True Vacuum

[Terminal]

The universe is ending.

It had always been mere speculation, but in the end, reality proved to be a False Vacuum. Either by chance or due to the machinations of some unknown force, multiple nucleating wavefronts of true vacuum were generated within the Virgo Supercluster.

These bubbles of spacetime, after expanding to swallow entire galaxies, began to expand faster than light as the rest of the universe began to implode upon the new expansive regions. As a result, the entirety of your civilization was engulfed in the true vacuum in an instant, without warning.

By some unforeseen miracle, all life and reality as it is known fail to cease. You have found yourself displaced in an entirely new universe. Theories abound as to how such is possible, but no firm answers are forthcoming.

Of more immediate concern is that the ultimate ecological disaster did not affect you alone. Other nations, other sovereign powers and forces, were displaced as well. Your nation, regardless of its previous existence, now finds itself isolated in an entirely unfamiliar geopolitical landscape.

New alliances will be forged. New hatreds will be kindled. The great minds were wrong. In this new universe, the capacity for a joyous existence remains. The paradigm of life, intelligence, and impetus go on.

888888888888

So hey, since everyone has declared Stellevia to be dead, I figured I would try and nab the next Space NRP slot.

The premise is simple. Every nation in play has been displaced from the false vacuum universe and finds themselves in an entirely new universe at a random coordinate location. This involves a bit of weirdness, since every civilization has been displaced in a cookie-cutter fashion - every planet and star that was a part of each respective power remained in the same place respective to each other, but every other star and celestial body in the universe was thrown to a new spot. Amongst other things, this means there are no galaxies or star clusters in the new universe - everything is just floating around in an unorganized jumble right now. The True Vacuum universe is therefore rife with rogue planets, surprise singularities, supernova remnants, massive gamma bubble fields, and more. Lots of room for esoteric space adventures in other words.

This is soft science fiction, incidentally. No hard science required (although if you want it feel free to indulge).

A gamut of basic rulings in advance since these things always inevitably crop up:

Rulings

-There is a speed limit on FTL travel. It takes a full week to travel 10,000 lightyears (for reference, the Milky Way is approximately 80-100,000 lightyears in diameter, so this is fairly high for a speed cap).

-Local Area FTL Jamming will exist as a defensive measure to prevent Alpha Strikes on Homeworlds and similar nonsense. Blitz can still be run since the range for Jammers will be limited to (relatively) small areas of space, and will be severely limited in number. It's mostly intended to give strategic planets time to brace themselves.

-Tactical FTL Jumps will be permitted as an additional layer of tactics for naval warfare, but tactical FTL Jumps must have sufficient power consumption/recharge/detriment so as to prevent its frequent abuse. No ship should be able to pull off two consecutive FTL jumps without some kind of downtime, drawback, or limitation.

-FTL Weaponry is also permitted, although such weapons are subject to the same limitations as regular ships. This means no multi-drive FTL missiles that can perform multiple consecutive jumps.

-No dyson spheres or similar megastructures. Space elevators are ok.

-In order to keep things consistent, everybody will stick to starships and space structures that are less than ten kilometers in diameter.

As a special feature, as everyone submits nations I will create a map of Anomalies throughout surrounding space (in the manner mentioned above).

This is just an basic overview to see if there's any interest. If I can get at least five interested parties to participate, I'll immediately begin work on an official OOC, nation sheets, an introduction, and a more formalized listing of setting descriptions/rules.

Thoughts, comments, interest?

[Sigma]

Looks pretty interesting, count me in :)

[TheSovereignGrave]

Well, I'm interested in this. I've been wanting to get into another NRP for a bit now.

[Skylar]

Interested. And the ground rules laid down should avoid some of the usual pitfalls sci-fi NRP's tend to run into. Very interested.

[FacePunch]

I've been looking for a space NRP. Count me in.

[EveryMemeAKing]

Interested.

[Terminal]

I count five interested parties. Perfect.

I'll have an OOC up sometime tomorrow, likely early to late afternoon.

[Eschatologist]

Oh man this looks fresh to death like a bird in a zip-lock bag. I interested.

[Willy Vereb]

My only issue with these rules is that they are a bit inflexible but yeah, things like this need to be straightened out.

One issue is that not every FTL travel method works by "jumps". Think of the Warp Drive from Star Trek, for example. It propels the ship in real space on a constant rate and the sensors/crew can observe their surroundings or make course changes the whole time.
Obviously, the most common limiting factor of these to be slower in comparison.
This is no universal rule but dramaturgy wise you can more easily get away with making these "warp engines" slower than you do for jump drives.

Warp-like FTL methods have several differences, including new sets of "ups" and "downs" for its mechanism.
Advantages:
- Activating the "warp drive" is almost negligible in energy cost and, at least when nothing else is in demand, it can be maintained almost idefinitely
- Warp travel steers the vehicle in realspace which means the crew is aware of their surroundings and can make course corrections the whole time
Disadvantages:
- It may be slower (less physics-dodgy method than jump drives and as I said writers can get away with slow warp drives much easier)
- Navigating in realspace means you still need to avoid larger debris and other hazards in your way
- While you can react and make course corrections, at FTL speeds any "turns" you make would usually require tons of space since all those tiny delays in time add up
- Warp engines don't make you disappear from realspace, you only became faster so the enemy may keep targeting you

Warp Drive applications:
- Ships: see above
- Missiles: the warhead travels at FTL speeds practically the whole time so it lacks the weaknesses of the "jumpdrive missile". On the other hand it's in realspace and has all the issues described above.
- Other weapons: You can use something akin to a "warp accelerator" to propel projectiles or even energy beams at superluminal speeds for extended range and perhaps accuracy.
- Communications: you can enhance radiowaves and such to travel faster than light, the so-called subspace comms in Star Trek are like this. Potentially inferior to jumpdrive-derived methods, tho.
- Sensors: You can practically use the same tech to get FTL sensors which will be essential for this NRP anyways. Besides without FTL sensors you would fail to even navigate with a warp drive.
- Computing, electronics: FTL circuits can increase the speed of computers and every electronic system in general.

There are perhaps more but these are the most obvious ones.
Note, you can also get various interesting applications for jump drives but in some areas they're more limited.
For example it's rather difficult to imagine the application of jump drives for sensor technology.

[The Grey Warden]

I am interested in a SCI-FI nation roleplay. It's been awhile since I saw one on here.

[Willy Vereb]

Ah, there's always one or two space RPs are active.
The problem is that they are nowadays kinda cursed to end fast. Hope some game can finally escape this fate.

[Monkeypants]

Haven't seen ya in a while, terminal.

I'll join in too.

[ASTA]

-No dyson spheres or similar megastructures.

:(

[Terminal]

@Willy Vereb, I am aware of different forms and permutations of FTL. Regardless, the speed limit applies to all of them - including FTL which uses superpositioning as well as discontinuous wave-function fallthrough (which according to common sense would travel from point A to B instantaneously). That said, your stated advantages and disadvantages to using non-jump drives are valid. Different forms of FTL will have their pros and cons, especially when used in naval battles.

OOC going up in a few hours, incidentally. I'll send everyone who expressed interest a PM once it's done.

[Willy Vereb]

@Willy Vereb, I am aware of different forms and permutations of FTL. Regardless, the speed limit applies to all of them - including FTL which uses superpositioning as well as discontinuous wave-function fallthrough (which according to common sense would travel from point A to B instantaneously). That said, your stated advantages and disadvantages to using non-jump drives are valid. Different forms of FTL will have their pros and cons, especially when used in naval battles.

OOC going up in a few hours, incidentally. I'll send everyone who expressed interest a PM once it's done.

@Terminal

Well, like I said, I don't particularly have a problem with the spirit of the limitations.
Not sure if they are explicitly needed but I don't mind them either.
The only issue is that you only defined them by the typical "hyperdrive" mechanism.

Travel speed is easy to get around. It only determines how fast you can get from point A to B.
So perhaps the instant jump drive can only make 1400+ lightyear jumps and require 24 hours recharging after each use.
Warp drives and hyperdrives are fine even without this limit.
Just for balance I suspect the warp type should be somewhat slower or something.
Besides, pushing FTL speed caps to their limits would be unwise. It'd eliminate any chance for growth.

Tactical FTL limitation looks too strict at first but the last sentence clarifies things and makes room for the warp drive uses.

FTL weapon limitation sounds nonsense when attempted to be applied to the warp drive derived methods. On the other hand thus the limitation can be ignored out of common sense for these and apply the same for tactical FTL. No unbeatable super FTL weapons.

The new additions, though...they are kinda bad news.
The Dyson Sphere limit is relatively no problem. There are some creative civ ideas where the entire nation lives in a giant ancient space ship.
10km limit is a serious issue, though. You see big ship doesn't equal powerful.
And certain brainy hard sci-fi measures would require rather large constructs.
A number of fun spaceship ideas are also impossible
Then there's also the issue with race who migrate in space colonies.
I get that you don't want people to move around in ships with the size of moons or planets but this is getting overboard.
Generally the majority of these issues can be solved by GM management and the good'ol common sense.
As things are you may be stepping on the creativity of people.
One thing is to prevent OP civs and crazy arms race.
And another to neuter the chance for diverse ideas.
Pardon me if I come off a bit harsh here, that's just the way I am. No offense meant.
My point is only that the way you word things can be problematic for different FTL mechanics.
Also that your latest addition to the limits is well...too limiting.
Granted, I doubt I will be held back by these but I remember dozens of civs that would be pretty much impossible by these, even though they were pretty balanced otherwise.
Hardlines may be better to be replaced by a comprehensive view.
A race having thousands of ships with the size of the Moon is definitely OP. If they can replace any vessel in real time their industry is beyond insane.
A civilization living on a wandering moon-sized colonyship which made by ancient technology they no longer know or perhaps even understand is a whole other deal.

[Terminal]

The new additions, though...they are kinda bad news.

@Willy Vereb

There are no new additions. The original post has remained unmodified since it was posted 15 hours ago.

10km limit is a serious issue, though. You see big ship doesn't equal powerful.

@Willy Vereb

Speaking as a person who prefers to utilize cruisers, I agree. However, this is a specific point of contention that inevitably crops up in Space NRPs. To list just a few examples,

In AaMS, one poster had ships which averaged between ten and two hundred kilometers in length, another had no ships larger than seven hundred meters, a third used ships ranging from thirty meters to over fifty kilometers. In IA one poster had a number of vessels described as 'destroyers' that were more than twelve kilometers long while another had 'dreadnoughts' which were no larger than two. In WoSS one person actually wanted a ship that was five hundred kilometers in diameter, when everyone else was using ships and structures smaller than seven kilometers. In WatS, ships varied in size between posters to the point where people both on the upper and lower end of the spectrum were complaining about each other. In IW, a small relatively new regional power with primitive technology possessed an armada of fifty-kilometer long warships while a longstanding, centuries-old quadrant superpower 'had difficulties' manufacturing warships larger than eight kilometers. I could go on.

The fact of the matter is that, if I do not come out with a ruling here and now, absolutely nobody will be able to agree on the same basic parameters for ship sizes. Since I don't want to unnecessarily force everyone into using a rigid classification system, I just defined an upper limit. Feel free to freely designate your own classifications of ships and their dimensions, up to the ten kilometer ceiling.

The number is perhaps selected arbitrarily, and pending discussion I might be amenable to changing it. However, I am of a mind that a hard ceiling is necessary in this matter. I am also open to permitting the occasional exception to the rule, but this would be on a per-case basis.

[Monkeypants]

I'm assuming that if it were worked out and for story purposes, a vessel of beyond 10km would be accepted but the decision to put a limit on size like that is acceptable to me.

Also, ftl speed limit regardless of type is also acceptable. Not everyone here is that well versed in science and I for one am not going to go to wiki to look up different properties yall throw out when I could be writing a story.

All in all, happy to see a new RP starting up!

[Nilesapa]

I have interest since I made a app for stellevia before it died.

Here's the app from Stellevia:

The Verdant Sanctum

All you need to know in life is one click away

The Liliate


The liliate are really a composite of two species. The first species being the titular liliate, who are large, plant-like beings with many lily-like heads. The second species are the buzzers, who are akin to bees except come in many uniform colors instead of the yellow jacket color bees typically are associated with. Through millions of years of co-evolution the liliate have become a mutually intelligent being. The buzzers get a mobile home and food source in exchange for pollinating the liliate and carrying out tasks for the liliate.


The liliates themselves are large, plant-like beings whose many appendages, stems, leaves, vines and roots give them mobility as they wrap, pull and drag themselves around. They tend to move about in large capsule-like devices when inside spaceships or environments hostile to their kind, but on good soil they tend to go without the capsules. The lily-like parts of their bodies are akin to their heads in that they hold many sensory organs that allow them to see countless more colors than humans. Liliates also reproduce with their lilies, usually pollinating themselves when alone or pollenating with another liliate in close proximity. They don't have gender or sex, but have seen enough other animals and aliens to have a concept of what gender and sex are. Liliates are universally referred to in feminine pronouns despite not having human concepts of femininity. They're liliates.


Besides liliates, there are buzzies who co-evolved with the liliate. Buzzers, like mentioned earlier are like bees with multiple castes and a highly eusocial mindset. Physically they're only a bit bigger than a bee, but come in many colors of the rainbow to indicate their role in the hive. A liliate is a host to buzzies, usually having at least two dozen hives and queens who make their home somewhere in the liliate's large stems. These queens act as a consciousness for the liliate through a mode of communication not properly understood. Buzzies are around the size of a large bee on average, the queens being only 5 inches in size and have a whopping 12% of their body weight as a brain. They're not that smart despite that. The queens produce babies and relay commands from the liliate to the buddy drones to have them do all sorts of tasks. With advancements of technology, the amount of Buzzer types has expanded greatly through genetic engineering.


Liliates as a species are numerous, but the vast majority are commoners who lack the advanced biotech the higher classes of the sanctum carry about. Their high populations are more due to their long life spans as opposed to fucking like rabbits; a Liliate can live 3 centuries on average.

Their diets consist of water, sunlight, fertilized soil and dead, rotting corpses along with a wide range of nectars or bloods (depending on role) for the buzzers.


Government


Their society is a somewhat feudal society where the affairs of government are private to the common liliate as the typical liliate has no concern for political troubles. They are much more inclined to enjoy a pastoral existence on a garden world than to go around conquering and empire building. They don't see the point in democracy since your typical liliate can live in the wild just fine, modifying it however they like.


The ruler of their civilization is the Verdant One, who is picked by assembly (ritual will be shown IC) from the elder patrons.


The elder patrons are the close knit circle around the Verdant One who carry out the will of the Verdant One and enforce policies domestically. Their jobs are also highly spiritual in that they will pick worlds to bless with life, however the Verdant One can overrule any of the decisions a Elder Patron may make. Besides the additional responsibilities, they still carry the burdens of their lesser peers.


The liliate who deal with political concerns are the patrons, who are called such due to their patronage of the arts and their patronage of life. Their main tasks are to carry out the more complicated tasks of the sanctum such as genetic modification, diplomacy, waging of war and management of the commoners. They do not own land like a noble, instead having a communal spaceship with other members of their pod they watch over a planet with.


The commoners have it the best, arguably. While the patrons in theory have absolute control over the commoners, the commoners in practice are simply tasked with making the world a prettier place. They are numerous and live on a planet without borders, tinkering with the ecosystems and biomes of a garden world or progressively designing and terraforming/bioforming a wet enough desert world. They don't get drafted into wars except in situations of planetary defense where they may levied by the patrons to fight against a hostile intrusion.


Outside of the liliates (and their buzzers), various forms of organic drones/wetware are used for repetitive tasks and ship construction. These drones tend to just be modified versions of animals they have encountered among the cosmos.




Military technology


Their military is a mixture of organic and artificial technologies, but very lopsided towards organic tech with inorganic (metal/metalloid-based) tech being seen as a "necessary evil".


Their deadliest weapon is a powerful radiation array ("Sunshine" as it is colloquially called) that pretty much reduces a world to a blighted hell hole incapable of growing life. The liliate themselves find the weapon utterly horrifying and only use it as a last resort, only having a limited supply stashed on high level spaceships under constant watch.


Liliates specialize in biological and chemical warfare, with conventional methods not really gettuing nearly as much funding. Their vast library of deadly toxins and diseases is a well known secret of the Sanctum, and this library only grows as they expand and find new chemicals and breeds of bacterium.


On ground, their deployments of drones who are chemically intoxicated to do anything on the whim of their liliate patron, offensive terraforming and swarms of patronized buzzies (with stings that contain all sorts of horribly contagious, extremely fatal illnesss) make them pretty much a death knell to civilian infrastructure. In space, their weapons are sub-par due to their ships being more carriers than fighters. They make use of laser weaponry and other conventional modes of ballistics, but all this is more to defend a ship more than engage in a offensive war in space. Instead, the Liliate try to rush to planets they know the enemy won't be willing to glass (like a planet full of civilians) to get a leverage on their enemy and force negotiation.


On the defensive they tend to make use of multiple defensive platforms laden in conventional weapons and tend to dig very deep into planets (especially cave heavy worlds) in places where potential conflict may arise. Such digging in can make quite impressive monuments to the terraforming capabilities of the Liliate, despite how amish the common liliate is to an outside viewer.


Technological Overview


The Liliate, as mentioned in the military section are biotech heavy. This applies to their less murderous applications of tech as well. For instance, they make use of neural manipulation (or mind control) to make beasts of burden bend to their every whim. This mind control relies heavily on instinct manipulation and requires for a node to be placed inside one's head for it to actually be effective. The Buzzers have developed castes that pretty much try to go into your ear to allow for a liliate to control your mind.


Their computers use a neural form of wiring that allows them to think through many different designs of creatures and splice them. Experimentation using these computers is a constant in their society. This same neural wiring is used in their space probes, which are encased in protective layers of plastics/metals. The application of the automations are pretty diverse, but they're only seen in the company of patrons and on spaceships- they aren't allowed on the garden worlds.

The Liliate tend to terraform worlds that 'have potential' into garden worlds and can do so in a matter of a several decades because once a planet is blessed to be terraformed more and more common liliate will be transported to the world by the patrons.

Number and industry-wise they're around average in terms of productivity when it comes to space ships. In colonizing and terraforming, they're very productive.

The FTL they use is standard with nothing unique about it. The cultural impact of FTL however, is what caused them to begin their quest to start seeding and terraforming any world they bless with their kind. Even if it's already in use, as the concerns of some meathead or metalhead only matter if they dare undermine the Verdant One's wishes.


Cultural Overview


The Verdant Sanctum's overall culture is actually quite artistically inclined, at least for the vast majority. They treat their ecosystems and biome modification as art, and therefore is not usually trying to be efficient in terms of sustainability or ecological harmony. The common liliate live in quite open conditions with the closest things to homes being shelter systems from harsh weather or incomplete worlds. Patronic liliate tend to live in spaceship terrariums, only being allowed to go on world by a elder patron. A elder patron is only allowed to go on world by the verdant one, who is rooted on the home world.

The word buzzer is never actually used to describe the species that is in communion with the liliate; buzzer is a slang term invented by some other species. The liliate themselves do not really distinguished buzzers from the liliate. It's as absurd to them as claiming your tongue or pinky is a separate species. Or claiming white blood cells are separate from humans. In the Verdant Sanctum, the "buzzers" pretty much act as and perceive themselves as extensions of the liliate. The queens may be psychologically independent from their liliate, but they pretty much see themselves as part of the same mind. Despite this, the buzzers pretty much have autonomy in what the liliate is saying since when a liliate talk, it's really the coordinate buzzing of the buzzers. If a buzzer queen is lost, it is like losing a part of one's personality.

Liliate have a great interest in life in general, going as far as to raid and abduct life on alien worlds should there be no other means to obtain it. On several occasions already there are liliate who have put multiple alien species on a planet and tried making a functional ecosystem out of it. They see technology as a necessary evil that has enabled them to spread life outside of their single star system and their relationship with technology is very mixed as a result.


Their economy is pretty much built around constant expansion, for they need to keep colonizing and terraforming more worlds in order to keep growing as a civilization and most liliate go without money instead just having a simple barter economy. Patrons however, do have a system of wealth that is more based in favors than in actual currency- the better a patron is doing, the more they are allowed to commission to the common Liliate. Trade with aliens is done exclusively in barter, however.


Their relationship with other forms of intelligent life who have embraced metal-based technology to far greater degrees is not all that great, however they may find common cause with an ideologically similar species. Their system of blessing worlds may cause them to get into major trouble with another society. They have many other art forms beyond ecological art including art that humans would refer to as "art" like their large scale gardening, rock art, symbol drawing and painting. (sadly their paintings can't be fully enjoyed, let alone understood by human eyes).



History


The Verdant Sanctum's History is one that started in tragedy, for the Verdant Sanctum formed only after their kind some several hundred years ago suffered a massive dying off known simply as "The Weltering" that nearly caused their species to fall back to the stone age. In what seemed like the end of their kind, the first Verdant One managed to bring together the anarchy that was consuming their world and in what should have been the end of Liliate civilization turned into a renaissance and cultural rebirth as their conventional technology managed to accidentally happen upon the Warp Drive. In this renaissance, the baseline for the Verdant Sanctum was born.


In the first explorations of space, a realm once seen as a empty void without any value to their kind they discovered that other planets also had life. The discovery of alien worlds with life lead to the first blessings of alien worlds as the Third Verdant one set down the foundations for which worlds may be blessed by herself personally.


The criteria goes like this:
1. Wet enough
2. Warm Enough
3. Sunny Enough


Over the following few centuries and to present day, the Verdant Sanctum has spread across dozens of star systems (moderate size civilization with dense population- tell me how big is balanced for this RP) and have made contact with intelligent life in the past century.


(History beyond this point will be based in history collaboratively decided on)


Other


(Will use this section for my characters)


Formulaic Patron of Skimming Light

Prospecting Elder of the Blue Abyss

Imagining Patron with Violet Minds

(Naming convention is ROLE + SOCIAL CLASS -transition (not nessecarily just "of")- Adj + Noun)

I may edit the app to better fit the setting.

Anyways, time to strike up a debate:

FTL weaponry is stupidly impractical despite being possible in this universe. Mainly since FTL bombing is a total waste of a warp drive. Why have a one-use warp bomb when you can just warp in a spaceship loaded with WMDs that are just as effective? Not to mention a spaceship can adjust to situations way more effectively than some dumb missile.

[Terminal]

I'm assuming that if it were worked out and for story purposes, a vessel of beyond 10km would be accepted but the decision to put a limit on size like that is acceptable to me.

@Monkeypants

Correct. The current boundary is there as a general rule, but I am open to the occasional exception as long as there is good reasoning and intent behind it.

As a general notice, the OOC will be up within the hour.

[Willy Vereb]

@TerminalPer case basis allowances to the rules sounds like a good solution.
As for sizes, they kinda also represent the industrial power of a nation.
So a more primitive nation should have inferior industry thus:
A.) Even though the 12-mile ships are classified as destroyers, they aren't nearly as numerous as the common ships of the other
B.) There are other technical details which makes the creation of larger ships difficult, maintaining a stable field for FTL travel, for example.

Such discrepancies will be occurring regularly within the RP. There's no way to completely mend them aside from invasive intervention from the GM, which isn't really advisable.