New Sci Fi Setting Seeds

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

"The Flowers that Bloom in the Spring..."

We've got to stop them!

Why? If the peasants can grow more corps and raise more Cattle we can be paid more taxes. Besides, have you seen silk? Mulberry trees could make us rich!

Or get us killed! The Red Weeds kept the peasants under control. They had to constantly struggle just to feed themselves.

Yes, unending constant struggle.
The blight that's killing the Red Weeds is a blessing. Now the peasants can become comfortable and we can become rich.

If the peasants become comfortable, why would they need Lords? Or tolerate us?

Vast fields have changed from dull red to vivid green. They say the black rot that is killing the Red Weeds (the native "plants" of the planet Cycnus) was created in one of those hidden tech enclaves South of the river Rhea Silva. Once the black rot causes spots on the Red Weeds earth plants can grow near them and crowd them out. Earth plants actually need less water, sunlight, and good soil, to thrive.

More later...

Another way to play this setting is competing visions of the good.

Picture group A) we'll call them the Levellers. They are radical egalitarians. They reject most social norms. They go off and form a community of their own deep in the Red Weeds. They reject hierarchy for networks of equals. They reject marriage for communal childrearing (although they respect pair bonds). Most forms of social order are examined and if they don't seem to have a purpose rejected. (Mind you these folks backtrack now and then, but the Levellers say "mistakes are how you learn.")

There are other communities in the deep Red Weeds that abandoned the Lords but not the norms of their faith. This group we'll call the Seekers.

The Seekers see the Levellers as dangerous radicals that will force the church to call a holy war against them all. The Levellers see the Seekers as wannabe Lords.

It's easy to imagine the fight between these groups.