[Signups] Master of the Galaxy IV-2: Return to the Unknown

[Scrapknight]

First of all, I'm absolutely thrilled about the amount of interest in the game. I really hope I will be able to provide an experience worthy of the enthusiasm. I want as many people as possible to be able to participate in the game, but I also need to be realistic about the amount of orders I will be able to handle and still provide a quality experience. One of the main reasons my last game, The New Order, ended before its time is because it ballooned from eighteen participants (already a large number) to a staggering twenty-eight, all with orders and complex stat sheets. I want to do right by this one, as I want to carry on its legacy right. So, here's what I'm going to do.

In addition to characters, there will also be IC nations, like in other nation games you may know and love. Generally two systems or smaller, they won't have orders and generally won't be the focus of updates, but the IC you produce will be taken into account, and you may even receive orders on special occasions if you become the focus of attention. I will not, however, look kindly on players exploiting this to cause chaos, as I will be wielding my canon-hammer much more vigorously against IC states for the very reason that I don't have direct control over their orders. Be cognizant of your position, and you may reap the rewards.

I'm also happy to announce the following:

Jeeshadow, Fingon888, Plank of Wood, Gorganslayer, Galren, Terraferma, and Aedan777 are welcomed back as their respective nations.

On the same principle, iisbroke and baboushreturns are welcomed as the Knights of Progress and the Pure State, respectively, both IC nations. However, due to some canon changes between games, I'd like to speak to them before they post their profiles.

For the rest of you, I will keep signups open until the 14th. I also highly suggest that, if you so desire, add some choices of IC nations you may wish to play. Current NPCs that could become IC nations are:

Solesian Oligarchy
Diclonus Dominion
Sorian Union
Terran Free State
Zelsar Republic
Black Khanate
Grey Khanate
Purple Khanate
Any of the Ukrask governments (PGCMU Bureaucracy / Alba / Transamuria / United Free Ports)
Any of the Ahbrazz governments (Moderate Faction / Ahbrazzan National Congress / Ahbrazzan True Democratic Movement)

I am open to modifying some of the less important of these to more resemble your initial polity idea, within reason; please contact me. Those of these that people are interested in will receive profiles.

Baekdu is also still open.

Finally, if none of that appeals, you have a few other options:

- Characters are also a thing.
- Players' polity ideas may appear as civilizations that are nearly or just beginning the spacefaring era on new planets other powers attempt to colonize. They may play as them once discovered if they so wish. There are no guarantees of this, but it might happen.
- There is a very slight chance I will add one more slot to the Novus Galaxy. (But don't bet on it.)

Cheers,
Scrap

EDIT: To be clear, players selected for the open slots (Post-Skaven, Hermit Kingdom, Novus A/B/C) will have orders. This is only for those who are ultimately not selected.

 

[iisbroke]

On the same principle, iisbroke and baboushreturns are welcomed as the Knights of Progress and the Pure State, respectively, both IC nations. However, due to some canon changes between games, I'd like to speak to them before they post their profiles.

((I sent you a conversation on the forum because IRC isn't working for me at the moment. Also of course I'm excited for this game, Masters of the Galaxy is always fun.))

 

[DeMarchese]

Are there any spots still available to join as Great or Secondary Power?

 

[Scrapknight]

Are there any spots still available to join as Great or Secondary Power?

You can still apply for a new slot or for Baekdu. I'm going to consider all applicants and make my decision on the 14th, so feel free to.

 

[Corman50]

I'd like to claim Baekdu

 

[Scrapknight]

Barring international incident, I'd like to welcome alexander23 as the Zelsar Republic.

Carry on as you were. Signups end 9/14.

 

[DeMarchese]

You can still apply for a new slot or for Baekdu. I'm going to consider all applicants and make my decision on the 14th, so feel free to.

Well then, thank you for the offer.
I would like to apply for Baekdu, although I am aware that our friend @Corman50 has already claimed it first. Consider me as a secondary claim if such thing is possible.

I am also aware that Baekdu is the most powerful state, so I will try to be careful to not kill the fun to other players.

 

[iisbroke]

Well then, thank you for the offer.
I would like to apply for Baekdu, although I am aware that our friend @Corman50 has already claimed it first. Consider me as a secondary claim if such thing is possible.

I am also aware that Baekdu is the most powerful state, so I will try to be careful to not kill the fun to other players.

Worse case scenario one of you can play as one of the two, there are three but Mikkel Glahdr claimed one, [Turan/Resedaria/Itsonkuez]: [Hermit Kingdom]. Or, the one who doesn't get to run Baekdu can be an IC character whose in charge of one of the Novus Galaxy colonies or something.

*the above are just suggestions by a fellow player

 

[Scrapknight]

It's not first come, first serve; I'll consider them out of everyone once we reach the 14th. Thanks for your applications, both of you.

 

[Korona]

Haven't been able to catch you on irc, but is it ok if I IC as the PGC itself. I was thinking I'd IC as the organization similar as to how people did it in the previous game, and I'd also be in charge of the mandate. Up to you however, but genrerally playing as the pgc is my choice.

 

[baboushreturns]

The Most Illustrious and Non-Degenerate Pure State of Xaxthyx and Xan’thi

Short Form: Pure State

Capital: Temple of Utter Harmony, Xaxthyx, Ilthinia System (Purity System)

Government: Totalitarian single-party dictatorship
Leader: Chief of the Non-Degenerate Peoples Elkiv ik’Vator

Politics:

• Major “Parties”:
  • JSN, Crusader Faction (Fanatical Purifier)
    • While discipline in Jhabrat sur-Nara is fierce, it contains two main strains of thought within it. Both believe that humans are a “degenerate” species, identified with the chief opponent of the traditional god of the Xaxthyxian species, and must, without exception, be exterminated. This also goes for “collaborator species”, species with human-like societies or that otherwise interact with human polities as anything but dogged adversaries. This means that JSN essentially believes that all non-native Xaxthyxian life in the galaxy deserves to die, as well as some disliked native Xaxthyxians besides. All but the most radical JSN acolytes do believe that other non-human polities could survive if they adopted JSN ideology, but most believe that war must first be waged against them to make them “see the light.” The main differences between the two factions are obscure differences in doctrine and foreign policy. The Crusader faction believes in trying to actively purge the galaxy of humans and collaborator species to the exclusion of any other concern, including its own survival.
  • JSN, Constructor Faction (Ultranationalist)
    • While no less dedicated to exterminating humanity and collaborator species in principle, a sub-faction of JSN believes that, rather than actively trying to immediately purge the galaxy, the Pure State should consolidate its position in Ilthinia first. This means prioritizing the defeat of the Home Army over further crusades abroad and seeking, if not international recognition, then at least semi-normal relations with cooperative non-human polities.
• Minor “Parties”:

• Ilthinian Home Army (Paternal Autocrat)
  • The various Xaxthyxian elements of the Trade Coalition that opposed JSN, whatever the reason, eventually united in the face of the unrelenting onslaught to battle the Pure State. They are chronically undersupplied, as JSN controls the resource-rich tropical band and the Home Army must survive in the frozen north. While most of their ideological components have long since faded away, fighting solely for liberation from JSN, distinctions boil under the surface; anarcho-capitalists, pro-Sorian meritocrats, anti-Sorian meritocrats, pro-Sorian monarchists, anti-Sorian monarchists, republicans, Coalition restorationists, and so on fight shoulder to shoulder. General Uathi Culther, a native Xaxthyxian, is Supreme Commander of the Home Army, a position he received largely to show that JSN oppression does not only affect humans.

History:


The planet Xaxthyx in the Ilthinia system is a mostly icebound world, with thin green belts of vegetation around the tropics and massive, unconquerable glaciers in much of the northern hemisphere. It is also remarkable for being home to thirteen different sentient species, all relatively closely related but not interfertile. Some xenobiologists propose that Xaxthyx was actually seeded with these species by an ancient spacefaring empire, but this is fanciful speculation at best; the scientific consensus is that these species diverged from a common ancestor hundreds of thousands of years ago. Native Xaxthyxians developed complex, feudal-like societies based on commerce across the seas in the tropical regions, often headed by particularly prosperous naval captains. These relatively backwards mercantile societies were contacted by the ships of the Xan’thi Trade Coalition about one thousand years ago, and were for the most part easily accepted into the Coalition.


The relationship between the Coalition and the native Xaxthyxians was not always so harmonious, however. While the Coalition had several non-human species of its own in the system of Soria, which was blessed with three life-bearing planets, several exploitative corporate entities with membership status in the Coalition subjected several native Xaxthyxian species to indentured servitude. This was against Trade Coalition policy, and indeed the Coalition vigorously reprimanded offenders; however, Xaxthyx’s lack of inhabitable land and scarce labor motivated many corporate entities to keep trying. Eventually, radical ideologies demanding an expulsion of the Trade Coalition began to spread, and as each failed to deliver, they became more and more radical. Eventually, the sur-Nara movement, which demanded the total destruction of all Xan’thian species, especially humans, gained wide acceptance amongst the Xaxthyxian underground.


By the time of the Coalition Wars, the leading party of the sur-Nara ideology, Jhabrat sur-Nara, had obtained arms, defectors in the Xaxthyxian parts of the Trade Coalition military, and popular support, and began a general uprising against the Coalition. What they lacked in resources and strategy they made up for in fervor, especially as the human-dominated Duchy of Soria gained momentum on Xan’thi. Soon, even as human and native Xan’thians on Xaxthyx put aside their differences and united against JSN, it was too late. JSN conquered almost the entirety of the tropical belt, pushing the resistance groups into the mountains, and established a shaky but brutal dictatorship over the lands they controlled, creating the modern Pure State.


Despite its name, the Pure State does not control any land in Xan’thi and barely controls Xaxthyx, facing unrest and uprisings from ex-Trade Coalition militias. They have no true navy to speak of, only a few assault ships predating the elerium era with only a doubtful ability to crack modern planetary shields. Their main strength comes from conducting terrorist attacks, primarily against Soria but also against Albion and other nearby human powers. JSN is not considered a serious threat outside of the northwestern Harthus Galaxy, but most powers with a human population have at least been targeted by a JSN attack, even though many have been unsuccessful. Crucially, the Pure State has control of several Trade Coalition-era nuclear defense platforms, which are armed and pointed at all major Sorian cities as well as its own. This threat has kept Soria, at a minimum, cautious, and talks about what to do about the Pure State have been circulating the PGC for over a decade. In practice, most nations’ counterintelligence departments and coast guards do much of the work in preventing JSN terrorist attacks.


Domestically, the Pure State is in theory a single-party dictatorship. The civilian authority, the Chief of the Non-Degenerate Peoples, and the military authority, commander of the Great Purity Army, are united in the same person, who is the absolute dictator of the entire state apparatus. In practice, the Pure State is constantly at war across its own territory, and its power flows from the barrel of a plasma rifle. The true power in the Pure State are the individual warlords and death squad leaders that keep Xaxthyx firmly under their grip. JSN death squads patrol the tropical bands in semi-armored hovercrafts, killing humans on sight as well as the four native species that sided with one faction or another in the Trade Coalition instead of the uprising. The icebound northern areas are mostly left unmolested except for occasional “crusades” against any resistance movement that stays in one place for too long.

List of Jhabrat sur-Narah Attacks

The Weyland Yutani Hijackings
Casualties: 37,000

The Albion Moon Bombing
Casualties: 3,000,000

The Canberra Bombings
Casualties: 28,000,000

 

[Brettles]

Slot Taken: Novus Galaxy C

Polity Name: Consolidated Holdings Corporation​

Government System: Corporate Oligarchy
Leader: Klaa, Primary Executor of the Corporation

"In Faithful Service to the Shareholders"​

Species description: Antopla
The Antopla are hairless biped pseudo-marsupials. Standing at approximately one and a half meters tall, they possess two large forward facing eyes and prominent canines, marking them out evolutionarily as predatory carnivores. Their skin is grey in colour. Their legs and arms are digitigrade, giving them an impressive turn of speed and long reach, but somewhat reduced manual dexterity. They are adept swimmers, forgoing use of their arms to swim exclusively with their legs, a stratagem suggesting a now lost tail featured in their evolutionary past.

Home world description: The Antoplai homeworld of Wellom is notable for its extensive wetlands and shallow oceans. These wetlands are where the Antopla evolved, hunting for fish and ultimately developing fire. Scattered continents are mostly flat except at their centres where large rugged mountains harbour innumerable ecological niches.
The planets climate can best be described as temperate to cold, and wet. Though the planet possesses a high axial tilt (10 degrees) , this processes with the same orbital period as the planet. In effect, there are no seasons on Wellom, instead the south hemisphere has a permanent summer and the north permanent winter, allowing for a permanent northern icecap. The planet's extensive oceans and wetlands help keep the temperature gradient below the poles remarkably shallow, though cloud cover is almost complete across the whole planet. Days are 29 hours, and gravity is 0.8g.

History:

Spoiler: Early History

Early Antoplai history describes the rise of innumerable small tribes and chiefdoms to more organised city states and kingdom. Locals wars and disease outbreaks were common and population growth low. These early kingdoms often organised around charismatic rulers or local religious traditions, or combinations thereof.

Around 3000 years ago, a particularly successful prophetess named Reela established “Washreela” (The Path of Reela). This would go on to become the primary religion of the Antopla. She lead the religious conversion of her home continent, initially by peacefully converting local rulers, and later in a series of violent crusades that left thousands dead. The religions core tenets of personal responsibility, dutiful service and emphasis on humility were vastly successful even past its prophetess' death, and missionaries from her home continents risked long journeys on wooden rafts to bring her word forward. Ultimately they were successful, installing a broadly similar religious tradition across the whole planet.

While Reela's teachings had much to say about how people should live, priests should act, and the nature of reality, one of the reasons for its success was that it was light on political theory: allowing local rulers to adopt it without surrendering their own power or altering existing power structures. In effect this cemented the ruler-ship of a great variety of polities, from theocracies to feudal kingdoms.

Gradually, improved technology allowed first trade and diplomatic relations across the globe, but later projection of military might. The trade and productivity boom increasing the wealth of the kingdoms and city states empowered a growing middle class there, who ultimately obliged these more states, run by more secular authorities, to reform into democracies and constitutional monarchies. However, the numerous theocracies across the planet's surface did not, since these government were much less strongly class structured: the priesthoods were meritocracies that saw the talented rise regardless of birth and this allowed the middle class to buy into the power structure, strengthening it rather than reforming it. No theocratic government reformed to a democratic one prior to the industrial revolution, while the majority of the secular kingdoms did.

A tension developed between the secular and religious states that only worsening with the dawn of an industrial revolution 300 years ago that saw much of the world's natural resources rapidly exploited. The secular and religious states became caught in an arms races that ultimately saw both factions build extensive alliance networks for self defence. Conflict was inevitable, and when it came, cataclysmic. The superior technologies and industrial capacity of the secular states was pitted against the superior manpower and tactics of the religious ones. Both sides deployed vast armies, air-forces and navies in the conflict, which reached a peak when the secular sates developed nuclear weapons. Before they could even be used however, extensive espionage efforts by the religious faction allowed them to duplicate the feat. There was small scale nuclear exchange over six months, with 30 nuclear weapons employed, often deployed within hours of their completion. Finally the religious faction was defeated, having been broken and bankrupted by the war. Neither side had been spared from the immense cost of nuclear war however.

The secular states enforced a harsh peace on the losers, reforming many of them to democratic states, with mixed success. By the time the victor's patience for enforcement ran out, approximately 70% of the polities on the planets were secular in governance, ruling over approximately 80% of its population.

After the disastrous global war, a new power began to emerge: powerful corporations that held the wars debts of both sides. These corporations had grown incredibly wealthy from the war, and now had access to vast leverage over both the victors and the losers. Initially, they sought to use their leverage to reduce their taxes burdens, and avoid onerous regulation. They moved their headquarters to defeated religious states, using the backing of the secular governments and their new host's desperate poverty to extract larger privileges and ever lower tax rates. At first these were small steps in small polities without the resources to resist, but gradually these corporations came to insist on similar arrangements in the wealthier secular states. Over time, these corporations began to occupy a greater and greater part of their employees and customers lives.

Soon this extended to issuing passports in their own names to their employees that were far more useful than those of their native counties, collecting rents in exchange for ever more basic services and ultimately establishing permanent mercenary militaries (often by simply buying then from bankrupt and war ruined polities). The religious and secular states attempted to prevent this shift, but political corruption and the threat of withdrawing business meant the advantage always remained with the corporations. Over the course of 100 years, political power was gradually usurped and 98% of all governmental assets ended up in the hands of corporations. Following this, this was a brief period of intense competition as these mega-corporations sought to establish monopolies and corner markets totally free of regulatory oversight. Mergers and hostile takeover become increasingly common.

Ultimately a banking and telecoms conglomerate, The Altus Group, won out, buying all its competitors and becoming the majority stakeholder in every major corporation. Upon realising this goal, the company reformed into the Consolidated Holding Corporation. Decades later economists are still working out the implications: there is one employer, one price, and one company. Competition is dead, and so id free enterprise, crushed by a monologist with unlimited tools to enforces its reign. The Corporation is beholden only to those who own shares in it, but they are terrified the vast power they wield over wages and prices will inadvertently trigger a recession, and lower the company's dividends.

In the subsequent years, various factions within the corporation struggled for power, most successfully the Horizontal Integrationists, under whom the corporation has become a true stellar power: The Corporation invested at first in asteroid mining, and then FTL travel and interstellar colonies. Excess labour is exported off world, keeping labour prices high and resources from the colonies flowing homeward. However, as the corporation reaches the borders of other star polities, the power of the Horizontals wanes, and the Corporation's future looks ever more uncertain.


Politics
The Consolidated Holdings Corporation is a publically traded company (indeed, it is the only such on Wellom). Shareholders are entitled to vote in proportion to their ownership stake. The day to day running of the company is managed by the Primary Executor, who serves at the pleasure of the stakeholders. The ownership of the company is divided into billions of sub holdings: a worker might save all his life for a fraction of a share, and the richest citizens hoard their thousands as a symbol of wealth and prestige. Ownership is currently estimated to be divided thus:

Horizontal Integrationists
The Horizontal Integrationists, or Horizontals, believe in further expansion, and continuing the policies of the past century: more systems to keep the dividend of the corporation growing. The conservative faction, they enjoy the support of the substantial Antoplai religious community.

Vertical Integrationists
The Verticals believe that investment is better spent internally. The by investing in more automation and streamlining supply lines light-years long, the company will grow far more successful than by expending shareholder money on more colonies.

Demergers
The Demerger faction advocates for breaking up the corporation into smaller ones, to restore competition and allow free enterprise to once again exist. Considered idealists by both Integrationist factions, they are notoriously vague about how exactly a new singular mega-corp would be prevented from reforming.

Democratic Demergers
Dangerously radical and marginalised, the democratic demergers argue that a new non-profit corporation should be spun off to provide citizens with services in exchange for an obligatory rent, which in exchange would buy every citizen an equal, non-transferable share of ownership. That is to say, a democratic government. Shunned by all right thinking Antopla, merely mentioning the word “non-profit” to the wrong people is likely to see you come to the attention of the dreaded Inquisitors of Personnel Resources.

 

[Scrapknight]

I'd like to welcome our remaining player nations.

Brettles: Republic of Baekdu
Mikkel Glahder: The Storm Kingdom
Plutonium95: Free Territories of the Ismar Traverse
MadMartigan: The Kingdom of Divine Light
Noco19: Manje Confederacy
etranger01: Velian Exarchate

Congratulations one and all. May your nations prosper. The rest of you, I have no less affection for your signups; it was a very difficult choice. Do feel free to sign up as characters, IC nations, or spectate. Let me know if you need any more information.

This is also a friendly reminder to @Dadarian to claim the Tasavalta if he wants it, or else it'll go up for grabs.

The game launches 9/20. Get hyped!

- Scrap

 

[Korona]

i'm the pgc as mandated by scrap no one sign up for my pan galactic baby

 

[Scrapknight]

i'm the pgc as mandated by scrap no one sign up for my pan galactic baby

can confirm

 

[Dadarian]

​

"And thus spake Janus 'We are a people unto ourselves, a nation not of the rich, the poor, or the imperial. We must cast off the notions, beholden as we were, to such archaic means of organisation. To whit, we create one true republic, not of a institution, but of the people. Thine choices are clear, to transfer all sovereignty from the bureaucracies that bind us onto the very people that define us. Begone Shufalen! Hence forth, we shall forevermore be Tsavalta!'"

 

[Scrapknight]

​

"And thus spake Janus 'We are a people unto ourselves, a nation not of the rich, the poor, or the imperial. We must cast off the notions, beholden as we were, to such archaic means of organisation. To whit, we create one true republic, not of a institution, but of the people. Thine choices are clear, to transfer all sovereignty from the bureaucracies that bind us onto the very people that define us. Begone Shufalen! Hence forth, we shall forevermore be Tsavalta!'"

very approved. welcome back, paesano

 

[Tapscott]

Name: John Smith Prime (Id: SC013-C18-VG2)

Age: 30

Polity of Residence: N/A

Occupation: Captain of the Space Vessel: ISV Wanderlust

Description: The ISV Wanderlust is a fully independent and self-sufficient space-vessel that travels from planet to planet, system to system, taking on various requests and commissions in return for whatever resource they desire at that point in time.

Operating as a mobile pseudo-scientific/mercenary vessel, the ISV Wanderlust's main purpose is to produce clones, often derogatorily referred to as 'Copies', to staff the vessel and fulfil external requests. These clones are vat-grown to mature a vastly accelerated rate and are given extensive biological enhancements that allow them to do tasks that are beyond the physical capabilities of regular humans. The clones are all grown to have a naturally subservient mindset, that still allows room for intelligent behaviour and innovative approaches, combining the need for docility with the need for independent thought.

The major drawback with the clones grown by the ISV Wanderlust is that they are only effective for 15 years after their ‘birth’. Upon reaching the 15th year of their existence the clones will begin to experience a gradual degradation in their intellect and physical capabilities. Roughly 1.5 years after reaching their ‘expiry date’ the clones bodies and mind will begin to fail much more rapidly and catastrophically. Their limbs will begin to experience necrosis, their minds shall be effected by memory loss, and fits of psychosis that end with death. All buyers of the clones are advised to terminate any clones that have reached their expiry date so as to prevent any damage to them and theirs.

Due to the moral grey ground that is cloning many systems forbid private entities from creating their own clones, and strictly enforcing a state-only policy for this practice. It is not uncommon for some systems to have forbidden cloning in its entirety, declaring such products of the industry to be abominations. The ISV Wanderlust has managed to weather all negative attentions focused upon it and its operations by citing a document that was issued to them near the start of the Interstellar Era. This document, formally entitled ‘Research Carta de Libero Arbitrio’ or ‘Charter of Free Research’ lists the rights that the ISV Wanderlust technically has, amongst which is listed the right to investigate and research practices free of outside interference and influence. While this document is not often recognized by any offended systems, it still gives the IVS Wanderlust a thin excuse to arm itself in the pretense of 'self-defense'.

With the newly made captain, John Smith Prime, showing remarkable independence, innovative thoughts and behaviour there is a large amount of speculation as to what the IVS Wanderlust will be directed to do next. The traditional manner of isolationism and paranoia that has gripped the leadership of the space-vessel seems to be gone, and in its place a strong desire for interaction with the outside world and the direct empowerment of the vessel and its denizens.

Captain John Smith Prime
Id: SC013-C18-VG2​

The IVS Wanderlust

Cloning Chambers within the IVS Wanderlust​

 

[Scrapknight]

((Being for the benefit of @alexander23 .))

Zelsari Republic
"Freedom, Democracy, Unity"
​

Official Name: Zelsari Republic
Short Form: Zelsar
Capital City: Byzinten
Capital Planet: Zelsar, Zelzar System
Government: Unitary "constitutional" presidential republic
Leader: President Cornelius D'Horti
Ruling Party: Justice and Development Coalition (Authoritarian Democrat)

• 
  
  
  • The President of Zelsar is elected by popular vote every five years, with unlimited terms. President Cornelius D'Horti has recently begun his third term in yet another hotly disputed election.
  • The Zelsari Congress is quite small by the standards of galactic republics, with each system sending one hundred representatives to Byzinten for a total of four hundred members.
  • The executive powers of the President are extremely broad. He has control over defense, foreign affairs and even economic policies with little congressional oversight, and has sole control over appointing the judges of the Court of Cassation.

History:

Zelsar has a long and troubled history, rivaled only by Albion for sheer levels of civil strife. With a relative young recorded history of only about 6000 years, civil strife was not an uncommon feature of its early history. Thousands of years ago, two large nation-states whose descendants make up Zelsar's current ethnic groups, the Yetari Empire and the Qarun Republic, fought for centuries at varying levels of intensity, ending in a victory for the Qaruni that resulted in the proclamation of the Zelsari Republic, or the "First Republic." While the First Republic would face intense political struggles of its own from a vestigial Yetarian movement, eventually the system stabilized and a relatively peaceful democratic system maintained itself for nearly one thousand years. This peace would be shattered by a powerful proto-syndicalist movement that collapsed the planet into a hundred years of brutal civil war, eventually resulting in an establishment coalition crushing the revolutionaries and establishing a new, more authoritarian regime referred to as the "Second Republic."

This, too, would not last forever, and the victorious Coalition eventually turned on itself again. Yet another civil war raged for another hundred years, between the incumbent Zelsar People's Party, which would become one of the most nefarious political groupings in the galaxy, and scattered opposition militias and parties. The ZPP, after a great deal of bloodletting, eventually abolished the Republic in all but name, and a hundred years later abolished that as well, renaming the state the Zelsar Union and eliminating the last traces of the popular franchise. Space colonization began around this time, and for a time the Zelsari state prospered - the last extended period of prosperity it would experience to date.

During this time, the ZPP perfected its brutal autocracy, engaging in a sinister campaign of rewriting history. Much of the pre-Union period of Zelsari history has been lost to the ZPP's "thought police," with the above being mostly based on reconstructions. Yetarian and Qaruni ethnic identities alike were brutally suppressed in favor of a conception of a "New Zelsari Man" unbound by traditional culture. The Zelsari language, a descendant of Old Qaruni, was itself heavily edited, eliminating thousands upon thousands of words and making it almost resemble a computing language in its lack of ability for poetic expression. And, of course, individual rights and liberties were utterly quashed, with citizens who defied or even appeared to defy the ZPP disappearing into the night without warning. The general populace was kept sated with generous government subsidies funded by the wealth brought on by space colonization, which encouraged the state to deplete the resources of the homeworld and the other planets of the metropole. Accordingly, combined with natalist policies to encourage a strong army and navy, the population boomed.

Over time, the ZPP kicked the can down the road with respect to its population and resource crises, until around An. 3 when it faced a severe problem. Unrest on the homeworld was high, and people were refusing to move to the other systems in the metropole (the government found little use for extragalactic colonization). Dissidents were increasing in number, and the other metropolitan worlds could not support them. The government came to a solution so brutal that not only would it bring widespread galactic condemnation but triggered yet another brutal civil war that would annihilate what little hard-won prosperity the country had accumulated. Three billion people, deemed in one way or another undesirable by the Zelsari government, were packed onto what they were told were colonization ships. The state simply revoked their residency permits, as was its right, and issued new ones for other worlds in the Union, and people boarded them. These ships would never reach their destinations, as they were deliberately designed with faulty reactors that would detonate after several weeks of extended operation, and just like that, three billion of Zelsar's population vanished.

This was too much for even the docile people of Zelsar, and widespread anger and despair at the brutality of the ZPP came to a head. The first to turn against the Party was the military, led by Marshal Balthazar Hedreath. Second came another group, led by a young army colonel named Baxter Van Zandt, better known by his nom de guerre that he took in honor of one of the doomed moral victors of the late Second Republic: Colonel Alexander Seeford. Van Zandt, henceforth referred to as Seeford, was a rarity in Zelsar. He was, unbeknownst to most, educated in Baekdu by a military eager to steal technological secrets, and was a true idealistic republican of the highest order. He resolved to bring down the Union entirely, instead of merely handing it to Marshal Hedreath, who held a preponderance of state assets and would have likely emerged victorious without outside assistance. Seeford at first cooperated with the Marshal to wipe out the ZPP forces, then turning on him. As brilliant a military leader as he was a politician, Seeford outmaneuvered Hedreath's armies at every turn, even winning many of them over with his impassioned pleas for democracy. After eleven terrible years, in a conflict that racked up as many casualties as the War of the Foundation hundreds of years ago, Seeford won against all odds, and found himself as president of the Third Zelsari Republic.

While a democrat, Seeford found himself ruling a country that did not match his ideals. His party, the Democratic Republican Party of Zelsar (DRPZ,) was filled mainly with his own appointees because few people not associated with the old regimes could be persuaded to run. It occupied nearly a 90% majority in Congress until Seeford himself saw fit to create an opposition, Forward Zelsar (FZ,) whose policies he mostly dictated and whose members were also mainly his appointees. He joined the Republican League and professed the virtues of democracy while tolerating little dissent from his program of reindustrialization and modernization at home. He begged Congress to take initiative in repairing the country and respond to the people, but was often forced to rule by decree in the face of its inaction and incompetence. In truth, the Zelsari republican movement was by this point quite small, and most were so cowed by Seeford's impressive displays that they simply chose to do whatever he said. Unlike, for example, Baekdu, Celtia or Azeratii, with well-developed and vibrant political cultures, Zelsar had to be dragged out of autocracy, and drag it he attempted to do. Seeford did everything he could to reign in the power of the military he relied on (though over time he became less dedicated to doing so, siding with the Army over Congress late in his term when things weren't going his way) and rebuild the devastated nation, but it was difficult for him to affect meaningful change in either respect. After his second term was over in An. 24, he retired with surprisingly little fanfare. A year later, he shot himself in his home in Byzinten.

The DRPZ died with Seeford, as did much of the old FZ. What remained was quickly taken over by neo-Populists and offshoot movements that preached "organic government." After such a grouping nearly won a congressional supermajority, the military, full of Seefordist liberals and anti-Populists, declared the election invalid, dissolved Congress, set up the liberal Republican Center Party to contest the new Forward Zelsar, and held a new election that saw the RCP fend off FZ in a narrow win. Thus would begin a familiar pattern, with the military allowing free and open elections - as long as they were won by the Republican Center Party, with less liberal parties seeing swift military intervention with varying degrees of success. None of this promoted good governance, with GDP per capita falling over the period and much of the War of the Third Republic-era damage remaining even in some of the largest cities.

In An. 32, a new kind of opposition party was formed: the Justice and Development Coalition. Composed of largely ethnic Yetarians, or at least those with Yetarian names, this party promoted traditional values and conservatism but proudly proclaimed their allegiance to the Third Republic. The military allowed them to compete unmolested, and they won, sweeping President Cornelius D'Horti into power in An. 34. President D'Horti won accolades across the Republican world for finally bringing good, suitably democratic governance to Zelsar not from the barrel of a gun. He, too, however, would quickly become a tyrant, like so many before him. D'Horti quickly spurned the Republican League after a dispute about elerium weapons escalated, cracking down on dissent and seeing military and Seefordist conspiracies wherever he looked. In his second term, he edited electoral laws to give his party a massive structural advantage, and continued his brutal crackdown on the press and civil liberties, earning widespread League scorn to little practical effect. Now, in his third term, he is merely a few steps away from declaring himself Dictator, which many claimed to be a personal ambition of his. But will he, knowing yet another civil war could be on the horizon - one his country could ill afford? Or will he take a different path?

 

[Dadarian]

Commonly used as the flag of Tasavalta, but not officially used in any capacity

Tasavalta
"Forever Forwarding the Revolution!"
​

Official Name: Tasavalta or Tsavalta
Capital City: None
Capital Planet: None
Government: Revolutionary Direct Democracy
"Leader": Ihmistenpuhuja Turnu Kaasvla
Ideological Faction of Predominant Position: Janhallitsijasukun (Revolutionary Populist)

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  • The Ihmistenpuhuja is not a governmental position, but an ambassadorial position abroad, representing Tasavalta internationally (and therefore becoming the face of the Republic).
  • There is no administrative body in Tasavalta, as all motions are done via direct democracy to the level of administration responsible. The result is collective rule of all things in Tasavalta.
  • All powers lie in the power of the people, and as a result the people have the freedom to do whatever they wish if the majority votes for it.

History:

Tasavalta was a hermit empire long before it became a hermit republic. The Shufalen Empire, decadent in it's administration, ruled it's space with an iron fist and a feudalistic approach to politics. Education was rare, innovation rarer, and to many it seemed as if the Empire would last forever, an immovable entity of administrative apathy and imperial hegemony. What they didn't count on was the longest drought in the history of the Shufalen Empire. Water exports had left the cities throughout the Empire with a dire lack of food, and outrage at the deprevations that occurred as a result toppled what was once seen as the near godly Empire. A man, by the name of Janus Vapaamies, peddled a radical departure from Imperial Governance. He preached a philosophy of public input, of individual choice combined with collective moralism. His ideals, backed by powerful militias, saw a revolution become a Revolution. As the last Imperial Family member was executed, Shufalen fell, and Tasavalta rose.

The new Republic was not without it's detractors, as millions of Shufalenists, anarchists, and would be counter-revolutionaries were purged by People's Tribunals. These organs of the people, juried by all the members of the city, oft brought death upon the necks of those that stood in the way of the Revolution. Millions were slaughtered in the Tribunals, as anti-Revolutionarism was a taboo in which death was the punishment in breaking. The most predominant anti-Revolutionarist was Jax Kekka, a madman who sought a total anarchy deprived of even the smallest sense of attachment to a state. Breaking into the citizenchip hub on the most populous planet of Kalis alongside his followers (named Pojatkekka), it was only through luck and sheer firepower that the entire citizenchip program was saved from elimination. Jax Kekka would then be the subject of the largest Tribunal, of whom every member of the Republic voted on as a jury member. His execution was broadcast live.

Since the end of the Revolution and the Purges, the primary factors for the establishment of the Republic disappeared. The anti-Revolutionarists had died or gone into deep hiding. Food was available to all. The People had their voice. Thus, the state began to sag upon itself as the inherent bureaucracy of everyday life fell upon the people. Longtime and beloved Ihmistenpuhuja, Janus, retired to a relatively private farming commune, leaving his followers to take up the mantle as voice of the people.

As such, internationally the Republic is a hermit, known solely for it's Volunteer Brigades dispatched to nearby civil conflicts in order to defend the people, and it's (usually vacant) seat at the PGC. Ideologically lost thanks to the immense success of the Revolution and without a direction for the future, Tasavalta continues on it's hometread path, terrifying democracies and autocracies alike as it's citizens vote via their citizenchips every day.