1. FTL-wise, warp drives are gravity sensitive. Warp drives cannot go into regions of the galaxy where gravity is too strong.

1a. The gravity well limits basically mean you can't warp into the habitable zone around a star, within the moon system of a gas giant/planet or into the atmosphere of a dwarf planet. You can warp into an asteroid, but it isn't recommended.

1b. Wormholes do not have the gravity well restriction, but you do have to carry the other end of a wormhole to where you want it and if the link breaks, it is very hard to re-establish that link.

1c. Unique warp drive systems that break with the limits can be proposed, but they should have clear guidelines as to how they operate. Indeed, there's.. a secret warp drive type the dealers have (and offer, more on that below) that break with these systems already.

2. Technology-wise, there cannot be mega-engineering beyond the planetary scale for player factions (even the ancient aliens don't have that in the present day), the ability to make supernova inducing devices and there is a prohibition on true ASI (as an ASI would be a god computer, an AGI mainframe is fine however).

3. Alien-wise, it is recommended to make the species feel like it doesn't share the same genus as humanity at the very least. Like, make them at least as alien as a chimpanzee or gorilla if you gotta have the back breaking 2 legs thing.

3a. If you have something that be a new species of human, I would prefer them being a new species of human instead of being an alien. The human history has a lot of breathing room for that kind of background.

Basic app sheets. You do not need to use these app sheets at all and can use your own app sheet structure, but they exist for those who want the reference.

Faction

Name:
Overview: [A non-specific overview of the society]
Structure: [How your society governs and organizes itself]
Beliefs: [The culture/beliefs of your society]
Technology: [Technology your civilization uses. This includes your military technology]
Demographics: [The demography of your society, I recommend using mostly percentages]
Other: [Anything else]

Sapient

Name:
Overview: [A general idea what they're like]
Traits: [What are the traits of this species?]
Psychology: [What distinct aspects of the way they think/see the world are there?]
Permissions: [How can other players use this sapient? If you have no specific conditions just write 'universal' for universal access or 'none' if you want nobody else use them]
Other: [Anything else]

(Optional)

-World-

Name:
Overview:
Other:

The Dominion

Dominant Species

Humans
There are also various alien species under foot or in space zoos/freakshows.

Overview

The Dominion is a decrepit, ossified and ancient Imperium with an imperial senate that acts basically as a centralizing body.

The imperial senators in modern times are emperor appointed to govern and run distant, often extremely culturally distant sectors they often have no local ties to. The once effective and organized statesmanship of earlier Emperors have eroded over the centuries as the sheer administrative sprawl of the empire led to an insular elite unable to even know what is going on anymore. This would lead to increasingly decedent and impotent leaders often with no understanding of the various human societies the Dominion has sole sovereignty over.

In practice, the Dominion has fragmented considerably by present day. Diplomats to the Dominion have to wear imperial regalia, despite some of these societies not even being part of the Dominion and haven't been for many generations. Following the decorum however, is what limits the risk of punitive expeditions / interventions and allows for a lot more activity under the radar...

The Dominion's technology includes a wide range of powersuits, fast warp drives, the industrial ability to make large spaceships, fusion power, life extension tech and various other grab bag technologies with the Dominion's technology and numbers being by design balanced to the other human players.

Leader

The current "Imperial Executive of the Dominion" (or Emperor, as most call them Emperor anyways) is an extremely old man whose life was extended with advanced life extension technology known as Octo Smith. Octo Smith is a boney figure who is 275 years old by current carbon dating estimates. He is dependent on a medical power suit stylized with baroque flair he wears all the time. He is believed to have senility that even the best neurosurgeons have struggled to crack, but nobody dare questions it ever since the Bombing Incident back when he was a young, spry 230 years old and 80 years into his time as Imperial Executive.

Player-NPC relationship recommendations

Human players ideally have all matter of relationships with the Dominion, from loyalist to an ancient lost colony that developed into a force of its own- it doesn't matter, the universal sovereignty of the Dominion is applied to all human societies no matter how distant or different. Non-human players are often just despised by the Dominion, even the more advanced ones.

The Dominion is a faction that is used as a foil for the human players.


The Dealers

Not much is known as the 'dealers', only how at times they manifest in various UFOs and such and often make offers to various beings, whatever their background. They always manage to know the language and situation when they appear, with Dealer sightings permeating the galaxy. Not much is known of them beyond their advanced technologies and their selective generosity with it. The nature of these dealers is not well known at the start, but will become known as the RP progresses.

These technologies tend to be black box technologies that usually work when abiding by the agreement you made with them.

Karbana Kinnis

Overview

Karbana Kinnis is an enigmatic city world of alien origin. Karbana Kinnis is a living fragment of a civilization lost to time. A civilization whose artifacts found by archaeologists led to it being believed they were just extinct until much more recently. Karbana Kinnis is an extremely insular world, with seemingly endless urban sprawl covering much of the planet with with an ecology of automata who have kept the sprawling, escherian cities intact over many millennia. It is a highly populated world however- with numerous factions who all share the same planet and loathe everything outside of the endless cities they call home.

The many layers of Karbana Kinnis have created a world that simply is overwhelming in scope, with orbital security systems that make bombing it near impossible. They evidentially once had far more massive populations and wormholes to other, distant worlds. All of the wormholes shut off and signs of mass die off suspiciously absent on the surface. What lurks in the depths of such vast city will take one hell of an expedition to find out.

Player-NPC relationship recommendations

Karbana Kinnis is a place multiple alien players can co-habitate, as the many districts have created a wide selection of sub-regions ideal for the various city world descendants of this fallen society to branch out in many different directions and societies Gravity wells vary in the different layers of Karbana Kinnis, with low gravity floating regions in low orbit sky cities tethered to the world itself by space elevators maintained tediously by the automata and high gravity regions in the depths of Karbana Kinnis filled with the stench of death. Being a part of Karbana Kinnis gives you more leeway with tech than usual, along with access to the fossil wormholes that weren't closed off. You also get access to a bit of GM spoiler lore. However as a trade off, you will have more black boxes to work with and a general anxiety of the non-city world parts of the galaxy... which is most of it.

Outsiders to Karbana Kinnis ideally have interest in the world as it is a world flooded with ancient alien technology.

Overview:
Structure:
While legally speaking, the Aurolian Sector is a republican “protectorate” of the Dominion. In actuality, the Aurolian Sector is run by a fully autonomous Federal Republic.
The Aurolian Government is split between Three Branches, the Executive Branch, that being the Office of the Chancellor who is both the Head of the Senate and the Commander-in-Chief of the Republic’s Armed Forces. One of the many tasks of a Chancellor consist of the creation of Laws, the signing of articles of diplomatic importance such as treaties, to appoint judges for the Interstellar Court and so on.

The Legislative Branch, that of which being the Aurolian Senate. The Senate's main tasks consist of the passing of laws brought forward by the Chancellor, passing or vetoing Legislation by the Chancellor, and are to give consent to enact a Declaration of War. And finally, there is the Sectorial Court, who are responsible for the enforcement of the Laws created by the Chancellor and passed then enacted by the Senate within the sector. SC Judges are appointed by the Chancellor.

Star Systems within the Republic are partially autonomous entities who are responsible for both maintaining worlds and installations within, and to maintain its own defense with their local System Defense Force to act as its shield.
Demographics:

• Baseline Humans-62%
• Human Offshoots-22%
• Aldzir-12%
• Other Xenos-4%

Military: