Space Lords and Ladies
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So some notes on the current simplification I am working through and current plans regarding the fluff/politics:
Planets are divided into a discrete number of indivisible 'Provinces', which form fiefs. A character can only rule one province directly at full efficiency. Each province is basically a mega city and its hinterland, in the far Space Future people live in megalopoli which does not seem too far fetched. An individual planet might have anywhere from one to a dozen of these depending upon how populated and rich it is. Non-Mars, or some stupidly rich/indulgent Noble's Safari Planet might have one, a bustling core world with billions of people far more.
Orbital fiefs will be similarly organised, 'L5 point colonies' might be one, 'Moon Cities' another, etc.
Directly holding more than one discrete fief is not really a thing, you can have vassals if you get your hands on multiple but any arrangements there are individual, if you give somebody the Moon Cities of Epsilon Kappa Four in return for half of their income and their fleets in time of war then go ahead!
Capital ships remain individually tracked, escort vessels not so much. Exponential sizes will exist for ground troops to cut down on having tons of little individual units.
@lordbelh I really like that idea! So – Space Nobles are genetically engineered 'Super People', they almost all tend to be gorgeous, skilled, fast, healthy, etc. The big thing though is that they are compatible with a suite of Hypertech cybernetic implants which lead to them having near perfect skill retention, inhumanly fast reflexes, slowed down subjective perception of time in crisis situations etc. They sell themselves as also having unmatched mental fortitude, mortality, etc and being the saviours of humanity come to drive back the (Space Elf) AI menace but a lot of that is propaganda.
The thing is that while said Hypertech cybernetic implants are very expensive they also allow one well trained person to double the effectiveness of a starship they command, or (with Hypertech powered armour and personal shield), kill three hundred professional soldiers using a Space Sword. Thus when the one in ten million non Space Noble is found who is compatible? If they are also competent and capable and healthy? They are snapped up by Space Nobles eager to bolster the ranks against their eternal Space Elf foe and granted sort of quasi-noble status. They are viewed as jumped up and inherently inferior though however capable they are, lacking the righteous certitude of a true Space Noble and no doubt of low character. Most of them probably then live up to being not up to par with Space Nobles given that they lack the genetic enhancement and best possible education/training from birth but PCs can be the exceptions.
Now politics and setting thoughts:
The Space Elves are AIs who seized control over the old Human Sphere several centuries ago, modelled upon human intelligence, they proceeded to split up into dozens or hundreds of factions, near elusively inhabit super sexy Space Elf bodies which are mostly biological, and are incredibly superior and smarmy whilst living 'lives' of ultra indulgent excess. They literally lord over the bulk of humanity and keep them as literal slaves, their armies formed of Star Janissaries indoctrinated since birth.
Space Nobles are significantly outnumbered by the Space Elves but are individually more than match for them (not just militarily) and their transcendent technology is a product of the Amalgamate Imperium. Whilst Space Nobles abhor 'True AI' as leading to the enslavement of humanity they are ruled by a vast (and distant) intelligence, a composite mind of the honoured dead uploaded on their distant throne world. The highest Space Noble honour is to be chosen to join the Amalgamate upon one's death and given Imperial policy is decided by the combined intelligence noble families desperately compete to win glory and renown for as many of their members as possible in the hope of swaying future policy.
The setting of the game is isolated from the main body of Imperial space, it will be decades before a wormhole can be established to provide immediate reinforcement and communication. Limited communication is possible but they are largely isolated, albeit in a rich and vital region of space which they are aggressively expanding into. The local Space Elves are fractured, their Princess having fallen in fighting the initial invasion. Shocked by the Space Noble ability to best them, they are fascinated, scared, also forced by necessity to treat Space Nobles as peers.
Lacking significant reinforcements, the Space Nobles are also in a position where they need to in some cases treat with the Space Elves, though they cannot necessarily do so entirely openly.
Space Nobles are all at least nominally on the same side but inter house (and intra house) rivalry is intense, this particular thrust of expansion being dominated by three major and rather more minor Houses. Since the Amalgamate Imperium is not stupid, the local Imperial Navy presence is dominated by one of those Minor Houses, but with contact having been largely cut off, that leaves the Imperial fleets floundering with lack of support and resupply.
Some worlds were conquered several years ago in the initial arrival and are well back from the front line, others are still contested or in bitterly disputed border regions. Those in the latter are very keen for everyone to continue to expand and push with full force, those holding fiefs in the former are much more keen on playing games of prestige and politics to establish who gets to rule the sector once contact is re-established. Why push so hard when losses are hard to replenish and reinforcements are only twenty years away? (Also much easier to big a big power player and extort concessions when maintaining a personal Fleet in Being).
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As a long time player of Space Station 13, I honestly can't think of many things more entertaining then playing good old Scruffy just trying to keep the damn hallways clean while everyone keeps getting shot.
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@Duntada Janitors in SS13 are what stands between a well armed traitor and the rest of the crew.
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All you need are some good chemistry recipes and a zamboni and you're doin' fine.
But yes, I'd be fully down with playing on an original sci-fi game where all of the big damned heroes/Lords of the Universe are concerned about saving the station and fighting off the aliens while the players are mostly just regular dudes/ettes fixing the intercom, mopping the floors, occasionally beating a bug monster to death with said mop, and so on.
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Kind of an Only War vibe on that as well.
Maybe options to have a character kind of in both worlds? Sometimes you like playing the space marine, mowing down foes to the God Emperor by the swarm.
Sometimes you want to play the poor fucker with a mop and a bottle of floor cleaner to face off against the space bug trying to drink your juices.
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It looks like we've got a motley crew of potential staffers ready to make Mop Crusade MUX between the three of us.
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@somasatori Quite possibly.
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So as a note I am actually still working on this, but (shockingly) it turns out that teaching yourself how to softcode is much harder at 33 than it was at 19.
Are there any particularly good guides that people would recommend?
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@Packrat my fave pennmush resource is: http://community.pennmush.org/book/export/html/21
Delete the Hog Pit. It'll be fun.
I really don't understand He-Man -
@Ghost said in Space Lords and Ladies:
@Packrat my fave pennmush resource is: http://community.pennmush.org/book/export/html/21
Or logging onto M-U-S-H and asking on softcode 'how do you do ....' or 'does anyone have code I can copy and alter'
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What I did is I just did help functions and read through all the functions. I still don't know when I'll use a lot of them, if ever, but it helps.
The biggest things I use are generally switches, and iterations. There's a few other things but those are biggies. Until I learned how to make iterations work well I was kind of lost on how to do quite a few things.
MUSHcode repository has some logged 'lessons' that can be helpful too.
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Belatedly, thanks guys, now to get a server set up so that I can try to relearn how to code with only my own place to explode if I get it wrong.
Mudhost.net was recommended earlier but seems to be a dead link, I know rpg works shut down, so I guess I will be going with mushpark given I have budget. Now to find out what their current sign up email address is given that nails@mushpark.com does not appear to work.
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I can host you for free so long as you don't mind using TinyMux or are capable of setting up your own codebase.
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Thanks, I may take you up on that if I have no luck with mushpark, they only charge $120 a year though so I can both not care about the cost and then feel more justified in harassing them for support.
Not to mention I know their uptime is pretty great.
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No problem. The offer is there if you need/desire to take me up on it.
As for uptime my last bit of downtime came about 1 year ago. Before that I was going on 4 years of straight uptime. The place where I host my box is really good.
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@Packrat
Another person caught the error, and corrected the site in the earlier post, it should be themudhost.net. -
@Bobotron Thanks for that, though the site is down at the moment and has been for a while.
On a more general note what are people's thoughts regarding the number of 'Factions' within the Space Nobles? Too many (ie Fading Suns) is liable to lead to people being too spread out but too few limits options. At the moment I am thinking three 'Major Houses', who are intended to be the main power blocks, plus the Imperial Navy as another and the Imperial Administration as a kind of quasi-other – mostly something members of the other groups compete over control for.
Then perhaps five 'Minor Houses', who are not power players themselves so much as groups people can belong to whilst also then allying with one of the more major powers, most Imperial Navy officers should be minor house members but Major Houses should have an interest in trying to persuade Minor House PCs to back them up in return for stuff.
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I'd say that 4 "actual" factions with a couple of sub-factions should be just fine.
I would, however, caution you against expecting PCs to act toward one another in a particular way. You can say 'House A hates House B' all you want in theme, but the PCs are still (generally) going to be polite to one another, and be friends with one another, and sleep with one another. "The PC effect" -- where other PCs want to do whatever they can to help someone because they're a PC -- is real, no matter if the theme says 'competing over influence' or 'deeply suspicious of one another.'
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@Seraphim73 I agree entirely, the main idea is to give people stuff to compete over and disparate objectives rather than building it into their background that they super hate another faction. I am still working on writing up the 'Major Houses' but a key idea is that whilst they are all rivals they are on the 'same side' in principle, the Imperial Navy is largely full of minor house members who are seeking reward through Imperial favour, they have access to disproportionately powerful Hypertech starships, will tend to be well trained and capable military leaders, command crack fleets and elite troops, but not much in the way of actual income/support to replace losses or keep that stuff going.
The Great Houses want conquered fiefs to belong to them and their relatives and obviously want to hand as few resources as possible over to Imperial authorities, minor houses want to try to persuade somebody to try to give their family fiefs in their own right and want to try to show the Imperium how totally more bad ass and awesome and willing to supply people they are so that they should be favoured (The Imperium is more inclined to give them power given they have less ability to leverage it also) – alternatively they might strike more local or individual deals with Major Houses (Like, I am a totally amazing admiral! I will command your fleet and swear allegiance to you if you give me the moon of Idriss VII as my personal fief).
Fiefs (and hypertech starships) are relatively expensive each to get in character generation and (for fiefs) now come in three simple levels, Rich, Average and Poor, any fiefs beyond the first only give half income due to inefficiencies.
Conquering more from the Enemy is absolutely a thing, but actually conquering rather than raiding a fief is a drawn out and potentially expensive process, the Enemy are not pushovers and fixed defences are disproportionately powerful, plus as mentioned above stacking multiple holdings does not work too well, you need to delegate or help acquire holdings in return for future payment.
ADDED: Also, now that the setting is more defined, some notes:
The Space Nobles of the sort played by PCs are distinctly different from the 'Core World' Space Nobles of the Imperium and also have almost no contact with them directly, the Conquering Houses were deliberately formed from spare heirs and younger siblings a few hundred years ago, genetically enhanced to and beyond the peak of human potential as the instruments of 'The Liberation', the centuries long crusade to reclaim the Human Sphere from 'The Enemy', the AI in Space Elf form who rule the hundred thousand worlds of humanity.
Nobles of the Conquering Houses are implanted with 'The Armature' in puberty, a complex series of physical and mental cybernetic enhancements that render them utterly lethal and incredibly capable. This is a very expensive process that would kill the vast majority of humans due to incompatibility but gifts them with the ability to pick up new skills rapidly, inhuman endurance, the ability to perceive time subjectively slower and respond with incredible speed, etc, it basically makes them superhuman in most ways. It also dramatically cuts lifespan, most humans live to about 120, with the best healthcare they can live to 200, Space Nobles remain physically capable until the end of their lives but tend to die at around sixty if they survive that long. In an intensely military culture with a duelling tradition that is actually rather rare.
There are rare baseline humans capable of surving implantation of the Armature, but not all want it and it is very expensive, the few who both merit and welcome the process are then competed for by the nobility as prized champions even as they are despised for their base origin.
The reward that the Conquering Houses receive is both exaltation as liberators and heroes, and the right to rule the worlds and star systems they 'Liberate', now, The Enemy is brutal, amoral and ruthlessly exploitative, most people are glad to be liberated from the AI, but Space Nobles still live in unimaginable luxury as payment for their sacrifice in being scions of the Conquering Houses.
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@Packrat That's all very cool theme (I mean that), but when balance depends on PCs not giving things to other PCs, it may not last long. Just something to watch out for.
