I am thinking about making AAR story. I do plan to play Vanilia DW Universe (no mods!!!) in sandbox mode. And I thought... Why not actually share it with DW community (or what is left of it)? So here is what I think - if there are people that would like to read it, or maybe even have influence on how it goes (to some degree that is!) than I believe it will be worth it. If not - than not. Simple as that.
So here is my question to you guys - interested? Or not at all? Obviously don't answer if you are not interested - just ignore and that is it Write if interested. Than I will post all settings I will play as etc.
Oh! And if you are interested, suggestions how to name my empire (Race - Human, Goverment - Monarchy) would be welcomed.
Thank you for attention and time reading it!
(correcting my flaws in ENG and explaining why something is wrong and how to write it correct also welcomed!)
Galaxy Settings
- even clusters
- 1400 stars 15/15 sectors
- expansion pre-warp
- agression normal
- difficulty normal (no stinking scaling!)
- research cost 500k
- space creatures normal
- pirates normal (averange proximity)
- pirate strenght normal (no respawn)
Colonisation Settings
- colony prevalence normal
- independent life rare (why there is no "NONE" option???)
- colony influence range 106% (as suggested by game)
- no arbitrary colonisation limit!!! Bleh!
Empire Settings
- human race
- monarchy
- possition in galaxy random (ended up in middle)
- home system normal
- size starting
- tech level pre-warp
- corruption normal
AI Empires Settings
- 19 empires auto-generated
Victory Conditions
- none (we decide when we end this story, there won't be any Shakturi Axis comming in, no Guardians to enforce their rules, no limits on what we want and when we want to call it win/loose)
Much has been lost with passage of time. We do not know how exacly it all started, but we know for sure that everything had it's begining when August Baxter II sat on throne of Rigalia - right after his mother's death. Rigalia was rich kingdome (August's mother was a wise ruler) with strong possition in the world. But it's possition, while strong, was not one of super power. That was to change during August's reign. Through carefull plotting, wise decisions, few well placed bribes and strategical alliances he managed to unite (most of time peacefully, sometimes by force) all neighbooring kingdomes under his rule. Power to be reckoned with.
As time passed, new methods of communication and transport were discovered, making it easier and easier to controll bigger and bigger territory. August's daughter - Jadwiga Baxter - conquered and incorporated into Rigalia more and more lands. Soon, there remained only a few kingdoms which were able to rival Rigalia's power, and even fewer that would be able to surpass it.
Generations passed as Baxter dynasty struggled for dominance with other major powers - sometimes with it's influence and money, other times with it's vast armies. Some wars were won, other were lost. New discoveries has been made - some opened new opportunities, other posed new dangers. Some were used instantly, others were kept for years in secrecy. Eventually, as planetary resources were becoming more and more limited, wars were comming to an end. Every major "player" realised that continued rivality on global scale will achieve nothing but total depletion of natural resources and huge devastation. Yes, eventually somebody would won and become ruler of whole planet. But it would be world of death and ruins. Agreement has been made. Kingdoms were united under one ruler - for the first time since known history. Irony wanted, that first monarch of this newly found kingdome - Alexander Baxter XIV - was also last in his dynasty. He died few years later without leaving a heir to the throne...
Current Situation
The Baxter Kingdom under the leadership of Gudan Bendu XI has full control over it's native planet - Crown. It's star system, known as Sol, consist of four planets and one moon. It is unknown what resources those planets posses. The Crown is closest planet to the star. Second planet, counting from star is Gyug. Despite it's distance from the sun, it is covered in endless deserts. What makes it interesting though, is fact that it posses it's own ecosystem - not very complex mind you... But it is there. Life is there. Next planet, known as Sol 2 is atmosphereless piece of hard rock. Finnaly, there is gas gigant known as Sol 3 and it's moon Sleb. Sleb is extremly violate world, covered in rivers of hot lava. Apart of those, there are some smaller asteroids that may or may not posses valuable materials.
If mankind wants to survive and thrive it MUST reach to all those distant worlds, no matter the cost...
Audience Hall was spacious... No. Oh no, no, no... To call it spacious would be huge underestimation. Audience Hall was enormous! When you walked in, you could hear endless echo of your every steep. As long as it was empty that is. Which it wasn't. Not today at least. His majesty, King Gudan Bendu XI was calmly sitting on his throne, at the very end of hall. On his both sides one could see endless crowd of clerks, advisors, security officers and nobles. All of them in their official suits, richly decorated with gold, silver or bronze - depending on their social hierarchy. Betwen them was long, red carpet leading interesants from entrance right toward monarch. Everything was well illuminated, making arrivals feel like whole place was made out of crystals.
"Lord Antiliusz Hassari - First Engineer and Royal Lectuler is seeking an audience with Your Majesty. Will it be granted?" asked laudly one of pages standing next to a doors. Of course... It was just a show, part of a ceremony. Something that media can talk about to commoners.
Short silence... King Gudan waved slowly his hand in inviting gesture.
"Lord Antiliusz! Your audience has been granted to you. You are now allowed to stand before King." the same page said, as tradition required. Then, and only then Lord Antiliusz slowly started to walk on red carpet toward his liege. He wasn't young anymore. But even if he would, his walk would not be any faster than was right now. Tradition demanded it... Finnaly, when he reached throne, he bent his knee and waited. Another part of ceremony of course.
"Who are you and why are you here?" asked monarch, barely looking at kneeling man.
"I am Lord Antiliusz your majesty, First Engineer, as well as Royal Lectuler at Collegium Novum, and I am bringing you report on our progress with space construction." Of course the king knew all this. He was getting daily updates. As it was - industralisation of space was highest priority. Never the less, there were things that needed discusion... But not here. In private, after official part of audience.
"Report than." said the king, rising his hand with signet ring.
Lord Antiliusz rose from his knee, camed few steps toward the king and kissed his signet. Only than he began his report. "Construction of Space Port has been finished since two months now. All systems are working as intended. Moreover our construction yards managed to produce small flotilla of mining ships. Those will remain in orbit for as long as it takes for our exploration ships to find suitable targets for resource extraction. We also succesfully managed to establish three research facilities in orbit around Crown. Finnaly, I took liberty Your Majesty to send construction ship toward gas gigant. That is only place in our planetary system where we are likely to obtain fuel for space ships. Construction Ship is able to perform resource scans as well as our explolers."
After those words King Gudan waved his hand in dissmisive gesture - everybody in Audience Hall well knew what that ment. Official part of ceremony was over. Everybody was to leave room. Everybody but few those whose presence was required by King. It took few minutes for everybody to leave, but in the end there were only five people left: Lord Antiliusz, King Gudan, Lady Recca, Prince Than and Sir Magnus. Prince Than was king's younger brother. As for Lady Recca and Sir Magnus - they both were one of closest and most trusted advisors of his majesty. What was interesting, from people who were left none had any ties to any of Great Noble Families (unless you count King and his brother of course).
"Allright. Now that we are done with ceremonial part... Let's hear real raport."
"Your Majesty... What I said was truth and..."
"But it wasn't all you wanted to tell, wasn't it? Don't get me wrong Lord Antiliusz. I know you didn't lied. And I know that our progress at development of space industry is going as planned. I choose you to oversee that exacly because I trust your abilities. There is a reason you are First Engineer and not somebody else. But I also realise that there is something important. Very important if you decided to come here to personally speak to me about it. So we are here. Waiting. What was it you wanted to inform me about?"
"Your Majesty, our first exploration ship managed to get to Sol 2 and performed scan of its surface. First thing we detected was huge deposit of steel and gold..."
Lady Recca, who looked so far as if was bored and unattentive suddenly rose to attention. "Gold? Are you sure of that? We knew that was possibility but so soon? You know what that means, right?" - that was rethorical question. Of course they all knew what it ment. It ment that within few months value of gold and other materials considered to be valuable will drop significantly. But before that will happen, some people will become incredibly rich thanks to exploitation of outter sources. Rich and powerfull... Powerfull eoungh to challange King's possition? Propably not... King was a king after all. But definietly powerfull eoungh to shake currently stable social hierarchy. And than there were Great Noble Families which would do anything to lay their hands on source of gold (or silver, or platinium). Everybody knew that Crown's mines went "dry" long time ago...
"That is not all. Please... This is nothing in comparison Lady... You see... We discovered something unnatural on Sol 2. A monolith. And it is ancient. Our estimations point at 20000 years old... We are still investigating data, but for now... That is all we know. If we want to learn more about it, we will have to setup permanent presence on that planet and we aren't ready for it yet Your Majesty."
"Is that all? Or is there something else that you would like to report?"
"That is all Your Majesty."
"Right... Who knows about it beside us and crew of exploration ship?"
"Nobody Your Majesty. I strictly forbidden spreading invormation about it to anybody untill you say otherwise."
"You have done well Lord Antiliusz. Sir Magnus?!"
"Yes my liege?" young man was silent up untill this moment. "What are your orders?"
"Make sure that our troops are ready. When mining ships full of gold will start comming back from Sol 2 everybody will learn what riches space is holding. No point keeping that knowledge out of public. We knew that it will happen sooner or later anyway. But so fast... Make sure that our troops are ready. If any of Great Noble Families will make a move and will try to lay its hand on not its transport, make sure that we are ready to stop them. No matter what. Order must be ensured. Expand army if you have too. I trust your judgment Magnus." Sir Magnus silently bowed before his king and with fast walk he left Audience Hall. King turned toward Than Bendu - his younger brother. Brother... You always were representing me and my will before Great Noble Families. Please, inform them about our discovery at Sol 2... Regarding it's natural resources that is. Try to make sure that none of them will do anything that would upset current status. It will be best if we will manage to avoid violence, but make sure that Kingome is ready to use force if needed. Can I count on you with this one?
"Of course brother. I will do what I can." Younger brother put his hand on King's shoulder and after few moments he departed.
"Heh... As for you two... I have only one task for both of you. Learn as much as you can from what you found on Sol 2, and make sure that nobody will learn about it before we know exacly what we found there. You should have plenty of time before miners will manage to get there. Do what you have to in order to keep it secret."
And so, real audience with king camed to an end...
Exploration and industralisation of Sol System was going smoothly. Sol 2 quickly became steady source of steel and gold on unimaginative scale - and that was work done just by private mining ships. Just as predicted, at first such uncontrolable influx of gold shaked old system and its social hierarchy. After few months gold started to loose value to the point that it stopped being considered as a symbol of nobility. With time social structure regained its stability, with only few minor diffrences. On possitive side, population of Crown seemed to be a lot happier when every commoner from middle and even poor class could afford some gold for themselfs - even if only for decorative purposes.
Too make matters even more interesting, in two years since discovery at Sol 2 there were over 8 reliable sources of gold within Sol System. As it turned out, many asteroids were an exellent sources, even if not as rich as Sol 2 was. As for ruins... Their origins remained a mystery. There is no clue who or what could raise them. But their message has been sucessfuly decoded. So what was it? A pair of coordinates. One set of coordinates is pointing at nerby star system. Another set was pointing at Sleb. To be precise, at one location on its surface. Once scientists learned everything they could, it was decided to let public know about this discovery. Not that there was any choice after all - sooner or later, no matter how much efford would be put into hiding them, somebody would learn. Not now - than in one or two years. Matter of time. But with secrecy out of the way, new options were aviliable for Kingdome. Eventually it has been decided that stable presence on Sol 2 was required in order to further increase resource mining operations, and so first planetary mining station has been set up.
Just as it was expected, Sol 3 - only gas gigant in Sol System was rich in calson and hydrogene. To be honest, those were only two resources that one could extract from it in significant amounts. It was quickly decided to establish mining operation there. As a matter of fact, decision to set up gas mining station at Sol 3 has been made long before Sol 2 was even explored. Unfortunatly distance separating Sol 3 and Crown was so big that construction ship needed almost whole year in order to just get there. In that time another construction ship was built and sent to establish constant presence at Sol 2. Never the less, slowly, but surely gas mining station was established at Sol 3... And something else has been found there.
During the flight, crew of construction ship discovered small object orbiting gas gigant. At first they believed it to be either a small moon or just an asteroid. But on closer inspection object's shape looked too regullar to be any of those. Decision has been made to investigate said object as soon as it was possible, and one of exploration ships has been quickly ordered to do so. Nobody wanted to wait untill construction ship will finnaly make to its destination. And even than first thing of order was to setup gas mining station. Taken all that into account, sending exploration ship was way faster solution, even if it had to travel from one side of Sol System to another. In addition Sol 3 has a volcanic moon - Sleb - that needs to be properly investigated.
What was discovered in orbit around Sol 3 was a fully armed and functional space warship. It's technology was more advanced than what currently mankind possesed, but not very much. After some consideration Lord Antiliusz Hassari made decision that it will be best to simply bring ship into space port and dismantle it. It took over half a year for warship to travel that distance and technological progress made thanks to that was limited at best.
Attachments
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After carefull scans of Sol 3 and inspecting warship orbiting it, exploration ship was directed toward Sleb. Its crew was given set of coordinates to check while in orbit. Currently we may say that Sleb was source of most precious discoveries in entire Sol System so far. First thing that crew noticed was another warship! This time however it was much bigger, but also heavily damaged - to the point that boarding it without specialised equipment proved to be impossible. And even if that would be possible than chances that anything on that ship was still in working condition... Well... Chances for that were extremly low. Best course of action would be to send one of construction ships with its equipment and crew to try and fix damaged ship as much as possible.
As for Sleb itself - it proved to be source of few valuable resources - most of which were not present anywhere else in Sol System. That alone made it one of prime targets for mining operation. As a matter of fact, when information of Sleb's natural resources camed to Crown, many private investors decided to sent their mining ships right there, despite vast distance that separated Crown and Sleb.
But all that was nothing, when compared with finnal discovery that Sleb had to offer. Carefull scanns of provided coordinations proved that some structure was hid under moon's surface. What was more interesting, was the fact that despite all sesmic activity going all around the globe, that place seemed to be stable since tens of thousands of years. Why? That is unknown and will stay unknown for a very, very long time. Anyway, it was quickly discovered that one of caves connect directly to underground structure and so expedition was sent. What they discovered was baisic knowledge that in theory could lead to development of Faster Than Light travel. Of course, such technology was still out of mankind reach, but with this knowledge it was possible to start working on it. It will take years to develop first FTL Engine, but it will happen some day.
(this is really stupid - at some posts I am allowed to add pictures, at others I am not because "you are not allowed to add links and pictures for 7 days since your 10th message". Come on! Where is consistency in that statement? Why some posts CAN have it and other CAN NOT? Either allow for all or disallow for all. Decide yourself! Stupid!)
Attachments
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Thanks USSAmerica It is really nice to hear it! At the moment I am at stage where I completly took care of my own Star System while waiting for FTL to be researched. So... That will be moment of silence story-wise for now. At least untill tommorow (mine tommorow, not necessarily your ).
Good story. Hope you keep at it. Makes for a great read on my lunch hour. And great to see there's still some life left in the thread.
Thanks Of course I will keep it going! I didn't started it just to abbandon for no apparent reason Also, once I will be allowed to post LINKS I will have something else to share with community... But that is future. Now is now. Speaking of which, time to write more!
Years have passed as The Baxter Kingdom consolidated its grasp over Sol System. Every planet by now has its mining base. Sol 2 become popular tourist attraction bringing regullar income for state. Lesser asteroids has been shared betwen Great Noble Houses - a way of compromise betwen nobility and royality. While King and his court hold power over all major source of resources, nobility was free to use minor sources as they saw fit. And while at first it seemed that nobility was put into big disadvantage by such agreement, in reality even minor sources allowed for virtually infinite income. System was so simple! Commoners were doing hard work of mining - be it by ships or by working in mining stations - and ruling classes were taking large percentage of income for allowing mere commoners to exploit their "land". And yes, while before space exploration gold was hold as symbol of power, richness and authority, now possesion of land took that role. And so, every - even smallest - asteroid in Sol System has been claimed by one or another noble family.
It was simple and solid system. Very stable - even if it was not uncommon for miners to perform an act of "pirate mining". Despite how it all sounds, this system brought a lot of improvement into lifes of lower classes. Influx of materials ment more aviliable work for better payment. It also ment more goods on market that were affordable - even luxurious ones that in past were aviliable only to upper classes, and even than not for everybody - only for richest. New cities has been found. Old cities were build taller and taller - after all resources weren't a problem anymore. At lest, they were less of a problem than aviliable space. Finnaly, for the first time in known history some of commoners became actually richer than some members of nobility. Before space exploration, such situation was unthinkable. Now it was slowly becoming acceptable reality, and every statistical analysys was comfirming that it wasn't just one-time occurance. It was a trend. Of course, it didn't mattered much for royality or any of Great Noble Families - their possition was and would remain unaffected. But smaller noblility could feel in danger. How this problem will be addressed? Future will tell. For now, Crown was flourishing and Kingdome became stronger than it ever was.
And than... Everything has changed once more. After over a decade of hard work, Lord Antiliusz Hassari and his team were succesfull in creation of very first FTL Engine. It was large, bulky, expensive and inefficient as hell! But even with all that, it was fastest way of travel aviliable for mankind. It was also only way to reach neighbooring star systems. And finnaly, even with its inefficiency it was still way cheaper way of travel than usage of conventional Ion Thrusters. What happened next, was true revolution. Every ship that was in use was redesigned so that it would feature FTL Engine. Travels that took months or even years before, now took only days. Transport of resources suddenly became more fluid, less time-consuming and way less risky. Kingdom retroffited its two exploration ships, that were sitting aimlessly in orbit around Crown for years. Now, with FTL Engines, they were recrewed and refueled - a new purpose was put into their existence...
Royal Palace
Some things change... Other stay the same. It was true for everything, including Rolyal Palace - some things changed, other things stayed the same. But to make things even more interesting, sometimes the more things change, the more they stay the same. Audience Hall was filled with crowd - as always, every noble family had its representative, every major press send its representative as well as royal court being present. Despite numerous changes, ceremonial parts stayed the same. King Gudan Bendu XI sitting on his throne with half bored, half dismissive expression. Red carpet prepeared for those who asked for honor of audience... But still, sometthin has changed - golden statues were gone. In their place were put paintings representing landscapes of diffrent world that were now under royal controll, holograms displaying more interesting landscapes from another worlds and even actual rocks that were taken from those planets and brought back here - intact. Those were most beautifull actually. It is not to say that gold dissapeared completly from royal palace - it was still very present. It just... Stopped playing major role. Now it was more of a background, side decoration... Just like nicely done and well polished building material before. It was, it looked pretty, but other than that it was of no real value.
"Sir Erhard Kümmel and Lady Colette Beauchamp, two captains of exploration ships are seeking an audience with Your Majesty. Will it be granted?" asked laudly one of pages standing next to a doors. Yes, definietly... Some things NEVER change, even if everything else changed.
As always before, King Gudan waved slowly his hand in inviting gesture.
"Your audience has been granted to you. You are now allowed to stand before King." and as tradition required, both captains stood up and slowly approatched their king, kneeling right before him.
"Who are you and why are you here?" asked monarch, barely looking at them.
"I am Lady Colette Beauchamp your majesty. A captain of exploration ship. This is my younger collegue - Sir Erhard Kümmel. He is also captain of exploration ship. We camed before you, Your Majesty to ask for your approval of our mission. We are to take our crew and our ships and leave Sol System. We are to venture into unknown, where no human was before."
King stood up, camed close to his two subjects and put his hands on their hands in patronising gesture. "I approve and bless your mission. May you both return without harm. While you are there, remember that you are my representatives, and by extend - representative of our noble Kingdome as well as whole human race. May honour guide your heart as courage fills your soul. Be pround, families whose sons and daughters serve Kingdome as those two are. For my favour will shine upon you." After this little speech, King took back his place at the throne, let both pilots stand up and kiss his signet ring. After that they were allowed to depart, and so an audience was over.
Two days later, both pilots left Sol System and become first human being that ventured toward distant stars. Four days after their departure, their families were given ownership of every moon and asteroid to be found in those systems. It was a clear message for all noble houses in the Kingdome - serve me well, and I will return a favour by granting you welth and possition.
Attachments
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"No." his words were laud and strict. "No." he repeated raising his finger, as to underline his objection. "Agreeing on that would leave my possition weakened. But what is more important, it could lead to in-fighting betwen noble families, and that is one thing Kingdom won't risk."
"But... I thought that was exacly what you hoped to achieve Your Majesty. Giving full rights to two small noble families whose members happened to be captains of exploration ships sent into..." Lady Recca started talking, but than seeing Gudan's expression she stopped. She knew her liege well eoungh to recognise that look. She missed something, small detail.
"No. Not to that extend. Yes, I want them to rival each other. But not to fight. Not this way at least. Giving noble families right to field armed fleets would lead to dissaster. Even if they all just claim that it is needed to protect their property in space and to fight mining piracy, I can not agree on that. They can arm their mining bases if they so desire. They can controll traffic at docks and limit illegal ore smuggling. But that is all I can allow them. Nothing more." he slowly moved toward his chair and sat down. He wasn't young boy anymore. Even with all advancments in medicine... He was aging. King or not king - time was claiming everybody eventually. "I don't mind if they will start killing each-other in their rivality. But I won't give them anything that could damage the Kingdome. If they want to fight their petty wars without dragging anybody else into it - that is all fine by me." moment of silence... "Yhh... Don't tell them that I said this of course. That would encouraged them too much."
"Yes Your Majesty... Nevertheless, there is still a problem we are facing if we refuse to let noble families to field their own fleets. It is not a problem we can just ignore and hope it will solve itself at some point. If not they, than it is us whose burden is to provide military security for the Kingdome." quickly pointed out Sir Magnus, and seeing that he has king's full attention, he continued "Your Highness. We must field our own Royal Fleet. We must make military presence at space. Maintaining fleet that is able to guard everything is of course impossible for us. But we don't have too... All that we need is to show everybody that Kingdom is capable of fielding the fleet and make them believe that we can guard everything - even if we can't. Of course... Even such fleet will cost a fortune bo build and than maintain..."
Again silence. One could even hear fly trying to escape room through closed window on another end of room.
"Kingdom is rich Sir Magnus. If what you are saying - and I have no reason to doupt it - will calm down nobility and show our strengh than those will be money well invested. Contact Lord Antiliusz. He and his team should be able to desighn proper space warships. I would not be surprised if he made such plans few months ago... There is reason he is First Engineer after all. As for fleet composition and amount of ships needed... I will leave this up to you. Just keep in mind that our funding, while great is not infinite. But this puts us into another problem I have to deal with." he looks at Sir Magnus and than at lady Recca as if checking ther attention "Great Noble Families will not be happy about my refusal. They will get angry about it, and while they may be not in possition to cause any harm for now, they will do so in first occasion."
"They would not dare your highness!" Sir Magnus tried to protest, as if not believing his own ears.
"Yes, they would Magnus. They are like dog. Hungry dog can bite his master. You must throw him a bone every now and than. Question remines, what bone shall I give them this time?"
"A command Your Majesty..." started Lady Recca with clever smile on her face "Royal Fleet... Its ships... They will need a captains, admirals, generals! Somebody who will command those commoners who will be crewing them. Somebody who will claim all the glory for fleets achievments... Or humiliation for their lack. If I may advice you Your Majesty... Just make sure that whoever is allowed position of ship captain, admiral or general... Make sure he is young and has family - children would be best of course. In case of any disobidience that would let you to suspect they may turn against Kingdom and use their leadership against you or any of your loyal servants our forces could easily..."
King Gudan rouse his hand to stop her talking "That is eoungh Lady Recca. Go please to my brother and arrange everything with him. Make sure that he will present it to nobility in most atractive way. And with that I consider our meeting to be finished. You two are dissmissed."
Lady Recca and Sir Magnus bowed gently, turned back and walked away...
This is the moment where I have an offer to all that are reading. If you want to, you can create a character - give him name and surname, as well as some information for me what kind of person he/she is, though that is optional - I can always make it up. If you do that, you may see character you created to show up every now and than in story. I will pick a character in game and rename him so he can represent your character. If he dies - he dies. There will be short story about it and he stays dead - though you can make another from same family. Your characters will all start as ship captains on automated ships. If they will do something that will catch my attention they may be rewarded with custom-made ship (designed by YOU but with some limitations given by me). If they will shine more with something they will get promoted to fleet admiral - and their Flagship will be again custom-made, this time with only limitations being in-game limitation. Of course, if you don't enjoy such things, no problem! Just enjoy reading and that is it.
Sounds like fun! Young Lord Baltimore, from the Maryland minor noble family, grew up sailing the waters of Kingdom on Crown. He sees serving in the Royal Space Fleet as a logical progression from the sea to the galaxy. He is a careful planner and loyal to the King, so he will serve the King well but not take extreme risks without lots of research and analysis. His two young boys and wife at home are the best reason to not die in glorious battle for the King unless it is a worthwhile death. [8D]
Sounds like fun! Young Lord Baltimore, from the Maryland minor noble family, grew up sailing the waters of Kingdom on Crown. He sees serving in the Royal Space Fleet as a logical progression from the sea to the galaxy. He is a careful planner and loyal to the King, so he will serve the King well but not take extreme risks without lots of research and analysis. His two young boys and wife at home are the best reason to not die in glorious battle for the King unless it is a worthwhile death. [8D]
Allright! Your character will be added in my nerby session than! Just to make sure we do understand each-other. That character will work on full auto ship. I will have very little influence whether he will take risks or not. Though every now and then I can give him some specific tasks (like escorting Colony Ship etc) to give chances for "level up" - and those tasks will be of lower risk. I will have to come up with some system that will manage that... Oh well! Nothing better than dices! Works every single time
Day one.
FTL Engine is working without problems. Our engineer notified me that it will take around fifteen days for it to fully charge and perform "jump". Within this time, if anything will go wrong or mission will be aborted we can saefly just turn it off. Crew is excited. Morale is high. I have ordered to fly away from Crowns gravitational well during those fifteen days. Lucas (ship's main engineer) assured me that such things do not matter with FTL Engine. According to what he says even black hole doesn't have eoungh strenght to stop it from working, but I believe that everybody will feel better that way. Beside, crew needs task to concentrate on - I can't just let them sit and wait and do nothing.
Day eight.
FTL Engine is now half charged. So far there were no noticable malfunctions. Our little ship managed to leave Crown's gravity well without an incidents. Crew starts to get bored. Tommorow will start series of exercises just to keep them focused and away from harms way. What worries me is Lucas. He behaved strange today. I know there is something he doesn't tell me, but knowing him there is good reason for that. We still have about a week, so I can afford to just wait a bit longer and observe.
Day ten.
Everybody is getting nervous as jump time is comming. Only about five days is left. At least according to what Lucas is saying. Speaking of him, we had to day longer conversation. He noticed some strange things happening near FTL Engine. Nothing dangerous - he assures me. And definietly nothing serious eoungh to shut it down. He described it as "humming for the past". I have no idea what to think of it, but decided to declare engineering section completly offlimits for anybody but engineering staf. Lucas prommised me that he will shut this thing down at first glimpse of trouble. For now we proceed as plannet. I sent proper raport to His Lordship First Engineer. Waiting for reply.
Day eleven.
Reply from First Engineer has camed today. Apparently Sir Erhard Kümmel reported simmilar anomalies. However First Engineer assured us that there is nothing to be worried, he didn't thought it will be noticable for crew but was well aware of this occurance. I can't say it calmed me much, but I have to admit that everything what His Lordship build so far, worked perfectly.
Day fourteen.
Sir Erhard Kümmel's ship performed succesfull jump today. At one moment his ship was there - in orbit of Crown and at another he just dissapeared. Observators from Space Port claim that there was a small flash of light at moment of jump. Somehow I am now more calmer. I shared news with crew in hopes that it will calm them as well. Lucas is very excited. Today I have scheduled finnal exercise for crew. Tommorow morning (ship time) we will perform jump.
Day eighteen.
Yesterday jump proceeded without any incident. We are now flying toward nerby star system. Should reach location within twenty days. All systems work perfectly. Engineering team reported that moment we performed jump, "humming for past" cased to exist. Apparently it only manifest itself during charging period. There is nothing else for us than to wait untill we get to our destination. Tommorow I will declare day off for all of crew, apart those whose work is absolutly essential. They will get their day off after tommorow.
Day thirty eight.
FTL travel went without any problems. Transition from hyperspace to normal space was smooth, though some crew members reported feeling sick for few seconds after exiting jump. Doctor Laura assured me that there is no threat for their health. Also, she pointed out that everybody affected comfirmed to have car sickness. After making sure that we are alone in star system I declared this day to be free of work for all, but most essential crew members. It is good occasion to celebrate. We are after all first humans in history of mankind that travelled into another star!
Day fifty seven.
We just detected FTL Signature! There is no way it comes from Kingdome! Our scanners show object of strange, irregular shape showing up at another side of system! And it is moving just like... Like us. From planet to planet. I already disscused situation with my officers and informed crew. We all agreed that this is worth sacraficing one of our message capsules. I am sending note to the Crown. We are not alone!
Conference Room at Space Port
It was large room, able to accomodate up to two hundreds people. But right at this moment, there were only few - The King, First Engineer, Lady Recca, Sir Magnus and few representatives from Great Noble Families. Lord Antiliusz stood in middle, rest took their places. No one dared to interrupt First Engineer.
Three hours ago our sensors detected Message Capsule entering Sol System. You are familiar with it, aren't you? No? Allright. Quick explanation. Every ship equiped with FTL Engine is also equiped with three Message Capsules, that are also capable of FTL travel. They are actually way faster than our ships due to their low energy requirements and... Never mind. Point is - standard transmisions would take years to come as they travel at slow speed of light... Hehehe... Slow speed of light. It sounds funny, doesn't it? Anyway, message capsules allow us for faster than light communication in limited manner. But because every ship is equipped with just three such capsules, only most important messages can be sent. My Liege... Message we recieved from Lady Colette Beauchamp is propably one of most important messages we can ever get. Apparently, to what she believes, we are not alone. We don't know any details at this moment, but we may be sure of one thing - while her ship was performing standard scanning of one of inner planets, sensors detected another ship exiting hyperspace. There can be no mistake about what it means...
Indeed, there was no mistake what it ment. It only ment that fleet must be expanded quickly. Ships needed officers and captains. As it was now, right of leadership must be expanded toward lesser noble families. After all, there is no telling what this newly discovered race can plan...
Atmosphere in Audience Hall was tense. You could feel it. It was still hours before Teekan Ambassador will arive, but everybody was there, ready, waiting. Guards were doubled - nobody wanted ANYTHING to distrup this moment. And it was indeed historical moment! For the first time in history Baxter Kingdom was to recieve a guest from another civilisation. There was no ceremony planned for such an event, so whatever happened it would be improvised to some degree. King was sitting on his throne, with Lady Recca and Sir Magnus standing just next to him, whispering, talking, giving advices and making sure that nothing will go unchecked.
"So, to sum it all up, their society seems to be build around trading traditions. They form guilds that function simmilary to our nobility. At lest to some extend... Ah... How they are called again?" asked Lady Recca.
"Mercantile Guilds. They form Mercantile Guilds. And ten richest are effectively ruling their society. Unlike our nobility though, they believe that value of person doesn't come out of his birth, but rather from economical worth." explained Sir Magnus "Which is dangerous idea your majesty! Some of our commoners lately has become richer than minor noble families. Under Teekan administration they would become new nobility - if I can call it that way, while poorer noble families would become commoners. I don't need to explain why Teekans may not be too welcomed by most of us." as Sir Magnus was talking, King Gudan was noding his head slowly in understandment. He too was not glad that such ideas existed in civilisation that seemed to be neighbooring Kingdom directly. But for now, he must greet their ambassador and make sure that he is well recieved. Protecting kingdome from poisonous ideologies will have to wait for later.
"What do we know about their physical apperance? Small, furry... Bit like rats? Is that how they were described?"
"Yes your majesty. But their custom forbids them showing without full clothes. So do not expect to see their skin... Or fur... Or whatever it is. Also, do not try to make them kiss your signet ring. That would be highly unproper. And seeing how their fleet size is ten times bigger than our, we do not want to offend them. When their ambassador will come, he will not kneel before you. Insted he will bow deeply - a custom not present in their society, but they agreed to perform it for the sake of celebration and as a token of good will. Kneeling was out of option because their legs are not...
"I understand Recca. They can't. And that is it. He will bow before me. Than it will be my turn to come close and extend my hand toward him. If I remember it correctly he will snif my hand before speaking. Right?"
"Yes your majesty. After ambassador's speech, we will exchange gifts. I made sure that our gift is way richer than they gift will be. After all it is to be expected from the king. And after that we will officially exchange our maps and sighn Free Trade Agreement. That last thing sounds really good actually. Maybe we will manage to get something valuable. And if not, let's hope they will prove to be good buyers."
"Right. Thank you Reeca. So... Again... Here is my royal seal... Document of Free Trade Agreement will be carried by one of ambassador's helper... Over here... And as soon as...
...
Ceremony went as planned. Both civilisations acknowledged their existence and independence. Tready of Free Trade has been sighned and maps were exchanged. Teekans were allowed to establish an embassy on Crown. Mankind was allowed to send an ambassador - Than Bendu, who was king's brother - on Roorea Minor. Despite all those gestures of good will and mutual cooperation and respect, Teekans were not allowed to enter and live with humans. It was deemed to be too dangerous for Monarchy to let it happen. After all, their philosophies were totally diffrent and it was unknown if they could adapt without spreading their own ideology. Maybe in time... But not for now. It was made sure that commoners will have as little interactions with Teekan citizens as possible. Two days after ceremony, Kingdome established contact with another alien civilisation... And than another and another. Unlike Teekans though, those contacts were not so friendly. They seemed to behave in same way that in old times pirates were...
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Pirates - as they were called - have prooved to be dangerous and mercilles civilisations. Not only they possesed better shields, stronger weapons and harder armor. They also possesed faster way of travel than Kingdom or Teekan Mercantile Guilds. At first it didn't looked like much of a problem - Royal Space Fleet managed to get hold of it's space assets and mining stations were more than capable of repelling sporadic attacks. However as mankind's reach grew larger it took longer and longer for fleets to reach places where they were needed. As if that was not eoungh, pirate raids became more and more organized. Insted of attacking just one target at a time, they started to attack two or three distant targets. In that situation there was no way for Royal Space Fleet to answer every call for help. What was even worse - every time mining station managed to repell attacker, he just retreated into dead space and took advantage of its superior shield regeneration. Then he returned with fully regenerated shields, while those of mining station were still not fully renegerated. Eventually Kingdom started loosing its stations - and while they were easy to replace cost and material wise, time that was required to rebuild them was problematic.
To counter this new threat two things has been made. First of all, amount of shielding and missile launchers installed on mining stations has been drastically increased. Secondary - First Engineer Antiliusz Hassari begun his work on new, way faster and more efficient FTL Engine. Unfortunatly, it was way more complicated than one would have thought.
Given the situation, King Gudan Bendu XI made a decision to pay off strongest pirate clan. Royal treasury would suffer great time, as price was big. But whether he liked it or not, Kingdom didn't have resources to continue this fight. Waiting for better moment would hopefully proved to be wiser plan. And insted of fighting, he drew his attention to expansion and exploration, which proved to be right decision as two planets very simmilar to Crown has been found within aera of space that was climed by Kingdom. Colonisation ships were quickly desighned, built and sent. 60 milions of humans set out in cold sleep, waiting for their Arks to reach destination.
As time went, pirates raids continued. But without their strongest clan taking part, they were easy to defend against. However pirates brought not only death and destruction. As surprising as it may be, they also provided - for a right price of course - means of communication with another civilisations spread around galaxy. And while Teekans were mankinds closest neighboor, they were no longer that unique. Another thing that pirates made possible with their fast ships was huge influx of alien tourists. And while mere commoner had little to none chance of meeting any of them, many nobles were more and more exposed on alien influence... And vice-versa. Many of rich and influential alien beings were exposed on Kingdom's influence.
As Crown grew economically stronger, Royal Space Navy was finnaly expanded...
Write if interested. Than I will post all settings I will play as etc. 
It is really nice to hear it! At the moment I am at stage where I completly took care of my own Star System while waiting for FTL to be researched. So... That will be moment of silence story-wise for now. At least untill tommorow (mine tommorow, not necessarily your 