Re: Background story

[Dave Fancella <david.fancella@comcast.net>]

On Wednesday 11 February 2004 08:22 pm, Jens Granseuer wrote:
> On 11.02.2004 10:59, Dave Fancella wrote:
> > On Wednesday 11 February 2004 05:44 pm, Jens Granseuer wrote:
> > > > In the year of 2162, Jens Rasmussen piloted a test craft
> > > > [...]
> > > > In the year 2473, the Island of Tyarin invaded it's nearest neighbor,
> > > > Kerlo. [...]
> > > > Now finally united, the people of Nexus built a new capital city, the
> > > > city of Allantha.  Looking forward to another period of prosperity,
> > > > they once again began looking to the skies, wondering if there were
> > > > any surviving humans left in the galaxy.
> > > >
> > > > In the year of 2483, the Kandelians arrived.
> > >
> > > I believe the numbers need some sorting out. We need to fix either the
> > > mission description in Uprising or rework the timeline a bit.
> > > Uprising says the Kandelians arrive in 2483 F.A., ie. 2483 years after
> > > the foundation of Allantha, which apparently is a completely different
> > > calendar. Right now it seems like adapting Uprising is easier, but I'd
> > > still like to keep a different calendar for Nexus. It really shows how
> > > disconnected they have been, doesn't it?
> >
> > No problem, really.  Since Nexus got split off from the main branch of
> > man, I can just move the founding of Allantha to that year and edit what
> > is now the foundation of Allantha to be a rebuilding of that great city. 
> > Has more romanticism in it that way, I think.  :)
>
> Does that make sense? If Allantha was founded 2487 years ago, and New
> Allantha is rebuilt now this means that Allantha must have been a city
> on Earth, right? Then, if you built New York (i.e. rebuilt York), and
> are separated from Britain by both space and time for quite a few
> generations (not to mention that the sun sets in the middle of the night),
> would you base your time-keeping on that in York?

Hm, maybe I wasn't that clear.  I'm saying leave the number the same, 2487 FA.  
Add something to the story that says "When Nexus lost contact with the 
humans, they established their independence and built the city of Allantha".  
Some history rewriting here to allow for a period of peace and rebuilding 
before the factions take over, and they start numbering their years from the 
founding of Allantha, which coincides with their declaration of independence.  
Then after the factions take over, Allantha gets sacked a few times and 
finally fades.  Then, when the new freedom fighters emerge and end the 
Tyarinian War they rebuild Allantha, hoping to bring about the same peace and 
prosperity with which the legends of Allantha are now seeped.  Then Nexus is 
separated from mankind for about 2,500 Nexus years before the Kandelians 
come.

So that would actually put the arrival of the Kandelians (assuming a 365 day 
year on Nexus, an assumption we don't have to make) around 5000 AD.  If we 
make the Nexian year shorter (and having it in a binary system is starting to 
make less and less sense), like say 400 days, then we can make the gap a 
little more reasonable.

Anyway, that's what I was trying to say.  :)  

There are a few other considerations.  I'm wanting the humans to have survived 
after a dreadfully destructive war in which the PRA finally gets overthrown 
and the controversial Nexus documents are found.  This is a war that should 
last centuries, and we might be able to reasonably stretch it to a millenia 
when you consider the distances involved, but that would be quite a stretch.  
The idea is that in a campaign that's really late in the civil war against 
the Kandelians on Nexus the humans show up.  The cavalry, so to speak.  
Except they're not interested in a free nexus either, but they are interested 
in throwing out the Kandelians.

Anyway, there's also the question of development.  SInce Nexus only had to 
revert back to steam and was able to keep a lot of documentation that helped 
them advance post-nuclear quickly, what level of development should we expect 
them to have after 2500 years?  It might be quite a stretch there just to try 
to retain the original dating used in the game.

So, the idea is that the Nexians do a lot of damage and are very close to 
winning the war on their own.  It could be said that the Nexians have won, 
the Kandelians just haven't figured it out yet.  Then some starships from the 
rest of the human race show up and the Kandelians bail completely.  For some 
reason or other, yet to explain, the humans are now at war with Kand 
formally, and discovery of Nexus provides a planet that has the resources to 
reverse the tide of the war completely.  But Nexus wants to be free.  That 
could make for an interesting situation.  :)

> The 2487 of Allantha simply clashes with the other numbers which are Earth
> years. The simplest solution I can see is to move the arrival of the
> Kandelians to something like 26 F.A., though that's a really small number.
> If you consider that, some 80 years or so of peace isn't all that much, so
> maybe the arrival of the Kandelians should be pushed back a bit, let's say
> to sometime around 2700 or 2800 in Earth terms. Then we could set the year
> to something like 267 F.A. and in that case we should probably also change
> the year of the Third Emperor to maybe 919 or so.

A couple of things I think we should settle.  How long is a Nexian day and a 
Nexian year.  I'd like to see at least half a millenia (earth years) between 
loss of contact with the larger portion of the human race and the Kandelian 
invasion.  Time for the factions on Nexus to really sink into the culture, 
time for plenty of peace and prosperity dotted with periodic wars, and time 
for them to rebuild their tech base to a level that would be competitive with 
the Kandelian army.  And enough time for the fabled city of Allantha to be 
built, become a huge technological and economic power on its own, get sacked 
a few times, become a legend, and ultimately fade to mythical proportions.  
That way, the discovery of the site of Allantha and the subsequent rush to 
rebuild it become very symbolic of Nexian independence and unity when the 
Nexians unite in order to end the Tyarinian War.  Also leaving time for the 
rest of the human race to beat itself to near oblivion and recover, so that 
they can show up towards the end of the Nexian battle for freedom from Kand 
and throw a monkey wrench into the whole thing.

Keep in mind that I totally missed the references to Allantha when I made this 
draft.  :)

I'm also intending to stick a war on Kand's other side, the side unknown to 
humans, or a really nasty civil war, or just a very factionalized society, 
something that prevents them from being able to go to war with the humans, 
leaving the EU on its own against the PRA when the war does break out.  
Basically the reason Nexus loses contact with the PRA in the first place is 
because the EU starts blowing up planets and the PRA retaliate in kind, sort 
of an interstellar version of global nuclear war, where the EU and PRA are 
both knocked back to a slower than light tech base.

Dave

> Jens

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