the couple of Lorica Automatica they have managed to steal so far (at great risk) have stopped working when brought outside Rome-8. Paralabs believes this to be thanks to the strange TL(8+1) scientific principles at work here, as also seen in the intertextum, Roma Umbrata's "internet", which requires a mind-machine interface to function properly, leaving its operation to specialist kyborgoi known as scriptori (of which every respected Roman possesses one or more). Homeline still isn't sure whether it's because of some as of yet undiscovered universal physical principle, or some shibboleth particular to Roma Umbrata. To find it out, they need more battlesuits to take apart. Guess who gets the job?
Cowd is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-18-2008, 02:07 AM   #2
Ed the Coastie
 
Ed the Coastie's Avatar
 
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Sierra Vista, Arizona
Default Re: Roma Umbrata: Cyberpunk Caesarism

Interesting. I'm already envisioning some adventures taking place in, around and beneath Londinium...
__________________
"It's never to early to start beefing up your obituary." -- The Most Interesting Man in the World
Ed the Coastie is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-18-2008, 02:53 AM   #3
Xenarthral
 
Join Date: Aug 2005
Default Re: Roma Umbrata: Cyberpunk Caesarism

Looks good, but...

Nitpick:
Quantum 3 means Centrum Zone: Inaccessible - Centrum can only reach
Quantums 6 to 10.

What makes the Romans' powered armour so desperately wanted? It's not
as if Rome-8 is the only or most advanced world with powered armour -
not to mention that there are ones which are not dependent on variant
scientific principles that make them unreliable elsewhere.
Caliph powered armour might be difficult to get hold of, but considering that
the Rome-8 ones all stop working outside the the parallell, they have to be
really special to make, say, picking up a prototype (or maybe even a non-prototype) in Shikaku-Mon's Brazil, Bonaparte-4, Gernsback or possibly
Lenin-3 and continue from there of less interest.

You also forgot to explain why the traditional cyberpunk approach of "give
large amounts of money to the right person" for acquiring mors suit of
powered armour is not an option. (That is, why the answer to the question
is not "White Star, who simply buys the suits".)
Xenarthral is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply

Tags
bloodsports

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Fnords are Off
[IMG] code is Off
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -6. The time now is 09:50 AM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.9
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.