Faction Name:
People's Republic of the Belt (PRB, Communist Belt, The Republic)

Faction Government:
The People's Republic of the Belt is led by the Belter Communist Party, and functions as a single-party oligarchy. The official head of state is the President, but total power is granted to the People's Senate. Representatives in the People's Senate are elected by representatives in Regional Councils, which are elected by representatives in Local Councils. The President is elected by the People's Senate. Generally, representatives in the People's Senate are rich industrialists and bribe the Regional Councils to keep themselves in power. The President, meanwhile, functions as nothing more than a mouthpiece for the People's Senate. Though the PRB is officially a Socialist State, there are few restrictions on the power of corporations and labor laws are practically nonexistent.

Territory/Claims:
The People's Republic of the Belt claims a large portion (Approx. 10% total territory) of the inhabited Asteroid Belt, with its capital on Ceres. Its few core bodies are heavily populated metropolises, but as one moves further away from Ceres the populations get sparser and sparser until there are only small mining outposts. Most of the heavier populated asteroids rely on imports of ice for water and oxygen, while specifically designated "breadbasket" asteroids and stations maintain artificial ecosystems to keep atmospheric equilibrium.

Ceres is the largest and heaviest populated body in the PRB, and its city of Saltsgaver which serves as the capital of the Republic is the largest city in the nation. Interestingly, most of the more densely populated bodies are inhabited by lower class workers while the middle class can be found in the much smaller, post-industrial cities that act as the capitals of "breadbasket" farming asteroids such as Elon (one of the oldest hollow asteroid colonies) and Sydney.

Culture:
The People's Republic inherited much of American culture, as the original colonies were founded by the American SpaceX corporation. Colonists were restricted to those deemed "Pure Americans" out of a belief of American supremacy-the idea being that the American dream and spirit would drive the colonies to success. Despite the revolution including a fairly large number of Chinese colonies, over the years the sheer number of American descendants cemented it as the clearly dominant culture.

However, the early attempts of the Republic to distance itself from Earth are clear. Solresol-a constructed language considered alien enough by the founder to show favor to neither Chinese nor English-is taught in schools, printed on all products, and used at official government functions. It's simplified script-seven colors used to represent the conventional musical notes upon which the language is based-is considered an easy bridge between the minority Chinese and majority English speakers. Exported products usually have it printed on them as well, making the simple color-based script representative of the nation as a whole.

Furthermore, traditional communist iconography can be found throughout the nation including some "Saltsgaverist" symbolism. Aside from the requisite red, hammers, and sickles of any degenerated socialist nation, many older buildings are constructed around Saltsgaver's personal philosophy. The Council chamber, for example, is a zero-g chamber without any area for representatives to sit or stand. As such, they simply float in the chamber without any sense of up or down-making it impossible to consider anyone "above" or "below" anyone else. Furthermore, the Ansbach Auditorium on Ceres has a central stage placed well below all of the seating. The auditorium was used by the early Presidents of the Republic for addresses, the idea being that it showed the President as below or inferior to the people-making them out to be a servant rather than a ruler. The fact that no official has used it in a century is used as a sign of the Republic's decay.

Other traditional "Saltsgaverist" iconography include various works of art that curiously represent Biblical events, a remnant of the highly devout rule of President Saltsgaver. In the capital building's lobby there is a painting depicting Simon of Cyrene carrying the cross, and in Ceres Spaceport there is a massive mural of Saint Cristopher carrying the child Jesus across a river. Saltsgaver was a Christian Socialist who believed that communism was ultimately the will of God, and it shows. Though in modern times religion has completely disappeared from the middle and upper classes, Christianity is still widely popular among the lower classes (which, of course, makes it seen as a fool's belief by the better-off). It is, however, heavily influence by Saltsgaver's own beliefs and lacks essentially all of the once controversial beliefs that created early 21st century social struggle. Any modern Belter priest will happily tell you about the overturning of the moneylending tables, but he will most definitely refer to any passage calling for the stoning of homosexuals or wives that talk back as "bourgeoisie and blueblood propaganda meant to divide the working class".

Though the actual ideals of communism are rejected by the middle and upper classes, they are still very much alive in the lower classes. All that keeps them in line is the good living standard relative to other lower classes offered by the Republic, as well as the remaining empty promises of a future utopia made by politicians who themselves own the very corporations they speak against.

History:
The Republic began as a series of American colonies founded by the SpaceX corporation, and were originally restricted only to American citizens due to a belief in American supremacy that was highly prevalent at the time. SpaceX's asteroid colonies were championed alongside Mars as proof of the nation's greatness, and as a result extensive government funds went to the corporation to boost their colonization efforts.

In the colonies, however, nobody could see the benefit. Most colonists were poor Americans who had been promised good work and good pay in the asteroid belt, as opposed to the technical professionals that had made up the early Martian colonies. Instead, they were met with lackluster safety regulations that characterized corporate space exploration. While mining asteroids, incorrectly calculated ordinance and weak construction led to many incidences of lethal decompression.

It was common for early colonies to run short on essential supplies, and in the case of one of the smallest colonies the population almost suffocated before an oxygen tanker reached them. Habitation remained a major problem, with artificial gravity being impossible on the surface of an asteroid and most colonists being unable to afford trips to rotating space stations for therapy. As it became clear that none of the colonists could ever return to Earth, SpaceX found it harder and harder to keep its colonies in line.

To solve this problem, Elon Musk himself brought in Nicholas Saltsgaver-a genius engineer on SpaceX's payroll-to devise a cost-effective way to placate the colonists. In return, he promised him anything so long as his plan worked. His solution was to hollow out Ceres and create an artificial environment within it, then set it spinning and steadily increase the speed to allow the colonists to re-acclimate to Earth's gravity to give them the illusion of being able to return.

It was not exactly cost effective, but Saltsgaver and his team assured Musk that it was thee only way to placate the colonies. Such a large investment would be a sign of the company's dedication to its people, and of course it would make a great location for an elite administrative and scientific population once fully completed. To facilitate the hollowing of Ceres, the US government provided nuclear weaponry to the company. It had, after all, been mining the asteroid belt. Had he wanted to, Elon Musk could have bought the entire Senate.

Saltsgaver was placed in control of the project, and after years of work SpaceX revealed the Ceres colony. With Saltsgaver appointed as governor, he and his personally-selected team began to screen applicants. Contrary to what he had proposed to Musk, the majority of those who were given property on Ceres were miners from other colonies. The select few well-educated people that came in did so not because they applied, but because Saltsgaver offered them various positions. In the first few years of the establishment of the Ceres colony, the first Belter university was founded. To "encourage the development of further officials and scientists for the company" it didn't require tuition, only five years of employment in SpaceX. As such, it functioned more like a military academy than a traditional university.

The Ceres colony grew to become the SpaceX capital in the Belt, and soon boasted its own industries for the processing of the ore mined in other colonies. Factories began to spring up on the surface of Ceres rather than in the interior, allowing for microgravity manufacturing of various products using resources mined and processed nearby. This was the first time any product bought on Earth was made entirely in space, marking a new era in manufacturing.

As the governor of Ceres, Saltsgaver made a killing on trade and manufacturing. The vast personal wealth he amassed he used to steadily gain more influence within the company, attempting to gain control over the rest of the belt colonies. Every colony he gained control of, he put extensive effort into industrializing. When the company refused to, he personally paid to send any colonist who requested to Ceres for higher education. He quickly became the face of the benevolent megacorp and the "bootstrapper" on Earth.

With the image of a philanthropist supporting him, he founded an independent business on Ceres itself. Using the extensive engineering base found in the educated on the dwarf planet, he had a shipyard station designed and constructed in orbit of Ceres connected to it using a space elevator. In a surprising move, no experts from Earth were brought in to work in or supervise the shipyard. Saltsgaver gave up the shares entirely to the workers, with the sole condition that they put any orders placed by him at top priority. And so, the Ceres Naval Syndicate was formed.

SpaceX wasn't happy. Saltsgaver had not only become a competitor in shipbuilding, he had a distinct advantage over the corporation's expensive need to launch vessels from Earth. Even worse, he didn't even have a stake in the business. It was run by its workers alone, meaning that SpaceX was incapable of siphoning it's income through Saltsgaver (early colonial industry run by individual businessmen under SpaceX employ was made to be profitable to the company through the pseudo-taxing of individual incomes). As a result, SpaceX began to become hostile to Saltsgaver.

Behind the scenes, Musk and Saltsgaver were at each other's necks. Musk knew that Saltsgaver stood to surpass him in not only fame but corporate influence, and Saltsgaver knew that Musk could have him thrown out an airlock if he wanted to. After many years, SpaceX made a private statement to Saltsgaver: all imports of food and water to the asteroid colonies would be subject to tax at the time of import and the time of sale. Furthermore, all imports had to be carried on SpaceX vessels.

This led directly to two events. First was the Battle of Ceres Port, wherein a crew of a dozen smugglers bringing in food from the Chinese colonies was massacred by SpaceX security personnel at Ceres Port. An additional sixteen colonists were also killed in the struggle when they tried to act as a shield for the smugglers, whom were their only source for affordable food. Second was the Ceresian Nuclear Crisis caused by the detonation of a nuclear mining charge by a merchant ship under the personal employ of Saltsgaver, which led to fears of a nuclear-armed Belter state. Comparisons suddenly started to pop up between the modern belt and the Thirteen Colonies.

A few months later, the true purpose of the nuclear charge was revealed. Saltsgaver declared the construction of a second hollow asteroid colony at Blair's Asteroid (named by a SpaceX survey team, formerly known by a catalog number). The news of this shocking announcement covered up the fact that the Ceres Naval Syndicate had expanded with ten more berths and taken on a former USN captain and multiple USN engineers to assist its design team. After years of construction, the new Blair Colony was officially founded. And Saltsgaver personally requested for farmers displaced from their land by corporations on Earth in Africa and Asia to come, promising he would pay for their transit and allow them to keep their profession.

That raised tensions more than even the nuclear crisis.

Soon afterwards, the Belt colonies had their first major harvest. A farming industry that sprung up almost overnight on Blair now fed the Belt. SpaceX was furious, and began to make open threats to remove Saltsgaver. He had lost most of his former allies in the corporation, and him being flat-out fired and his assets seized by Musk was a very real possibility. Rather than try to placate them, he requested that the Ceres Naval Syndicate design and construct a brand-new fleet of "mining vessels". The supposed idea behind these ships was that they would use lasers to break chunks off of asteroids, then use drones to pick up those chunks and bring them into a central bay for storage and/or processing.

Anyone with access to the highly confidential plans, however, would know well that they were exactly what many suspected them to be. Space warships. Though SpaceX had no true basis to shut down the project, they did demand that the mining colonies of the belt allow them to station PMC garrisons in fear of a coming strike (Saltsgaver had always been soft on unions, which had originally been an integral part of his "Good Businessman" image). Some accepted, some refused, and what would soon become battles lines were drawn. In the year 2121, SpaceX requested to station a garrison in the small colony of Mat-5231-14. It refused, which led instead to a small collection of SpaceeX "representatives" forcibly evicting suspected union sympathizers.

It's Sheriff, Sydney McCoy, brought the SpaceX representatives to the mayor and stated that she believed their warrant to be false. Though it is no longer known if the warrant was fabricated, the mayor took a single look at it and declared it to be bogus. A shootout ensued and the SpaceX representatives were killed. In response, the corporation deployed a force to the colony. A merchant vessel affiliated with it rammed the interplanetary transport delivering the troops, killing an estimated three hundred mercenaries. From that point on, the Mat-5231-14 was considered in open revolt.

The miners seized an intra-belt passenger ship and took guns from the Sherrif's armory with them, alongside re-purposed mining drills and anything else they could find and use as a weapon. Various other mining colonies declared independence at the same time, and soon a makeshift armada of union-commandeered vessels approached Blair's Asteroid. The Port Authority security forces let them in to dock and promptly detained all SpaceX vessels at the colony. A battle ensued between the miners and the colony's mercenary garrison, at which point the US Government intervened.

Army forces stationed on the asteroid were mobilized against the miners, but the tenacity and numbers were too much for even the Army to overcome. Seeing an opportunity to end not only the small rebellion but also any hopes of Belter self-sufficiency, Musk successfully petitioned the American government to send one of their three heavy warships to nuke Blair's Asteroid.

Saltsgaver had the colonial-owned "mining ships" diverted to intercept the American vessel, and one of the earliest examples of a modern space battle ensued. The heavily-armored designs of the ships on both sides made for a long and drawn-out laser exchange. As one observing reporter on the Belter side reported, it was "Like the battle between the Monitor and the Merrimack". The American vessel (The USS Liberty Bell) was greatly outnumbered by the three Belter ships that intercepted her (The Leslie Fish, the John Henry, and the General Anspach) and soon met its defeat.

At this point, Saltsgaver declared the SpaceX Belt Colonies to be in open rebellion against the corporation and the United States of America, and promised that if the war of independence was won then he would completely relinquish control of his businesses to the workers and create a democratic government in the Belt. SpaceX suddenly realized what they were looking at. This wasn't a rouge businessman, this was a socialist revolution that had been in the works for years.

The war was long, lasting for a total of eight years of struggle. After only the first year, however, corporate and government forces had been driven from the ground of the Belt. For seven years, the only fighting was in space. Even once the American Star Navy had been defeated, however, SpaceX refused to relinquish their claim to the asteroid belt and attempted to call in Chinese corporations and their government with the promise of land. His last ditch effort failed when the warship Molly MacGuire parked itself in geostationary orbit above Washington D.C. and threatened to hit America with one of the nuclear charges used to hollow Blair's Asteroid. SpaceX was forced by the American government to relinquish control over the Asteroid Belt, and after a month of debate they finally accepted.

In the aftermath of the Belter Revolution, SpaceX lost credibility with the American public. Their stubborness to surrender even with a warship in orbit threatening a nuclear holocaust caused mass boycotts and protests in America and in their colonies. The company would eventually go under and be denied any Federal funding, ending its existence and ruining the once-powerful Elon Musk. He died some time afterwards, in what appeared to be a suicide.

[More comes later, I have an essay to write]

Technology:
An overview of the faction’s technological capabilities. Keep in mind the general scale I outlined. If there are any questions, PM me.

Military:
Just your military capabilities. You can include equipment descriptions if you want to, but don't try to sneak by a Wave Motion Gun or something.

Northstar is a hardcore corporate state. The entire corporate-state is one massive megacorporation divided into a dizzying array of subsidiaries, contractors, subdivisions, and cartels, with all inhabitants employees of Northstar one way or another.

Northstar’s internal worker-culture retains holdovers of previous Pan-Oceania corporate (America, EU, Australian, Japanese, etc) influence, but is largely home-habitat grown corporate culture in it’s own right as well. In Northstar, everyone has a definite value as tracked by the amount of debt they owe to the MegaCon or their respective subsidiary division, and how much and what kinds of stock they own within the MegaCon representing their contribution and degree of ownership. These factors and what ratio they are in determine a person’s place and status with the system-spanning MegaCon. Most underclass citizen-employees have single-digit or double-digit stocks at most. Middle-class have thousands. And of course the executive tiers have many millions or billions of stocks in their name and under their thumbs. Those without stock value are little more than company property, and those without stock and high debt can sink to being property of even a near-broke underclass citizen-worker (often referred to as "furniture")

Northstar’s underclass citizen-workers are organized into three loose tiers based on stock, debt, and position.

“Specialists”- Underclass that somehow after decades of hard labor achieve a measure of stock value, pay off most of their mandatory debt, and specialized career success can escape part of their menial labor to achieve comfort on some level in this day and age. While still committed to hard work, people with money can at least buy a cheap last-gen android assistant or leverage rank into getting less arduous work gigs. Very, very few worker-citizens can rise to this rank, but Northstar doesn’t actively obstruct careerists and lets those who can succeed despite the class strife of the solar-age rise.

“Worker”- The vast majority of Northstar’s worker-citizens are people with little to their name but their debts from mandatory basic education, med-treatments needed to grow up in low-g to company near-Earth standards, and a single stock declaring their citizenship within Northstar and the right to advance up the corporate ladder. The micro-career ladder of the workers is a microcosm of the Northstar system as a whole. A struggle for a apartment built out of a shipping container you only have to share with four others, to get someone else to run the waste-management gig this week so you can attend a skill-seminar, to afford a subscription to Millie-Taki’s latest multimedia collection, to fight to pay off the debt interest and avoid falling down the social ladder, to maybe one day meeting a pretty partner and having a kid. Billions of workers live, struggle, toil, rise, and fall every year. Such is life within the MegaCon.

“Drones” "Furniture" "Tools"- Those with no stock do not even own themselves, consigned by crushing debt and misfortune to be little more than corporate property even below Android workers (who technically are company stock incarnate). While this also includes immigrants to Northstar who must earn their first unit of stock, at least they aren’t burdened by debt like worker-citizens that fall down the corporate ladder and unlikely to get back up. Debt blocks opportunities, education, and is a stigma of irresponsibility. Enough debt to be a drone is enough to be a slave to the company for the rest of your immortal life if you aren’t mulched on the high-danger job.

A couple of non-standard “perks” of being a Northstar worker-employee are mandatory growth treatments for low-g maturity and longevity (which are folded into a citizen's mandatory debt just for being born into Northstar, but at least mean they can live within normal-g conditions) and the enshrined and ironclad-enforced right for all worker-citizens to have basic access to the medialink network for free, with persocomps and VR displays offered for almost nothing to ensure workers get to partake in the “free” media, anime, and games of Northstar, and potential access to higher levels with the right subscriptions. This serves to both guarantee underclass participation in the highly addictive consumerism of Northstar entertainment and anime, while also tranquilizing them from their hard daily toil for the company without actually obtaining the true worth of their labor. Bread and circuses in the 24th century, and Northstar has plenty of both to offer to its highly consumerist internal culture.

Middle-class citizen-workers, sub-executives, and talents live in penthouse suites with a wide range of luxuries and attended to by a minimum of two android servants, with most of their life spent in the VR strata of Northstar’s networks in extensive immersive VR simulations for their play, shopping, and most social interaction. While Northstar doesn’t give a flat basic living stipend, the dividends and automated stock portfolios the middle class have enable them to self-fund their own luxury in perpetuity, while leaving some wiggle room of status within the class for the illusion of upwards or downwards movement. Unusually for most modern factions, a sizable percentage of the middle-class do “work” in an indirect sense, taking up part-time teleoperations gigs folded into VR simulations akin to a 21st-century Farmville or civ-dictator simulator. While still a minority, its nonetheless a shot in the arm for Northstar's bottom line outside of the usual cultural, entertainment, and philosophical products of the idle middle-class.

The trillionare and quadrillionare ultra-elite of Northstar’s Executive, Director, and Founder positions are said to live lives of unimaginable luxury. Some live in personal space-palaces attended to by armies of android servants, hidden in the void between worlds. Others live within the highest strata of the Quantum network, utilizing entire asteroid planetoids as quantum server farms to live centuries as gods in private VR pocket-universes for every minute in realspace. But not all of the Directors have departed from the real world, with the Board of Directors being a definite and real presence within the MegaCon and far from an idle circle of rulers.

AI android servants are a commonplace sight in Northstar habitats, from public utility workers to embodied office-worker level AI’s, to the harems and small armies of servants accumulated by the upper class and the legions used by SecFor. Most Northstar worker-citizens have gotten used to these animal-eared demihumans, but plenty within and without Northstar detest the “kitties” “kawii-kis” “furries” for taking job opportunities and possibly beginning to crowd out regular humans on Northstar stations. Most kemonomimi function as conventional working middle-class, doing office-work and skilled labor while roleplaying a facimilie of regular consumerist life. Why these androids are allowed to act so.....human is a judgement only known to the Founder that first made them. But Northstar isn't terribly concerned with an AI-revolt given their corporate loyalty programming and practical benefits to Northstar AI's sticking to the systems by their own choice (if they are even capable of realizing such a choice exists in the first place) clearly having worked for centuries. It is even rumored that a AI is one of the Board of Directors, but there is no definitive proof of that.

Citadel Stations: Northstar’s latest and greatest of space habitat designs, the Citadel-class habitat is a rotating space city in the stars, produced with the latest cutting-edge technology and evolution of human psychology within tight spaces in mind. Some are configured as industrial platforms, others as luxury stations devoted solely to producing a self-contained VR universe for their inhabitants, plus a usual run of labor platforms that can hold a unprecedented number of underclass with a across the board improvement in creature comforts and standards of living for even the lowest common worker. Several quantum-servers hosting construction recruitment websites crashed less than a day after declaration of their entry to mass-production from the sheer number of applicants from across the system, eager to buy their way into a Northstar Station under the immigrant-labor programs allowing old and new worker-citizens to earn a place with sufficient labor to offset their entry fees and berthing.

Despite the publicity of their construction, outside observers note the proportion of labor being drafted to build them is disproportionately low compared to the number of stations spotted being built. Some of them very well off the traveled trade lanes and without any external labor, with no questions answered of what they are for or why there are active SecFor patrols guarding all routes in and out of their build zones with shoot-on-sight orders.

Kemonomimi Android Lines: Northstar makes extensive use of complex robotics and automation from industrial robots to domestic servants to near-wholly automated starships. But their most visible product lineage are Kemonomimi domestic androids. Designed to be adaptive yet obedient task-centered AI servants, Northstar labs can custom-tailor these AI’s to suit the desires of their buyers in appearance, personality, skillset, and degree of independence with unrivalled precision. To distinguish androids from humans, Northstar primarily styles their product lines as Kemonomimi (humanoids with animal features and anime styling for deliberately not-quite human look in a attractive way), a early design choice that has led to enduring success across the solar system even as other android servant trends ebb and flow (cat-types remain a perennial favorite, followed by dog-types). Most Northstar middle-management and office-worker level AI’s are embodied in kemonomimi to keep them personable and grounded in human-like psychology, and they are exported by the millions to stations and factions that desire obedient underclass servants.

Unlike many other factions, Northstar has few qualms of mass-producing robots and AI androids of distinctly sub-human quality en masse for civilian, industrial, or military purposes. It is rumored that several newer habitats and shipyards recently built have their underclass replaced with compliant android labor in increasing percentages. While the Board of Directors haven’t begun actively phasing out human labor on their existing habitats, they have fewer reasons to keep using humans on their newer stations. And for some reason, Northstar's faith in their AI's has been rewarded with compliance, without even hints of AI rebellions other nations fear.

Military Kemonomimi: Combat-grade kemonomimi for Northstar SecFor are a far different breed than the cute, sexy, and obedient civilian models. Underneath the skin is kineticweave armor, diamondate skeletons, combat-reflex programming, micro-quantum computer cores running adaptive combat programming, weapons integrated into limbs. Company-level command units have built-in quantum communicators, enabling them to be remote-controlled by off-site tacticians (Specialized AI or human) to provide higher coordination than their individual task-intelligence systems.

Units expected to go into the heaviest of fighting or special ops work drop the pretense of being pretty humanoids, adopting more beastial forms like werewolves, multi-limbed spiders, mechanized dogs with built-in weaponry, or wholly robotic walking tank weapon platforms. Shedding human inefficiencies for combat lethality.

Northstar also exports military kemonomimi to other factions and corporations, either with SecFor on private military contractor agreements or downgraded last-gen export models bought outright. As the per-unit cost of android troops drops below the upkeep of human infantry (food, water, air, time in gravity and exercise, training, etc), its a hard question of how much of a place humans will have on the battlespace in the next century.

Dog-o-War: Short, petite dog-types rarely standing above 4”6. Designed as cheap, disposable, and low-impact cannon fodder for cramped habitats and slum-fighting, DoW’s are always used and deployed en-masse to put down threats with submachineguns or micro-lasers. Not terribly smart nor tactically adaptive, but numbers and the immunity to vacuum and zero-g make them useful in their own right. Recently there have been experiments in mass-networking into wolfpack formations.

Grunts: A catchall for a general range of standard infantry units based on any kind of K-type. Besides the body underneath being synthflesh covered mechanisms and warbot, they are equivalent to human troops in armament, armor, and operational role. Minus the weaknesses of needing air and gravity, or fearing going into combat. While perhaps lacking in initiative and creativity, numbers and reduced logistical upkeep compared to human troops is a fair tradeoff in Northstar’s point of view as they cram them into boarding pods like Old Earth sardines.

Bodarks: Elite Werewolf-types specialized in special forces work, large and powerful 6”2 machines with wolf-faces while wielding powered armor loaded with a wide range of armor and operations loadouts (corridor-assault, stealth, zero-g maneuver, etc). Northstar bends many of it’s own AI regulation protocols to make these beasts the most lethal killing machines they can be, giving them a considerable capacity for adaptation and creativity, but also requiring careful handling to keep them from the same instabilities human spec-ops are prone to when abused.

MAWLR: Centaur-types built around a mechanical lower body of four heavy legs and a upper body loaded with heavy artillery ordinance, laser cannons, missile launchers, or all-around coverage of machineguns. While situations that warrant such a walking tank are rare, and they are unable to traverse most human-sized internal tunnels and corridors, Northstar retains a considerable cadre for rock-hopping campaigns, planetary assaults, or clearing hanger bays for landing troops while immune to most small-arms. Why Northstar feels the need to also give them a external humanoid torso and head is a mystery for the ages, because they are totally redundant.

Northstar Security Force (“SecFor”) was originally just a customs and patrol task force, little more than corporate rent-a-cops. As Northstar expanded and interplanetary piracy took off, rent-a-cops became a full police force, then a gendarme as worker riots and warfare became possible, which then morphed into a security fleet for hire as other factions found themselves unable to survive and raise a military from scratch to defend themselves. Security and anti-piracy patrols for client-states would morph into military defense agreements for member-habitats effectively Northstar in all but name and logo.

Today SecFor is a dominating military force in the solar system. While not the strongest per-ship and crewman, nor the most cutting-edge or loaded with the most exotic hardware, nor the most tactically brilliant or inspired, it is both among the largest space forces in the solar system and the strongest in logistical support power within the Belt. Both of which more than make up for a litany of flaws.

Part of Northstar’s incredible depth in numbers stems from extensive automation and usage of kemonomimi androids whenever recruitment incentives fall short of quota, a not uncommon occurrence as manufacturing of new starships has surpassed the training pipeline. Where a human needs years of training and on the job experience to become skilled at their job, kemonomimi androids can download skills and abilities as needed and go through hundreds of simulated drills within minutes with enough Q-comp support while performing ship operations.

An unusual asset of Northstar Security is the ability to mobilize a sizable percentage of their otherwise unproductive middle-class as part-time teleoperations tacticians for robotic soldiers (averaging 3% to 5% depending on scale and marketing). A joint technological-logistical-societal breakthrough under the umbrella meme of “War as a Hobby”, Northstar’s available tactical command assets can be bolstered exponentially with the right incentives and marketing. The greater the challenge or enemy, the more thrill-seekers at the ready to remote control attack drones over commlinks while separate from the battlespace. While not the same as professional tacticians or full-time troops on site, being detached from death, fear, and morality of troops makes for potent equalizers and/or distractions to help real soldiers or perform raids. Its also led to instances of usage of excessive force and a few atrocities to rebelling workers by gamers detached from the real world, but Northstar waves them off as the usual risks when events escalate to open warfare and primarily the fault of the enemy to force them to escalate to such levels. Surprisingly, the risk of death should enemies home in on the hobby-commanders is just considered another part of this "hobby" for the thrill-seeking.

Admittedly, Northstar’s numbers and multitude of ways to bolster their manpower and command abilities are deceiving in a sense. SecFor is stretched out thinly across the asteroid belt and Northstar's trade lanes to the core worlds, and even the mightiest of warmachines operates a careful edifice of deployment and limited assets available at any given flashpoint. A mighty battleship fleet doesn’t matter much when it’s on the wrong side of the solar system. Yet strategic breadth and depth matter as well, and while Northstar might lose skirmishes and battles, nobody has come close to really waging full-scale war against Northstar as a whole or being able to inflict lasting crippling strikes against such a decentralized logistical infrastructure that can replace lost shipyards and habitats and ships with ease.

Northstar SecFor is a sizable naval presence in the solar system. Though not the greatest nor most advanced or tactically brilliant, it's size and logistical power means it maintains a consistantly high force readiness and resupply level.

Northstar’s logistical strength means their forces can be more loose with ammunition expenditure than other powers. Not only can battleships fire off hundreds of nuclear torpedoes, thousands of smart railgun grounds, and tank heavy damage without concern to the corporate bottom-line, there will most certainly be ammunition, fuel, and repair ships tailing behind every Northstar task-force to resupply on-site. A luxury few other nations can claim.

Another example of Northstar logistics and their disregard for AI-danger is the extensive use of attack drones, self-guided remote-controlled or AI driven mini-gunboats operating at speeds and g-forces that would kill humans loaded with short-life railguns and antimatter munitions. Relatively cheap and expendable compared to real starships, particularly in expensive personnel training bills, they are used and expended with ease by any ship with a external hardpoint or hanger. While easy prey for a starship’s precision weapons or point-defense arrays, they don’t need to live long to bring antimatter torpedoes to bear from a dozen different angles a regular starship couldn’t, and that can decide the course of a battle easily.

Northstar’s prized battleships and fleet carriers aren’t as active as the multimedia machine makes them out to be, as they are usually kept in secure dock and their crews in constant simulator drills, leaving the bulk of patrol work to corvettes, escorts, and cruisers. Even for a MegaCon, the expense of outfitting and supplying them across interplanetary distances isn’t something even they easily stomach or do on a whim. But when the situation warrants heavy metal, Northstar isn’t one for half-measures, considering any situation that warrants a battleship should be put down by three with a full-court press support and escort train. So far Northstar has only had to go all-out against another solar-power this way seven times, four times ending without a shot fired and three times ending with the utter destruction of the opposition. This does however leave SecFor’s battleship corps relying more on sims than actual experience though. Destroyer and cruiser crews handle most of the heavy lifting on a day to day basis.

Northstar also possesses considerable reserve forces within their massive civilian trade fleet in form of Auxila: civilian ships with underlying military-grade reactors, engines, and hull characteristics. In peacetime freighters haul cargo, passenger liners provide comfort and luxury to travelers, couriers run hardcopy messages and executives, and mining ships serve as bases for mining drones. In times of sufficiently serious war however, a sizable fraction of the merchant fleet can be returned to shipyards and be refitted within a few weeks with destroyer-grade weaponry, supplemental defenses, and onboard complements of military kemonomimi androids. While nowhere near as hardy as real warships, they can mount and support the same railguns, missiles, and attack drone complements of real destroyers and can operate behind the main line of warships to add more guns to the firing line, or perform independent raiding ops with a field commander onboard (where most War as a Hobby players end up). Unfortunately, this also means a quarter of Northstar trade ships are also ideal grabs for wannabe pirates, who only need a shadow port, a good hacker, and some spare weapons to bolt on to turn them into ideal raiding ships.

Faction Name:
Fenrir Heavy Industries. Abbreviated as FHI.

Faction Government:
Mega Corporation - Led by a Board of Directors
Fenrir Heavy Industries lays more on the definition of a modern day Corporation than other mega corporations of its time. It does not have citizens or voting on corporate matters. It does however respect its workers rights to unionize and express their wants and concerns for the company's direction, which are duly noted during the next meeting of Directors.


Territory/Claims:
Headquartered out of the sprawling city in Mare Nubium on the near side of the moon, Fenrir Heavy Industries owns all manner of properties across the system. It’s most notable being Sköll Yard located in areostationary orbit above Mars.





Culture:


History:
Fenrir Heavy Industries in the history books will not be seen as one of the “Conquerors of the System” as many other Mega Corporations that spearheaded the colonization of the system will likely be known. Instead it will probably get a small excerpt below a picture of one of its shipyards that reads, “Early Orbital Shipyard constructs vessel, Fenrir Heavy Industries 21##”.

Fenrir got it’s start as a joining of two shipbuilding tycoons on the 21st of May 2022; Mitsubishi Heavy Industries based in Japan and the Ulstein Group based out of Norway. The corporate merger of the two saw their new Headquarters moved to Nagasaki in order to take advantage of the shipyards already in existence there as well as to place the headquarters in a relatively central location in relation to the demand for ships and the name changed to Fenrir Heavy Industries.

Following their merger and the rather recent expansion to the moon, Fenrir began to build up connections in the aerospace industries around the world seeking to soak up as much information and schematics as possible to advance their budding mega corporation to the stars. After a corporate agent managed to make off from a still unnamed space agency with the preliminary designs for a very early form of ship capable of traversing to Mars with relative ease Fenrir’s direction was set. Later that same year they hitched their first ride to orbit on an older generation rocket. This was the year 2039, the same year that Edda Yard would begin construction.

Edda Yard was the largest undertaking by a shipbuilding company that had yet expanded into space. Following a two year construction process, and a near bankrupting of Fenrir Heavy Industries after a devastating setback that saw some hundred fifty souls lost in a shuttle docking gone awry, Fenrir finally put Edda Yard into service in 2041. The largest orbital shipyard yet created roared to life overnight as its first shipments of materials arrived from Earth and the same brilliant minds who had constructed it got to work creating the first ship to be laid down at Edda.
Jump over 200 years into the future and Fenrir Heavy Industries has expanded through the solar system, becoming a name known for quality ships and negotiable prices that allow even the “little guy” to own their very own ship. Since it’s creation Fenrir has remained true to the ethics of old and the far more moral side of humanity, removing their hand from the cookie jar of expendable human resources and distancing themselves from the ideals of governing as a company. It does not keep them from doing business with such corporations though, and even now after hundreds of years of disregard towards humans, Fenrir still works alongside many of the system's greatest offenders.

Technology:
An overview of the faction’s technological capabilities. Keep in mind the general scale I outlined. If there are any questions, PM me.

Military:
Just your military capabilities. You can include equipment descriptions if you want to, but don't try to sneak by a Wave Motion Gun or something.

Faction Name: Union of National Syndicates

Faction Government:
Fascist Dictatorship

Territory/Claims:
Currently the UNS has regained a portion of what was once the british empire reclaiming all of the british isle (including what's left of ireland) aswell as reclaiming its south african colonies and nova scotia.

Culture:

History:
Since 2016 The United Kingdom when they left the EU had seen a great upheavel in Political thinking ideas ranging from Fascism to Anarcho-communist factions popped up all over Britain. At first it was seen as a normal effect of changing of the Status Quo and would soon settle down as peace is restored and the british people come to terms with their new stance in the world stage. This was not the case at all. Outbreaks of violent protests and battles in the streets occurred as various factions in the streets of london fought bloody and destructive turf wars. It was during this havoc the Union of Nationalist Syndicates was born. Based on the mixing of ideologies of Moselyism and traditional italian Fascism. a new system was created where the banner of "Public Obligation, Private Liberty" Reigned supreme In the coming years the Union of National Syndicates grew in representation in parliament causing much opposition between them and various anarcho-communist and socialist groups. In 2021 the Queen was asassinated by Communist revolutionaries along with the rest of the royal family. Seizing this opperunity to denounce the Communists and socialist forces which stood against them as the enemys of order and peace, thus gaining them much popularity amongst the common man. This lead to even more strife in the streets as each side resorted to violence to protect and advance their parties. While the rest of the world was advancing into space the UK remained fairly isolationist dealing with the internal struggles between the various factions.
It wasn't until 2036 when one faction proved Triumphant. In what was regarded as "The Night of Awakening" the paramilitary branch of the UNS succeded in assasinating several High profile Communist/socialist MPs along with the storming of Westminster declaring finally and offically the UNS under "The Leader" Oscar Wellington the De-facto rulers of britain. After this victory the UNS acted quickly and decisevly rounding up and either imprisoning or executing all opposed factions. Imposing a policy of "Public over Private life" the UNS quickly set about rebuilding the nation from the ground up, Nationalizing various heavy industries the UNS rebuilt the infrastructure of Britain. In the coming years of "regeneration" the UK rose once more into national prominence with it regaining much of its land it lost in the previous centuries re-acquiring South africa, Ireland and Nova Scotia under the policy of "One People one Nation".
While mostly focused on regaining much of its lost territory the UNS hasn't completely ignored the prospects of space colonization as such they have begun a vigorous program of technological advancement in attempts to regain the time they have lost during the internal struggles. In 2075 "The Leader" Oscar Wellington died leading to much internal speculation as to who would succeed him. Soon after his death the UNS set up a council which would act not only on Wellington's own will but sort through the possible candidates to find the most suited for the position. after several months of deliberation the next "Leader" was choosen to be one Norman Ancoat a Officer in the National Defense Force (the military of the UNS) who had become a war hero during the reclaiming of Nova Scotia. Since the "election" of Norman Ancoat as the new leader the UNS has seen a great resurgence in colonialism both in earth and in space, creating the Colonies of Nova Caldonia and Nova Brittannia

Technology:
An overview of the faction’s technological capabilities. Keep in mind the general scale I outlined. If there are any questions, PM me.

Military: