The ZAON map I linked the other day threw down the challenge gauntlet.
I can never resist a challenge.
http://fnord.sandwich.net/spiral/map10-b.gif
(Warning! Very Large Resolution!)
It's not finished yet, by a long shot, still have to get the wormhole routes and the galaxy overlay in, but it's a start, and damn if it doesn't look good.
---
S. "Mal" Breen
aka Mr. Fnord, Map Boy and Chief Vorlonologist
http://fnord.sandwich.net/
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Add New Khatovar to it. It's _somewhat_ a political entity, even though it's just a single system. It's in near the lower left corner of sector 4x;6y, around the same distance from the 0 line as the Caprician Cluster is.
By the way, Babylon _9_ ... *looks at where you put it* *chuckles* Oh yes, I'm all for it! Very cool idea.
Now back to my regularly scheduled psychosis.
-Griever
*type**type**type*
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>speaking of the babylon stations, I only saw 4
>stations; 5, 7, 9, and 23. where's the other 19?
Undecided as to placement as yet (i.e. don't wanna play with somebody's stuff if'n they have a station already in mind.)
For the record:
Bablylon 1: "Overflow" station attached to the Galactic Council Hall. (not on the map, because the spiral emblem is a bit too big for both markers)
Babylon 5: The station we all know and love dedicated to keeping the peace in the middle reaches of the Centauri Sextant.
Babylon 7: Diplomatic meeting house for the Centauri coreward non-aligned. Also tends to get overflow of Taiidani/Arrikeen problems.
Babylon 9: In-joke. Also deals with the eternal Silesan/Andermani dispute & the non-aligneds in the area.
Babylon 23: Handles the Inner Sphere conflict in a Council-carved neutral zone. Expected to be first against the wall when the next Succession War breaks out (nobody in the Sphere is fond of outsiders meddling in their affairs).
---
S. "Mal" Breen
aka Mr. Fnord, Map Boy and Chief Vorlonologist
http://fnord.sandwich.net/
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>Roger wilco. I think you got your coordinates crossed, btw: 4x;6y puts it right in the middle of the Humanx and nowhere near the 0 line.
Reverse the coordinates, tho, and it works, so 'sall good.<
Yah, they did. Good catch. Looks nice on the updated map as well. I need to screw my head on straight, it's still mostly spinning.
Frigg and Freya, I've got finals coming in three weeks, assignments to hand in before that, and several sacrifices to lay down on altars of various deities I don't want messing with my mind during the period's duration. Plus an extra assignment I need to hand in because I screwed up ongoing commentary of the last one (I'm starting to hate java) because I'd had a sum of oh, twelve or so hours of sleep during the three preceeding days and spent the rest trying to clobber Analysis and something called Theoretical Basics of CS III into my brain. Yay, don't you just _love_ it when you get a cluster of tests on three relatively important subjects in the course of two consecutive days?
*sigh*
Sorry about the rant. I needed to let off some steam. And right now I'm going off to blow off some stress in preparation of the coming storm.
*points dramatically*
Off to the manga store!
*yawn*
... and the coffee shop.
Laters.
-Griever
...
...
this has all the lookings of the beginning of a writing binge, but truth be told I'm so burned out and depressed right now that anything to get my mind of the rut will be welcome and to hell with resolutions.
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Or, rather, just something I'd like to see tried - with the exception of the Successor States and places inside the Nexus, political boundaries in the Spiral are, to say the least, kind of vague. For showing that, I really liked the way the maps in DP9's Core Command were set up (for that matter, I really liked a lot of other things about that game, but that can wait until I can afford a copy) to show what were intuitively only rough indications of where the different states covered.
That said, aside from my usual inclination to fiddle with the political boundaries (I'm pretty sure these are from an older version), it's so neat I feel guilty complaining.
Blessed be.
-n
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Hm. Looking through my copy of the CC player's guide, the map doesn't so much show "states" per se as it does the general range of each of the player species in the five galaxies. Actual -nations- on that map's scale would be near invisible. I can't think of a good way of showing a nebulous border aside from going back to the old blobs o' color map style, which would make the map a hell of a lot more difficult to read.
---
S. "Mal" Breen
aka Mr. Fnord, Map Boy and Chief Vorlonologist
http://fnord.sandwich.net/
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I've done some work ups of what's in the 'Nexus' region. (as a refresh, the nexus is a network of fold points that allow a jump from one location to another, much like a wormhole. They exist between the Core and the Darkvoid and are possibly a byproduct of the Darkvoid).
Since the nations within the Nexus are mappable (and can in theory be reached by normal hyperspace travel), it would probably be a good idea to show them on the map. Major polities are:
Star Union of Crucis - about where the 'E' of 'CapricE Custer Nations' is.
The Arachnid Omnivoracitiy - below the 'S' of 'Caprice CluSter Nations'
Khanate of Orion - below ch'Rihan, level with Dragonswa^
Terran Federation - above and to the left of the 'R' in 'Caprice ClusteR Nations'
Free Terran Republic - below the Terran Federation
Rim Federation - below the Free Terran Republic
Ryall Hegemony - halfway between Caprice and New Khatovar
'Harvesthome' - about halfway between Caprice and the edge of the Core (not part of the Nexus)
Cadia - edge the Darkvoid, level with Qo'nos
I know this makes that part of the map very crowded, but that sector (6,4) is pretty messy, a sort of Balkanised feel with the polities intertwined because the Nexus fold points don't overlap and turn back on themselves. When the Darkvoid disappears and the Nexus goes, this will leave a very confused situation - and a lot of space that has very poor hyperspace charts and extremely confused politics.
drakensis
"I believe that forgiving the enemy is God's function. Ours is simply to arrange the meeting." - General H Norman Schwarzkopf
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Just a note while I'm working on Spiral stuff - the Nexus is not, in and of itself, related to the Darkvoid. In fact, it's considerably older, having been there at least since anyone, including the Vorlon, can remember.
In short, while the DV is ~35k years old, the Nexus is closer to 3.5 -million-, just like everything else the Xunca left behind.
Whether and/or how the Nexus will be affected by the -removal- of the DV, I don't know.
Blessed be.
-n
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Okay, my mistake then. I thought you'd said it was but I am a bit vague about some of the ancient history bits so I probably got the Xunca confused with someone else.
OTOH it's a likely theory for Spiral inhabitants who don't have access to the Council Archives. And it neatly explains why no one's actually mapped that bit of space in hyperspace.
drakensis
"I believe that forgiving the enemy is God's function. Ours is simply to arrange the meeting." - General H Norman Schwarzkopf
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Added the Nexus nations as per Drak's specifications.
I'd also like to make a request for some assistance from our Most Just LE regarding wormholes: The connections on your map are difficult to read and even more difficult to redraw on the big map. If you get a spare minute could you take the .gif and scribble where the wormholes are supposed to go on top & mail me a copy when you're done? It would be most appreciated.
---
S. "Mal" Breen
aka Mr. Fnord, Map Boy and Chief Vorlonologist
http://fnord.sandwich.net/
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Griev - in creative and emotional limbo (no login)
another bit to fill in
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January 28 2004, 8:45 AM
Ah, nearly forgot. Neo-Edo, Nippon system. Lower right of (4,6), about the place where you've got the low part of the W.
Hmm, we probably should do something to fill in the Taiidani, with that big empty space in the middle. And the Juraii. I'll let the latter to someone more involved in stuff that side of the Spiral.
What do we put into the Taiidani though. We've got the Harkonnen, seat on Giedi Prime, which are the largest House - or at least one of the largest. Give 'em a big honkin' patch of the center. Then we have Ordos (anyone remember where _they_ are from?) - I'd say give them the shallow border stip in the sectors (7,7), (7,8), (8,7) and (8,8) as territory. Maybe a little farther, stopping just a centimeter or two under Caladan. Not too deep - they have Kessel, but not Corellia. IMO.
Atreides - Caladan and a fair bit of that sector, nearly the whole border with the Aan. Moderately deep, bordering with Harkonnen territory in one or two places.
House Tomoe - just above the Ordos. Maybe include Corellia? Other than that, I don't know. I'm woking on specifics though, or hope to come up with something at least. Right now it's a dry spell.
We'll need more houses, of course. More minor ones, allied with the big ones. Then we'll need territory owned by the 'government' as in Lionstone - military installations, Arrakis, Golgotha, strategically important swaths of space. Though they ought to be 'padded' on the outside, by House territory. Just so that anything wanting to get to Imperial 'lands' needs to bleed itself on the lackeys, you know.
Heh, you can put the Arulco system somewhere in there as well, on the Rim, as a place ruled by a semi-renegade Taiidani warlord. Just for laughs. Who knows, maybe we'll need a suitably despicable villain someday in the future.
-Griever
having ideas is one thing. putting them to use is another. I find myself needing improvement in the latter department.
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Nice, but you've misspelled Arulco. Or was that intentional. Brownie points for anyone who got the reference.
Other than that, I have no objections. Hmm, maybe pull Giedi Prime a little higher, but that's it. Hmm ... _Tomodachi_? So what's there, anyway? I'm getting distinctly UFish vibes from the name.
*blink* Oh, hey! You put in Halo! Not my favorite ringworld, but then again, Sternberg may object if we were to steal his, and this isn't going to be a pr0n anyway so Halo works just as well.
*blink2* Oh, one of the wormhole terminal exits systems is missing a name - the one in the Taiidani.
The background works, and very well IMO, so I vote we keep it.
Hey peeps, looking down on this map, I get the feeling we don't show nearly enough appreciation to our resident Map Boy. Three cheers!
Hip, hip ... hoooorah!
Hip, hip ... hoooorah!
Hip, hip ... hoooorah!
On a sidenote, I just got done watching Witch Hunter Robin. It's not 'xactly as good as you'd expect after seeing the first episode, but very cool nonetheless. The plot actually makes sense, which is a nice thing to experience again after far too long a time.
Hmm ... the whole Salomon thing most definitely has me thinking _Iscariot_ ... heck, I'd been mixing them up throughout the course of my viewing. This thing deserves an adaptation ... well, because of that and 'cause Robin's just so darn cute too ... even though she's got a horrid taste in clothes. I mean, what the hell is she, color blind? You look at her wardrobe throughout the course of the series and think somebody must have left a stereo with 'Paint It Black' running full volume at her bedside for a few years running when she was young. About the only saving grace is that she sleeps in the nude, despite which fact there is about as much fanservice as there was in Hellsing. Read - almost none. *sigh*
Can't have everything.
Enough ranting, though.
Gotta dash.
Laters.
-Griever
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>Nice, but you've misspelled Arulco. Or was that
>intentional.
No, that was a typo.
>Hmm ... _Tomodachi_? So what's there, anyway? I'm
>getting distinctly UFish vibes from the name.
Yep, you have indeed caught Map Boy's Sole Allotted UF Callback. If you look closely and are sufficently erudite (or ran with the wrong crowd in high school) you'll be able to find Map Boy's Ironic Statement elsewhere on the map. ;)
As for what Tomodachi represents, I rather like it as the ancestral home of House Tomoe. ;)
>*blink* Oh, hey! You put in Halo! Not my favorite
>ringworld, but then again, Sternberg may object if we
>were to steal his, and this isn't going to be a pr0n
>anyway so Halo works just as well.
Well, the Most Just LE ordained a namechange for the AAnn Empire to the Covenant of the AAnn, so where there's one... Actually, as the Halo is basically a Culture Orbital that shrank in the wash, and Culture=Vorlon, it's perfectly canonical.
Besides, the Niven Ring is horribly unstable anyway.
>*blink2* Oh, one of the wormhole terminal exits
>systems is missing a name - the one in the Taiidani.
Guh. It's always something....
---
S. "Mal" Breen
aka Mr. Fnord, Map Boy and Chief Vorlonologist
http://fnord.sandwich.net/
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Enthusiasm is all well and good, when it doesn't make me make an ass of myself. I just realized, we have _already_ adapted Witch Hunter Robin. Or rather, Mal has. Something kept bugging me after I scribbled down the previous rambling, and I went to check ... that _is_ the series you set your bases in whilst describing Pacem, right Mal?
Hmm ... how about branching out. The various STN-regional branches handle psis and most other Talents, whilst Iscariot is looked upon as the slightly senile older relative with more 'exotic' jurisdiction - capable, but a little loopy - 'I mean, who in the right mind believes in Vampires? Puh-lease. It's probably just some Talented faker with a penchant for exotics. Feh.'
Though when at some point they are made aware of Vlad ... heh.
*yawn*
this one is going back to sleep now.
Ja ne!
-Griever
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>Enthusiasm is all well and good, when it doesn't make
>me make an ass of myself. I just realized, we have
>_already_ adapted Witch Hunter Robin. Or rather, Mal
>has. Something kept bugging me after I scribbled down
>the previous rambling, and I went to check ... that
>_is_ the series you set your bases in whilst
>describing Pacem, right Mal?
Got it in one. The sort of deliberate rustic feel to the planet combined with the seas of windmills are lifted from Haibane Renmei. (I was toying with seting a small Haibane colony there to mingle with the Catholics, but HR is a bit too esoteric for a fast-paced space opera like the Spiral.)
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S. "Mal" Breen
aka Mr. Fnord, Map Boy and Chief Vorlonologist
http://fnord.sandwich.net/
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Okay, minor edits, redid the Nexus to conform more to Most Just's vision, added a few planets here and there. Dropped the galaxy overlay mainly to preserve bandwidth - don't despair sports fans, the galaxy will be back on the final image when I upload a FUCKING HUGE high-quality jpeg version.
With a little luck and maybe some more feedback (hint, hint) this will be ready for prime time over the weekend.
Excelsior!
---
S. "Mal" Breen
aka Mr. Fnord, Map Boy and Chief Vorlonologist
http://fnord.sandwich.net/
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very nice map, lots of empty space still left though. Here is my sugestion of how to deal with that, whenever one of us comes up with a new world of any importance we add it to the map and send it to you for an update (maybe as a big red dot or so to make it easy to spot? Anyway, the exact mechanism would best be left up to you.) This makes two things easier, adding new worlds becomes easier for us, as does their location, and it makes it easier for you to fill in the map without stepping on peoples toes. Now we need a repositroy of general planet descriptions and then it suddenly becomes easy to use settings the others created. That should make the spiral feel a little more integrated.
Comments? good idea? horrible idea?
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Having the authors sketch out where stuff is supposed to go on a mostly-final junk map isn't a bad idea. It worked quite well for setting up the wormhole routes and a few border tweaks.
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S. "Mal" Breen
aka Mr. Fnord, Map Boy and Chief Vorlonologist
http://fnord.sandwich.net/
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Added a few planets to the Juari Sextant and a Fun New Feature:
On the opposite side of the Galactic Core from the Nexus is the Worldweb, believed by most researchers to be either a) a Xunca rough draft of the Nexus, b) another (long-forgotten) race's attempt to copy the Nexus, or c) fnord.
Like the Nexus, the Worldweb is composed of a network of short wormhole links between the stars in the local area. Unlike the Nexus, the Web has a physical component in real space - geodesic spheres around a hundred miles across made of unknown material, each one caging a good-sized quantum singularity. These spheres appear to act as anchor nodes for the individual worms, as well as acting as gravitational disruptors for local hyper.
The wormhole junction points themselves also have sizable artifacts surrounding them. The exact purpose of these structures is unknown, but xenoarchaeologists speculate that the structure could be used for direct point-to-point linkage of star systems. To date, however, all attempts to figure out the exact control mechanism - or even to get a response from the artifacts - has failed.
The Worldweb is still traversible in the "default" mode, however, in much the same way as the Nexus is. The area has been settled by the inhabitants of a long-forgotten Terra Template at the behest of the Juraiian TechnoCore AIs. Why the TechnoCore sponsored this settlement, and why it maintains a heavy presence in the WorldWeb to begin with, are mysteries to all but the highest levels of the Empire.
That, plus their continuing obsession with the border planet Hyperion, makes most dedicated Jurai-watchers wonder exactly -what- game the Core is running on the fringes of Glorias....
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S. "Mal" Breen
aka Mr. Fnord, Map Boy and Chief Vorlonologist
http://fnord.sandwich.net/
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It's been a while since I read Hyperion, but I gotta wonder how many headaches the Shrike causes Sailor Pluto. 8)
Speaking of Pluto, I know Moon is Humanx, and Saturn is Taidani, but I don't think the rest have been assigned yet (so to speak). I was thinking, The Vorlons are known to occasionally keep people in storage for later use (the B5 ep with their inquisitor for example), how about having Setsuna as one of them?
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> Speaking of Pluto, I know Moon is Humanx, and Saturn is Taidani, but I don't think the rest have been assigned yet (so to speak). I was thinking, The Vorlons are known to occasionally keep people in storage for later use (the B5 ep with their inquisitor for example), how about having Setsuna as one of them? <
Lessee if I can remember how this worked out the first time...
Going spinwards, we have:
Hotaru Tomoe, last daughter of that noble Taiidani house and arguably the most powerful battle esper ever produced by the Empire's esper handlers.
Ami Mizuno, physician in training, galaxy rank cryokinetic, and - nominally - an expatriate Midgaardian living in the Commonwealth. In fact, she is a Vorlon, a junior member of one of thousands of Societal Monitoring Teams conducting anthrosocioological research on the other civilizations of the Spiral.
Usagi Tsukino, registered nurse and psychological counselor. She, unlike her shy and bookish best friend (see above) really is Humanx, and is also Sextant ranked in three completely -different- fields of Talent - anodyne, empath, and telekinetic.
Minako Aino, age 413 standard, of the Juraiian world of Ai-no-ya-sei, and first in line for the inheritance of the Barony of that world and the attendant titles to its extremely popular and profitable tourism trade. Less common knowledge is that she is (His Imperial Highness the Crown Prince Tenchi Masaki excepted) very possibly the most naturally gifted practitioner of the Juraiian magical arts of her generation.
Hino Rei, the Burning Ruby of Luthien, already famous across the Inner Sphere as a pyrokinetic, precognitive, spiritualist and legendary beauty... despite the fact that she's still several years short of her majority.
Mamoru, hereditary Mechwarrior of Kentares IV's Chiba family. Known to possess considerable, but as-yet untapped potential in the fields of clairvoyance, anodyne healing, and telekinesis.
Makoto Kino, daughter of Dolist parents who died because of poor maintence on the public transportation systems servicing their home in the very worst slums of Novue Paris. Despite a noteworthy lack of seniority, her tremendous electrokinetic gifts have made her a vital part of her Aprilist cell, and indeed the Resistance as a whole.
Haruka Ten'ou, life-titled the Baroness Skyfall of the Star Kingdom of Manticore, and the favorite daughter of the galactic gevvadyne (the word is a corruption of GEV and aerodyne, and as its ancestry implies, refers to airfoil lifted vehicles which are designed to fly only with the aid of ground effect - it's saner than pod racing, but only just barely) racing circuit. While there have been occaisional complaints that her paranormal physical and telekinetic gifts give her an unfair advantage in competition, most other successful racers on the circuits have some similar edge, so they haven't gone far... partly since none of the complainers realize just how extensive those gifts -are-.
Michiru die Graefin Kaiou, Galaxy-rank hydrokinetic and internationally famous artist and musician, is, despite her nominally-secret but widely known affair with the above, a loyal servant of the Anderman throne.
Real name unknown, I-Branch Recognition codename Voidwalker. Most common alias is a local language variation of "Moment of the Dark King". Age unknown, but predates the beginning of I-Branch records. Capabilities unknown, but do include teleportation of self and others across ranges which have been -observed- as measurable in tens of thousands of light-years; concluding that this represents the limits of her range must be regarded as wishful thinking, as she has never been observed to suffer strain from teleportations, regardless of distance. Possesses access to ultratech artifacts equivalent to, but notably different from, Xunca technology. As her agenda remains unknown, all teams are instructed to observe only after first ensuring the avoidance of confrontation.
Blessed be.
-n
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>Hotaru Tomoe, last daughter of that noble Taiidani >house and arguably the most powerful battle esper >ever produced by the Empire's esper handlers.
Well, actually Hotaru Tomoe is listed as deceased in the Taiidani database. Something to do with a nasty aerodyne accident on her homeworld around her thirteenth birthday.
The most powerful battle esper ever produced by the Empire's esper handlers is 9PKEA/I ... but she calls herself Nine for simplicity's sake. In part because of the rating, in part because what she can actually _do_ is classified to the nines.
The fact that she resembles the youngest Tomoe daughter is merely a coincidence. After all, even her siblings and parents stated, when confronted with Nine during one of her field assignments, that the resemblance is merely superficial. Well, her father (the younger of the two brothers Tomoe - sons of the then head of the House) aside, but that's because he died in the same aerodyne accident as his daughter.
Her story is one I'd like to chronicle.
>Mamoru, hereditary Mechwarrior of Kentares IV's Chiba >family. Known to possess considerable, but as-yet >untapped potential in the fields of clairvoyance, >anodyne healing, and telekinesis.
Kentares IV ... Kentares IV ... Kentares IV ... whyfor do I seem to recognize this ...
... oh ... _that_ Kentares IV, as in the backwater little rock that plays a central part in MW4:V?
Strange, but oddly compelling.
>Makoto Kino, daughter of Dolist parents who died >because of poor maintence on the public >transportation systems servicing their home in the >very worst slums of Novue Paris. Despite a noteworthy >lack of seniority, her tremendous electrokinetic >gifts have made her a vital part of her Aprilist >cell, and indeed the Resistance as a whole.
And when Pierre takes over she learns that things that sound too good to be true usually are. For instance, when her apartment is stormed by Commitee troopers who try to 'arrest' her for merely being what she is. Ransom and her little pack see Mako-chan as a threat to their little regime, despite her usefulness to the Revolution.
'Hey, she could turn on us.' is the basics of their reasoning. Paranoid, ain't they?
>Haruka Ten'ou, life-titled the Baroness Skyfall of >the Star Kingdom of Manticore, and the favorite >daughter of the galactic gevvadyne (the word is a >corruption of GEV and aerodyne, and as its ancestry >implies, refers to airfoil lifted vehicles which are >designed to fly only with the aid of ground effect - >it's saner than pod racing, but only just barely) >racing circuit. While there have been occaisional >complaints that her paranormal physical and >telekinetic gifts give her an unfair advantage in >competition, most other successful racers on the >circuits have some similar edge, so they haven't gone >far... partly since none of the complainers realize >just how extensive those gifts -are-.
If anyone bothered to check, they'd find that her racer has _no_ steering assist systems whatsoever, and the controls are extremely robust and resilient ... from _both_ the foils' side and the pilot's side. That, and if anyone _else_ tried to fly the bloody thing it'd fall apart as soon as it reached any sort of reasonable speed, because of harmonic vibrations tearing the hull asunder. Now, why doesn't that happen when Ten'ou is racing I wonder? ;)
Hey, if she can _cause_ an object to resonate and vibrate with a certain frequency, she can sure as hell suppress vibrations like that.
Other than that, I've no further comments.
-Griever
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> Kentares IV ... Kentares IV ... Kentares IV ... whyfor do I seem to recognize this ...
... oh ... _that_ Kentares IV, as in the backwater little rock that plays a central part in MW4:V?
Strange, but oddly compelling. <
Reference the Kentares Massacre.
In the Battletech history, Kentares was the planet where Co-ordinator Minoru Kurita of the Draconis Combine was killed by a sniper at the height of the DCMS invasion that almost crushed the Federated Suns.
His son, Jinjiro, on being informed of this:
1) promoted the Sergeant who told him of his father's death to colonel
2) decaptitated the General who didn't dare tell him of his father's death
3) went to Kentares and gave the order "kill them all"
Five months later, less than 10% of Kentares population were still alive. 52 million civilians were dead. The discipline and morale of the DCMS were shattered, many of it's best officers committing suicide rather than participate in the slaughter. And the troops Federated Suns had a new battle cry.
Remember Kentares
drakensis
"I believe that forgiving the enemy is God's function. Ours is simply to arrange the meeting." - General H Norman Schwarzkopf
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Family legend has it that Grandpa Chiba started out as a midranking Drac... and outright -defected- the instant he realized what he was being asked to do. And promptly went on to take over the resistance forces in his area, going on to save several -thousand- people over the course of the occupation.
The fact that an obvious Drac was allowed to survive the planet's liberation is generally taken as the most convincing possible evidence that the story is, in fact, true.
And as to Makoto... well, I'll grant you that Ransom would have -liked- to be rid of her and all the other Aprilists... but the thing is, that the April group (I'm blanking their proper name) had a well-deserved reputation for integrity... which made them very popular, and in turn made getting the Mob after any one of them a pretty tough sell.
Left on her own, Ransom might've tried, but Pierre and Saint-Just have more sense than that.
But making her People's Commisioner on a ship bound for the most irrelevant possible of screaming hinterlands... -that- they could do.
Which was how she got packed up on a battleship bound for the Inner Sphere, to do some under-the-table trading with the Cappelans and the Combine. Not the PRH's preffered partners, granted, but Manticore's Xephon wormhole terminus and the already warming relations between Steiner and Davion mean that the Peeps are, as usual, a day late and a dollar short for the folks they'd -like- to be dealing with.
So. It did some good, and she wasn't anywhere -near- New Paris, so the Committee was prepared to count the whole thing as 'good'.
Blessed be.
-n
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So... does anybody have any further comments/additions/corrections, etc. for the current draft of the map? 'Cause I'd really like to put this puppy to bed...
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S. "Mal" Breen
aka Mr. Fnord, Map Boy and Chief Vorlonologist
http://fnord.sandwich.net/
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There are quite a few of them, if you'll remember. I'd offered to let you handle them, but if you're looking to hang up the hat, give me an hour or so and I'll sketch up where they should go.
'Minor wormhole' being defined as one that doesn't (yet) matter to the plot.
Blessed be.
-n
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Mmm. Rename Sentinel - that was a mistake on my part, Sentinel III is supposed to be the middle of bloody -nowhere-, it shouldn't even be on this map - as Heifong, and say that it's a three terminus junction.
Eraas proper should be one, size to your disgression.
Naboo is a junction, that's why the Guild wanted to own the place, two termini.
-Maybe- Corellia.
Erehwon has a Havenite tech base and two termini; only require that one of those three points be somewhere that makes allying with the Manties both logical and practical.
Floating an idea - New Avalon, Atreus, Sian, Luthien and Tharkad are all on an unusually regular wormhole system, junction at Terra (B23 - another thought, howsabout saying that the Babylon stations are what the Council puts in place to regulate wormholes?)
Not wormhole related...
I'd request adding some of the more notible Bujoldian nations - Barrayar, Beta Colony, Jackson's Whole and Cetadanga at the least, all somewhere in the lower parts of the Nexus.
Blessed be.
-n
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Hey all, I'm back. Been somewhat busy with non-Spiral stuff over the past couple months, but more into things now.
To the Juraiian Sextant, add:
- The Kilrathi 'Empire', near the edge of the Juraiian Empire near the IS border. They're nominally a Juraiian province, but do a lot of raiding and expansion of their own. The RDS Tiger's Claw is a _Magellan_ class JumpShip converted to dedicated carrier ops. :) Kilrathi systems include Kilrah itself; H'rekkah, H'hriss, and T'lan Meth (core systems) and Ghorah Khar and K'Tithrak Mang (forward bases).
- The planets of Sylvanin and Refuge are tucked into a corner of Eraas; they're home to Simon R. Green's Hawk and Fisher. (And I suspect that the Transient Beings are going to figure into Act III somehow.)
- I've got this twisted, twisted vision of the Dragaeran Empire being spread across a system or twelve somewhere in Juraiian space. Upscaled for the Spiral, of course. Forget this business about 'seas' of chaos; they've got an entire star made out of raw amorphia! :D
Also, on the subject... I'm worried that Ahb and Vega expand too far into the neighboring sextants. Part of the Spiral history, after all, is that the Juraiians have been around for fifteen millenia longer than everyone else. Abliar'sec was the center of a spacefaring culture back when the Cameronians were still groping towards agriculture - given that kind of lead time, I'd expect the Duchy of Ahb to have expanded across two-thirds of the Draconis Combine before the Cameronians ever got into space. Unless we have (a) something on the IS rim to slow them down, or (b) move Ahb away from the IS border to give them more elbow room.
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> - The Kilrathi 'Empire', near the edge of the Juraiian Empire near the IS border. They're nominally a Juraiian province, but do a lot of raiding and expansion of their own. The RDS Tiger's Claw is a _Magellan_ class JumpShip converted to dedicated carrier ops. :) Kilrathi systems include Kilrah itself; H'rekkah, H'hriss, and T'lan Meth (core systems) and Ghorah Khar and K'Tithrak Mang (forward bases). <
The far outer corner of Ahb, I'd say, and therefore much behated by both the Davions and the Kuritas.
> - The planets of Sylvanin and Refuge are tucked into a corner of Eraas; they're home to Simon R. Green's Hawk and Fisher. (And I suspect that the Transient Beings are going to figure into Act III somehow.) <
Oh. Hell. Yeah. ^_^
And am I the only person that think that Hawk and Fisher have a suspicious amount of similarity to Frost and Silence? Not that there's any connection in the -Spiral-, of course - that'd be pushing it a bit much - but I'd bet that's not the case IRL.
> - I've got this twisted, twisted vision of the Dragaeran Empire being spread across a system or twelve somewhere in Juraiian space. Upscaled for the Spiral, of course. Forget this business about 'seas' of chaos; they've got an entire star made out of raw amorphia! :D <
*blinkblink* Where do I... Vlad Taltos! -Ex-ellent.
> Also, on the subject... I'm worried that Ahb and Vega expand too far into the neighboring sextants. Part of the Spiral history, after all, is that the Juraiians have been around for fifteen millenia longer than everyone else. Abliar'sec was the center of a spacefaring culture back when the Cameronians were still groping towards agriculture - given that kind of lead time, I'd expect the Duchy of Ahb to have expanded across two-thirds of the Draconis Combine before the Cameronians ever got into space. Unless we have (a) something on the IS rim to slow them down, or (b) move Ahb away from the IS border to give them more elbow room. <
Actually, I'd say that it's more that the Terran Hegemony were perhaps the only people in living memory advanced and numerous enough to fight Jurai, agressive enough to -want- to, and arrogant or stupid enough to try. Luthien used to be right on the border.
The casualty rate was very much not worth it, but they did take a good sized chunk of territory. Things got very tense for the next fifty years or so while the Juraiians tried to get their act together for a general call up and offensive operation. Then Azusa's father died and everything else in the universe vanished in the swirl of politics over the succession, and by the time Azusa was safely in power, the Hegemony was gone and those worlds were vital and willing parts of the Draconis Combine and he didn't need a reputation as a warmonger on top of his mother-in-law and everything else, so...
Blessed be.
-n
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I'm a litle vague on the beginning of Azusa's reign, but if we're placing it as something in spitting distance of 500 years (formation of Star League) or 700 years (Yosho vs. Ryoko, Fight-O) then it would neatly replace the ReUnification War in the history of the Cameron Sector.
Prior to this era, the six major states and four minor states colonised from that terra-template had been engaged in a 150 year period of warfare. This being the third such interstellar war they had gotten into, most of their neighbours dismissed it as business as usual. However, the warfare sparked considerable technological advances (the BattleMech), particularly in teh Terran Hegemony which was relatively uninvolved but running short on raw materials.
By leveraging their technology and largely intact military, the Hegemony convinced the other 5 major powers to join them in the Star League and forged their combined armies into an massive force rather than leave millions of soldiers at a loose end (historically a bad choice). Having picked off several local neighbours who'd annoyed the outlying members, the Star League wound up with a bad case of overconfidence and compounded it by achieving stratgic surprise against Jurai.
For a while it looked like the Star League would be the third major empire to dominate an entire sector (after Jurai and Taiidani). The damage to the Juraian reputation was such that the Jurians had to divert a lot of their forces to reminding their other neighbours not to be as foolish, and the war settled into a stalemate with the Juraians dominating space wherever they were but hopelessly incapable of being everywhere the Leaguers were. (on the ground, the power of Jurai was almost unstoppable but again, users were so badly outnumbered that it was a stalemate).
With both populations frustrated in the extreme, Azusa negotiated a peace treaty as one of the first acts of his reign, leaving him tied to that policy even after the Star League disintergrated into the Succession Wars.
(And there's an interesting idea. Yosho's mother is human but what if, instead of coming from Tenchi's Earth, she was a human from the Cameron Sector. A marriage of state would be easily explained under those circumstances. And were Yosho to return as Crown Prince, that would give Jurai, through him, a claim on the Star League and an opening to intervene in the Succession Wars. Interesting motivation?)
drakensis
"I believe that forgiving the enemy is God's function. Ours is simply to arrange the meeting." - General H Norman Schwarzkopf
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> (And there's an interesting idea. Yosho's mother is human but what if, instead of coming from Tenchi's Earth, she was a human from the Cameron Sector. A marriage of state would be easily explained under those circumstances. And were Yosho to return as Crown Prince, that would give Jurai, through him, a claim on the Star League and an opening to intervene in the Succession Wars. Interesting motivation?) <
Heh. Yeah, that's -very- interesting, although I doubt that Yosho himself would be up for it. I'd doubt that the Juraiian noble's attitude towards a filthy commoner would differ much, in the long run, from the average Cameronian's reaction to the idea of being ruled by a damned treeboy.
(and before I forget, we'll need to account for why the marriage would be with a Kurita rather than a Cameron...)
On the other hand, Tenchi is Yosho's only living direct descendant.
And Jurai is going to be rather... busy, at least for SS3.
Blessed be.
-n
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I agree Yosho wouldn't want this, which would give another explanation for the split between him and Azusa.
As for Funaho, I don't see why she'd need to be a Kurita rather than a Cameron. Ethnic japanese aren't particularly uncommon in the other successor states, it's the japanese culture that is rare. And counterwise, a large number of the Combine's 'samurai' aren't ethnically japanese.
The Cameron family might well have had a branch who lived in Combine space however.
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Minor worm links added, a handful of new systems as per request. Gekou and Vega could use some additions, so if you have any ideas, try and aim for there.
---
S. "Mal" Breen
aka Mr. Fnord, Map Boy and Chief Vorlonologist
http://fnord.sandwich.net/
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Wouldn't it make sense for the council headquarters to be at a wormhole terminal/junction? There's got to be a reason it was built where it is and not somewhere else.
Also, in Humanx territory, you might want to add Alaspin. Or not, it may not be important enough to rate a listing at this magnification. The same goes for Midworld.
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For the Galactic Council Hall - not a wormhole. Those are getting way too common. :) Instead, a patch of unusual hyperspace - call it a 'meta-wormhole'.
For almost everyone in the Spiral, the Galactic Council Hall and the area around it is just normal territory. But possession of a certain type of artifact (very rare, very old, and possibly Xunca in origin) allows the Hall to be used as a wormhole nexus to (theoretically, at least) just about anywhere in the Spiral.
Limitations: A single 'key' artifact only allows translation to four or five different points in the Spiral, no more. Some allow only one. Each key provides different openings, though - so you could use one key to go from Saschen to the Council hall, then activate another to jump to Humanx space. (Assuming that you had access to two keys at once, that is - which would make you richer than some heads of state in the Spiral.) There's whispers that the collected artifacts are all just fragments of a larger 'Great key' which would open up the entire Spiral, but if so nobody's ever assembled it.
All known keys are property of the Council, entrusted to their agents and often only given out for a single mission. ("Hmmm, we need a troubleshooting team out near Saschen. Here, take this cube and give us your old one back. We expect you back in two weeks for debriefing, Citizen.")
There's rumors about once every five or ten years that a new, unclaimed 'key' has been found, somewhere (and leads on the location of a lost key are the Spiral's equivalent of maps to El Dorado or Brooklyn Bridge deeds) but nothing's ever panned out about this. If enough keys fell into the hands of the Council's enemies, they could probably launch a surprise attack against the Council Hall and decapitate it, so the Council's very interested in controlling any keys that appear.
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