Conflict Defines Existence

[abathur]

To: Prospective Combatant
Status: For your eyes only.
Date: October 12, 2246 2100Z

Post-Recruitment Briefing

This document is intended to be accompanied by excerpts of various writings of historic or cultural import with the intent of bringing prospective soldiers up to speed on the situation as it now stands.


"In the greatest days of man it will come to pass that all that is built, all that is beauty and success and knowledge will be crushed under the wheels of a great machine that seeks to force the lives of men to take a singular and desirable shape."
--The anonymous hermit of the Antarctic, protector of man and seer of the apocalypse. January 1st, 2048.

"In the days immediately following the establishment of the presumably inevitable yet historically dreaded "one world order," known to some as a sign of the impending end of all things but most as “The Zenith” (some overly spun and woven propaganda meant to instill peace and acceptance in a single governing body by painting the self-glorifying portrait of mankind at its pinnacle) the weapons of man were forcibly collected and all but those needed for government peacekeepers warehoused. Ironically, this would in fact be the peak of the societies of men, the species known as Homo sapiens, and the planet known to its inhabitants as "Earth." The Zenith managed to last a full century past its inception, however, the organization was cracking, corrupting and preparing to crumble by the end of two decades. While no official state religion was supported by "The Zenith," large Christian, Jewish and Islamic voting constituencies managed agreement on various social issues whereas most other factions and regions had a hard time pulling together. Tensions mounted quickly as the generation coming of age strained against the religiously inspired restrictions--yet government limits on children drastically reigned in birthrates.

Several generations were necessary to displace the previous religious majority, and so it would come--103 years after the founding, religious factions withdrew from The Zenith in self-righteous disgust. Religious fanatics struck out at the governing body through prolific guerilla warfare. Warehouses in highly religious areas fell under the control of fanatics, escalating scale and lethality of the violence led what remained of The Zenith to unilaterally declare war on all non-citizens. In the wake of thirty years of war the earth is a husk of its former self. What war itself did not eliminate, famine has devastated. Less than a million remain--the fastest, the strongest, and those smart enough to join forces with others like themselves.

It was shortly after the first prediction that I sabotaged that machine--that "doomsday device" men built upon the moon, to destroy the approaching meteor (in 2040.) To prevent such a powerful and horrible creation from being turned on the lands of men. Despite my efforts, however, a single blueprint of the creation survived to be propagated through the redundant network servers of "The Zenith Public Library System." They have seen them--The factions that have survived the foreseen apocalypse. They come for me, the lost seer. Too frail to flee, I fear they will crack me, finding the locations of the hidden pieces to the machine. After I am rendered useless and executed, the fighting will continue as they fight for control of the locations of the pieces and seek them out. The apocalypse lives on, its worst is yet to come."
--The anonymous hermit of the Antarctic, protector of man and seer of the apocalypse. December 12, 2186.


With some basic history out of the way, we'll get back to what is true at present. The end of restrictions on childbirth and adapted underground farming aided by a few remaining nuclear facilities has allowed the sustainable population to grow up to a few million, yet birthrates exceed what is sustainable. Young men brutal enough to survive on aggression alone but lacking the family or community for a good life volunteer (and some not so voluntarily) by the thousands when recruitment ships stop by, in cases regardless of the ideals for which they will fight. Malnourished, scrappy and plagued by deformities and disease, we desire not your bodies, merely your aggressive survivalist nature.

You, soldier, will have your consciousness forcibly removed and placed into that of a body of your choosing, fresh from the recruitment farms, bred and trained to be nothing but the strongest and fastest, filled with complacency, cooperation and completely devoid of a sex drive. Years of training have fine-tuned their bodies for combat--years of survival at all cost have done the same to your consciousness. You signed a contract promising immortality for the duration of your service term, this will be accomplished by placing your consciousness (well, the last saved copy before your untimely demise really) into a new and identical body.

Should you desire, at the end of your term of service, you may choose to give up your present body and adopt an empty one at our home colony. Home colonies are self sufficient and highly secret, as such; no physical transport is available to these systems. The recruitment farms are the closest functional equivalent to a home planet with maintained populations to keep the controlled breeding processes active and provide necessary related services.

(cont...)

[abathur]

To: Combatant
Status: For your eyes only.
Date: October 12, 2246 2200Z

Pre-Combat Briefing

Welcome _____ soldier. The following is a quick outline of the origins and beliefs of the fighting factions. Knowing the motivations of our forces and those of your enemies will allow you to make choices in-line with our ultimate vision, and allow you to better anticipate the moves and tactics of your enemies.


The CARTEL

At least, that’s the common name, officially known as the "Cartel for the defense and advocacy of Customs, Acceptance, Religion, Tolerance, Ethics and Liberty." The CARTEL is an amalgamation of practitioners of various religions with one purpose--mutual survival. In the days of their separation from The Zenith fanatical religious factions maintained an unspoken mutual non-aggression pact but coordinated military assaults against them made it quickly obvious that their guerilla efforts would need an element of global cooperation if they were to survive the anti-religious backlash. Splintered into tribes and small factions socially, the troops of the cartel are united in a holy fervor for protecting their personal religious beliefs. More recently, with the addition of non-religious refugees from earth (another necessary evil) their ranks are slowly becoming less religious yet more generally skilled. Attempts to indoctrinate new recruits could create an ultimate combination.

As a legacy of a generation of guerilla warfare and their propensity for tradition CARTEL forces can be expected to employ weapons designed for use in stealthy hit-and run guerilla style attacks. Recent infusions of technology into the CARTEL's arsenal have primarily come from kidnapped Beaufort Technocracy scientists, yet even in these additions the applications have been almost uniformly geared towards self-sufficiency in the field and guerilla style operations. Focus is usually on speed and cunning--CARTEL troops usually pack light and rely on their resourcefulness for in-field re-supply.


Beaufort Technocracy

Short and to the point. The Beaufort Technocracy was fathered by scientists repressed under the traditionalist religious majorities marking the early Zenith policies. These scientists retreated to the Arctic Ocean where they founded a few under-water cities in the remote, icy and rarely visited Beaufort Sea. The colonies were relatively small technocracies but without social hindrances much was accomplished in a hundred years of silence and isolation. When the news of the breakup of The Zenith began to trickle in, memories of the anonymous prophecy came to the forefront. It was then, before the thirty year war that the Beaufort Technocracy launched their spaceships out of the Arctic Ocean on a pilgrimage.

On encountering some ships and settlements of the space-based trading and transportation corporations a sort of mutually beneficial alliance came to be. The trade corporations were anticipating making large amounts of money supplying a worldwide war effort, in addition to shuttling refugees. The Beaufort crew was looking to establish a space presence but would find it easiest to do so by piggybacking off corporation mining and trade outposts. In exchange for new faster, cheaper and sustainable propulsion technologies the corporations would grant the Beaufort group the right to stay in various corporate settlements until plans and materials could be gathered for other settlements. In the time sense, however, this alliance has partially fallen apart. There is no hostility between the groups, but for the cause of money the trade corporations make money where they can, from any group, especially in shipping recruits from earth to the various recruitment farms.

The Beaufort group may have initially been the mallest group but have been effectively been bolstered in numbers by escaping the devastation of the thirty years war and gaining early establishment and infrastructure in space and on various Planets. Their only major setbacks thus-far have been some losses of key technology to kidnapping/ransom raids on Beaufort leadership and scientists by CARTEL bands and the loss of a few recruit farms to each. Luckily, the others are restricted to studying and applying the technology, and do not seem to really have a full grasp of how to use the technology for continued development.

Truly a group of creative but practical minds Beaufort forces can be expected to employ a diverse array of tactics and will frequently be found carrying multi-function weapons which may function in rather unusual ways. Similarly, Beaufort vehicles may focus on unique and surprising sources of agility in their efforts to not only protect their technocracy from encroaching restrictive social standards but also to simply push the envelope of what can be accomplished. Modularity in their equipment has also been a recent Beaufort obsession as evidenced by reports of varied prototype weapons combining various technologies on a whim.


The Remnant

The Remnant is primarily made up of the anti-religious contingencies still loyal to the cause of The Zenith, filled with more vengeful fervor than ambition to reform the global ruling entity. While combat decimated large amounts of civilians and low-level combat troops many vehicular, manufacturing and efficient supply line technologies and protocol already exist. Similarly, a fair amount of command structure and experienced military knowledge remains in place. To some extent, the strength of The Remnant was the source of The Zenith's downfall. As a primarily traditional fighting force designed to fight another army they faced an extreme handicap at the hand of guerilla warfare in the presence of an innocent civilian populace. With the pleasantries out of the way and revenge on their minds traditionally destructive tactics can again be used without pause.

Remnant forces can be expected to use weapons most favorable to straightforward traditional and destructive tactics, have efficient supply lines, excess equipment stores and at least an initially more functional command chain. As time passes, however, these benefits become less and less pronounced.

[abathur]

Basically fiction in the form of two memos to recruits. Mostly focused on core background work rather than coming up with a bunch of shit that isn't necessary at this point. If we go with something like this I can flesh it out much more (even these two memos possibly, but I feel this conveys the main idea.) Hopefully I've been clear enough to set a general story background and creatie an M.O. for the factions that will be rather useful in pushing beyond. Presumably the time-scale is modifiable depending on HOW futuristic things are. I tried to focus on soon enough that things like standard bullets are likely still in use but that it's semi-plausible that the Beaufort faction with 100+ years of uninterrupted research could put out some really incredible (some of my personal motivations hinge on the plausibility of some other suggestions). The memo can also be several years old itself and relate background of the interstellar war but still be missing 20 years of history.

Didn't expect this to take me all fucking night but I didn't want to post it until I liked what I had. ;)

[Cl2v2r]

:o

:D

;D


Apart from some enourmously long sentences, I think it's fantastic.

I'm afraid you may have come out too early with this work. Too many others are going to use it as a benchmark and not bother writing anything. Of course, those people with vivid imaginations (unfortunately not me) should put whatever they can in as ideas or whole plots.

Nicely done ab.

[Aftiel]

Very nice Ab.

[Cogburn]

I think some of the names of things got in the way of my understanding the gist of what was being discussed. I read it a few times more and I've got some questions.

The "goal" of the game would be the discovery and utilization of the "doomsday device" mentioned in the 2nd Quote block? And its on the Moon... Does this mean that there is space combat or once the peices are gathered it works like an Orbital Strike?

One faction had underwater cities... Underwater combat? New vehicles for such? Underwater is like Space combat... Transitions are tough to handle the differences in physics from ground-based combat and still keep things "real". Not that it's impossible, but I just want to get a handle on the kind of universe we're talking about.

<3 well thought out ideas. This is good shit.

[abathur]

I leave that somewhat open intentionally. I'm not sure what we want... If we want any space combat we could probably knock the timeline back 100 years and have at. Essentially the original use of the otherwise unnamed "doomsday" device was to practically vaporize a pretty big incoming meteor (one classified large enough to be a "doomsday event".) In the case of a war, however, the doomsday device is something that could eliminate rather large amounts of people (wiping large cities off the map, vaporizing spacecraft, etc.) This is here as the motivation for the war. The collection of the pieces could essentially allow one side to obliterate the other two and end the ongoing war. I don't quite have exactly how such a scenario would work, but it could open up the door to some unique events (or could just as easily be made practically impossible to do by making sure there are enough missing artifacts in enough different places--I'm merely creating door, whether it is open or not can be decided later)

As for underwater combat, it's an environment. Whether we use it is again up in the air for decision. There could be no conceivable reason to go there and as such no combat there, or there could be justified reasons involving underwater vehicle combat and firefights in an underwater city (drool if done right.) Not to mention the condition earth is in allows for multiple places to create war-torn urban combat. Beyond that there wasn't the intent for all Beaufort cities to be underwater, though I definitely think there should be focus on unique combat environments from place to place where possible. In PS it's a different look. I'd like to see a different look and feel with different things to consider (sliding all over the place on a primarily iced over continent, mega jumps on small low-grav planets/moons, underwater combat, combat on planets with atmospheres so thick it's like fighting in bad fog, etc. )

Certainly a lot of stones left unturned as far as the fiction goes. I just included what seemed relevant to the memos and to the beginnings of the project.

[HeliosRed]

I read something in there about being seperated from my sex drive? That blows.

[abathur]

(insert plot twist here)

A rather non-political alien race shows up and decides they'd like to jump into the fray. They could give two shits about who wins, they just have insatiable bloodlust. They're here to kill, and have the technology to over-ride existing spawning systems and equipment pipelines to fight for whichever empire they desire. When populations are within a few %, the alien mercenary army is divided evenly among all emipres so as not to destroy that balance. When a population starts going below a set number (30? 27? etc.) all of the alien mercenaries infiltrate the underpowered empire. Essentially, story wise, aliens randomly (perhaps even comically) abduct high-ranked players.

Players get the option to accept a symbiotic relationship with one of the aliens. Player retains control, symbiont hops on its back and sticks some shit into the back of its neck/head/nervous system and in some friendly way modifies the host. The host can no longer hold command positions and has to forfeit any group he's part of. Symbiont offers some alien assistance in reaching fights quickly, maybe even gives it access to some unique equipment through base terminals. The aliens are rather weak buf have an affinity for bloody brutal combat (as opposed to just zapping) so they get off while pulled in an "experiencing" things through the neural connection to the host. If so inclined there could even be some different levelling avenues for new hosts. Ultimately you end up with a sort of balance buffer against outnumbering situations in the short term, even if they aren't really related to 4th empire shit but rather just people logging out because they're being beat on.

For the mercenaries it takes their experience and adds a new dynamic to it. And it isn't something you just lvl up to, but something that can sort of randomly happen to you once you're past some certain point and are logged in, outside. The rate can be changed based on whether the current number are adequate. The really fun part, it could be 100% left out of the game fiction and shit (I think this is the way it should be personally which is why I've got the concept out in the open but haven't really written some "fiction" for it.) Just let people start figuring it out a month after launch when they start hitting lvls to trigger it (just make sure there's ample explanation from the aliens, if they deny there's a chance it can happen again later.) It'd probably be some awesome hype and insanity when people start hitting an "easter egg" of that size and they're hearing things from friends friends, maybe seeing someone walking around with an alien mounted on his back, or flying around in some alien-tech type aircraft...

[Cogburn]

OOoooooooOOOOOOOOooooooooo..... Secret expansions. :)

I think that the basics of this overall plot idea are going to be our winner. I'm a little ... wary ... of a few of the plot points. The overall progression of history is what I like most.

To oversimplify: The world is first overcome by a religous New World Order. NWO is destroyed in a cataclysm of some sort. Whats left of that old society fight over what remains.

Right now my favorite thing about this idea are "The Remnants." The idea is solid, the name is fantastic.... But the other two factions.... Hmmmm.....

I'm feeling inspired. I think I'm going to steal from your ideas and writeup something a little different. A combination of your idea and mine. Might take a day or so.

[abathur]

Feel free to rename them I guess, though the names did take while to come up with and I found them amusing in their own way.

"The Remnant" is strong, self-righteous, proud--a people out for vengeance.

"The CABAL," especially the long version represents multiple peoples bound together with a common goal, yet glossing over their goal of killing to survive with a set of talking-point style words, throwing in a healthy dose of Religious hypocricy in killing those that disagree with them to promote tolerance (though presumably justified for survival.) Ultimately, another self-righteous position trying to rationalize a murderous position.

The Beaufort Technocracy is the epitome of a precise scientific community. The name, to them is ultimately unimportant and is merely informational in nature strictly descrbing what they are, a technocracy style government (that governed by scientists and their ilk) and where they are located. Perhaps outwardly pretentious they do not see themselves as such. A creative name of some sort would seem a waste of creative talent that should be applied to new discoveries and applications thereof.

But perhaps those are the nuances someone who enjoys complex characters likes to create yet are only really enjoyed by the creator ;) I guess I an't stop you from doing what you will with it, but personally I'm somewhat protective of my ideas, and moreso of my writing. To some extent, I would prefer to be the one to butcher what I have at the behest of others. Ironically, the remnant is the group I spent the least time on, perhaps I worked too hard, ~

[abathur]

Thought I would also mentioned that I personally liked the idea of planets over continents from a development perspective. In an expansion, sure you can just find a planet. It's not easy to be super advanced and randomly find a continent. The bending was cheesy, and the interface isn't the best but done right from the start it could be cool. It opens up the opportunity for seasonal battlegrounds (while somethings orbit is within reasonable range) perhaps even events based on trying to mine valuable resources off a mamoth comet that is going to blaze by...

It also opens the door for vastly different environments that really mix things up. New physics, different atmospheres. It's easier to keep it mixed up when you have a storyline reason for that kind of control over a play area. Variety keeps things fun, keeps them from getting stale.