Coup D'etat II: Tides of Time Primer

The Worlds at Large

The second Coup D'etat campaign takes place during the 31st year of the 81st reign of 55th era, aka 55.81.31

You guys remember this, right?

Let's start with a review of the universe as it was in a period of time we could conspicuously call "before you found it."


112 Years Ago (55.80.19)

The Massert No Sve (10-12 o'clock, outer ring) consists of millions of systems. Every group here has millions of systems, so I'll dispense with mentioning that in the future. A ruling class made up of old families from a collection of species, called The Regulators, runs the government and most of the military. In an effort to tone down internal strife, The Regulators have created a hybrid race known as the Massert No Sve to serve as a future ruling class with a unified identity. The Massert No Sve are well-known for their technological advancement and intelligence apparatus and it's widely suspected they fuel the conflict between the Pris and KAMATAS for their own gain.

The Pris (6-10 o'clock, inner ring) are a typical militaristic lizard race. They have massive warships, oppress other races within their borders, and generally fail to observe Peter's Evil Overlord List. They are physically strong, and strangely observe a military democracy to select leaders.

The KAMATAS (12 to 4 o'clock, inner ring) are led by the Sszera, another lizard race. To outsiders, the Pris and Sszera are very similar, but pheremone differences make personal contact between the two sides a rancorous affair. The Sszera tend to be weaker, but more clever than the Pris and they also have the diversity of the remainder of their people to draw on. KAMATAS is the series of initials of the alliance's ruling races, the Sszera having added the final "S" to the name after they supplanted the Athraphi in the 78th Reign. KAMATAS ships are usually modular, hexagonal designs; they're commercially popular and used across the galaxy for shipping and other tasks.

The Slemmgraise (1 to 4 o'clock, outer ring) are an economic entity with strong political and martial power over their region of the galaxy. They are also a race gifted with an ability to teleport across the vastness of space. Few in numbers, they universally travel in groups, as their genetic code is the secret to their efficient, autonomous teleportation. Many enemies would moves suns and moons to get a copy of it. The Slemmgraise were responsible for the destruction of the PROTECT, a race of artificial intelligences who administered the galaxy five reigns ago.

The Infusers Alliance (6 to 9 o'clock, outer ring) is run by another small, insular race, The Infusers. The role of The Infusers in the IA is often inflated by others. The Infusers are generally concerned with science and leave much of the administration (and real power) to their aides, the Mandarins, made up of members of local races.  Half of the reason The Infusers remain in power is that they are preoccupied with socially-beneficial research. The other half is that they equate their power with their existential safety and apply the full weight of their scientific knowledge to answering existential threats (see Kharadel). The Infusers Alliance is generally well-regarded amongst their neighbors, even boasting an amicable split from the Massert No Sve several decades ago.

The Free Alliance (5 o'clock, outer ring) is made of rebels who won their rebellion and are now learning to govern. Militarily and politically weak, there are still large areas of unruled systems both inside and outside of their boundaries that cause them problems. The Free Alliance is the wild west of the modern era, though it's undoubtedly on the freer and more pleasant places to live in the galaxy. The Monolith homeworld, Monoliths' Favorite Planet, is located in The Free Alliance.

The Arthroai are insect soldiers that exist throughout the galaxy. They often adjudicate large conflicts on planets, respond to global emergencies, and prevent atrocities during invasions. The Arthroai are a collective intelligence and build large hive structures on many of the worlds they serve.

Campaign 1 Epilogue: The Devil's Workday

As you return to Massert No Sve space from your fateful encounter with The God of the Silver Leaves, your first stop is DeForest Station.

The Celestial Wind docks without incident, as the station's automated docking procedure works perfectly. There's no sign of The Voice of the Deep though. When the personnel disembark, there's no sign that The Voice of The Deep has uploaded itself into the station's memory core, as it did at the other ancient bases you've uncovered. The station's brightness and clean, mechanical humming create a cheerful contrast to its eerie stillness.

The five of you—The Infiltrator, Major Luke Princeton, Captain Casto Molla, Razka Bazel, and Kandow Orryx—explore the station in two groups. The Major suggests the creation of another time vault, which Kandow shoots down immediately; the aged scientist has no desire to once again summon The God of the Silver Leaves.

Eventually, Razka and Casto find the torso of an android. The central cognitive core is depowered; the continuous processes which support sapience silenced forever. The body is tethered by wiring to a closed blast door several feet past it, leading to the station's control room. As they approach, Cass finds the android's power battery buried in the wires, torn free of the wires as the torso clawed its way from whatever is on the other side of the doors.

Cass thinks she again hears the distant sound of a massive, metallic whale from her home planet, breathing its last, grating breath. She knows what the sound really is.

They stop, ready themselves for combat, and call in their compatriots. On the signal, they open the blast doors and expose the heart of DeForest Station. There, they find nothing but blinking lights and data feeds from across the galaxy. The only unusual addition to the room is a massive, black monolith.

It's missing a corner, and the lights of the room reflect off of it with a silver gleam, revealing a cut across its center. It bows in submission as they enter and remains still as the Disciples of the Voice of The Deep begin piecing together what happened.

Internal cameras reveal that The Voice of The Deep uploaded itself to an android body. No sooner had it succeeded in that than the strange, but distinct ship of The God of the Silver Leaves appeared. The Predator himself emerged, and an unrecorded exchange happened between him and The Voice of the Deep. In an apparent panic, The Voice fled the room, only to be caught by the blast doors as it attempted to destroy The Predator. It continued crawling until its circuitry, still caught by the door, ripped its power source loose. In a mechanical panic, the last of the PROTECT destroyed itself to escape The Oncoming Storm, finishing a job the Slemmgraise began five Reigns ago.

The Predator says another four words, then calls out to his ship, from which the damaged monolith emerges. The monolith itself describes the conversation; The God of the Silver Leaves was angry—furious—that it and its fellow monoliths had killed so many in his name. He had sentenced the scarred, silver monolith to serve the Disciples of the Voice of the Deep until such time that they released it from their service. It was to learn humility, compassion, and respect for its foes for the rest of its existence, a small down payment on the lives it had destroyed so far. The monolith offers to serve and obey you all.

Bonus map with points of interest for specific locations mentioned.

Float On

The galaxy changed as a result of your actions during the first Coup D'etat game.

• You gave the Massert No Sve a copy of the Slemmgraise genetic code. This allowed them to disable the Slemmgraise teleportation ability and turn a cold war hot.

• You convinced the Arthroai to disable their fail safes to save the worlds they protect. This resulted in Arthroai being "evicted" from many worlds by militaries who resented their status as self-styled protectors. This preserved the reputation of the Arthroai amongst the common folk of the galaxy.

• You destroyed the Pris fleet hunting rebels in The Kastulas System of the Free Alliance. This gave the rebels a free hand and a secret base to work from. It also precipitated the collapse of the Pris Alliance.

Not everything was your fault. Some things happened in the due course of the galaxy's natural changes or as a result of the actions of The God of the Silver Leaves and his followers:

• During the campaign, precognitives across the galaxy were murdered by Monolith adherents of The Silver Leaves.
• After the campaign, the Massert No Sve took DeForest Station, a base than can collect information from across the galaxy.
• Trees with silver leaves began sprouting up on worlds across the galaxy. The leaves were inscribed with knowledge; science and technology as well as a number of uncomfortable political truths. Very little peace and stability came from that. The Massert No Sve and Pris started experiencing riots because of the revelations of the trees. This happened during the campaign. It was mostly Pron Gartor's fault.
• The Slemmgraise have increased their genetic diversity to protect the uniqueness of the teleportation abilities. This happens after the campaign, during the war between the Slemmgraise and the Massert No Sve.
• KATAMA-Sci, the scientific order of KAMATAS which predates the Sszera, has begun a full on secret war with the Infusers Alliance. This was precipitated by the destruction of the time vault at Fal D'Bow Base.
• The prevalence of both the Word of the Silver Leaves and The Testament of the Lonely God has increased across the galaxy. While no single group of believers has emerged as the soul voice of the movement, it's believed that it's only a matter of time before that happens. This begins before the campaign and continues until long after it.
• Perhaps most notably, ever since your encounter with The God of the Silver Leaves on Fal D'Bow Station, there have been whispers that the limitations on the processing power of artificial intelligences no longer apply. Where AI's were once limited to levels in intelligence with rough parity to those of sapient biological species by an unknown physical law, they are now unbound.

One Chance
I'm putting the bulk of this in an email, but I want to have another jam session either after the final Pathfinder game or on the weekend following that. Just some things I'd like you  all to be thinking about for that:

• Things that you didn't like during the last CDT game. You don't have to wait for the jam session to get with me on that; feel free to email me any time. I know some folks don't want to feel like they're nitpicking or coming down on folks in front of a group.
• Things you did like. Because...ego.
• Things you did like because I'd sincerely like to do more of those things.
• Who you want your character to be. You can play your old characters. After all, there aren't any humans in this setting so the average life span of sapient species is something like the square root of whatever you want it to be with a multiplier for gratuitous vampirism. Only one real restriction on that:

• Things you want to happen to your character, both in their history and in their future.
• Races you want to add or want to see more of. No humans, although the galaxy knows humans exist, there aren't any hanging around.
• Technology you want to see.
• Shit that went down in the past 112 years. The Predator was pretty clear on the everything you know blowing to dust thing, so the galaxy is generally worse off than it was when you left. Remember that it takes a few years to travel between galaxies, but it does happen.
• The conflicts you would like to see. The last Coup D'etat campaign featured moral decisions, social interactions, and tactical planning instead of a lot of stand up fights or real puzzles. Do you want more of that, less of it, or maybe the same amount but delivered a bit different (I know some of the nuances ended up being a bit too subtle).
• Most importantly; the mood you want for this game. Terry's Werewolf campaign was about pups learning the ins and outs of political maneuvering, Josh's Pathfinder game was about experienced adventures averting a mysterious global peril. What kind of game would have you anticipating playing it from Monday morning? The current Coup D'etat setting wasn't super-bright and this one has a lot of potential to get dark. I mean, Batman to the power of receiving the life experiences of a civilization of billions before their collective experiences, culture, and future are snuffed out in front of you dark. It doesn't have to be that way though; it absolutely doesn't. I mean, I'd like to do something akin to finding hope in the darkest of times and/or the heroism of continuing to struggle in the face of oblivion, but none of those are real locks. I mean that second one is, but it doesn't have to inevitably happen now.