[Game] Generate a Space Trader Setting

[(E)]

95c Where to get a crew?

Navigators are generally high on the list of required crew, the best of them are of course trained in Vather. As with every thing from Vather the price is high. A Navigator who is trained on Vather can usually get a job on a MegaFreighter or carrier and earn more in a year than your average free trader's ship is worth. Aside from home systems there are a number of places that navigators are trained chief among these are the 20 of so "complex" systems dotted around the galaxy, each of these with their challenging gravitation topography is used by one training facility or another as a final qualification test. As neither of these is really an option the next place to look is on a refueling 'hook. They act as a centralized location for Jump crew looking for work and jump crew gossip.

Want someone who knows how to space walk? Check any habitat that serves asteroid miners the sentients who work the belts have the skills in spades, many of them are talented engineers especially in a make do kind of way. If you get the opportunity Xylysus are always an asset for starters they don't need a suit and secondly their natural climbing ability is a great bonus.

Doctors and Biological specialists are a bit trickier to find, the best place to look is core worlds and well built up colonies. Medical staff on the more recently colonized worlds are usually specialists so their skills don't travel as well.

A good Cargo chief can be tricky to find but a lot of the bigger companies have a high turn over and the first place to look is habitats on the main trade lanes and the boundaries of company territory, especially the dropnet hubs and bars. Quartermaster is usually a second in command position so choose carefully, ex-long range survey crew are typically well trained in this field.

A back up engineer is always a reassurance so keep your eyes open when you are visiting well established Habitats. These habitats rely on engineers so they have a strong incentive to have a good training center. On the off chance you meet a Rhii without a Surge they have a good broad technical education and a flare for improvisation. Handy in a fight too. There are added life support costs to worry about.

Question 97
Whats the most infamous port/habitat/planet when it comes to illegal activity and piracy?

Random Technology: PIN, aka personal network, a central hub usually mounted on a wrist strap that either wirelessly, through a smart suit/clothes or through the bodies own bio-electric field interconnects all the electronic devices on a person.

[(E)]

Question 96
The Symbiotes and Genetic engineering of the Galadriel system.

When they were discovered the twin worlds of Harsh and Penelope where considered marginal at best, so no one made too much noise when the Divergers set up the first colonies there.

Penelope is an Ocean world with a considerable depth of water before hitting anything solid. It was deemed too costly to develop as anything beyond a tourist destination, the Pacific Commonwealth sent the first bio-engineers there with an open ended missive to make it a friendlier environment. They seeded a sanctuary ship named "Elysium" and settled down to work, by the time the ship was grown the political environment on Earth had shifted away from biotech and the crew where quietly paid off and forgotten. Now the fruits of the first settlers are visible from space as huge floating islands of rich coral drift gently across the endless ocean.

Harsh is another story altogether, a dense violent planet with ferocious volcanic activity and a borderline homicidal environment. Early on in the colonization of Penelope it was used as a prison, this was when the natural wealth of the planet was discovered, Kimberlite pipes erupted regularly and the very dynamic nature of the surface was continually bringing valuable metals and compounds to the surface. Harsh is a rich source of the rare materials used in Jump Inverter Rings and regardless of the brutal environment people started coming to seek their fortune. The surface conditions are such that permanent structures are a waste of time, "Bunkers" are used instead, these are actually very robust surface to orbit craft that embed themselves in the surface. Non enhanced prospectors typically use modular environmental suits made by a local Xylysus/Sulth company.

These two very different environments have led to the local popularity of symbiotes, Many of the locals work for a week or two on Harsh then spend a month or two on Penelope. Genetic Engineering would leave them unable to enjoy the safer lifestyle that Penelope offers. Cybernetics suffer from a lot of wear and tear on Harsh and as such aren't the most popular way of surviving long enough to seek your fortune. Many of the spacers who work the habitats favor them however.

There is one common piece of Genetic engineering that marks many of the prospectors of Harsh, "Spinal nodes" a modification that makes some common symbiotes more effective by providing the ideal attachment points. Gristly anchors with wide arteries and easily accessible nerve corridors, these are located in pairs on either side of the spine though the exact number and location varies between individuals. Spinal nodes also have the advantage of allowing quicker changing of symbiotes compared to someone without them.

Common Symbiotes
- Breather Shell, A crab like carapace that attaches like a backpack, internally is is almost entirely comprised of lung/gill tissue suited to the atmosphere of Harsh. Two versions exist, one has a flexible tube that runs to the wearers face, the other taps into the wearers Spinal Nodes and oxygenates their blood directly. both types are designed to be worn with an environment suit.

- Mad patch, This smaller symbiote is usually placed behind the ear, it sends tendrils out along the sub-dermal layer until it has a large enough antenna to function as a highly accurate metallic anomaly detector. These are favored by prospectors due to the dynamic nature of Harsh's surface. Several versions exist but it is very unlikely to see anything but the three main ones. The three main ones in order of popularity are the basic auditory variety which has a flat grey appearance not unlike shark skin and sends visible tendrils into the auditory canal and across the shoulders, people who posses these can hear the magnetic profile of their environment. The second most common is used by more hard core prospectors and it lives beneath the skin of the forehead and pectoral regions, small tendrils can be spotted around the eye sockets where it attaches to the optic nerves. The third most common locates itself beneath the skin and in the bones of the hands resulting in a slightly elongated hand that can feel for minerals.

- Swim Suits, This full body Symbiote is used by the undersea workers and farmers of Penelope, the more spinal nodes a wearer has the longer their endurance wearing it is. Common types provide the host with a fluke and gills.

- Lenz, Many sub types exist but the basic design is the same a small jelly like symbiote that fits over the eye like a contact lens and sends a tiny feeding tendril up the tear duct to latch on to a blood vessel. Most frequently designed for underwater use but some allow an increase in in the visible spectrum.

- Cleaner 'sites, a modified blood born parasite altered to process various types of toxins in the blood so they can be processed by the kidneys.

- Bio-electric enhancer, two versions exist the first has a hard core usually located on a spinal node pair or the sternum and faint tendrils over most of the hosts skin it works similarly to an electric eel and provides power to any appropriate device. The second version has offensive capabilities.

- Glands, this a whole family of symbiotes that are usually subdermal and produce a substance, they are designed to work internally and are in effect a dedicated drug/hormone injector. The meta-tabolism gland or "meta" is a common example it can be used to slow the metabolism down to conserve resources or to boost it when desired. A "ZGG" gland exists to help combat the long term effects of zero G.

- Microdermal symbiotes, these are tiny organisms that grow directly out of the skin and are generally short lived and require frequent reapplication , some resemble scales and are used by those who spend large amounts of time in the water, others are applied to the palms and soles of the feet to increase grip. Some interlink to form armour or an airtight layer.

- X-Glands, a sub-type of gland that produces it's substance externally, the latest breed can produce a length of spider like silk thick and strong enough to support almost half a ton. Others produce medicines, poisons, suit sealant, perfume and irritants to name but a few.

- The Latest product of the Genetic designers is the cyber-organism in which the symbiotes nervous system is overridden by a cybernetic implant that is slaved to a matching implant in the host. This has allowed the development of an organic exoskeleton/environment suit with all kinds of built in cybernetic enhancements. It is however very hungry necessitating the host to continually eat very calorie rich food.

The genetic engineering in Galadriel is far from coordinated and many more types exist than are mentioned here. Large scale divergence from the human norm is uncommon but many inhabitants are sufficiently different to be easily noticed as engineered.
Common Genetic engineering
- Tidal sensitivity, this alteration to the inner ear allows a greater perception of the variable gravity on Harsh and the dramatic tidal changes on Penelope.
- High G and low G Tolerance.
- Pressure Tolerance.
- Nictating membranes.
- Micro gills and increased lung capacity
- Increased physical resilience

Uncommon Genetic Engineering
- Webbed feet
- Full gills
- Upgraded physical abilities

Question 98
Do any Divergers have access to power armour, organic or other wise?

Galadriel Rumors: One Diverger group has advanced their genetic engineering to the point that they can thrive on Harsh. Native life has been discovered on Harsh, silicon based organisms that are advanced enough to form tribes!! Native life has been discovered on Harsh, it is tough enough to live in the magma and attacks prospectors who get too close to cooling lava.

[Frost]

Originally Posted by (E)

Question 98
Do any Divergers have access to power armour, organic or other wise?

As a rule no, although there may well be one off experiments here and there, nobody in the various diverger states and collectives is building or in fact breeding the stuff. Diverger research is limited by a raft of practical and cultural restraints.

Firstly Diverger researchers operate under similar physical constraints to humanist researchers and often on a considerably lower budget despite their access to more sophisticated robotics it still remains hard to create a suit worth producing.

Secondly most diverger groups have a deeply entrenched (although not entirely logical) preference for implanted or engineered solutions to body enhancement. Stand alone powered exoskeletons tend to be viewed as an absurd halfway house, they don't permit a human being to act directly but they don't replace them either.

The closest any Divergers commonly approach to power armour would be some of the 'mobile carriers' used by a loose alliance of radical pro-cybernetic groups referring to themselves as Renouncers, but probably better known as Maggots.

Renouncer culture is based upon the abandonment of the natural human form and at least a partial withdrawal from the physical world in favour of virtual environments facilitated by the use of neural interfaces and 'simplification' the removal of 'unnecessary' body parts in order to reduce the physical needs and simplify the care of people permanently connected to VR systems.

When forced to deal with the physical world on its own terms Renouncers resort to robotics, primarily basic telerobotic systems. When these prove to be impractical or insufficient usually in violent or other emergency situations the next step is the employment of mobile carriers, full body cyborgs created by modifying non-humanoid robots to accept direct neural control from a highly simplified renouncer.

[TGLS]

Question 81 by (E)
With many militaries changing to the Black Bess their old weapons are being sold off, What exactly is hitting the markets, legal or otherwise?
The Black Bess designed for essentially three main jobs (though it works in any environment): Anti-Personnel Weapon (With regular bullets), Light Anti-Armor Weapon (With disruption bullets), and Area Denial Weapon (With Multi-Flechette, soon grenades and shotshell).
The GWQ-108 is the main weapon being dumped, having previously been many militaries' standard infantry weapon. It is especially easy to find at black markets, as it is almost identical to the civilian variant the GWQ-108C, except it is slightly more powerful and has a higher rate of fire.
Some militaries are dropping the GWM-118 because of the "irrelevance" of tanks and thus anti-tank weapons in modern warfare, though many keep them since the side that declares tank irrelevant is the first to be crushed in the next major war, starting with the Franco-German War of 2327.

What questions are left:
Question 77 by Daigoro
Mid-jump, intruder alarms sound from the cargo bay. The jolting and jostling must've shaken the stowaway(s) from their hiding place. Who are they, how'd they get on board, where are they trying to go, and how will they plead not to be keelhauled?

Question 84 by ericthered
Have other galaxies been explored? why or why not?
- This is still on my to-do list

Question 89 by TGLS
Can somebody stat one of the alien races?

Question 90 by (E)
I have just retired from my career as a tectonic engineer where should I go on holiday now I have finished slinging Psuedo-nukes and asteroids at uninhabited planets?

Question 93 by (E)
What are some of the wonders* and great works have been built by the inhabitants of the Interstellar Drift?

Question 97 by (E)
Whats the most infamous port/habitat/planet when it comes to illegal activity and piracy?

[Daigoro]

I think we can feel free to add extra questions, guys. As we've seen, some take a while to get answered, others are knocked over pretty quickly, so having a variety to choose the one that gets your gears going from is desirable. Shall we say 8-10 as a limit to avoid too much confusion?

Also it gets away from (E)'s and my questions dominating.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by TGLS

Question 93 by (E)
What are some of the wonders* and great works have been built by the inhabitants of the Interstellar Drift?

Lets see... Vather would consider itself to be a wonder of the world all by itself, but its mostly just a wealthy hive of industry.

There's 'Kwinti's Face', which is essentially a continent that's been carved to look like the 'face' of a famous Mar Kan leader (in his long deceased day). Its still inhabited.

Commetfall is an ambitious Akriti terraforming project where comets where dropped on an otherwise dry planet. (This was before 7D jump). Its quite impractical and still not a great world to live on, but the geography lends itself to some really impressive vistas.

The Xylysus Collection is a huge 'museum' of an abundance of species from all across the galaxy.

The Largest Habitat in the world was built by the CyKoi, known as 'Do Ko'. Do Ko Is a large cylinder spun for gravity with giant windows covering 50% of it.

Question 98:
Are there any nasty diseases that have been picked up? Like what? anything that crosses species?

[TGLS]

Originally Posted by TGLS

Question 77 by Daigoro
Mid-jump, intruder alarms sound from the cargo bay. The jolting and jostling must've shaken the stowaway(s) from their hiding place. Who are they, how'd they get on board, where are they trying to go, and how will they plead not to be keelhauled?

From the logs of Captain Lars Kruger
November 8th, 3115 02:18 UTC
I have been awoken from my sleep by a sickly bending of metal and intruder alarms from the cargo bays. I hate Mondays.

November 8th, 3115 02:23 UTC
Navigator Marissa Keeler, has managed to seal the doors of the cargo hold before me or Chief Engineer Richard Sampat woke up. Or next move is to assess the damage we heard and find out what the unwanted guest has in store for us.

November 8th, 3115 02:43 UTC
We were heading through the cargo bays, between the corridors of crates stacked to as high as the ceiling, when a Kagoshi sprang out of who knows where and managed to get the jump on me. Luckily, Giang La was just around the corner, and disabled her with a well placed electrolaser. I left Giang to tie her up and place her in an unused room, while I met with Sampat to see what the deal with the bending was.

November 8th, 3115 02:53 UTC
Disaster! The bending is chronic damage caused by Keeler's jumping quirks. Any more jumps without reinforcement could lead to the ship tearing itself apart. I knew I should have hired a secondary jumper last November. Wait, that was a Monday too! I hate November Mondays. Oh, and look, Giang has his hands full in the spare room.

November 8th, 3115 03:37 UTC
By the time I reached the spare room, the Kagoshi had put Giang in a chokehold with her legs. Didn't any ever tell him that Kagoshi are incredibly flexible? Or that their martial arts work with the all the limbs? Or that when you tie somebody up you tie their arms and legs? Not wanting to replace the cargo operator and security guard at the same time, I was forced to handle the situtation diplomatically, instead of potentially electrocuting Giang.
The Kagoshi's name is Kai-Netsu. She was kidnapped from her colony by some Diverger Pirate/Slaver group. They were, surprisingly enough, next to us a week ago when we were in Neo Nanjing to trade beef. It figures that was only November Monday where everything was going right. Anyway, she didn't want to be sold as a slave (Obviously), and she managed to get away from the slavers. She picked our ship because it was nearby, and we were leaving the same day. And of course, she thinks we're crazy Humans, who want to keelhaul her, enslave her, or do some other nasty and illegal thing to her.
I don't hate Divergers, I really don't. But when they keep going around and ruining Humanity's good name, I get really angry. Anyway, I offered to drop her off at the next port provided she works her way there.

November 8th, 3115 03:53 UTC
Richard has news. In fact, this is a good news, bad news situation. Good news is that Keeler's jumping quirks aren't entirely responsible for the stress. My luck must be turning around, because the bad news is the ship is causing a stress on the structure, that could tear the ship apart anyway. Did I mention I bought the ship on a 3 years ago, on a Monday? Kai-Netsu says she has experience with welding, and Richard was quick to bring her into his repair scheme.

November 12th, 3115 16:53 UTC
Things are looking up. We've sold off all of the cargo (Giang might not be able to tie a knot, but he can sure sell), and have had the reinforced structure replaced. Kai-Netsu is talking about staying on and Richard keeps saying we need an engineer's assistant. So just to prepare for everything to fall apart in 3 days.

[Daigoro]

Question 84: by ericthered
Have other galaxies been explored? why or why not?



Answer
Voyage of The Felix Coggan

Journey…. across the vastness of intergalactic space
Explore…. the alien worlds of a galaxy unknown
Feel…. the wonder, the dread, the exhilaration, of 22 selected individual crewmembers equipped with Empathoviz™ limbic recorders for the duration of their entire 6 year mission

Coming in 3116.8…. Take a ride of 2.5 million light years together with Commander Jeb Entrix and his heroic crew of Fiedler Rangers onboard the Felix Coggan Class Deep Cruiser Flagship- The Felix Coggan. See unseen vistas of the Andromeda Galaxy through the very eyes of the first civilised peoples to step foot across the chasm. Marvel at the power of the first Cosmic Range jump drive array ever built, the culmination of 35 years of precision Blue Danube engineering, on its maiden test voyage. And you will thrill when you encounter the very exotic lifeform Ranger Fleem finds on the first stop of their 27 world survey….

This feature is a co-production of Caaren:Bash Softcasting and Fiedler Ranger Corps Scout Division.
Directed by NayGhee.



Reviews for Voyage of The Felix Coggan

-- 4 thumbs up: I don't know if it was the spectacle or the full power on the adrenal channel, but I loved every minute of this documentary.

-- 3½ thumbs down: That's 10¼ hours of my life I'll never get back. I suspect there might be a subliminal feed of lethargy in the limbic track, cuzz I couldn't bring myself to turn it off despite being thoroughly bored. Not sure why I expected anything better from this "acclaimed" CyKoi director- I felt the same after his Symphony for a Dying Red Dwarf.

-- 5 thumbs up: It's a long journey, and you get that in this docofeely. The tedium of 3 years of jump travel is masterfully juxtaposed with accomplishment upon their arrival- and those nebula scenes, breathtaking!

-- 6 thumbs down: So, they travel all that way, and SPOILERS!! there's nothing there! No alien empire, no space vixens, nuttin! I want my 55 gigayen back.

Question 99 by Daigoro
Apart from the renowned navigator's college, Southbank Metrickal Lyceum on Old New Melbourne, what are some other famed educational institutions and their specialty fields of study?

ETA: Dibs on Qn 97- Pirate Haven. Cheers.

[(E)]

Xylysus, Question 89

The Xylysus evolved as arboreal apex predators in giant forests with dense branches and foliage. Their home world was lost to a solar event pre FTL, they predicted the event and uploaded the majority of the population. They survive as digital consciousness' in robotic bodies who seek to recreate their organic forms. Physically they are 3 meter tall bipeds with a tail. The skeletal structure of the torso is closer to that of a snake than a human and their head is something between a canine's and a mustilid's.

Racial carry overs and mental [-1]
SM +1
Sensitive [5]; Fearlessness 1 [2]; Broad minded [-1]; Attentive [-1]; Proud [-1]; Uncongenial [-1]; Imaginative [-1]; Versatile [5]; Mental disadvantages relating to not having a flesh body [-10]
Racial skill; Climbing [2]
Many cases of overconfidence, (Apex predator)

Social [-5]
Low Tech, most areas [-4]; High Tech, Robotics, Computers [1]; Duty, recreate species [-2]

Physical [82]
Machine meta trait [25]; Absolute timing [2]; Digital Mind [5]; Possession; "mind module" -50% digital with no copying [50](?); Unaging IQ only -75% [4]; Doesn't Breathe [20]; Vacuum Support [5]; Electrical [-20]; Sleepy [-8]; Cannot Float [-1]

Robotic bodies general mimic their old physical ones for social reasons. The following traits are common. But there is variation, typical bodies/shells/sleeves/cases/frames can get up to 600 points in some cases.

Common mechanical traits [238]
ST 16 [60]; DX 12 [40]; HT 12 [20]; Sharp claws [8]; Terrain adaptation, confined spaces [5]; Foot manipulators [14]; Flexibility [5]; Night Vision 8 [8]; Perfect balance [15]; Reduced consumption 4 [8]; Silence 2 [10]; Slippery 4 [8] (very flexible spine); Clinging [16] (from claws); Super climbing 4 [12]; Teeth, sharp [1]; Restricted diet, power [10]; Maintenance, one person monthly [-2]

Other points
- The "Neural core" is a tough armoured component holding the Xylysus' mind and it can be moved from body to body.
- The Xylyxus have no way of producing new consciousness'

Notes; Some choose a mechanical look and some try to perfectly recreate the look of their old forms, either way they follow the same physical layout.

Random Technology: EMP sponge, absorbs a single EMP pulse then burns out when connected to a piece of electronics.

Question 100
Does it look like the Xylysus will recreate an organic branch of their species anytime soon?
Sub Question what is a good term for the Xylysus' bodies?


work in progress

[Daigoro]

Originally Posted by (E)

Enhanced move confined spaces [?]

Or Terrain Adaption?
Plus- Brachiator?