This post details two Empires contending with each other in the Warcry campaign at the moment. I’ll talk more about that in a little bit.

There’s also some discussion of when a Kingdom needs to become an Empire, and a mysterious religious body that seems entwined in events.

The working title of the article was “Empires Of Pain”, and I’m still not sure which title is the better one. In the end, I made an instinctive choice.

Acknowledgment

The Idorian Empire and Lamaraine Imperium are derived from material published in I. C. E.’s “Raiders From The Frontier”, a campaign module for Space Master by A. Brooke Lindsay III, © 1989.

Use In Other Campaigns

Everything herein should be fully compatible with Traveller, and with most other sci-fi franchises. The abilities and distinguishing political structures of the two empires mean that they can also work in a superhero campaign, and maybe in horror, too (with a bit of work).

It should also be possible to reinterpret the content to achieve compatibility with a Fantasy campaign run with a rules system like D&D or Pathfinder. The Gene-splicing of the Idorians might be ‘magical infusions’ instead of technology. Similarly, the brain grafting of the Lamaraine sounds like something Illithid might be paid to do.

A bigger problem is confining them to a site that is large enough to support the necessary imperial infrastructure but not so large that the PCs bumbling into the middle are totally overwhelmed by sheer numbers. Forced to be subtle and stealthy, perhaps.

The Fumanor Scale

Fumanor was a game setting under active threat. That meant that there was always a fluid situation requiring command decisions on a regular basis – the closer you got to the borders, the more this was the case.

A rider who runs his mounts to near-death and then transfers to a fresh mount can travel about 8 times as fast as a determined traveler, all things being equal – or so I decided. That gave the initial Kingdom of Fumanor four layers:

• The Inner Kingdom, up to one day’s death-race away (8 days normal travel). This was reduced to 5 days normal travel to take advantage of natural defensive terrain (a choke-point in a ravine between two impassable mountains). In fact, it was surrounded in all other directions by impassable mountains.
• Outside the Inner Kingdom on its one ‘exposed’ side was The Major Kingdom, two days death race away (16 days normal travel). It was surrounded by a wall and regular fortifications that took a generation to erect, even with magical assistance. With the expansion of the Kingdom, these are now rarely threatened and many have fallen into disuse. Many think of the Major Kingdom as the “real” Kingdom, an attitude that leads to political turmoil.
• The Outer Kingdom, three days death race away (24 days normal travel). But there was no hard border; in some areas, a habitation could be 32 days from the capital, in others it might be only 28. This area is under constant threat from the creatures of the Wilderness.
• And beyond the Outer Kingdom lies the Wilderness, where men were the hunted, not the hunters. Three weeks’ travel through the wilderness brought you to the Elven Lands, a further week could take you to the Elven capital or the entrance to the Dwarven Mines; three weeks beyond those was the gateway to the Orcish Kingdom.

(It’s worth noting that the inner kingdom started as a Barony, but had the good fortune to survive a global cataclysm relatively whole about a century before play started. They have been expanding and civilizing the surrounding wilderness ever since). There’s more to both stories but it’s too long and complicated to go into right now).

The campaign was all about growing pains caused by the success of the PCs. They brought closer alliance with the Elves, forged an alliance with the Dwarves, the terms of which made them independent entities within the overall Kingdom. At a stroke, this doubled the area and resources of the Kingdom, but the new lands were simply too far away for effective management.

The solution was to split the kingdom into three administrative regions or “Kingdoms” (plus the Elves and Dwarves). The original capital would directly rule over the inner Kingdom and about half of the Major Kingdom. A new western capital would rule over the balance of the Western Major Kingdom and the western Outer Kingdom. A new Eastern capital would directly rule over the Eastern Reaches and be the diplomatic point of contact with the Elves and Dwarves. Each would have its own ruler, who would sweat fealty to the King in Fumanor.

Of course, the PCs then had to go and win a war with the Orcs (who attempted an massive invasion due to Drow manipulations). In the course of the war, Lolth recaptured the spiritual heartland of the Elves using the gates of Joraldon (which I have written about before, in The Ultimate Weapon: Spell Storage Solutions Pt 5) – but she lost her grip on her own ‘beloved’ Drow in the process.

The whole thing turned out to be a half-baked scheme to elevate her to the status of a true deity. Again, that’s a side-issue; what really matters is that the war was concluded by exposing Lolth’s deception to the Orcs, who hate being used for another’s benefit. So they agreed to peace terms that permitted them to take the place of the Elves, who had abrogated the treaty almost immediately. Individuals, however, still respected the treaty; not all of them became evil, just as it took time for Drow to step out of the shadows.

At a stroke, the Kingdom expanded more than 5-fold in area – most of it wild and untamed. And then the Orcs were invaded by The Golden Empire, with their armies of Undead and magic beyond anything the Kingdom could muster. So they did what they always did, and assembled an adventuring team to investigate – and if possible, solve – the problem. That’s the basic background to the Fumanor: Seeds Of Empire campaign.

The key point: The Kingdom had already grown to the point where efficient administration required it to distribute it’s administration. It would be a Kingdom for less than a generation; the only practical approach was for it to become an Empire. It had all the problems of an Empire but not the tools to solve them (Though, to be fair, it’s “Empire” was more of a Commonwealth than an Empire in the more traditional sense).

Applying the same logic to an interstellar political body is simply a matter of scale. Think of each significant resource or population center as a town; and consider the capital in terms of the time it takes supplies to reach the populace within. Major cities are always net importers of food and net exporters of skills and goods.

If the capital needs the full resources of every system within 1 day’s travel, forcing those systems to also be net importers of food, it not only needs a multi-system administration, but a defensive perimeter around those critical worlds, and then a broader swathe of systems that feed those inner systems, and an army / navy / space corps to protect all of the above, and put down any insurrection]. That’s a kingdom, in my book – an interstellar one.

Divide the speed of the fastest messenger service – we’re obviously talking FTL of some kind, here (see Fascinating Topological Limits: FTL in Gamingfor more on that subject) – by the speed of the typical merchant / transport vessel.

You’ll usually get a ratio of three-to-five. These faster vessels are the equivalent of riding horses to death, what I described earlier as a death race; as soon as your basic kingdom grows that many times in distance from the capital, it needs to decentralize its administration and become an Empire (or equivalent sociopolitical structure).

So that’s the practical definition of an Empire that I use.

The basic Interstellar Kingdom is 1 central system plus a ring of systems feeding it, plus a ring of defensive systems. Call it 15 systems as a rough guide (refer to Anatomy of An Interstellar Empire, below). As soon as the Kingdom grows to around 60 systems, it needs to shift to an Imperial model.

In this diagram, there is one Capital, four inner systems (in yellow), and ten outer systems (in red). From those outer Kingdoms, another layer of 12 fringe systems have been colonized, almost doubling the size of the Kingdom; at this point, the Kingdom would be starting to display signs of growing pains, if you knew where to look.

This takes the preceding Kingdom and grows it a bit more. The 12 systems that were in the outer Kingdom have been joined by 12 more, and from those 24 systems, another 49 have been claimed, bringing the total to 88 systems. What’s more, another 20 systems have been reached and at least partially explored; at any tick of the clock, the Empire could grow to 108 systems.

It wasn’t a deliberate design feature, just a function of the geometry, but it’s worth observing the ratios of systems in each layer (which is why I separated the 24 and 49).

10 / 4 = 2.5
24 / 10 = approx 2.5
49 / 24 = approx 2

These ratios imply that the next layer, exploration of which has only just begun, will eventually contain between 2 and 2.5 times the 49 systems of the current outer layer (green), i.e. 98-124 systems. This is a fairly good approximation to use in other maps of provinces and the like; assuming that they are all roughly the same size, you’ll get two-to-two-point-five as many in a ring around the existing cluster. If they are larger, this number will go down; if smaller, it will go up.

This Empire is pretty close to minimum size. At the very least, half of the worlds in the “10” ring would need to become provincial capitals, or better yet, 10 of the worlds in the “24” ring.

What’s the difference? “10-ring” provincial capitals or sector capitals (or whatever you want to call them) would be ideal for administering the Empire as it is right now because they are roughly half-way from the Imperial Capital to the outer reaches.

The “24-ring” would result in looser direct Imperial control (not necessarily either bad or good in itself), but would be ideally placed to administrate the next ring of worlds, too.

Okay, so now we’re on the same page, definitions-wise; you don’t have to use my approach, but it’s important that you get a sense of scale in terms of what I mean when I describe an “Empire”, so that you can translate it back to a fantasy equivalent.

The Idorian Empire

This empire is situated in a globular cluster within the Galaxy. It’s inhabitants may or may not have been human, once; for certain, they can’t be described that way any more.

The homeworld

Idorians are very secretive as to the climate and location of their homeworld, even to the point of refusing to discuss the basis of their biology. There’s a lot of speculation from various sources that they come from a Swampy world and originally had webbed fingers to help them in swimming, but there’s nothing but a few vague hints that could all be misdirection.

Dominant Species

The Idor are the dominant species within the Idorian Empire. They have gray skin with a slight hint of blue, with individuals varying in both darkness of gray and intensity of blue shades. Their faces include flaps that grow from the cheeks to cover the nose and mouth and provide a natural protection against atmospheric contaminants. When angered or upset or simply claiming dominance, these flaps flare out, revealing the facial features.

They are tall, strong for their size, and incredibly resilient. Specifics beyond these general traits vary from occupation to occupation, as many lower castes are specially engineered to have greater capabilities and prowess relevant to that occupation.

Quite how that fits in with their religious orders, no-one knows.

Furthermore, it is likely that one in three carries an experimental genetic modification, granting them unusual capabilities even relative to others of their caste / occupation.

Slaves

When the Idorians discover a new species, they enslave it. At first, this isn’t as bad as it sounds; the Idorians tend to stick fairly close to the shadows and rule by locally-installed proxies, and they are lavish in their expenditure of resources to improve the local botanic, medical, technological and agricultural capabilities. In terms of protection from predating rivals or natural disasters, it can even be seen as a good deal by the locals.

Genetic analysis

Part of those medical advances are extremely detailed genetic analyses. These are not considered adequate until the genetic analysis of an individual tells the Idorians everything that there is to know about the individual through the various phases of its life (arbitrary divisions are used if there are no natural changes to which distinctions and specifications can be attached). The assumption is always that the individual will be raised in a healthy and secure environment, taking into account local conditions.

Social Assimilation

The analytic work can easily take decades if not generations. Quite often, to discover the significance of a particular sequence, the Idorians will need to analyze the genetic codes of other life-forms indigenous to the planet.

All during this phase of their conquest, the Idorians will be incorporating any worthwhile social practices into their own culture, while also firmly suggesting that the conquered species adopt more efficient approaches when those are clearly superior.

Gene Crafting

Things start to change when a genetic trait that is deemed desirable is identified. They identify the genetic coding that confers this trait, look for associated biological systems and subsystems, and work up a genetic ‘package’ to be applied to a select number of the ruling Idorian children hatched thereafter. These are carefully watched and their genetic inheritances and potentials mapped and analyzed; it is rare for these grafts to succeed the first time, or even then tenth time.

Early grafts are not intended to breed true; that is a separate problem to be tackled only once all the ‘bugs’ are out of the ‘system’. But that is the ultimate goal.

An example should make the problems in the process clearer.

Two additional eyes on prehensile stalks, generally facing behind the Idorian.

The eyes and the stalks are the easy part, copied whole from the slave species. It’s the supporting infrastructure that gets complicated.

Nictating membranes to protect from glare. Maybe taken from the donor species, maybe from a species of aquatic creatures.

Additional visual processing centers within the brain, which either has to grow as a result, or something else has to be sacrificed. Increasing the size of the brain can cause balance problems, or weakened skull density, or all manner of other problems. Musculature and bone might need to beefed up to support the additional mass of the head.

Some of these problems can be alleviated by reducing the functionality of the new eyes; they might not need to see color, for example. They might be able to get by with lower detail resolution. Perhaps they can be tuned to function in spectra to which the host organism, giving them better night vision or natural infrared-sensing capabilities.

Additional motor controls to permit conscious control of the eye stalks. They might be able to get these by modifying the genes from an insect, effectively adding the stalks as an extra limb. Or they might steal an idea from terrestrial cockroaches, who effectively have a single brain cell controlling each limb with no communications to, or direction from, the central nervous system (such as it is). An entire upgrade plan might be needed to incorporate refinements one at a time.

Then there’s the problem of reconciling the visual input between the different sets of eyes. Should the new eye stalks be able to trigger impulses and reflexes without conscious thought? Or should they be tools that have to be actively monitored by the consciousness? Is it better to dim or even block the main eyes when concentrating on the stalk view – that could simplify the brain re-engineering considerably!

Does the new visual sense increase the need to take mental shortcuts in processing visual information, leaving the species more susceptible to optical illusions? Does it promote ‘laziness’ that costs visual acuity in the primary sense? Do the additional brain capabilities cause an increase in psychoses or other mental aberrations? Is there an unexpected resonance between the new sense and some other biological function – do the eyes twitch when the host breathes in, for example? Do they become useless when the host is shivering?

The list of questions, and potential problems, just keeps growing.

It will sometimes transpire that a perceived advantage is not adjudged worth the attendant cost to the organism. in which event, it will simply be documented as an ‘unsatisfactory’ upgrade.

(I had another example that i was going to include – a venomous bite – but am short of time. So here’s a very quick summary:

Sacs to contain the venom, a biological function to produce the venom, personal immunity from the venom, secondary organ functions, voluntary vs involuntary release, and so on. But it isn’t as good an example as the one I presented in full.

The Slaughter

It’s when all the potentially-useful upgrades have either taken root in the Idorian population that the status of the conquered species takes a turn for the worse. The Idorians now consider themselves the ‘heirs’ of the conquered species, so they commit an act of mass genocide (aside from a few specimens preserved for research) and simply move in.

Eugenics can be a nasty business, can’t it?

Emotions and Emoting

It should be clear that the Idorian Empire’s primary species has an utterly ruthless streak. It would be easy to consider them unfeeling and emotionless, but this is incorrect; they simply think of their species as the pinnacle of creation – and should it not prove so, they simply upgrade themselves to eliminate any perceived deficiencies.

They are racists and fascists, but they are fiercely protective of their young and are capable of great gentleness. They generally treat conquered species part of the ‘family’ – but that doesn’t have quite the same meaning for them as it does for humans.

Other Personal traits

Idorians are not without their virtues. They have a stronger sense of honor than most humans, see charity as a responsibility as well as a virtue, could lecture Klingons on bravery, are generally highly intelligent, and are good conversationalists – if they are interested in the topic.

They think that incorporation of another species genetics into their own is a way of honoring that species, while the subsequent genocide is perceived as a mercy killing on a mass scale; the donor species is now clearly inferior to the (modified) Idor, and doomed to eventual extinction after generations of suffering.

Idorians take great pains during such acts to reduce suffering to an irreducible minimum and expend considerable effort to document and preserve the culture and history of the donor race. As they see it, having ‘inherited’ the resources, they have a responsibility to the new source of their genetics. And you can never tell when an element from a past culture will influence or inspire a new generation to advance the hybrid species.

The Lamaraine Imperium

The Lamaraines have a number of qualities that makes others perceive them favorably, but this respectability is a veneer that only exists to the extent that it is useful to the Imperium. They are strongly opposed to any form of racial prejudice, and – within their own particular social structure – are also strongly gender-neutral. In fact, anything that could stop an employee from willingly giving his all for his employer is considered barbaric and expressly forbidden.

Origins

A couple of thousand years ago, according to legend, a starship from some other great empire landed on a planet after an accidental space transit beyond the bounds of known space. Unable to return home, the crew formed a colony on the planet, which they named NewHome.

The survivors were just large enough in number to make the colony viable, from a perspective of genetic diversity. They cannibalized what was left of the ship that carried them to NewHome to give themselves a leg up as a colony, used fertility drugs to increase their birthrate, and sacrificed social mores and restrictions as necessary to maximize their gains.

In a generation, one colony had become twelve, that were starting to specialize economically by exploiting natural nearby resources. At the centenary of their arrival, twelve homesteads were a half-dozen towns with thousands of inhabitants. A century later, there were almost 58 million of them, and they had conquered the landmass on which their colonies stood.

100 years later, they were rediscovering the technology that had brought them hence, and they had conquered NewHome. Their numbers were now approaching 12 billion, and they were spread throughout the star system of NewHome. 500 years after their arrival and they had discovered pathways to other star systems and were an Interstellar Kingdom.

Stellar Geography

The Imperium occupies a ribbon loosely connected to a galactic arm. They are unsure whether that galactic arm is the one from whence they escaped, or if it contains the semi-mythical Home from which the dominant race derive. Some records were damaged or lost before the survivors learned how to read and preserve them, and some information was simply never documented within their databases because it was not considered necessary for their original mission.

Mysterious Purpose

What that original mission might have been is another fact that has been lost to history. There are all sorts of speculations, but nothing verifiable. It once must have been common knowledge, and as such no-one made a point of documenting it – until suddenly, the last person who knew it was gone.

There are hints – certain turns of phrase, such as references to ‘escaping’ the old culture, which is frequently demonized as repressive. But none of it is definitive. Heck, there are a dozen different names recorded for the ship that brought them to NewHome, and no-one knows which one is true.

Administrative Structure

The Imperium is ruled over by Mega-corporations, most of which once provided essential governance services on NewHome, but which have diversified by claiming and exploiting other star systems.

Each corporation, at its heart, is a family dynasty called a House ruled over by a Senior President. Within their own spheres of power, these Houses are virtually completely autonomous provided that they abide by the decreed law of the Imperial Praetor of NewHome (which is the head of another dynastic family).

The corporations rub shoulders at the imperial court on NewHome, often engaging in baroque and involuted games of dominance, spying on each other and stealing resources and intelligence – or trying to.

There are multiple tiers of management and staff within each corporation, and it’s not uncommon for workers desirous of promotion to move from one House to another – if they can physically relocate. The lowest tiers of worker are generally only paid enough on which to survive, but as workers are promoted in rank and responsibility, responsibilities and remuneration rise disproportionately. Senior executives may command the wealth of an entire star system that is nominally part of the House, for example.

Military Assets

The Imperium maintains a military that is nominally under the direct command of the Praetor, but which is provided – with trained crews – by individual Houses. Some specialize in one type of unit or asset, others are commonplace and built to common Imperial standards, if not to unified specifications.

These services are allocated to the corporations by Imperial Contract, which have a defined review date; should a house lose an Imperial Contract it is a serious blow to the prestige of the House which suffers the loss and a boost to the House that is awarded the new contract. In practical terms, this usually reflects a change in the status or capabilities of the House in question; decisions are relatively apolitical, but are also strongly influenced by public perceptions.

in practical terms, each House has its own militaries, which differ in strength and makeup of specialist units and Assets, but which is overseen by the Imperium as a whole.

Alien Relations

Almost a dozen sentient species have been discovered during the expansion of the Lamaraine Imperium. Under Imperium Law, these are automatically accorded full ‘human’ rights. However, before those rights can be accessed, their planet must accept being part of the Imperium, with it’s infrastructure, bureaucracy, political structures and social practices. If they do not accept membership, they are sealed into their solar systems and left to fend for themselves (although humanitarian aid may still flow in emergencies).

Should they accept the proposal, they receive full imperial benefits immediately. Work on any necessary infrastructure commences right away, at the expense of the House which has contacted the alien species. The locals cannot refuse these ‘gifts’ once they have opted into the Imperium.

When the lives of the aliens are as comparable to those of any other Imperial Citizen, the total cost is determined by the House (audited by the Imperium); the species must return to the House resources of comparable value, either in the service of its citizens or in material goods (including food).

Once that payment is made in full, the planet becomes part of the House that found it, or may establish it’s own House as it sees fit; the discovering House is entitled to a 5% share of any net profits earned by the new House or 10% if they are given responsibility for the new member planet, to defray maintenance costs.

In practice, this is many times that maintenance cost, by no accident whatsoever, ensuring that bringing a new species into the Imperium is a profitable exercise for the responsible House.

Senior Presidents

These are the heads of the ruling corporations and of the family Dynasties. Think socially-aware Robber Barons, or the CEOs of corporations in Cyberpunk.

Each bears a remarkable similarity in skills, attitudes, and personality traits to their parent, too much so for this to be accidental, but few bother to inquire further. The corporations make no secret of the cause, though they do not publicize it widely, either.

Firstborn Male Inheritance

The firstborn males are raised in the secure knowledge that they will, on their 18th birthday, inherit the corporation and become head of the Dynasty. This typically gives them an exaggerated sense of entitlement.

Life is generally pleasant for these unfortunates; they are frequently widely traveled, get to have adventures and a fair degree of independence, often have significant wealth in their own right, and it is not uncommon for alliances between Houses to be reflected by apprenticeships in the allied Houses’ service.

Every few months, the parents brain is stimulated to produce a ‘brain bud” containing skills, expertise, attitudes, and personality traits. These are grafted into the brains of the firstborn heir, where the engrams, RNA, etc, are incorporated into the brain, transferring skills and expertise from one generation to the next.

These are integrated with the existing experiences of the child, so each generation is like a more-modern revision of the existing Dynastic head. The heirs all know that something of them will survive the experience – and is sometimes even the source of the dominant personality traits – and have the general reckless confidence of youth to think that this will be the outcome in their individual case.

In the meantime, hedonistic tendencies are balanced by increasing responsibilities to the Corporation; they are generally viewed as extensions or representatives of the patriarch.

Later males

Everyone makes mistakes, and learns from them. Some mistakes are deliberately preserved as object lessons, often hard-learned, in the Heirs; but others are more shameful or unwanted. In particular, any weaknesses or vulnerabilities are not to be passed on; the goal is to make each generation incrementally better than the one before it. Early on, then, these are extracted via brain-bud and preserved in the mind of subsequent lesser heirs.

Upon reaching adulthood, these are expected to make their own way in the world; they are given a modest start (but more than most people get) and turned loose. However, they generally have the benefit of having accompanied either the patriarch or his elder brother on corporate assignments, may have been apprenticed to a member of the Corporate Board, have received a first-rate education, and are generally very well prepared for the inevitable.

They also frequently get to vicariously participate in the antics and adventures of the Heir. These shared experiences usually result in close bonds. It is not uncommon for an Heir to hire his brother as an Executive within the Corporation.

The reasons of this largess are to inhibit any thoughts of bringing about an ‘accident’ to the Heir in order to become the eldest (surviving) child. Between the price potentially incurred (the death of self) and the removal of incentive, there is little reason for disloyalty. “Better him than me” is often a mantra amongst these lesser male heirs.

Daughters

Daughters not only get educations as comprehensive as those of the males, they are often better educated in areas not directly relevant to Corporate Management. Sciences and arts are freely available, and they are encouraged to explore their own interests. Some families are happy for daughters to accompany Heirs on their escapades, while others shelter them a little more, or require them to go exploring life separately (with their sisters).

Daughters serve one additional vital function: insurance. The brain-bud process is not perfect, and sometimes things go wrong, something that often can’t be detected until the grafting is complete. Furthermore, even a successful bud does damage to the source brain. So both the existing Patriarch is aging, mentally, and the Heir may suddenly develop a serious psychosis or mental deficiency that renders him ineligible to inherit.

Other male heirs are either too young and inexperienced, by definition, or have been the recipient of brain buds of traits that are deliberately not to be conserved, making them ineligible for consideration. In such cases, the eldest daughter or daughters assume control of the company, overseen by their mother, and the Corporation becomes (briefly) a matriarchy.

Corporate matriarchies are feared throughout the Imperium. Their heads know that they are only in charge until their eldest male child becomes mature enough to take over, and they are furthermore being forced to carry out a job that they never wanted to perform. They can make only limited brain grafts to their children, who will automatically be disadvantaged as a result; the only hope they have for protecting those children from the depredations of other Houses is to force other Corporate executives to donate brain buds to their Heir.

In the meantime, they are automatically expected to be less capable, and to hand on a seriously diminished House; this gives them free reign to implement social change as they see fit with a total ruthlessness and lack of attention to profitability. They are responsible for a lot of the long-term reform and improvement within the Imperium, the radical progressives that counter the inherent conservatism of the brain-graft process.

And, because they are not expected to know the “unwritten rules”, they can sometimes use sheer ruthlessness and disregard of ‘established wisdom’ to create profit where none could be perceived.

When they reach adulthood, assuming that they have not been called upon to substitute for a defective male Heir, they not only get the same start in life as a younger son, they also get twice as much held in escrow as a dowry.

New Houses

Because new Houses are automatically the rulers of a new Corporation, which will only survive if other Houses invest in it, it must also be appreciated that it takes both a Male and a Female to found a House – and the female is usually the source of the ideas and inspiration that give the new corporation a ‘product’ or ‘service’ to sell.

Nine-tenths of New Houses fall in their first 5 years, and Ninety-nine in one hundred within two generations. To succeed, they have to offer something new, or better than anyone else, have to turn that into a profit, have to invest that profit wisely, and have to diversify enough to withstand any reverses of fortune – which jealous rivals will be actively trying to engineer.

A smart daughter is therefore at the heart of a new House, by definition. This immediately gives their birth House the first opportunity to invest in the new House, and to ally with it, benefiting both.

Political and Arranged Marriages

Anyone who claims these don’t happen is deluding themselves, but as a general rule they never work in the Imperium – and are strictly illegal, to boot. Daughters have the same rights and responsibilities as any other sentient, and coercion in choice of partner is an open-and-shut case. A great House can be felled by such a daughter simply going to the media and lodging a public complaint – if there’s evidence to back up the claim, of course.

The only safe option is to throw a male from the House you want to ally with into the company of a compatible daughter, repeatedly, and hope that something clicks.

Machine Rights

To be adjudged a sentient citizen with full rights, a machine intellect has to (1) prove that it is capable of learning and integrating new information into its world-view, and (2) prove that it has independence of thought. It’s not enough to pass some sort of Turing Test; it has to demonstrate a capacity for humanoid-type intellectual growth.

There is a Society For The Advancement Of Machine Rights operated by the Delphus-Vienna Family through the Yttrium Corporation who zealously police the ranks of those afforded Machine Rights; it is their philosophy that any false case harms the acceptance of Machine Rights in general, while any refusal to accept and acknowledge a genuine representative of the Machine Kind is an indictment of the entire Imperium.

Should some corporation own the hardware in which a Machine Person resides, the legal model is based on what happens with alien species – the corporate owners of that hardware have to immediately hand possession and title over to the Machine Person, but that Machine Person then owes the corporation the value of the hardware of of any services they were expected to provide. This has to be repaid before the Machine Person is truly free.

Agreements for upgrades on similar terms may be made; that’s a matter of negotiation. Some corporations are quite open about their support for Machine People in their service; others are sensitive to an independent Machine Person having access to their corporate secrets, and make it (relatively) quick and easy for the Machine Person to buy their full liberty.

Religion

The Imperium has a religion of sorts that dates back to the founding of NewHome, but many of its precepts are a patchwork of confused half-guesses. There’s something about an Omniscient Cosmos that would sound a lot like the principle of Karma, and a destiny that is to be shared by all sentients when they join with that Cosmic Omniscience.

Recent History

The two empires came into contact for the first time about 50 years ago. Both reacted cautiously. Diplomatic envoys. Gifts. Pretty speeches. Dancing Ghirurhs (8′ tall marsupials with three 10 inch claws on each hand).

Slowly, though, it became clear that there were irreconcilable philosophical differences between the two.

As things stand, neither the House (Jade-London) in direct contact with the Idorians nor the Empire have enough power to decisively overcome the other. The Empire is considerably stronger than House Jade-London on its own, but it almost certainly would not fight alone; there are any number of alliances that might be called on, and if the full might of the Imperium gets involved, the Empire is toast.

The result has been a lukewarm cold war in which both sides are attempting to boost their production enough to prevent the other from changing the status quo, accompanied by a number of limited (and deniable) skirmishes. If any of these take place at a flash-point, though, the war could heat up very quickly.

Acting as an anodyne to these petty grievances has been the Church Of The Omniscient Mind.

Church Of The Omniscient Mind aka The Order Of Tharsh

This is the principle religious body of the Imperium but no-one really knows what the faith is all about. Members of the Church are secretive and authoritarian, and are frequently recruited from the younger sons of the Great Houses.

Factions and Splinters

The Church has splintered into differing groups a number of times, leading to incessant interfaith conferences aimed at reconciling the differing beliefs. Ultimately, the Praetor can only publicly back one (and needs to have one to lead the official services within the Imperium, so he can’t stay neutral), which means that the incarnation that most closely publicly matches his personal beliefs is the one that will generally emerge on top.

Monks

Monks are the individuals with whom the general public has the greatest contact. These are frequently hooded, need not be human, and assume absolute authority over births, deaths, and associated rites. Almost every social function – marriage, maturation, etc – has a religious component performed by a monk.

Alien Faiths

One known tenet of the Church is that all true faiths contain at least a piece of the Truth, and none hold it all, for they are all the creations of flawed sentients. Even if such were personally guided by the Cosmic Omniscience, which several claim, the imperfection of the sentients perception of that guidance mars the work.

This doctrine has permitted the Church to assimilate the faiths of several of the alien species who have joined the Imperium.

When the Idorians and Imperium came into contact, it was determined that the Idorians had a more polytheistic nature, broken into multiple cults and sub-faiths. It was a natural reaction for the Church to host multiple interfaith exchanges between themselves and these cults, but it still surprised everyone when they announced that they had examined the precepts of the Yendai cult and found them to be fundamentally compatible with the Faith.

The inclusion of alien belief patterns is one reason why the faith is not really understood outside the Church itself. To which they would reply, “Understanding is not required; much is merely symbolic, anyway. Faith and Respect for those who believe is sufficient.”

Abbots

Monks can eventually be promoted either to Abbots or to Novitiates.

Abbots are still monks, but they get trained in bureaucracy, administration, and command, and in turn, train other Monks. They set policy locally and represent the Order Of Tharsh to the rest of the Galactic Arm. This path suits those of a practical or pious bent. Monks and Abbots swear oaths to remain celibate so that family connections have minimal influence over the church (it should ideally be none, but that’s recognized as impractical).

Novitiates

Novitiates are the lowest-ranking members of the Priesthood proper. As they advance in rank within the Faith, Priests are required to interface with the public. Senior Priests also set Church policy and doctrine. This path suits those of a more social or political personality. Priests are permitted to marry..

Higher Ranks

Clerics*, Bishops, Archbishops, Pious – these are the publicly known ranks of the Priesthood. What their responsibilities and powers are is not known publicly.

It is known that no-one not of Bishop rank can be assigned as spiritual advisor to the Praetor. But this role is usually confined to helping the Praetor make up his mind without influencing the substance of the decision. Whether or not this is another of those ‘hypothetical ideals’ is not known, but is generally assumed.

Other Precepts

Despite the monks best efforts to keep their philosophy internalized, a few specifics have leaked out. Some of these will be familiar to students of theology in our world, though often recast in slightly strange phrasings:

• Judge others not, for ye will be judged.
• Wealth placed in the service of Justice will reap Justice until it is corrupted.
• Wealth placed in the service of Honor starts wars.
• Peaceful prosperity is worth almost any secular price.
• What is sewn will be reaped. Often with interest.
• Corporate Irresponsibility is the only thing worse than Corporate Responsibility.
• All beings are motivated by Spirit. Some of them even know it.
• The sharper the blade, the deeper the casual cut. The same is true of tongues.
• A secret revealed is free for others to misuse.
• Truth in all things is preferred except when it is better to lie. There is no middle ground.

In general, most of the socially progressive beliefs and business practices of the Imperium have been incorporated into the faith-structure of the Church. The primary exception at this time centers around Machine People, which they are still considering.

The Church and its agents never refer to “souls”. They will refer to Spirit, which they consider the motivating force that drives all sentients, and to “taint” which perverts that force into destructive acts either against the self or others.

Politics and The Church

The Church attempts to steer as clear of all political narratives as possible; they dislike being forced to take sides, especially since there is no certainty that two Priests will reach the same conclusion and offer the same advice / interpretation.

They are, however, NOT meek and subservient. They are polite, and friendly, and pious, and as arrogant as hell. THEY know the operating system of the Multiverse and no-one else does, and they like it that way. They can go from diffident to forceful at the drop of a cassock; they are accustomed to ‘persuading’ arrogant House Patriarchs into abiding by their instructions. They only succeed in this because, most of the time, they don’t stick their noses in where they aren’t wanted.

The Hoods

The hoods worn by the monks tend to be a neutral middle gray (about 35% black for those familiar with that mode of description). They include wired shells underneath to distort the perceived shape of the habit so that the species of the wearer cannot be readily discerned. There are some things that are beyond this capacity, but they are always developing new tricks to this end – including holographic tentacles in place of hands.

Two-and-a-half creations

So there you have it. I guess it’s time to talk a little bit about the backstory. As discussed earlier, these are all inspired by someone else’s work, which I happily acknowledge. I read the part of the supplement that contains the adventure Cargo Macabre a month and a week before play, and a week later made some rough notes about how to dovetail the adventure with the ongoing quest within the campaign – enough that I would have been comfortable winging it the next day.

Specifically, i needed to involve some gentlemen of noble rank – the primary PCs daughters need husbands and their mother insists on this (and many other) preconditions. The PC has his own ideas, and there’s rarely room for both.

Which meant that I needed trouble sufficient to bring some representatives of the ruling house to the site of the trouble – and that demanded information about the culture. The basis of everything that you’ve read here was written in a single evening session the night before we actually started play – and the players are currently about half-way through the resulting adventure, which bears only minimal resemblance to the original.

What you have read here today takes those rough notes and the additional cultural details that appeared in the campaign and expands on them (including taking into account a few observations of the players during play). That expansion also consisted of a single evening session of writing.