[Interest Check] Stars without Numbers- a space oprea

[Mysticsage]

First off we need a better name XD

Second off this is the interest thread for an RP in space using the SWN system where i'll be posting stuff about the setting and answering questions for now till I get everything set up.

This game is going to be extremely limited on players for a few reasons. One being I'm busy with school and don't want to be overwhelmed. The second being I'm gonna try a new gm style which requires me giving more control of the story to the players and a smaller group makes that easier to try. Third I don't want this to die the larger rp's have a tendency to stagnate due to over commitment. So I'm going to try my best to keep up the pacing but i'm gonna be pushing you guys a bit as well.

As such here are some ground rules for this game.

[spoiler]

There can be multiple gaming groups in the same sectors

Due to the GM turn Gm's cannot be players under any cirumstance

All Gm's are responsible for maintaining the faction turn.

Each Gm mustt have thier owen personal gaming group (size does not matter from person to person)

Players may not switch groups without a story reason

[/spoiler]


Since i'm the only GM at the moment i'm limiting my group to

4-5 people

4 people have already expressed an interest so if you want the last spot act fast.


Setting stuff- more will be added in later posts

Key info so far: All parties will buy and maintain a ship of gm's choosing (lemon)

All players will be human (my game rule)

Setting
[spoiler]The year is 3200. Humanity is scattered like dust among the stars. The broken relics of a former day litter the sky and men and women struggle to rebuild the glory of humanity?s lost golden age.

For almost a thousand years humanity had expanded from its ancient cradle to fill the sky with its worlds. At first the expansion came by way of the enigmatic ?spike drives? that granted humans the ability to skip between stars. Countless nations, faiths, and ideologies sent colonists to the darkness above to find new homes where they could live free from the oppressive rule of Terra?s calcified masters.

The spike drive touched on different worlds. It folded the tissue of space and time and pierced it to emerge at distant stars, but the space between touched in turn those who traveled it. Over the course of generations, this subtle influence shaped certain descendants of the starfarers. The condition that resulted was known as ?Metadimensional Extroversion Syndrome?. Most simply knew its victims as ?MESses?. Later, they were known as psychics.

MES inevitably killed or maddened its carriers when they began to use their powers. The surge of extradimensional energy either cooked their brains or burnt a pathway through their sanity. It was only through decades of research and the expenditure of countless lives that techniques were developed for harnessing this power safely.
The channeling of psionic energy began the second great expansion of humankind. Even though hardly more than one in ten thousand humans were touched by MES, it was still enough to reshape human civilization. Vast choirs of psychics were employed to develop new technology, advanced manufacturing capabilities, and huge jump gates that could teleport whole freighters across interstellar distances. Spike drives were relegated to the frontier, to the distant star systems that could not yet afford to train the psychics or buy the components necessary to build their own jump gates.

This reliance planted the seed of the golden age?s destruction. In 2665, a metadimensional pulse of unimaginable violence erupted
from the Veil Nebula, washing over the whole of known space in seconds. Every psychic in human space was instantly killed or maddened by the surge, burnt out in what later became known as the Scream.

With the jump gates inoperable and all the psychic mentors insane or dead, the core worlds were suddenly cut off from the frontier. A few spike drive ships remaining in the core were able to make their way out, bringing tales of horror, starvation, and frantic warfare over shipyards and orbital factories. Most of the core worlds are thought to have perished, cut off from the worlds that supplied their enormous populations and fueled their vital technologies.

The centuries that followed were known as the Silence, as unnumbered human worlds fought to survive their sudden isolation. Some slid into barbarism or worse, their planets unable to support a starfaring civilization. Some worlds lacked metals, or fossil fuels, or any one of countless other vital ingredients for maintaining their industry. And all, of course, lacked the psionic mentors necessary to train a new generation of psychics.
Over the past six hundred years, humanity has slowly, painfully begun to heal the wounds of the Scream. Not all worlds were incapable of independent survival, and these hardy planets have become the linchpins of stellar nations and miniature empires. Trade routes have revived with time and the building of new spike drives. Expeditions are regularly mounted to the tomb worlds of the outer core to scavenge what can be reclaimed from the bones of the dead past.

Yet a pall hangs over these efforts. Great sacrifice has revived some of the old secrets of psychic training, but no world dares rely on psionic forces any longer. The nature of the Scream is still a mystery. For now, humanity strives to build a world that does not rely upon powers it cannot fully understand or completely control.

Human space is a vast canvas of mystery to most. Ancient nav charts are long out of date. Alien races have since moved into many formerly human-held sectors, and there remain ruins of races that long predate mankind. Warlords and petty tyrants scheme to expand their stellar domains, and brave souls struggle to recover lost secrets.
Stars without number await you.[/spoiler]




Further info can be found on the free edition pdf for SWN at rpg drive thru.


Only start thinking about basic character concepts and general backgrounds.

i will be activily working with your backgrounds and stories as we play thru the game. (no worries you will have almost complete control)

Be prepared for a lot of open ended and freeform questions throught play and on your chsaracter thread.

I will be going into more detail later



Things that need to be done:

I need to establish at least the sector before we can get things roiling and the intital character creation stage can be finished.

If you have any questions please ask them below

[Throndir]

[Mysticsage]

This is the sector of space that the entire game will play in. feel free to click on any planet or system for more info on that planet or system. Be aware that I'll be adding my own cultural notes and info before the game starts in a separate thread so that you can choose your home worlds.